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Id Software devs form "wall-to-wall" union

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Re: Id Software devs form "wall-to-wall" union

#321

Post by Jensson »

overfeed wrote: post #319
Izkata wrote: post #304

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I provided a range of leader:worker income/power ratios from 1:0 to 1:1 with no commentary whatsoever on outcomes For a slight perspective change, the thing that leads to what they mentioned: They're saying you forgot about the range 1:1 to 0:1.

> They're saying you forgot about the range 1:1 to 0:1. Color me intrigued! Tell me more about these slave-CEOs serving at the beck and call of empowered workers. I didn't merely forget about the 1:1 to 0:1 range, it's an Outside-Context scenario. I confess I have never encountered - or thought about - organizations with inverted hierarchies. Do you have any specific example of such a thing?

> I confess I have never encountered - or thought about - organizations with inverted hierarchies

Managers tend to make less than pop stars etc, the range exists. On some engineering teams the non-technical manager makes less than the engineers.

Being a manager doesn't mean you are well paid, he is just a bureaucrat managing the relations to those who want your services.

Re: Id Software devs form "wall-to-wall" union

#322

Post by lucyjojo »

appreciatorBus wrote: post #86
overfeed wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But that's cold comfort to someone who doesn't have a job because the company went out of business I suppose only those who lose their jobs because of a merger, or the CEO making poor decisions ought to get the warm and fuzzies because someone on the Internet won't blame them for their own misfortune. Somewhere on the spectrum between "egalitarian, flat organization Utopia" and "Slavery", one has to draw a line whe…

You forgot that collective ruin is also an option and we have seen this many times when societies attempted to do away with economic & market concepts.

this is actually pretty rare.

most case of ruin come from hostile warfare and/or interventions/state terrorism.

Re: Id Software devs form "wall-to-wall" union

#323

Post by sshine »

Daishiman wrote: post #150
sshine wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, unions can be protectionist about their work force, but there are international worker unions; maybe this is a European thing. An econ 101 observation: unions contribute to structural unemployment: Keeping wages above market-clearing levels, and by preventing wage adjustment. Through collective bargaining, unions can negotiate wages that are higher than what the market would naturally set. This can lead to the c…

> An econ 101 observation Econ 101 observations are utterly useless without the specific context in which they're made. This is like talking about spherical cows in a vacuum in the context of aerodynamics. In the specific case of unions, they always forget to mention that a higher proportion of a company's income going to salaries generally means increased consumer spending for workers, which spurs other kinds of ind…

> second and third-order effects are not really talked about in Econ 101.

Exactly, the purpose is to teach concepts, not the whole picture.

Re: Id Software devs form "wall-to-wall" union

#325

Post by lenkite »

Manuel_D wrote: post #197
jimbokun wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are a lot of defacto cartels where all of the corporations determine a ceiling on wages they won't go over. There was a big case with Apple and other Silicon Valley corporations were found to have colluded to not hire employees working for any of the other companies.

> There was a big case with Apple and other Silicon Valley corporations were found to have colluded to not hire employees working for any of the other companies. And there's some factories in Asia that confiscate foreign worker's passports. Nobody is claiming that workers' ability to move jobs is never compromised by employees. The question is, is there any evidence to back up that Id employees are in this situation…

> the best people can come up with is point to a decades old no-poaching agreement

Why shouldn't Id employees be smart and protect themselves in a job market currently going bad for IT ?

Regarding the US in general, wage-fixing is still pretty common

https://www.reuters.com/legal/litigation/us-nuclear-plant-op...

"In July 2025, a class action lawsuit was filed against Constellation Energy, Duke Energy, Pacific Gas & Electric and other U.S. nuclear plant operators, alleging that they conspired to suppress and coordinate worker pay for thousands of employees dating back to 2003. This lawsuit claims the companies acted together to keep wages low, which plaintiffs allege violates antitrust law"

"In a landmark verdict on April 14, 2025, the U.S. Department of Justice Antitrust Division notched its first-ever jury trial conviction for criminal wage-fixing under the Sherman Act in United States v. Eduardo Lopez in the District of Nevada. A home health care staffing executive, Eduardo (“Eddie”) Lopez, was found guilty of (1) conspiring with several competing home healthcare staffing agencies to fix the wages of home health nurses in the Las Vegas area, and..." https://www.crowell.com/en/insights/client-alerts/doj-secure...

"Hagens Berman: $200.2 Million in Settlements Reached in Lawsuit Accusing Red Meat Processing Industry of Wage-Fixing" https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20240909921707/en/Hag...

Re: Id Software devs form "wall-to-wall" union

#326

Post by lenkite »

Manuel_D wrote: post #192
salawat wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh, yes, because we've never seen a case where large companies entered into no poach agreements to suppress worker wages, right? Oh wait... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-Tech_Employee_Antitrust_L... Quit the gaslighting.

