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Kickstarter Union voted 97.6% to ratify one of the first tech union contracts

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Re: Kickstarter Union voted 97.6% to ratify one of the first tech union contracts

#261

Post by chickenpotpie »

syspec wrote: post #255
chickenpotpie wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well theyre a public benefit corporation so it shouldn't be big right? Profit is supposed to be a nice side effect of what they're doing, not their main goal. If they were raking in the dough I would be asking how much they really cared about helping people.

Well they'll need to grow at least 3% per year since everyone is going to be guaranteed a COL raise every year even on bad years.

No they don't, inflation is baked into their pricing model. They make money by taking a percentage of the donations. If inflation makes the dollar worth half as much, people will donate twice as much to get the same results.

Re: Kickstarter Union voted 97.6% to ratify one of the first tech union contracts

#262

Post by LordDragonfang »

adam_arthur wrote: post #202
LordDragonfang wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>If the Foxconn factory unionized, you can bet iPhones would cost hundreds of dollars more. I'd be willing to bet that they don't. iPhone prices are set at the highest price that Apple determines people are willing to pay, not by the cost to produce it; even the costs that do exist are mostly materials, not labor costs. Labor costs are close to 1% of the sticker price [1]. This is the same as the argument that errone…

Apple sets prices based on what they think will maximize their profitability. If iPhone cost $1M dollars, there are still people who would buy it. Demand is a curve, not a fixed value.

Sorry, I was being unclear. I meant "people" in the aggregate, as perhaps a stand in for the demand curve. And that Apple sets their price based on the highest point on that curve which still maximizes revenue, then uses their absolutely ridiculous amount of cash-on-hand to reserve capacity and set the supply curve wherever it would intersect that point on the demand curve. (Which is part of why Apple weathered the chip shortage better than most)

i.e., at the scale they operate, they are beholden almost exclusively to demand, rather than supply, and what supply constraints they do have are mostly a matter of material costs and logistics as opposed to labor.

As the other commenter points out, my argument is that this pricing method (and the comparatively tiny input labor costs) mean that the cost of labor has an effectively negligible effect on pricing, and only would eat into profits.

Re: Kickstarter Union voted 97.6% to ratify one of the first tech union contracts

#263

Post by 71a54xd »

giantg2 wrote: post #62
71a54xd wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Part of being an Adult TM is separating emotions from work. Admittedly, I was able to work on some very cool shit at Amazon - however the job made me hate my life. Ergo - adult logical cycles were spent, decided to get a new job after leetcoding for a bit. The people who aren't skilled enough to get new jobs or improve themselves (also holds true in any industry) will always be some degree of fucked. I admit, some un…

"or make the bar of performance set by the industry" Can you define that bar? That's the problem - there aren't any solid definitions without a contract, and it varies by company. The company can screw over people who are actually meeting the bar by simply saying the bar is higher than it actually is.

A level of performance / ability where you can interview, get a job and the salary you deem indicative of your skill. This varies from person to person obviously.

For instance, for a while I had a CS degree and was solidly above average, but I didn't quite meet the bar because I sucked at leetcode and didn't have enough experience. So I accepted this, improved, and now have a higher paying job.

Re: Kickstarter Union voted 97.6% to ratify one of the first tech union contracts

#264

Post by gorwell »

slg wrote: post #260
gorwell wrote: post #250

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here's what the book says, "Sometimes they're called Nazis. Other times, they're the far-right or alt-right. White Nationalists. No matter the name, hateful groups are spewing vile, racist, anti-immigrant, anti-POC, anti-LGBTQ+, anti-anything-but-white-Christian-views ideologies. SCREW THAT. ALWAYS PUNCH NAZIS".

What is your objection to that passage? Most Nazis today do not call themselves "Nazis" because almost everyone agrees the Nazis were the bad guys. That is all that passage is saying. Saying sometimes Nazis go by "the far-right" is not the saying all far-right people are Nazis. You are the one reading "hateful groups are spewing vile, racist, anti-immigrant, anti-POC, anti-LGBTQ+, anti-anything-but-white-Christian-vi…

I was just quoting from the book to provide missing context. My read is that they are casting a larger net than the traditional definition to include anyone that disagrees with their ideology.

Re: Kickstarter Union voted 97.6% to ratify one of the first tech union contracts

#265

Post by BitwiseFool »

ceejayoz wrote: post #219
BitwiseFool wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>"Let's be clear; the title was "Always Punch Nazis", not "Always Punch Conservatives". If you're mixing the two up, that's more on you than the author." I've definitely noticed an overlap between the kinds of folks who want society to embrace and normalize violence against "Nazis" and the kinds of folks who go around accusing opponents of Nazism with little to no restraint. Edit: I'm struggling to articulate this, b…

> I've definitely noticed an overlap between the kinds of folks who want society to embrace and normalize violence against "Nazis"... C'mon. Beating up and killing Nazis has been a core part of American culture for 80 years or so. Comics, video games, movies. Is Inglorious Basterds anti-conservative? Is Captain America?

