Union Is Formed at Los Angeles Times and Publisher Put on Leave • Hacker News Board

Re: Union Is Formed at Los Angeles Times and Publisher Put on Leave

#31

Post by geofft » Fri, Jan 19, 2018, 10:23 PM UTC

problems wrote: post #8

chollida1 wrote: post #2

I thought this was interesting because if knowledge workers like journalists can do so, why not programmers, or what ever term you'd prefer to be called?

I'm a programmer who's currently in a union position - I want out. I pay dues and get basically nothing for them, as developers we're generally in decent negotiating positions. Unions are great when you're not in that position, but just an extra cost when you are.

I've always been in a fine negotiating position for pay, but I've never felt like I had any negotiating position for things like getting a cubicle or office instead of an open floor plan, getting IP rights to things I do in my spare time that are not related to my own job but related to something my employer is doing somewhere, running an interview process that doesn't suck for both candidates and interviewers, etc.

Re: Union Is Formed at Los Angeles Times and Publisher Put on Leave

#32

Post by dizzystar » Fri, Jan 19, 2018, 10:23 PM UTC

ng12 wrote: post #12

e1ven wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've talked to people in the past who associate a union with factory work, and they don't feel like it applies to them. I sometimes point out that every movie star they've ever heard of is a member of a union. I think part of the problem comes from the decline in unions in the US over the last few decades. New industries aren't unionizing, and older unions are being undermined where possible.

The unions aren't for the A-list, they're for the struggling actors who would get paid minimum wage otherwise (or worse, you'd see a lot of "unpaid internships").

Ask the non-union folk about that.

Getting into a movie industry union is very difficult and rather expensive to boot. You don't just get into these unions by showing up at the door.

The correlation to software would be having a list of progressively difficult things you have to do, so that, ultimately, only 10% of people make it in. The rest pay their dues by working minimum wage jobs and unpaid internships.

Re: Union Is Formed at Los Angeles Times and Publisher Put on Leave

#33

Post by frgtpsswrdlame » Fri, Jan 19, 2018, 10:24 PM UTC

neuland wrote: post #29

chollida1 wrote: post #2

I thought this was interesting because if knowledge workers like journalists can do so, why not programmers, or what ever term you'd prefer to be called?

I will quit from any employer that forces all programmers to negotiate as a unit, because I believe that compensation should be based purely on your individual skills and the market. I also believe that forced collective bargaining is unconstitutional, because it requires people to associate with a group that they don't want to associate with. If a group of people wish to collectively bargain with their employer, tha…

Except collective bargaining won't exist without that law. The free rider problem will destroy any possibility of collective bargaining. That's why I think it's disingenuous to say:

If a group of people wish to collectively bargain with their employer, that's wonderful. But, they can leave me out of it, and I can do without whatever pay schedule and benefits they manage to extract from the employer.

Well you can't really 'opt out' of the benefits of their negotiation in that way, and for the same reason you can't opt out of the union. You're not talking about a future with some unions where people can also choose to go it alone, you're talking about a future with no unions at all. At least be honest about that.

Re: Union Is Formed at Los Angeles Times and Publisher Put on Leave

#34

Post by untog » Fri, Jan 19, 2018, 10:25 PM UTC

neuland wrote: post #29

chollida1 wrote: post #2

I thought this was interesting because if knowledge workers like journalists can do so, why not programmers, or what ever term you'd prefer to be called?

I will quit from any employer that forces all programmers to negotiate as a unit, because I believe that compensation should be based purely on your individual skills and the market. I also believe that forced collective bargaining is unconstitutional, because it requires people to associate with a group that they don't want to associate with. If a group of people wish to collectively bargain with their employer, tha…

> I will quit from any employer that forces all programmers to negotiate as a unit

You realise that unions are something imposed on employers, right? They don't like them.

Re: Union Is Formed at Los Angeles Times and Publisher Put on Leave

#35

Post by pjmlp » Fri, Jan 19, 2018, 10:25 PM UTC

chollida1 wrote: post #2

I thought this was interesting because if knowledge workers like journalists can do so, why not programmers, or what ever term you'd prefer to be called?

Programmers have unions in some European countries, for example IG Metal in Germany.

Re: Union Is Formed at Los Angeles Times and Publisher Put on Leave

#36

Post by geofft » Fri, Jan 19, 2018, 10:27 PM UTC

neuland wrote: post #29

chollida1 wrote: post #2

I thought this was interesting because if knowledge workers like journalists can do so, why not programmers, or what ever term you'd prefer to be called?

