Organizers have unionized 5,000 contract workers at Apple, Facebook, Yahoo • Hacker News Board

Re: Organizers have unionized 5,000 contract workers at Apple, Facebook, Yahoo

#331

Post by minhaz23 » Fri, Sep 15, 2017, 12:57 AM UTC

tptacek wrote: post #114

mseebach wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My fear for a tech union is whether it will deny someone like me the kind of opportunity I was very fortunate to enjoy roughly 10-20 years ago. At lot of us here got our starts under scrappy circumstances and with lots of hustling. I am very cautious not to support any move that will amount to pulling up the ladder behind me. You mentioned AMA in another comment; will our tech union require eight years of university…

I have effectively no college, and went to work right after high school. Whatever labor organization tech workers come up with doesn't have to be the AFL-CIO and it doesn't have to be the AMA. It can just take the best attributes from all those organizations. Or it can start more modestly! Maybe tech workers will just come up with two or three things --- say, late exercise on options and better IP clauses --- and jus…

Hey irrelevant but can I ask how did you enter the tech industry without college? If self taught can I ask how did you teach yourself and what (why), and with what resources?

Re: Organizers have unionized 5,000 contract workers at Apple, Facebook, Yahoo

#332

Post by Spooky23 » Fri, Sep 15, 2017, 12:58 AM UTC

briandear wrote: post #305

forapurpose wrote: post #264

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The reality is these are contractors who will get dropped as soon as it makes sense. Thats why you hire these services as contractors. I think the real test here will be how long till the union pushes facebook too far and they are just dropped. That overlooks the whole point of unions, which is to give people power over their work lives and prevent situations like the one you describe. Perhaps the union won't succe…

The problem with union negotiations is that members’ ability to earn isn’t related to the merits of the member’s ability. I don’t want to make the same exact wage as someone with the same seniority but perhaps less ambition. I am not an interchangeable widget. Everyone is not equal in value despite being equal in seniority or experience. A first year teacher might be amazing, but thanks to unions her wage is codified…

That's the argument of a boss in version of the prisoners dilemma.

The reality is that you are a widget, you probably make less several people whom you consider a less able and "ambitious" than you, and your salary is only loosely associated with your value, if at all.

Re: Organizers have unionized 5,000 contract workers at Apple, Facebook, Yahoo

#333

Post by CryptoPunk » Fri, Sep 15, 2017, 1:08 AM UTC

Spooky23 wrote: post #332

briandear wrote: post #305

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem with union negotiations is that members’ ability to earn isn’t related to the merits of the member’s ability. I don’t want to make the same exact wage as someone with the same seniority but perhaps less ambition. I am not an interchangeable widget. Everyone is not equal in value despite being equal in seniority or experience. A first year teacher might be amazing, but thanks to unions her wage is codified…

That's the argument of a boss in version of the prisoners dilemma. The reality is that you are a widget, you probably make less several people whom you consider a less able and "ambitious" than you, and your salary is only loosely associated with your value, if at all.

That's the class warfare paradigm that boils the world down to two monolithic blocs: employers and employees.

He is not a widget. A workforce is made up people with diverse and varying skills.

It's in the interest of society to incentivise individual skills development and promotion of people with more skill into positions of greater authority and responsibility, by allowing employers to base compensation and promotion offers on skills.

Re: Organizers have unionized 5,000 contract workers at Apple, Facebook, Yahoo

#334

Post by ryandrake » Fri, Sep 15, 2017, 1:11 AM UTC

morgante wrote: post #330

ryandrake wrote: post #326

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My guess is that what you describe as the "prime" developer market represents 1% of the tech labor force, surely no more than 10%. Much smaller than you think it is. There are plenty of talented people, even in these "top" tech companies, who do not have 6-7 offers thrown at them regularly and have to slug it out with the rest of us in a brutal labor market. I think what is being argued here is whether collective act…

It's certainly more than 1%. Top tech companies alone employ more than 1% of developers. > There are plenty of talented people, even in these "top" tech companies, who do not have 6-7 offers thrown at them That doesn't match my experience at all. Every Google/Facebook/Amazon employee I know constantly has interview requests and people trying to recruit them.

> It's certainly more than 1%. Top tech companies alone employ more than 1% of developers.

