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Google Urged the U.S. to Limit Protection for Activist Workers

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Re: Google Urged the U.S. to Limit Protection for Activist Workers

#111

Post by mcv »

village-idiot wrote: post #103
typon wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Programmers, maybe ones on HN especially, are super conservative and anti-labour for some reason. I don't know the history of Silicon Valley enough to figure out exactly why

Because a lot of programmers on HN are at the upper edge of their field’s income distribution for a variety of reasons, location definitely being one of them. When a field unionized, the people near the top typically stand to lose the most, even if everyone as a whole are more enriched. I would bet money that the most elite members of car manufacturing were also not particularly enthused about unionization, although…

  > When a field unionized, the people near the top typically stand to lose the most,
  > even if everyone as a whole are more enriched.
Not necessarily. From what I understand, some pilot unions do the exact opposite.

Re: Google Urged the U.S. to Limit Protection for Activist Workers

#112

Post by matthewmacleod »

typon wrote: post #90
josephv wrote: post #79

These comments read like a bunch of low-income retail shoppers defending Walmart because they provide something they otherwise couldn't get. I think these types of debates are bellwether for programmer/IT professional unionization. These are the exact types of lawsuits brought against organized labor as it was trying to get organized to prevent exploitative behavior. It's disturbing to see these same anti-organizatio…

Programmers, maybe ones on HN especially, are super conservative and anti-labour for some reason. I don't know the history of Silicon Valley enough to figure out exactly why

I think you can just look at the surface and see it as a natural consequence of a relatively easy, high-income, unregulated profession, with high demand for workers. Many of the benefits of collective bargaining aren't applicable to people who are relatively easily able to switch jobs or work as a consultant. That then tends to lead to… complacency, I guess? I would expect that relatively few people in that field have recently been in a situation where collective bargaining would have been a benefit to them, and that allows them to see only the downsides.

I do notice some agitation in the direction of unionisation from some parts of the industry – particularly in game development, where conditions can often be worse.

Re: Google Urged the U.S. to Limit Protection for Activist Workers

#113

Post by zimpenfish »

malvosenior wrote: post #94
typon wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Programmers, maybe ones on HN especially, are super conservative and anti-labour for some reason. I don't know the history of Silicon Valley enough to figure out exactly why

You succeed at programming by spending countless hours on your own with a computer. Your career is a direct result of your own hard work and passion. From that perspective, organized labor seems like an unnecessary dependency. Programming is a form of extreme independence many will be hard fought to give away. Developers (some) aren't super-conservative, they're libertarian.

> Your career is a direct result of your own hard work and passion.

If your code isn't using your own libraries compiled by your own compiler hosted on your own OS running on your self-built machine using a CPU you designed, no, it isn't. Sure, your own hard work and passion goes a long way but you rely heavily on the works of others and the privilege of being able to use them.

Re: Google Urged the U.S. to Limit Protection for Activist Workers

#114

Post by Ericson2314 »

anticensor wrote: post #107
josephv wrote: post #79

These comments read like a bunch of low-income retail shoppers defending Walmart because they provide something they otherwise couldn't get. I think these types of debates are bellwether for programmer/IT professional unionization. These are the exact types of lawsuits brought against organized labor as it was trying to get organized to prevent exploitative behavior. It's disturbing to see these same anti-organizatio…

If the employee side is numerous enough to unionise, the employer side should also be numerous enough to establish an employer organisation.

The whole point of unionization is the employer side has the advantage of being way less numerous.

Re: Google Urged the U.S. to Limit Protection for Activist Workers

#115

Post by jkaplowitz »

chrismeller wrote: post #74
skh wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t see how allowing workers to use workplace email to organize can be equated to coercing speech. Worker protections in the U.S. are quite poor in relation to the EU. I see no evidence that further limiting worker rights would be good for the people.

Most companies, even in the EU, say that workplace systems are for performance of job duties only. That doesn’t mean it’s necessarily legally enforceable, but either way it’s a much more nuanced argument than it’s being portrayed as. If I have a right to use company systems to organize a strike, how do they then account for those messages in their normal record keeping and compliance procedures? Do they also have to…

Google has never, as far as I know, required that work email systems be used for performance of job duties only. They certainly want work usage to be primary, and in some countries and circumstances they claim more rights to intellectual property created using work systems that they otherwise wouldn't claim, but they do allow incidental personal use.

In my experience working there in the past (before these cultural issues became a main focus), it was a major perk to, for example, be discussing a news item about a quantum computing device on a suitably targeted mailing list and have someone with quantum physics expertise chime in. :) Also informal peer-to-peer financial planning advice and many other topics.

Note I haven't worked for Google or Alphabet since early 2015 and certainly am not speaking for them here.

