151–160 of 1001 posts
Anyone else think the phrasing in the title is a bit weird? Were there other people voting in this election who were not Kickstarter employees? How can a group which makes up 100% of the electorate not "win" an election? The outcome reflects the majority opinion, by definition.
I worked in a union shop once, as a summer intern. Every day, we were told to be in the break room at 7:59am to begin promptly at the 8am bell. By 4:30 or 4:45pm, everyone was back in there, waiting for the clock to hit 5pm. One day, I needed to connect two PCs together, which was approved by boss as they would be isolated from the network. So, being the diligent type, I went off and found some network cards and a ca…
Large/medium sized companies are run with tiny fiefdoms where the more people working under you means more power.
You don't need unions to have people do bullshit and useless wasteful work.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's a cool anecdote. Meanwhile, unions across Europe won massive increases in standards of living for all workers, from better leave, healthcare, safety protections, to even blocking the wealthy from having control over their democracies through militant, labor-backed political parties.
I'm not sure that last part is really a recommendation. What if I don't agree with the political positions of my union's leadership?
When you work for a contractor working for a corporation, you work for the contractor. When you work for a union working for a corporation, you work for the union. The difference is that the contractor isn't even notionally on your side, and the union is, at least in theory.
Anyone else think the phrasing in the title is a bit weird? Were there other people voting in this election who were not Kickstarter employees? How can a group which makes up 100% of the electorate not "win" an election? The outcome reflects the majority opinion, by definition.
Only 46 employees voted for the union, 37 against.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
So you are fine with the majority forcing the minority to support something they don't want to support? Never going to get behind that notion myself.
By your anti-union tone, one can assume you're American. As we all know, in America, the norm is that the minority forces the majority to support something they don't want to support. Lucky you, not having to deal with horrible things like "democracy"! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_ele...
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Do they have to live a wretched existence? Exactly how wretched does it have to be to allow them the ability to organize. Or perhaps they are justified to want a better share of the value created at kickstarter by their labor.
The quote at the top of the comment chain is about living a wretched existence. Don't get me wrong, it's totally fine to form a union on the principle of "we're doing okay but we want more stuff", businesspeople are allowed to try and get richer with no higher principle in mind. But it's dishonest to pretend that it inherits some kind of inherent moral weight from the traditional labor movement.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
You worked in a union shop once. Not necessarily a representative unionised workplace, just the one you were in. Yet 'in your experience' they are not optimal.
Why don’t you contribute to the conversation by talking about your own experience with unions?
My colleagues and I ran a IBEW union shop for about a dozen years up through the dot-com bust. We had over 150 union electricians building out data centers, running fiber optics along railroad tracks, installing low-voltage datacom, etc.
We had a few electricians from the local pool who:
1. Would not show up on time. 2. Did sloppy work. 3. Lied about their work hours on timesheets. 4. Refused to stay updated on building codes, technology changes, fire protection codes. 5. Were rude to customers.
And we would fire them for cause and they would show up in our shop a year later as it was their turn to be rotated through again.
That said, the union gave us flexibility to scale up or down our workforce as needed to meet project deadlines. And provided us with trained, skilled and motivated workers.
YMMV.
I worked in a union shop once, as a summer intern. Every day, we were told to be in the break room at 7:59am to begin promptly at the 8am bell. By 4:30 or 4:45pm, everyone was back in there, waiting for the clock to hit 5pm. One day, I needed to connect two PCs together, which was approved by boss as they would be isolated from the network. So, being the diligent type, I went off and found some network cards and a ca…
A friend of mine worked as a developer at defense contractor with mostly union employees. One time they moved him to a different cubicle. Due to union work rules he literally had to wait two days for a union electrician to come by and plug his desktop computer into the wall socket. Just ridiculous.
Is Kickstarter in a right-to-work state? Because if not, 46 people are forcing 37 to support a union that they might not agree with, which is distasteful in the extreme.
Why does it work that way in the U.S.? In my country everyone can freely join a union, all union employees can go on strike if the union allows it, and they’re not allowed to prevent others from working. At no point to my knowledge do all workers in a company have to decide to unionize. Why the collective decision?
If this union shits the bed, and there's no evidence that it will but plenty of evidence that it's possible, it's going to be catastrophic to the overall case for tech unions in the US.
Unfortunately the signal from the actual discussion is going to be lost in the noise from vested interests in both sides, so we're probably not going to learn anything.
I worked in a union shop once, as a summer intern. Every day, we were told to be in the break room at 7:59am to begin promptly at the 8am bell. By 4:30 or 4:45pm, everyone was back in there, waiting for the clock to hit 5pm. One day, I needed to connect two PCs together, which was approved by boss as they would be isolated from the network. So, being the diligent type, I went off and found some network cards and a ca…
A friend of mine worked as a developer at defense contractor with mostly union employees. One time they moved him to a different cubicle. Due to union work rules he literally had to wait two days for a union electrician to come by and plug his desktop computer into the wall socket. Just ridiculous.