Biggest question is if a union or union-like system makes sense in companies where the average tenure is ~2-3 years mostly due to employee choice.
Why do they leave? Are those reasons addressable by a union?
Employee activism in tech stops short of organizing unions
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Re: Employee activism in tech stops short of organizing unions
#32Maybe unionization needs a disrupt? I'm not against unionization in a lot of industries, but it just doesn't make sense in its current form for the tech scene or any other high demand position. It feels like an outdated mechanism used for people who were happy to sit in the same role, doing the same thing, for 45yrs.
Unions exist in high demand positions too - sports, entertainment etc. Can tech unions be modelled closer to those, and less on the style of jobs you mentioned?
These are not high demand professions. They are a very limited number of jobs available with many more people who would love to fill them.
Re: Employee activism in tech stops short of organizing unions
#33The benefit in tech is options. Don't like your job, get another one. Don't like your boss, get another one. For many locations it's just the matter of turning a button on Linkedin or for many people sending some emails. That keeps people idealistic, vocal and demanding of the behavior from their employer/bosses. This is not the norm in other business functions. Unfortunately.
This current state of affairs gives employees a lot of power, as you observed, but it's important to realize it will not last. The downturn will come. The question is whether we want to use our current ephemeral labor power to protect ourselves when the downturn comes, because organization will be 100x more difficult when things go to shit and people don't think they have the luxury of risking their career to build a…
I will share my thoughts. Happy to be challenged and discuss more.
I think instead of looking for a past era solution we should look for a completely new solution set. Why not work on creating open systems. May be instead of getting a leverage over employers, tech people should contribute and create parallel systems. Which instead of creating monopolies help anyone challenge the status quo easily. I think it already happens to a great degree with many engineers and even companies contributing their tooling, research and solutions to open source.
May be we just need to accelerate that trend?
We totally should walk away from zero sum view. So not employer vs us. But how do we make sure that engine for innovation and opportunities keeps on running and keep on creating new companies
Re: Employee activism in tech stops short of organizing unions
#34Earlier quoted context omitted.
> but they never really exceed the corruptness of the corporate powers they negotiate with I'm not convinced that is the case, nor is it an either or (union or corporate powers). Your protection by the union depends on what the union negotiates... beyond that their ability to effect change pretty much stops there. Then you are again at the mercy of your employer. I've had first had experience with "oh yeah they can d…
You only have the current benefits because some sort of union fought for them. Call it government, call it whatever but it was an organization fighting on your behalf. > beyond that their ability to effect change pretty much stops there. Is that true? You can't negotiate even further by yourself? I think you do.
>You only have the current benefits because some sort of union fought for them.
I think that is a bit of a grand statement don't you think?
I've worked non union jobs and I'm pretty sure the benefits I get are not directly due to a union... I wouldn't associate ALL benefits with a union, nor would that necessitate forming one simply if you thought those benefits were related.
I've worked for some nice people, I do belive they seriously want to provide their people benefits...
>Is that true? You can't negotiate even further by yourself? I think you do.
Negotiate what exactly? The Union and corporate relationship generally lays out what the lay of the land is, the the areas that the employer gets to decide are usually pretty obvious and the union isn't likely to call a general strike because an employer made a choice.
Re: Employee activism in tech stops short of organizing unions
#35There has to be a balance of power between labor and management. When management has too much power, that power will be abused. When labor has too much power, that power will be abused. Unions make sense when labor doesn't have any power. Do programmers have enough power? I'd say yes. Maybe not across the board but -- in general -- yes. We aren't coal miners, that's for sure.
But not all tech workers are programmers. To compare to another union, the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers (IAM) represents machinists from Boeing and Harley-Davidson, distribution center workers at IKEA, and also wood, pulp and paper workers.
Re: Employee activism in tech stops short of organizing unions
#36Maybe unionization needs a disrupt? I'm not against unionization in a lot of industries, but it just doesn't make sense in its current form for the tech scene or any other high demand position. It feels like an outdated mechanism used for people who were happy to sit in the same role, doing the same thing, for 45yrs.
It's hard for me to envision unions in a white collar environment when there's a pretty high likelihood of individual contributors being promoted to management. In factories, there's usually a separate management class of people who are engineers or college grads who are brought in to lead, so the whole worker vs management dichotomy is much clearer.
Re: Employee activism in tech stops short of organizing unions
#37There has to be a balance of power between labor and management. When management has too much power, that power will be abused. When labor has too much power, that power will be abused. Unions make sense when labor doesn't have any power. Do programmers have enough power? I'd say yes. Maybe not across the board but -- in general -- yes. We aren't coal miners, that's for sure.
It depends on the specific industry in tech.
Do programmers in general tech startups have enough power? I’d say yes too. Do programmers in the gaming industry have enough power? Definitely not.
Re: Employee activism in tech stops short of organizing unions
#38Tangent - there was an article on the NYTimes the other day about how their editorial work was trivializing Bernie Sanders political impact the last election and actually using misleading headlines to distort the truth. I’ll try to find the link (on my phone now). It was pretty eye opening and had links to sources as well as exposing some of these editors and their role working for the Clinton camp. I call this out b…
The problem is that Sanders is in a democratic primary. If people in the circle of democratic party thinking aren't valid sources for reporting on a democratic political candidate, who is? Clinton was the party nominee -- all of the players will have done something connected to that campaign. The democratic party is a big-tent and demands consensus. When all of these connected folks eyeroll at the guy, it hints that…
The problem isn't that the democratic party is doing what's best for the democratic party. The problem is that The New York Times is doing what's best for the democratic party. They claim to be journalism but more and more, they are clearly biased political activism (as is the case with this story).
Re: Employee activism in tech stops short of organizing unions
#39Tangent - there was an article on the NYTimes the other day about how their editorial work was trivializing Bernie Sanders political impact the last election and actually using misleading headlines to distort the truth. I’ll try to find the link (on my phone now). It was pretty eye opening and had links to sources as well as exposing some of these editors and their role working for the Clinton camp. I call this out b…
Well, yeah. First of all, tech is a threat to established media. They were asleep at the wheel in the 2000's and most of the 2010's and missed that many people started getting their news from online sources. Secondly, established-leftist-media such as the NYT is anti-tech because their belief that tech helped elect the current administration. You will see these calls to action dissipate when a new administration gets elected.
Re: Employee activism in tech stops short of organizing unions
#40Earlier quoted context omitted.
How confident are you that this climate will continue for the rest of your working life? How confident are you that this climate will extend past your working life?
We can form a union when we need to form a union. There's no point in forming one just in case software engineering no longer becomes a sought-after skilled job.
==We can form a union when we need to form a union.==
In my 35 years of life, it has become harder to start a union, so it isn't out of the question that it becomes harder and harder to start a union when software engineers "need to". There's no guarantee that what exists today will exist tomorrow.