I think you're dramatically overstating just how integral "beating up and killing Nazis" is to American culture. I'd go a step further and say that the principles of liberty and the First Amendment are more ingrained than the notion that it is permissible and encouraged to commit violence against Nazis. Especially if the alleged Nazis are fellow Americans.

>"Is Inglorious Basterds anti-conservative? Is Captain America? "

Obviously not, and the fact that this is even being asked illustrates the concern because the association between Nazism and Conservatism has already taken root in some way. If you had just left those last two sentences out of your post, the first assertion would have stood on its own.

Re: Kickstarter Union voted 97.6% to ratify one of the first tech union contracts

#266

Post by BitwiseFool »

slg wrote: post #249
s1artibartfast wrote: post #245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I didn't say that milo ect were typical or that I agree with them. I said that the idea was about labeling conservatives in general as nazis and justifying violence. I don't agree with the idea that you get to punch someone in the face if you disagree with them, even if you label them as a fascist

> I said that the idea was about labeling conservatives in general as nazis and justifying violence. But these aren’t “conservatives in general”. These are people who are at the very least fascist sympathizers. No one serious is calling Mitt Romney a nazi.

>" No one serious is calling Mitt Romney a nazi."

It happened a lot more often back in 2012 when he was running for President.

Re: Kickstarter Union voted 97.6% to ratify one of the first tech union contracts

#267

Post by slg »

gorwell wrote: post #264
slg wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is your objection to that passage? Most Nazis today do not call themselves "Nazis" because almost everyone agrees the Nazis were the bad guys. That is all that passage is saying. Saying sometimes Nazis go by "the far-right" is not the saying all far-right people are Nazis. You are the one reading "hateful groups are spewing vile, racist, anti-immigrant, anti-POC, anti-LGBTQ+, anti-anything-but-white-Christian-vi…

I was just quoting from the book to provide missing context. My read is that they are casting a larger net than the traditional definition to include anyone that disagrees with their ideology.

>My read is that they are casting a larger net than the traditional definition

I doubt the book is about punching near centenarians who were members of a specific political party in the 1930s and 1940s. "Nazi" is now colloquially used as a general term to describe fascists and bigots.

Here is the Merriam-Webster definition for the word[1]. The traditional definition is definition 1. The definition the book is using is definition 2.

You don't need to wear a swastika to be fairly categorized as a Nazi according to that second definition. Some people espouse Nazi and Nazi-like ideals without self-identifying as Nazis. That seems to be the underlying meaning of the above passage.

[1] - https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/Nazi

Re: Kickstarter Union voted 97.6% to ratify one of the first tech union contracts

#268

Post by giantg2 »

71a54xd wrote: post #263
giantg2 wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"or make the bar of performance set by the industry" Can you define that bar? That's the problem - there aren't any solid definitions without a contract, and it varies by company. The company can screw over people who are actually meeting the bar by simply saying the bar is higher than it actually is.

A level of performance / ability where you can interview, get a job and the salary you deem indicative of your skill. This varies from person to person obviously. For instance, for a while I had a CS degree and was solidly above average, but I didn't quite meet the bar because I sucked at leetcode and didn't have enough experience. So I accepted this, improved, and now have a higher paying job.

I'm not talking about interviews. I'm talking about performance evaluation at the company. The issues are with moving goal posts, discrinatory practices, and office politics.

Re: Kickstarter Union voted 97.6% to ratify one of the first tech union contracts

#269

Post by SamoyedFurFluff »

lupire wrote: post #226
camdat wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Source this. Every Union I've seen continues to support performance based raises, just weighed appropriately against other compensation increases.

Source: the whole economy. If someone offers X, and you want Z, and you sign a contract for Y, they are giving you Y. Do you evet give Comcast an extra $50 for fun? It's what the company supports, not what the union supports. And "performance based raises" are obviously not CoL raisesm

By this logic a minimum wage means existing no one earns more than minimum wage…?

Re: Kickstarter Union voted 97.6% to ratify one of the first tech union contracts

#270

Post by slg »

BitwiseFool wrote: post #266
slg wrote: post #249

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I said that the idea was about labeling conservatives in general as nazis and justifying violence. But these aren’t “conservatives in general”. These are people who are at the very least fascist sympathizers. No one serious is calling Mitt Romney a nazi.

>" No one serious is calling Mitt Romney a nazi." It happened a lot more often back in 2012 when he was running for President.

And plenty of people today call Joe Biden a communist. Yet if someone has a "Punch a Communist" bumper sticker, I'm not going to call up the Secret Service saying someone is threatening the president because I know that name-calling is inherently unserious.

Meanwhile Richard Spencer's Wikipedia page starts with "Richard Bertrand Spencer (born May 1978) is an American neo-Nazi..." It is entirely fair to call that guy a Nazi and it is the reason the modern "punch a Nazi" meme centers on him.

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