I will quit from any employer that forces all programmers to negotiate as a unit, because I believe that compensation should be based purely on your individual skills and the market. I also believe that forced collective bargaining is unconstitutional, because it requires people to associate with a group that they don't want to associate with. If a group of people wish to collectively bargain with their employer, tha…

> I will quit from any employer that forces all programmers to negotiate as a unit, because I believe that compensation should be based purely on your individual skills and the market.

But that is the market, is it not? If your employer chooses to require all employees to negotiate as a unit, and is not required to do so by law, aren't they just doing that because they're a rational actor in the market?

The law is a different question, yes, but the fundamental motivation is to prevent 80% of the company from negotiating, say, "We all get 1-hour lunch breaks" and the remaining 20% from benefiting from the negotiation because that's the rational thing for the company to do in that situation, thereby providing an incentive for people to remove themselves from the "agreement" and coast on it nonetheless. What would you do to solve this problem in other ways?

Re: Union Is Formed at Los Angeles Times and Publisher Put on Leave

#37

Post by paxy » Fri, Jan 19, 2018, 10:27 PM UTC

FussyZeus wrote: post #19

lr4444lr wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For the sake of argument, you could ask for protected work hours, overtime, etc. I don't think we need it for this industry, mind you, but more so because there's no monopsony on the labor market from a select few large employers, not because of the supply and demand.

Also don't forget it would make it much easier for individual engineers to argue back at Management about employing dark patterns, or directives to make apps/websites addictive and generally harmful. For as much as people like to gripe about LinkedIn and their variously deceptive practices, marketing heads and executives don't write code. There are engineers in there making that stuff happen.

What makes you think engineers are against these practices?

Re: Union Is Formed at Los Angeles Times and Publisher Put on Leave

#38

Post by frgtpsswrdlame » Fri, Jan 19, 2018, 10:28 PM UTC

ng12 wrote: post #5

chollida1 wrote: post #2

I thought this was interesting because if knowledge workers like journalists can do so, why not programmers, or what ever term you'd prefer to be called?

Why do we need a union in a seller's market? If I'm unhappy with my job I can quit and get a new one in a week. It's not about being a knowledge worker. Screenwriters are unionized because there are many more people who want to write than there are gigs, therefore there's a high potential for abuse.

Even in a seller's market unions will still provide you with leverage you couldn't get otherwise. Unions aren't only so the dispossessed can bargain for more, they're so any group can bargain for more.

The one example I always give is of my mom starting out working in the 70's. Her employer was not unionized but had several unionized competitors in the city. Because her employer didn't want to bother with union negotiations all the time they paid a quarter more an hour than their competitors and so no union ever started up. My mom was benefitting from a union she wasn't even a member of. You could be in that same position if a programmer union ever started up.

Re: Union Is Formed at Los Angeles Times and Publisher Put on Leave

#39

Post by vvanders » Fri, Jan 19, 2018, 10:28 PM UTC

ProAm wrote: post #11

untog wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is interesting that programmers (as a whole) seem resistant to it. It's often described as being unnecessary, but when you go one or two posts down HN you find people decrying long hours, open plan offices, weekend callouts, etc. etc. I suspect it's just that when the going is good, people don't really think they need a union. If the prophecies come true and AI starts writing code for us, you can bet people will s…

> It is interesting that programmers (as a whole) seem resistant to it. Mostly because our working conditions are not bad, we are more or less paid fairly, there are a lot of options to move around. Also it'd be bad if we had other people negotiating on our behalf, for what we probably feel is less pay than we are worth, and the concept of seniority would ruffle and stop a lot of newer grads from getting higher payin…

Gamedev is the only sub-industry that comes to mind that could see a large benefit from a union. That said burnout is so high and there's so many people beating down the door for a job that its never really materialized.

Re: Union Is Formed at Los Angeles Times and Publisher Put on Leave

#40

Post by xienze » Fri, Jan 19, 2018, 10:28 PM UTC

untog wrote: post #4

chollida1 wrote: post #2

I thought this was interesting because if knowledge workers like journalists can do so, why not programmers, or what ever term you'd prefer to be called?

It is interesting that programmers (as a whole) seem resistant to it. It's often described as being unnecessary, but when you go one or two posts down HN you find people decrying long hours, open plan offices, weekend callouts, etc. etc. I suspect it's just that when the going is good, people don't really think they need a union. If the prophecies come true and AI starts writing code for us, you can bet people will s…

I think the realistic among us realize that creating a software developer’s union would lead to dramatically increased offshoring. Actors, plumbers, etc.? Can’t offshore those, so the dynamic between workers and management is a little different. Software development, you can offshore the hell out of that. Shoot, look at automobile workers, granted there’s still a sizable amount in this country but nothing like it used to be — and I think unions had a lot to do with that (“we’re paying them how much? Just make em in Mexico”).