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Kickstarter’s staff is unionizing

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Re: Kickstarter’s staff is unionizing

#711

Post by fphhotchips »

zaksoup wrote: post #701
fphhotchips wrote: post #566

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure - there are overheads in running a company where people like to work, and there's only so much that can come from the top line in a consulting business.

Parent to my comment was responding to somebody suggesting that consultancies provide "really good pay and benefits" and I was suggesting that this isn't true, currently, in the tech industry.

Yeah, I missed that the parent was suggesting good pay and benefits. My point is that the consultancies generally pick one or the other, because otherwise they'd be priced out of the market - even for really good staff that are hard to find elsewhere.

Re: Kickstarter’s staff is unionizing

#712

Post by Rogger »

maxxxxx wrote: post #20
Animats wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

Paid overtime is an excellent tool to get some time management discipline into an organization.

Hola

Re: Kickstarter’s staff is unionizing

#714

Post by BerislavLopac »

I think that the main problem with unions for software developers, especially at this particular time, is that tech recruitment is very much a sellers' market at the moment. Most of the companies have a lot of troubles finding quality developers of all levels, remuneration is growing to absurd levels and short-term contracting is almost a norm rather than an exception. For a moderately experienced developer, changing jobs is both a) trivial, and b) often the best way to ensure promotion and pay rise.

Unions were designed for a market where employers were taking advantage of job scarcity and insecurity, and where changing jobs often meant difficult re-training for new equipment and methodologies, which was often provided by unions. That does not exist today, at least in the software industry; a solid GutHub account is a much better certification than any training or even a university diploma.

My point is that, for the majority of software people, traditional unions can barely give any benefits over the power they can have themselves. And for the best people it can even provide disadvantages by lowering the standards.

Re: Kickstarter’s staff is unionizing

#715

Post by Apocryphon »

trhway wrote: post #561
swiftcoder wrote: post #555

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is generally true for full-time engineers. It isn't true for the vast legions of contract workers that stoke the fires of large tech companies. See, for example https://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-tn-apple-contract-wor...

yes, the companies are happy to shaft anybody they can (it is just right now they cant do that to tech employees). And i'm all for rising tide for everybody, for [significant] minimum wage increase, for more protections for contractors, for single payer, safety net and universal college education (and for higher taxes to cover all of it), etc. What i'm saying is that tech employees complaining should understand how m…

Tell it to the tech employees in the game industry.

Re: Kickstarter’s staff is unionizing

#716

Post by notSupplied »

repolfx wrote: post #696
bargl wrote: post #622

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yikes, I read my original post and I think yeah, you're right. I mean "more fair workplace". And fair being for both employee and employer. That's why I think competition would be important, as long as we can avoid a race to the bottom situation it might make unions more relevant.

I think what he/she was getting at is that "fair" isn't defined (by you). My notion of a fair workplace is one where people's pay and rewards are entirely determined by their skill and merit, as judged by the management. But lots of other people and especially unions define it totally differently: one where people's pay is determined by tenure, their union contract or their gender/race. That seems to be what these Ki…

What really disappoints me is when unions make demands unrelated to pay or work conditions, but to restricting competition. See LA teachers union and their demands to cap charter schools. This is a direct demand to punish teachers who are not part of unions. This is a stark reminder that unions is a "fight coercion with more coercion" solution.

It is important to remember that economic coerciveness is a result of overwhelming scale and bargaining power of one party over another. Kickstarter is a 100-ish headcount company located in Brooklyn, NY. This is hardly a captive employee pool compared to say, factory workers in a small town whose entire economy is centered around that one factory.

If Kickstarter workers unionize, I don't not believe it will results in two sides with equal bargaining power, Kickstarter will be in a substantially weaker position. If Kickstarter refuses the offer, all function ceases. If the workers refuses the offer, they have the robust job market of Brooklyn NY to fall back on.

Re: Kickstarter’s staff is unionizing

#717

Post by notSupplied »

conanbatt wrote: post #706
mcv wrote: post #676

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What unionless countries achieved these things? It seems to me that workers in countries with unions tend to have far better working conditions than those in countries without unions. The only alternative to unions to get these things is to get them directly enshrined in law, but in most countries that only happened after unions fought for it.

> What unionless countries achieved these things? It seems to me that workers in countries with unions tend to have far better working conditions than those in countries without union Beware of correlation/causation. Unions that represent the highest earning workers are the strongest, because the strongest workers already have the highest bargaining power and the highest salaries. A modern example of what productivit…

Exactly. Look at LA Teachers unions demanding cap on charter schools.

Charter school teachers are non-unionized, so this demand harms the pay of non-unionized "outsiders". If they succeed, they can parade the statistic that "Unionized teachers have gained income over non-unionized teachers thanks to the wonderful work of unions", when in fact what they have really done is transfer wealth from outsiders to insiders.

Re: Kickstarter’s staff is unionizing

#718

Post by CarlSchmitt »

tylerl wrote: post #652
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…

Unions don't exist for the employees' benefit, they exist for the union's benefit. There's a big ol difference, and because of their protected status, unions get away with a lot of really horrifying behavior. I've worked with several unions in different industries, and I can say pretty categorically that unions are brazenly unethical. Unions may sometimes improve working conditions and pay, but only in the sense that…

Union electrician here...I can annectdotally counter your "categorical" claim...have you ever worked in a skilled trade union?

Re: Kickstarter’s staff is unionizing

#719

Post by ace_of_spades »

crdoconnor wrote: post #699
ace_of_spades wrote: post #655

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure that was the whole point, to broaden the discussion beyond tending the symptoms and trying to get at the causes. An interesting idea could be to use a union or similar vehicle to start a co-op. Or start to strive for more democratic practices in companies. I actually like the comparisons to consulting companies in the sibling comments which seem to be an attempt at doing something like the outlined, however, wit…

Co-ops don't address the causes of coercive economic relations though. If they did they'd be much more common - Walmart and John Lewis both exist but they simply can't compete effectively in the same market. The only way to counter a Walmart is with a union - and a really aggressive one, too.

If you look at the video I posted at least one professor seems to think otherwise and I kind of find his arguments at least worthy to consider. Corporations will by nature have place an emphasis on pleasing owners, which in the case of coops are the workers. So, it doesn’t dispense with competition in general but aligns interests better with workers which should have a profound effect on “coercive economic relations”.

If you just mean that coops just cannot really compete, I would say that’s a myth. Look at Mondragon for example [1] or some large German coops. They also run successful competitors to walmart at leasr in europe. I think that one reason that they are just not as common is a general need to raise capital quickly, general availability of capital and a lack of education. But you are right that none of that is likely to counter an existing monopoly with access to huge capital baring some kind of legislative changes. There is certainly a place for unions.

1: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mondragon_Corporation

Re: Kickstarter’s staff is unionizing

#720

Post by Retra »

joejev wrote: post #571
Retra wrote: post #457

Earlier quoted context omitted.

None of that is relevant to the employer-employee relationship. My employer's competition is not my competition. Even if there were no hiring competitors, they would still not be my competition. I would still want equitable bargaining power with my employer. And regardless of that, if my employer is willing to pay our CEO over 20x what they pay their average employee, they are not in a position to niggle over the kin…

> And regardless of that, if my employer is willing to pay our CEO over 20x what they pay their average employee, they are not in a position to niggle over the kinds of systemic inefficiencies they would suffer under a union. Do you not believe that a CEO could have at least 20 times the impact on the value of a company than the average employee, and if so, should they not be compensated accordingly?

No, I do not believe in the divine right of kings.
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