This collusion affected 8 companies, and stopped over a decade and a half ago. Is there any evidence that Id employees are being subject to this kind of no poach agreement?

"Is there any evidence that Id employees are being subject to this kind of no poach agreement?"

Why should there be evidence ? They have a right to be pro-active and protect themselves from the C-suite.

Re: Id Software devs form "wall-to-wall" union

#327

Post by DesiLurker »

unionmember99 wrote: post #241
DesiLurker wrote: post #169

As a non gaming engineer, I dont want a union, what I really want is solid (really, harsh) enforcement of basic common sense labor rules for exempt workers like weekly working hour limits, no after hours scheduling or minimum notice/severance period for layoffs & many other abuses. Problem is tech industry does not wants to give an inch and workers don't complain because of higher pay and 'lottery ticket' effect. I f…

OK, so if you don't want a union, but you want to achieve goals which are typically fought for by unions, what exactly is the alternative mechanism you propose for achieving these goals? This sounds to me like "I don't want memory protection, what I really want is for my computer to solidly enforce common sense memory barriers", or "I don't want defense attorneys, what I really want is courts to provide common sense…

Did you miss the last sentence or had your mind made up already by then?

the reason I don't want a typical union is because they work out well where there is a clear separation of labor & capital. labor get paid wages & capital makes money off the invested assets. problem with tech is that in a tech ventures labor is a part owner and capital too (engineer equity). introducing a 3rd party (unions & union leadership) in these situations will likely have the worst effect on the capital portion of labor & possibly eroding the incentives altogether. Imagine having a set of union rules to follow when distributing equity to early stage engineers? how do you decide equitable when by definition you are on cutting edge of tech & innovation. & if you think that wont happen you are mistaken, that is where the biggest pie is and unions arent exactly 'shining beacon of honesty and integrity' either. Look all I want is just some basic labor laws are followed and tech employees dont feel the panic when they hear slack-chime on a weekend night.

there are other mechanisms like state level enforcement of labor laws and punitive fines. you know the good old law enforcement. its really not so hard if you actually want to do it.

Re: Id Software devs form "wall-to-wall" union

#328

Post by FrustratedMonky »

overfeed wrote: post #294
appreciatorBus wrote: post #240

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> somewhere on the spectrum between "egalitarian, flat organization Utopia" and "Slavery" I didn't say that collective ruin was a result of unionism, only that that you appeared to be trying illustrate a point by outlining a broad spectrum of outcomes, but IMO you forgot one common outcome of forced collectivization. Where it belongs on that spectrum can be debated but that it's a common outcome cannot be.

I provided a range of leader:worker income/power ratios from 1:0 to 1:1 with no commentary whatsoever on outcomes, because my entire point is that the outcome doesn't matter: at some threshold value and below, the existence of the org itself is immoral. We don't have to agree on where that point is, but its existence shouldn't be up for debate, IMO. I hope we can all agree that a slave plantation should not exist in…

The threshold does exist. Doesn't the poverty line take into account local conditions for median food/rent prices?

So minimum wage should be enough to be above poverty line.

This would solve cases like walmart employees being in poverty and needing government assistance to live.

Re: Id Software devs form "wall-to-wall" union

#329

Post by FrustratedMonky »

cogman10 wrote: post #208
AnthonyMouse wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not all of those were instances of the management purposely screwing people, but let's suppose some of them were. Should the conclusion then be that we should find ways to prevent that from happening again, or should it be that two wrongs make a right?

Not all businesses fail because of unions, but let's suppose some of them did. Should the conclusion then be that we should find ways to prevent that from happening again, or should it be that two wrongs make a right? It goes both ways. There are plenty of nations with strong unions throughout. In the US some work is primarily done by unions (such as trade work). The fact that someone can pull up an example where a u…

"he fact that someone can pull up an example where a union caused a business to go under doesn't make me think "we should eliminate unions""

It seems here it does.

For years every time a company fails that also happened to have a union, the union gets blamed. Never mind the management decision.

It's just a common flame bait for some groups to hate unions. That group doesn't actually reasonably think out these things.

It's like 'woke', the word 'union' is a key word that some groups use to label others for hate. They aren't sitting back and making an economic argument.

Re: Id Software devs form "wall-to-wall" union

#330

Post by tremon »

sbierwagen wrote: post #317
Animats wrote: post #111

Funny how the "story" doesn't link to the announcement it mostly copied from the CWA.[1] Here's the link to the union organizing page.[2] No draft union contract for Id, though. Interestingly, this is an industrial ("wall to wall") union, rather than a craft union such as The Animation Guild. IATSE Local 839, in Hollywood. TAG only represents specific jobs, mostly animation artists. A key point in TAG contracts is ho…

Double time at 14 hours? IBEW local 46 starts double time after 10: https://ibew46.com/media/7641/071724iwtentativelyagreedto.pd...

Electrical work is physical work, to point out just one obvious difference.
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