Major union launches campaign to organize video game and tech workers • Hacker News Board

Re: Major union launches campaign to organize video game and tech workers

#331

Post by spamizbad » Tue, Jan 07, 2020, 9:56 PM UTC

exolymph wrote: post #283

jakelazaroff wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let's use Facebook as an example. The median employee salary is $240,000 [1], but Facebook makes an average of $1,620,000 in revenue per employee [2]. Why is it okay for a company to extract a so much more money from an employee than they pay them, but not okay for employees to band together to get paid what they're worth? [1] https://www.businessinsider.com/facebook-median-pay-240000-2... [2] https://www.businessins…

Those people don't generate $1,620,000 with their labor once they leave Facebook. That number comes from being plugged into the Facebook machine, part of its system. Which is why Facebook gets the revenue and the employee gets a salary.

But that system is made of employees. It's not the office building or the computers. It's not the copy machine or the coffee maker. It's other workers.

If all I needed to do was make the same capital investments as facebook to get the same returns wouldn't that be wonderful?

Re: Major union launches campaign to organize video game and tech workers

#332

Post by gwbas1c » Tue, Jan 07, 2020, 9:58 PM UTC

bob1029 wrote: post #5

I read all of this as "Major union seeks to extract rent from an additional sector". I agree that putting developers on death marches is antithetical to everything that is human, but it's not like you don't have options in this industry... Tech work isn't like coal mining where your health is legitimately at risk on a daily basis, and where the number of alternative options available to the average worker is low to n…

> Tech work isn't like coal mining where ... the number of alternative options available to the average worker is low to non-existent.

Strange, I tend to see situations where some people can pick up a new job at the drop of a hat, and others just struggle to stay employed.

The industry goes through cycles, and someone who has a certain kind of engineering talent can easily pick up and move to another job. Everyone else is often stuck taking what they can get.

Re: Major union launches campaign to organize video game and tech workers

#333

Post by AnimalMuppet » Tue, Jan 07, 2020, 9:59 PM UTC

unapologetic wrote: post #286

AndrewGaspar wrote: post #245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If we're comparing to "Europe": - EU Youth Unemployment Rate: August 2019 https://www.statista.com/statistics/266228/youth-unemploymen... - US Youth Unemployment Rate: November 2018 - December 2019: https://www.statista.com/statistics/217448/seasonally-adjust...

Is that the same unemployment rate where the truth depends on how hard you look and who you support?

If there's something wrong with the statistics given in the source, point it out. If you've got statistics that you think are more accurate, give sources, and say why you think they're more accurate.

But this drive-by snide comment is pretty worthless. You can be better than that.

Re: Major union launches campaign to organize video game and tech workers

#334

Post by jahaja » Tue, Jan 07, 2020, 10:02 PM UTC

username90 wrote: post #296

jahaja wrote: post #265

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow, this is a very cynical interpretation of union leaders salaries. The previous posts implies that they are enriching themselves through members dues in a caricature manner.

Can you explain to me why a union leader should earn many times more than the median union worker? Enforcing that they don't earn more than median workers would increase solidarity and be more fair, but as far as I know no unions have such a policy. Why do you think they don't do it?

I don't think they should. I think it should be quite frugal. Some pay too much, some don't. It's in any case vastly different than the multiplier that the execs get.

Re: Major union launches campaign to organize video game and tech workers

#335

Post by walshemj » Tue, Jan 07, 2020, 10:03 PM UTC

Kalium wrote: post #262

Symbiote wrote: post #250

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What!? That is over 60× the membership cost of UNITE (the largest British union). Apparently, comparisons between the US and Europe don't work here either. Maybe this is because "union shops" are allowed in the USA. Article 11 of the European Convention on Human Rights forbids them (the right to free association is taken to provide the right not to associate). https://unitetheunion.org/why-join/join-unite/contributio…

UAW dues apparently run $70 per month - https://www.labornotes.org/blogs/2013/12/uaw-dues-increase-b... Which is still over three times the top rate at UNITE. I don't know what an average US union's dues are though.

