Kickstarter’s staff is unionizing • Hacker News Board

Re: Kickstarter’s staff is unionizing

#491

Post by natalyarostova » Tue, Mar 19, 2019, 10:43 PM UTC

cableshaft wrote: post #4

If Kickstarter can do it, the game industry can do it! Come on, game industry, it's your time to unionize!

The problem is being treated poorly in gaming is an equilibrium market clearing outcome.

People who want to make games (or discover dinosaur bones, or paint, or do other professions that are correlated with a deep, almost-aesthetic, passion) are competing with other people just like them. Since they tend to be so passionate about these things, they bid each other down. They work just a few more hours a week without pay then the next guy, just because they would so much rather build video games than standard dev work.

And before you know it, the field is treated worse. But it's an equilibrium worse, brought about by rational agents trading off work-life balance for work-passion.

Re: Kickstarter’s staff is unionizing

#492

Post by adamrezich » Tue, Mar 19, 2019, 10:44 PM UTC

eqdw wrote: post #115

apl002 wrote: post #19

what are the pros/cons of unionizing? I dont know jack about this

As I understand it, when a company unionizes, there are three main ways that you as an employee are impacted: 1. You are required to pay a certain amount (either percentage or flat fee, I'm not sure) of your paycheque into a new political organization, the union 2. You are entitled to periodically vote on the who to elect to leadership of the union 3. The leadership of the union represents the entirety of the staff a…

It's disappointing that this comment got zero replies aside from this one, I would love to see detractors' responses to it and get an actual discussion going

Re: Kickstarter’s staff is unionizing

#493

Post by jeffreybaird » Tue, Mar 19, 2019, 10:45 PM UTC

maxxxxx wrote: post #5

I wish the US would adopt the German model where unions are for whole sectors. That way it's a level playing field for all companies.

This is much more similar to the IWW model of organizing.

Re: Kickstarter’s staff is unionizing

#494

Post by spbaar » Tue, Mar 19, 2019, 10:45 PM UTC

mises wrote: post #64

chrisseaton wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know how unions work in the US, but most unions in the UK fund a single political party, which means you could be forced to pay to support a party with views you find abhorrent in order to work, so I hope not.

Completely correct. Three of the top 10 election cycle 2018 contributors were unions. * Carpenters & Joiners Union gave $38,366,262 with $37,822,215 to democrats and $529,000 to republicans. * Service Employees International Union gave $28,224,658 with $28,219,509 to democrats and $132 to republicans. * Laborers Union gave $27,538,080 with $26,810,870 to democrats and $708,100 to republicans. Source: https://www.open…

You're kind of burying the lede here by saying "Completely correct" and ending with "There has been court ruling around this area in the past few years". Haven't workers under a union been able to opt out of political giving since Abood in 1977? And public workers have been able to completely free ride since Janus

Re: Kickstarter’s staff is unionizing

#495

Post by squaresmile » Tue, Mar 19, 2019, 10:47 PM UTC

Animats wrote: post #16

cableshaft wrote: post #4

If Kickstarter can do it, the game industry can do it! Come on, game industry, it's your time to unionize!

Came up at GDC last year.[1] There's Game Workers Unite, but they haven't accomplished much.[2] The biggest success remains The Animation Guild, IATSE local 839.[3] They represent most of the Hollywood studio animators. Much of what their members do is very similar to what game industry employees do. But they get overtime. From the IATSE contract with Disney: "... all time worked in excess of eight (8) hours per day…

For comparison in Japan where the animators union is non-existent or not as strong, the working condition is usually pretty rough to downright horrible.

[1] https://www.animenewsnetwork.com/interest/2017-06-07/nhk-pro...

[2] https://kotaku.com/an-insider-s-look-at-working-in-the-anime...

Re: Kickstarter’s staff is unionizing

#496

Post by isk517 » Tue, Mar 19, 2019, 10:48 PM UTC

edoo wrote: post #361

bargl wrote: post #223

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this means we need to re-think how unions work. It should be used to create fair workplaces. My concern with the anti-union rhetoric in the USA is that we then turn to the government to protect workers. I think it's a lot better to have a union vs government as long as that union isn't protected from competition like they are today. If we can introduce competition into unions then they might better serve the…

Having competing unions is an interesting concept. It may be a hard sell because technically the primary legal ability of a union is prevent competition among the workers. If you are a rock star you can't get hired at a greater wage. If you are a nepotism cling on you can't get fired or demoted.