Re: Google Urged the U.S. to Limit Protection for Activist Workers

#116

Post by Aunche »

josephv wrote: post #79

These comments read like a bunch of low-income retail shoppers defending Walmart because they provide something they otherwise couldn't get. I think these types of debates are bellwether for programmer/IT professional unionization. These are the exact types of lawsuits brought against organized labor as it was trying to get organized to prevent exploitative behavior. It's disturbing to see these same anti-organizatio…

The difference is that software engineers, especially those at Google, have high social mobility and are well educated. I think that unions are inefficient, but I'm sympathetic towards or even support most of them because those workers don't have a better option. Googlers just come off as entitled. They should be intelligent enough to acknowledge when they're making clickbaity populist arguments that misrepresent complex issues, but they turn a blind eye to it. Calling out these arguments doesn't mean I support large corporations trampling over the weak.

Re: Google Urged the U.S. to Limit Protection for Activist Workers

#117

Post by malvosenior »

zimpenfish wrote: post #113
malvosenior wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You succeed at programming by spending countless hours on your own with a computer. Your career is a direct result of your own hard work and passion. From that perspective, organized labor seems like an unnecessary dependency. Programming is a form of extreme independence many will be hard fought to give away. Developers (some) aren't super-conservative, they're libertarian.

> Your career is a direct result of your own hard work and passion. If your code isn't using your own libraries compiled by your own compiler hosted on your own OS running on your self-built machine using a CPU you designed, no, it isn't. Sure, your own hard work and passion goes a long way but you rely heavily on the works of others and the privilege of being able to use them.

I'm developing in 2019. If I was developing in 1976 I would have been working on something much farther down the stack. Either way requires an immense amount of time in front of a computer to be a top performer and in either time period putting that time in would lead to success.

Re: Google Urged the U.S. to Limit Protection for Activist Workers

#118

Post by austincheney »

advisedwang wrote: post #67
austincheney wrote: post #39

> If the Labor Board did what Google wanted, “it would have a huge chilling effect,” said Google employee activist Colin McMillen Weird, I guess then they would have to use the employee email system for employment related matters. There isn't any restriction to prevent any employee from using a non-employer email system for organizing the very same activities. The unintended consequence of allowing this kind of activ…

It isn't nearly as easy to connect to people outside the workplace. You have to reach out to people to get their personal contact details, and doing this en-masse could be construed as organizing activity by itself. They could even argue you are ex-filtrating confidential information (list of employees).

> It isn’t nearly as easy to connect to people outside the workplace.

I think this is absolute core of the discussion. Like nearly all bad decisions ultimately it comes down to convenience. If this form of political discourse were as important as people claim they would find a way.

Re: Google Urged the U.S. to Limit Protection for Activist Workers

#119

Post by PhasmaFelis »

mcv wrote: post #109
typon wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Programmers, maybe ones on HN especially, are super conservative and anti-labour for some reason. I don't know the history of Silicon Valley enough to figure out exactly why

I don't see how programmers are super conservative. In my experience, especially on HN, they tend to be fairly progressive on average. However, they also tend to be somewhat libertarian. And so far, software development hasn't been an industry that really needed unionisation. But that could always change in the future, of course. Personally, I generally support unions, though I don't see the need for them in software…

I've found that programmers tend to be socially liberal (pro-gay rights, abortion rights, etc.) but financially conservative (don't like their money being spent on public goods). Which somewhat overlaps with libertarianism, yes.

Re: Google Urged the U.S. to Limit Protection for Activist Workers

#120

Post by JumpCrisscross »

DannyBee wrote: post #97
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It just goes to show that a large company is made up of many different people in different departments, sometimes with different agendas The e-mails referenced in the article were unsolicited policy preferences communicated by a multi-billion dollar company to a regulator in writing. These communications were sent following a PR and HR crisis. The chances that this didn't have high-level sign-off is virtually zero.

This is basically fact free. First, you have the timing wrong. " In filings in May 2017 " IE before a PR and HR crisis or whatever you want to call it. Second, it was solicited, as they were written as a legal response to a legal claim. Third, claiming that expresses a policy preference is silly. Do you believe that criminal defense attorneys express a policy preference that say, murder is okay? If you go and read th…

> you have the timing wrong. " In filings in May 2017

Conceded. Pardon me--cannot edit the original comment.

> it was solicited, as they were written as a legal response to a legal claim

Do we know these filings were in response to a legal claim? It could have been in response to something more frivolous. (I am having trouble finding the filing.)

> Do you believe that criminal defense attorneys express a policy preference that say, murder is okay?

One, this isn't a criminal matter. It isn't even being judicially decided. These are confidential regulatory proceedings.

Two, when criminal defense attorneys defend a murder suspect, they don't advocate overturning murder statute. There is a wide berth between arguing against the facts and circumstances of a case and arguing for overturning a law.

Three, I've been in senior roles at companies in regulatory deliberations and litigation. Each time, company counsel briefed senior management on the arguments they were preparing. More than once, someone asked if an argument was essential. Once, it was. (It was maintained.) Another time, it wasn't. Concerned about a client relationship getting caught in the cross-fire, the argument was dropped and the case amended.

When you give a shit about a constituency, you don't argue for overturning their rights.

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