Yes American unions developed in different ways to the UK

For example in Prospect (representing science technology and civil service managers and professionals up to around the GS15 level in us terms)

I am on the penultimate rate and I pay about 25$ a month

Re: Major union launches campaign to organize video game and tech workers

#336

Post by uerobert » Tue, Jan 07, 2020, 10:04 PM UTC

unapologetic wrote: post #234

uerobert wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Game dev is not a low barrier to entry industry. It is WAY easier to get a SDE job at a FAANG straight out of college than it is to get a job as a programmer at a big name studio, even with experience.

lol, no. Maybe at a place like Valve, but that's a special case. a private company swimming in cash and having basically zero urgency to innovate or produce even derivative content.

Any of the Rockstar Games studios, Naughty Dog, SCE Santa Monica, Bungie, Epic Games, any of the main Activision-Blizzard (Ininity Ward, Treyarcht) or EA studios (Respawn), etc... basically any major studio rarely hire straight out of college.

Re: Major union launches campaign to organize video game and tech workers

#337

Post by AnimalMuppet » Tue, Jan 07, 2020, 10:10 PM UTC

balls187 wrote: post #28

Have you considered what your career will be like at age 48? 55? 62? It's true that software developers are well compensated and in high demand, that demand tapers off rapidly after 40, when ageism comes up. If you want to go into management, then it's climb the corporate ladder, and get promoted until you can't do your job. What if you want to stay an IC? Become the lone developer who can support a legacy react appl…

I've seen what my career was like at 48, and at 55. Still guessing at what it will be at 62, but I'm not very worried.

> that demand tapers off rapidly after 40, when ageism comes up.

I haven't seen ageism come up. I've seen that I'm a pretty expensive guy, because 35 years of experience has value. But not every employer needs that, and those that don't hire someone less expensive. That's not ageism.

That is lower demand for people over 40, though. On the other hand, the supply is lower, too.

Re: Major union launches campaign to organize video game and tech workers

#338

Post by TimothyBJacobs » Tue, Jan 07, 2020, 10:13 PM UTC

ThrowawayR2 wrote: post #226

mlillie wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They do subject themselves to it. However, what that analysis lack is an understanding that the worker/employer power relationship is completely asymmetrical. Workers have everything to lose, Employers have nothing to lose. That leads to 'illogical' decisions such as workers who could find work elsewhere opting not to: Shit, their rent, their medicine, their family is on the line here. Maybe the new job will be worse…

> " Employers have nothing to lose. " Wrong in general and doubly wrong in the games industry where small game studios go bankrupt pretty much every other week. Not everybody is a FAANG or a billion dollar game publisher swimming in cash.

Are not some of the worst abuses at AAA studios?

Re: Major union launches campaign to organize video game and tech workers

#339

Post by awb » Tue, Jan 07, 2020, 10:14 PM UTC

arrosenberg wrote: post #330

awb wrote: post #258

Earlier quoted context omitted.

50-100% margins are normal for many growing businesses. Once a company / industry matures it can get away with lower margins. If you have too much money leaving the business through employees (CEO included) you slow growth. If you don't have high enough margins you also slow growth. It's a balancing act and free and fair competition usually provides the correct answer.

For a market to be both free and fair workers must have symmetric power and information with ownership and the customer. Otherwise the system is inherently unfair (in an economic sense) toward workers.

Every power dynamic is inherently unbalanced and unfair to at least some degree, but I agree you want it to be as fair as possible as often as possible.

I'd much rather see greater employee ownership in companies though rather than unions. Union and management negotiations are often a zero sum game. A win for one side is a loss for the other. And in between you can have damaging strikes or a breakdown in relationships. It's an us vs. them mentality, which isn't great for teamwork.

Employee ownership however aligns everyone's interests in the growth and profitability of the company. It puts everyone in the company on the same team and creates and us vs. them mentality with the competition instead which seems like healthy capitalism.

Re: Major union launches campaign to organize video game and tech workers

#340

Post by unapologetic » Tue, Jan 07, 2020, 10:18 PM UTC

friendlybus wrote: post #327

unapologetic wrote: post #301

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That will just drive more employers towards part time employees and outsourcing. The latter, I agree with the former reforms. You also aren't getting this sort of top down reform without obtaining more political power than the upper class. That's not going to happen without better organizing (Union, political movements, whatever).

These utopian goals turn into dystopias.

They don't. They exist all over and work fine.