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Glitch employees vote to form union, joining CWA

cwa-union.org

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Re: Glitch employees vote to form union, joining CWA

#71

Post by fiter »

einpoklum wrote: post #64
whoisjuan wrote: post #10

Ignorant question. But how do union dues work? Is it a percentage of your paycheck or a fixes cost? Also I assume there’s a formation/founding cost. How does that work?

1. If the union is complacent and is willing to put its financial situation in the hands of the employer, to be used as leverage against any struggle - then the union and the employer arrange for a fraction of each employee's salary to be deducted by the employer and passed to the union. That, at least in the US, is the common case. It is also extremely tempting - and I say this as a past union activist - to go for t…

I appreciate your opinion in your comments on this post. All of them read to me as balanced and nuanced.

Regarding 2, is there any reason the union achievements must apply to non-union workers as well?

Re: Glitch employees vote to form union, joining CWA

#72

Post by cfqycwz »

lbotos wrote: post #5

Here is a question: Why don't we have more smaller unions in America, but instead these GIANT mega unions? I get collective bargaining is better with more numbers, but it feels like there is no way to have a "new" union exist?

Another thing I haven't seen mentioned here is that bosses will often try to slow down, stymie, or break up organizing drives by dragging out legal arguments at the labor board. This means arguing that the bargaining unit should be broken up, that certain employees are actually supervisors and shouldn't be included, that certain supervisors actually aren't and therefore _should_ be included in the vote, that the proposed bargaining unit is too small and should include more employees, etc. Typically you'll need a lawyer to navigate this process, lawyers are very expensive, and national/international unions have money.

Organizing a union is also fairly hard, and staff of established unions are more likely to have the skill set to teach you how to have convincing conversations with your co-workers, make sure they stick together, keep everybody from freaking out when the boss starts threatening to fire people, etc. It's also good to have them around to provide financial/legal support if the boss follows through on those threats.

Re: Glitch employees vote to form union, joining CWA

#73

Post by safety-third »

bglusman wrote: post #44
ceejayoz wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know how you'd replace decades worth of strike warchest funding and long-term relationships with legislators.

I wonder if the unions would be friendly to a kind of affiliate relationship, and/or paying dues into a kind of program like the deposit insurance that banks pay to FDIC, but for strike insurance or something?

The affiliate thing might be interesting. Insurance is a no-go though. There would be incentive to strike to get more payout on the policy. Or worse, an insurance company would take it and would audit every strike for "legitimacy."

Re: Glitch employees vote to form union, joining CWA

#74

Post by bennysonething »

m0zg wrote: post #65
Apocryphon wrote: post #4

My highlights: > 90% of the workers indicated their support for joining CWA and authorized CWA to be their bargaining representative > about half of whom work in the New York City headquarters and half of whom work remotely throughout the country > Employees at major American tech and game companies have grown increasingly active and outspoken about workplace issues, including sexual assault and harassment, ageism, u…

Game studios especially need this. I'm a conservative in most other labor-related things (liberal on social issues), but holy shit the devs are abused by the game studios.

Completely disagree. They aren't miners working in horrible conditions where that's the only job in town. Game developers are highly talented, skilled individuals. There is a high demand for such people outside the game industry they choose to stay there. I'm a developer in the finance industry. Worked in a few other sectors too. If games industry is harsh, jump ship. Abused? Get real, the working populations outside the western world are abused and with little choice (and a lot of people in the west lower down the food chain). I think it's insulting to to people with limited options no money to lump games devs in with them. Personally speaking, last thing I'd want in software industry is a Union. Graded pay scales that take no account of productivity variability is a sure fire way to kill an industry. We re a privileged bunch as developers.

Re: Glitch employees vote to form union, joining CWA

#75

Post by johnpowell »

sevenf0ur wrote: post #63
kyoob wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's usually a percentage of workers' paychecks, between 1-2% is pretty standard. Founding, organizing, and legal stuff for newly forming unions can be handled by the larger organization (e.g. CWA) using pooled dues from existing unions within that organization.

Losing that much per paycheck with nothing guaranteed in return would chaff me after awhile. I hope it works out for them.

I was a union HVAC guy for a few years. And one very nice thing was that there were union shops and they went through the union to find employees. So if work dried up at one place the union would take care of getting my unemployment going and then when work came up they would call and say that I was needed elsewhere.

This probably wouldn't translate well to software. But it works great if you are installing ducts. Same goes for plumbers and electricians. My sisters first husband was a union electrician. That is why I looked into getting a union gig. I hate job hunting.

In the years I did it I worked for five different companies. I didn't have to run around dropping off resumes and doing practice tests. I just got a call from the union and was told where to go to work. And I made significantly more than my non-union counterparts. Easily more than the dues I had to pay.

