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Fastmail Employees Form a Union

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Re: Fastmail Employees Form a Union

#11

Post by KittenInABox »

mfer wrote: post #6

Unions are fascinating to me. When you are in a Union, part of your money goes to the union in order to, hopefully, make things better for you. This means the relationship between Union leadership and the Union members is just as important as between Union leadership and the company. Historically, we have seen Unions bring things like worker safety to the forefront and do numerous things to help people out. More rece…

Yes, unions are super nuanced and have their pros and cons. I think the writers strike on hollywood forcing them to pay for using written work in streaming is a good choice. I think gatekeeping participating in studios on union work effectively gatekeeps tv writing to the already-connected, also. Overall I guess unions are only as good or as bad as the people in them.

Re: Fastmail Employees Form a Union

#12

Post by righthand »

nightski wrote: post #10
righthand wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because software workers should start looking to form unions as large companies take to stagnate wages with large hire/layoff cycles that flood the employment market.

You can't unionize your way to a better economy, that's not how that works.

It’s not about unionizing to a better economy, it’s about protecting workers and preventing c-suite from making irresponsible decisions. Wage negotiation is just a benefit.

Re: Fastmail Employees Form a Union

#13

Post by mrweasel »

mattl wrote: post #3
superduty wrote: post #2

[flagged]

[flagged]

Because they shouldn't start their own union. Unions are across companies, having a single union for a single company doesn't make much sense. Take the UAW, they don't just cover General Motor, they cover all workers in that sector, giving them more power and influence.

It's the same with a Star Bucks union, that's silly and not cost effective. You have a "restaurants (and cafe's)"- union. Take McDonalds, they have an agreement with a union in Denmark, 3F. 3F covers fast food staff, construction workers, factory workers, paramedics and many more. They are hugely powerful.

Re: Fastmail Employees Form a Union

#14

Post by Scoundreller »

jedberg wrote: post #8
mattl wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

Because if an employer already treats you well it just adds unneeded bureaucracy. I'm a big fan of unions, but I'm also a big fan of treating employees well. I would hope that my employees would never feel the need to unionize because I already hear their feedback and give them the benefits they want. Unions create an adversarial relationship between labor and management. That shouldn't be necessary if labor and mana…

> Unions create an adversarial relationship between labor and management

Isn’t there still an adversarial relationship between non-union labor and management?

So the story goes: Management wants to pay as little as possible for the most work and labor wants to get paid as much as possible for the least amount of work?

Re: Fastmail Employees Form a Union

#15

Post by KittenInABox »

jedberg wrote: post #8
mattl wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

Because if an employer already treats you well it just adds unneeded bureaucracy. I'm a big fan of unions, but I'm also a big fan of treating employees well. I would hope that my employees would never feel the need to unionize because I already hear their feedback and give them the benefits they want. Unions create an adversarial relationship between labor and management. That shouldn't be necessary if labor and mana…

Unfortunately management and labor have never really been allies. Even at companies I super, super love to work at and treat their workers well.. they still will do things like shocking layoffs directly from the board-- because the board doesn't care even if my manager and manager's manager etc. does.

Re: Fastmail Employees Form a Union

#16

Post by taurath »

mfer wrote: post #6

Unions are fascinating to me. When you are in a Union, part of your money goes to the union in order to, hopefully, make things better for you. This means the relationship between Union leadership and the Union members is just as important as between Union leadership and the company. Historically, we have seen Unions bring things like worker safety to the forefront and do numerous things to help people out. More rece…

I would always rather be in a union than not. Sometimes unions can be opaque or byzantine especially in older industries, but what is always opaque is management. Having fair pay and time off is something I’d rather not leave to whoever happens to sit in the chair above me, because who sits in the chair above me can change on a whim.

Congrats to the Fastmail team!

Re: Fastmail Employees Form a Union

#18

Post by haolez »

mfer wrote: post #6

Unions are fascinating to me. When you are in a Union, part of your money goes to the union in order to, hopefully, make things better for you. This means the relationship between Union leadership and the Union members is just as important as between Union leadership and the company. Historically, we have seen Unions bring things like worker safety to the forefront and do numerous things to help people out. More rece…

Unions are really powerful in corrupt and underdeveloped countries. Correlation is not causation, but still, it's frustrating for workers in those regions.

Re: Fastmail Employees Form a Union

#20

Post by jmcphers »

elektor wrote: post #9

Congrats to the team! This might be the reminder I needed to finally subscribe. Gmail’s spam filter has been nonexistent for the past month (300+ clearly spammy email reaching my inbox).

I'm a happy Fastmail customer, but I would not recommend them on the basis of their spam filter. It's competent but makes at least a few mistakes a week. Google's was better for me.
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