That would be true only if you assumed around a huge number of top tech company hires were those prime developers. I've worked at all kinds of companies, including one you would undoubtedly consider "top." They all employ the full distribution. The mean will be higher in the top companies, but that's it.

> That doesn't match my experience at all. Every Google/Facebook/Amazon employee I know constantly has interview requests and people trying to recruit them.

Obviously it doesn't match your personal experience--we've already established that you're one of those "prime" developers. Likely your co-worker/acquaintance bubble is full of them too. Our perception of normal is often clouded by what we encounter every day. You see this all the time here on HN, where commenters tend to be smarter than the average bear. In that respect, I am open to applying that same reasoning to myself: I see talented people underemployed, struggling to get recognized, and at the mercy of their employer; and therefore I am potentially extrapolating this as normal. I think the numbers bear me out, but I admit I have not done more than casual Internet-research.

Re: Organizers have unionized 5,000 contract workers at Apple, Facebook, Yahoo

#335

Post by pavement » Fri, Sep 15, 2017, 1:14 AM UTC

xyzzy_plugh wrote: post #232

eutropia wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't believe this. Do you have proof?

I was present when a facilities manager explained why we shouldn't use spray-cleaner to clean whiteboards, because it wore down the paint faster, and repainting it cost $10k, and that they had already paid to repaint them twice.

...and then the facilities manager threw up their hands, sighed, said "yeah, but what can you do..." flipped through a couple of emails on the old smart phone, then went and sat down and watched some crap on youtube for a few more hours, until oh... 4:35 PM, close enough, and clocked out for the day, with the wall still unpainted. C'est la vie.

Re: Organizers have unionized 5,000 contract workers at Apple, Facebook, Yahoo

#336

Post by ericd » Fri, Sep 15, 2017, 1:23 AM UTC

wfo wrote: post #168

kevmo wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I largely agree. However, I think it is important for regulations to generally (not always) be structured on a sliding scale that is directly related to company size, i.e. the bigger the business, the more regulations it becomes subject to. Otherwise, regulations become a cudgel with which small businesses are beaten down because only the big established players can afford to comply. In today's age of regulatory capt…

Actually small businesses (while they vary widely and many of them can be good) can be home to the worst kind of abuse. Small business owners can be absolutely monstrous tyrants to their employees. Have you ever met a waitress at a restaurant who hasn't been sexually harassed by her boss? I've met.. one? and I've met quite a few waitresses. She can't complain to HR, there is no HR, there are no policies, there is jus…

With small companies, it's much easier to hop to another small company than it is if you work at the only car plant in town.

And I'm sure there are restaurant owners out there who aren't complete assholes.

Re: Organizers have unionized 5,000 contract workers at Apple, Facebook, Yahoo

#337

Post by morgante » Fri, Sep 15, 2017, 1:30 AM UTC

ryandrake wrote: post #334

morgante wrote: post #330

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's certainly more than 1%. Top tech companies alone employ more than 1% of developers. > There are plenty of talented people, even in these "top" tech companies, who do not have 6-7 offers thrown at them That doesn't match my experience at all. Every Google/Facebook/Amazon employee I know constantly has interview requests and people trying to recruit them.

> It's certainly more than 1%. Top tech companies alone employ more than 1% of developers. That would be true only if you assumed around a huge number of top tech company hires were those prime developers. I've worked at all kinds of companies, including one you would undoubtedly consider "top." They all employ the full distribution. The mean will be higher in the top companies, but that's it. > That doesn't match my…

> That would be true only if you assumed around a huge number of top tech company hires were those prime developers.

I do assume that. Yes, there is a distribution of abilities at top tech companies—but virtually everyone I've worked with at a good company could easily get other offers.

If you actually worked at a top tech company, your bubble should be similar to mine—I have a hard time imaging that many of your FANG colleagues are having trouble getting good employment offers.