Re: Glitch employees vote to form union, joining CWA

#76

Post by fiter »

johnpowell wrote: post #75
sevenf0ur wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Losing that much per paycheck with nothing guaranteed in return would chaff me after awhile. I hope it works out for them.

I was a union HVAC guy for a few years. And one very nice thing was that there were union shops and they went through the union to find employees. So if work dried up at one place the union would take care of getting my unemployment going and then when work came up they would call and say that I was needed elsewhere. This probably wouldn't translate well to software. But it works great if you are installing ducts. Sa…

Is this one of the angles that unions use to sell themselves to companies? They can help by providing a well of valuable resources to draw on in an as-needed basis. When both hiring and firing would be an easier proposition, I could see more activity occurring as a result. These people would have experience at different companies and could provide their knowledge like many say is the benefit of people rotating jobs a lot in the SF Bay Area.

Re: Glitch employees vote to form union, joining CWA

#77

Post by dragonwriter »

fiter wrote: post #76
johnpowell wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was a union HVAC guy for a few years. And one very nice thing was that there were union shops and they went through the union to find employees. So if work dried up at one place the union would take care of getting my unemployment going and then when work came up they would call and say that I was needed elsewhere. This probably wouldn't translate well to software. But it works great if you are installing ducts. Sa…

Is this one of the angles that unions use to sell themselves to companies? They can help by providing a well of valuable resources to draw on in an as-needed basis. When both hiring and firing would be an easier proposition, I could see more activity occurring as a result. These people would have experience at different companies and could provide their knowledge like many say is the benefit of people rotating jobs a…

> Is this one of the angles that unions use to sell themselves to companies?

Unions don't sell themselves to companies in the first place.

Re: Glitch employees vote to form union, joining CWA

#78

Post by Macha »

fiter wrote: post #71
einpoklum wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1. If the union is complacent and is willing to put its financial situation in the hands of the employer, to be used as leverage against any struggle - then the union and the employer arrange for a fraction of each employee's salary to be deducted by the employer and passed to the union. That, at least in the US, is the common case. It is also extremely tempting - and I say this as a past union activist - to go for t…

I appreciate your opinion in your comments on this post. All of them read to me as balanced and nuanced. Regarding 2, is there any reason the union achievements must apply to non-union workers as well?

You then give encouragement to employers to hire non-union workers or exclude union workers if they don't have to have the same rights/wages. It seems a bit of an own goal for a union to give more incentives for employers to fight them

Re: Glitch employees vote to form union, joining CWA

#79

Post by elihu »

bennysonething wrote: post #74
m0zg wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Game studios especially need this. I'm a conservative in most other labor-related things (liberal on social issues), but holy shit the devs are abused by the game studios.

Completely disagree. They aren't miners working in horrible conditions where that's the only job in town. Game developers are highly talented, skilled individuals. There is a high demand for such people outside the game industry they choose to stay there. I'm a developer in the finance industry. Worked in a few other sectors too. If games industry is harsh, jump ship. Abused? Get real, the working populations outside…

"Stay in a bad employment situation" and "leave a bad employment situation" aren't the only options; workers can also collectively work to make the bad situation better. There can be a lot of good reason to do that, and I think we should be glad that people are working to make things better where they are.

Re: Glitch employees vote to form union, joining CWA

#80

Post by einpoklum »

fiter wrote: post #71
einpoklum wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1. If the union is complacent and is willing to put its financial situation in the hands of the employer, to be used as leverage against any struggle - then the union and the employer arrange for a fraction of each employee's salary to be deducted by the employer and passed to the union. That, at least in the US, is the common case. It is also extremely tempting - and I say this as a past union activist - to go for t…

I appreciate your opinion in your comments on this post. All of them read to me as balanced and nuanced. Regarding 2, is there any reason the union achievements must apply to non-union workers as well?

There are several reasons for this, including:

1. Union activities are fundamentally based on a perception of a common cause, common interests, common destiny of all workers - in your company, or in general.

2. It is a much weaker achievement to get an employer to give some people some more. The more meaningful struggle (and in fact - what is often the only real game you can play) is the struggle of "what is an employee doing some kind of work entitled to" - that is, a struggle over what's standard, what's necessary, what's appropriate vs unacceptable. But if there are two categories of rights/benefits, the better category is always that of privilege, and you've never convinced the employer nor yourselves that you are due any of those things by virtue of your being a worker. At most it is by virtue of some kind of alliance with the employer at the expense of the underprivileged.

3. The more fractured the modes of employment are, the more leeway managers and personnel dept. people have to manipulate and apply leverage to individual employees: "Will you be in status X or status Y next year? Hmm, let's see. Well, you did A, and we didn't really like that. I don't know if I can authorize you being a Y" and so on. Also, you (= the union) will be playing cat-and-mouse with the employer all the time about who gets employed in what status exactly; and the more combinations you get the harder it is to keep track of everything and also have a credible and actionable perception of what's it like for the various groups within the rank-and-file.

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