You've hit the nail on the head. I've seen both sides of the union coin. Unions need competition just as much as business do to function properly.

My father is a trades person and when one union treated him badly he left for another one cause he had options. His union has also saved him from a lot of BS that companies he's worked for have tried to pull.

Alternatively when I was a student I worked a part time job where I was forced to be a part of a union with no options. Ever week they took money from my paycheck and the one time I had a grievance they pretty much ignored me. Making sure the girl that showed up hung over and vomiting every 2nd shift was not fired was more important because seniority.

Re: Kickstarter’s staff is unionizing

#497

Post by nerder92 » Tue, Mar 19, 2019, 10:48 PM UTC

tomohawk wrote: post #481

ace_of_spades wrote: post #401

To make this discussion maybe a little bit more solution oriented, what would be your solution to problems of labor mistreatment? Or do you suggest that nothing like that exists? I recently came across an interesting talk by Richard Wolff at Google [1] which suggests that a great solution would be the democratization of the work place in the form of worker coops. It’s actually a tried and true model that works well i…

Start a "consulting" business that provides really good pay and benefits to all of the workers. Be very selective about who you let in. You're now in the business of providing workers for companies that produce stuff. If they want access to your workers, they sign a contract with your company. If some workers don't like working for some particular company, transfer them to places where they like to work. You've now c…

You are basically describing ThoughtWorks.

Re: Kickstarter’s staff is unionizing

#498

Post by arthur_pryor » Tue, Mar 19, 2019, 10:51 PM UTC

duxup wrote: post #78

cableshaft wrote: post #4

If Kickstarter can do it, the game industry can do it! Come on, game industry, it's your time to unionize!

I'm highly skeptical of US style unions, but if any tech industry seems to need unions... it's the game industry.

if any part of the tech industry needs unions, it's content screeners: https://www.theverge.com/2019/2/25/18229714/cognizant-facebo...

Re: Kickstarter’s staff is unionizing

#499

Post by SlowRobotAhead » Tue, Mar 19, 2019, 10:52 PM UTC

naravara wrote: post #209

rb808 wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah but presumably with a union you can also take it easy, not worry about getting laid off and spend time on personal projects.

What about unions do you think magically makes it impossible to fire someone who isn't doing the required work? The only thing that changes is you have to actually do the requisite paperwork and monitoring to validate that you're firing them with cause instead of for arbitrary reasons and pretending it's with cause. The "we can't fire someone who is honestly slacking" is just as much a consequence of bad bookkeeping…

Just a quick question... But do you have any personal experience with the UAW (United Auto Workers Union)? Because while on it's face, I'd agree with your comment... but in experience I've seen things closer to what the other guy was implying.

Re: Kickstarter’s staff is unionizing

#500

Post by Frondo » Tue, Mar 19, 2019, 10:52 PM UTC

tomohawk wrote: post #479

drugme wrote: post #437

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It always seems to degenerate into an "us vs them" sort of thing whenever I talk to them about where they work. Why would I ever work some place where things are so adversarial? Maybe because the employer... made things "adversarial" by creating unhealthy / untenable / inadequately compensated working conditions in the first place? You also end up with this 3rd party involved in everything, creating all kinds of "rul…

There are lots of reasons people may think unionizing is a good idea. Maybe they think the grass will be greener. Maybe they think it will get the man off their back. Maybe they think they're engaged in some sort of class warfare, and this is their duty. Maybe they are people who focus on what they don't have instead of what they do have. All I know from friends/family is all a union does is put another group of peop…

> All I know from friends/family is all a union does is put another group of people over you to tell you what to do

This is an unfair characterization of what unions are. They're not a second set of bosses; they're democratic organizations, no more, no less. What you get out of them is largely up to you and your interest in being involved.

Saying they're "over you" and "tell you what to do" reminds me of people who complain about politics but don't vote (let alone be politically active). For people unwilling even to show up to the discussion and use what little power is literally given to them, it's unsurprising that they'll get more than the minimum from such organizations.