Re: Organizers have unionized 5,000 contract workers at Apple, Facebook, Yahoo

#338

Post by wfo » Fri, Sep 15, 2017, 1:31 AM UTC

chimeracoder wrote: post #144

mseebach wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So that's a nice optimistic vision, and if I had any faith we could keep it to that, I'd be for it. My vision includes scope creep and lots of greedy ambitious good-at-politics less-good-at-actually-doing-work types grabbing the show once it's successful. Most organisations meaningfully described as unions has a non-trivial element of excluding people from the trade in one way or another. I will never be a part of an…

> Most organisations meaningfully described as unions has a non-trivial element of excluding people from the trade in one way or another. I will never be a part of any organisation that will prevent any person from (trying to) make a living as a programmer in whatever way. The problem is that, once an industry unionizes, you don't really have a choice. The process of decertification is basically a catch-22: unions ar…

Well yes, a union is organized democratically so you can vote on what you support if you're part of one. The problems you identify are central to all of democracy: what if you lose the vote? Then positions you don't support will be supported! Decisions made by the majority don't obey the will of the minority! So your solution is to eliminate the vote altogether and give away any voice you have, since you might not get everything you want -- not have unions at all; to reject any democracy altogether, and instead let a tiny few wealthy oligarchs make all the decisions. The alternative is your work goes to support whatever the executives of the company want, which is usually explicitly the opposite of what is good for you since your salary and everything that is good for you costs the company money. The profits from your labor will go to efforts to automate your job out of existence, they will go to efforts to lobby to take away all of your rights and protections, benefits and bonuses. This is currently exactly what happens in every non-unionized workplace.

Re: Organizers have unionized 5,000 contract workers at Apple, Facebook, Yahoo

#339

Post by jhall1468 » Fri, Sep 15, 2017, 1:32 AM UTC

Density wrote: post #320

noobermin wrote: post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You might have missed this discussion from a few days ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15116861

That discussion is extremely weird. Posters are claiming that since Speech recognition took decades so must self driving cars. Speech recognition decades ago has nothing to do with speech recognition today. I understand the skepticism but I hope HN posters can make stronger arguments in the future.

I agree. Transformative technology has this effect on people. The other day I was arguing with someone that said we need true Artificial General Intellegence before full autonomy is available.

I'm fine with skepticism, but these types of unfounded claims drive me crazy. If you want to argue the companies aren't really moving the tech as fast as they claim, post actual evidence, not some nonsense about speech recognition in the 90s.

Re: Organizers have unionized 5,000 contract workers at Apple, Facebook, Yahoo

#340

Post by Clubber » Fri, Sep 15, 2017, 1:34 AM UTC

morgante wrote: post #254

Clubber wrote: post #244

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Considering there is already a shortage of software engineers, constricting it further is unlikely to be net positive. Since there is a short supply of software engineers, why do you think wages haven't risen? >every "open salary" calculator I've seen proposes a salary about half of what I make. Formulaic salaries help low performers and hurt high performers. I suspect that's because businesses manipulate that so th…

> Since there is a short supply of software engineers, why do you think wages haven't risen? They definitely have, at least for the high end of the market. For example, Hired shows a 3.28% increase in salaries for SF engineers this year. [0] > I suspect that's because businesses manipulate that so they can hire offshore workers cheaper. I'm positive that open salary initiatives are not an attempt to hire H1B workers.…

>They definitely have, at least for the high end of the market. For example, Hired shows a 3.28% increase in salaries for SF engineers this year. [0]

So if you really look at those numbers, you left out a bunch of them that don't back up your assertion that salaries are skyrocketing like they should in an ultra-high demand field:

  SF Bay Area | 3.28%
  Seattle | 2.14%
  Austin | 0.96%
  Chicago | 0.57%
  New York | 0.25%
  Boston | 0.24%
  LA | -0.13%
  London | -1.7%
  Denver | -2.63%
  Washington D.C | -2.85%
  San Diego | -4.92%
  Toronto | -6.29%

1. Half of the areas in your link are decreasing average salary before inflation.

2. Anything under the 2% inflation target is considered a decrease in income.

3. After subtracting 2% for inflation, add the cost of living increase in SF which was 78% between 2000 and 2015, and you are probably decreasing wages.

4. A union negotiator would know that. The hiring managers sure do (or at least the CFOs).

So let me ask the question a third time. If demand for tech workers is so high, why are wages flat? Do you think Apple/MS/Amazon/Google's EBITDA was that flat as well?

http://www.bayareaeconomy.org/the-cost-of-living-continues-t...