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Kickstarter employees vote to unionize

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Re: Kickstarter employees vote to unionize

#651

Post by TylerE »

kerkeslager wrote: post #646
ChuckMcM wrote: post #584

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tech workers could have effectively used the leverage associated with unionization since at least 1984 during the semiconductor recession. Considering that the revenue per employee number is at an all time high, and the amount of money the company spends on the employee's working environment[1] is at record lows pretty much explains why this is going to be effective now when it wasn't before. There is also the issue…

Also, frankly, fsk free snacks. Pay me the money you were going to spend on snacks, and I'll choose whether to spend it on snacks or not. And since the money spent on free snacks was probably about $20/week, it won't be a significant consideration in any of my decisions. Bus service might be more significant in some places, but every place I've ever lived had that subsidized by the government, and long commutes are a…

They are buying more than the snacks. They are buying you time, since you never need to make office grocery runs to stock your desk. Might not be a huge deal, but elimination of chores really is a perk.

Re: Kickstarter employees vote to unionize

#652

Post by Seenso »

yibg wrote: post #469
commandlinefan wrote: post #450

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actors are unionized (or “guildized”, which is basically the same thing), but their pay varies wildly and seems to be more or less relative to their objective value.

That’s a good example. I don’t know much about it, what benefits does the union in this case provide that isn’t achievable without one?

> That’s a good example. I don’t know much about it, what benefits does the union in this case provide that isn’t achievable without one?

This seems like an important benefit:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Residual_(entertainment_indust...:

> Residuals are royalties that are paid to the actors, film or television directors, and others involved in making TV shows and movies in cases of reruns, syndication, DVD release, or online streaming release. Residuals are calculated and administered by industry trade unions like SAG-AFTRA, the Directors Guild of America, and the Writers Guild of America.

Per the wiki page, these rights were won and have been maintained by striking and union-lead contract negotiations.

Re: Kickstarter employees vote to unionize

#653

Post by sjg007 »

elicash wrote: post #472
baron816 wrote: post #451

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree. Professional sports leagues are both monopolies and monopsonies (meaning they’re the only ones hiring those specialized athletes). So the market dynamics are very different from that of tech. If you’re a NFL linebacker, you don’t really have an option to switch leagues if you’re unhappy with how it’s run. If you’re a software engineer, you can switch companies very easily.

I brought up professional sports unions in the context of having a highly competitive group of workers who make large salaries, and that a union can still be useful in that environment as far as negotiations. That professional sports are monopolies and monopsonies isn't particularly relevant to this point. The fact that tech workers can find a job elsewhere is even more motiviation to unionize because you have even m…

It actually wasn't until baseball unions that players actually started getting paid well.

Re: Kickstarter employees vote to unionize

#654

Post by triceratops »

notyourday wrote: post #581
elicash wrote: post #379

1. Why do tech workers need a union? If you want to improve your workplace, you have additional leverage to fight for changes if you're in a union. There's often very little you can do alone. This might be things like pay, or it might be something else entirely. 2. But aren't tech workers elite coddled rich kids who are lucky to make what they receive? I mean, no. But even if so, high pay doesn't stop athletes from j…

> But even if so, high pay doesn't stop athletes from joining a union. Most of athletes aren't high paid. You don't hear about them and the high-paid athletes via players unions do everything possible to prevent newcomers from joining their ranks -- that's why there are deadlines when the teams must bring the number of people on a team down to a certain number. Most of SAG/AFTRA members only dream of a principal role…

> Most of SAG/AFTRA members only dream of a principal role again after using the exceptions while collecting tips slinging drinks in bars or carrying plates in restaurants.

And yet, they get healthcare through the union. Minimum rates for when they do find work. Residuals to get them through lean years.

Re: Kickstarter employees vote to unionize

#655

Post by Apocryphon »

scarface74 wrote: post #636
eropple wrote: post #600

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course there's no monopoly. But tech companies are pretty happy to collude, both at an executive level (we've had court cases about this) and at the memetic "this is what we think about management" one, in order to work against workers' interests. We, too, are allowed to work together to combat this. Wage suppression, limiting our ability to grow and expand into different areas, and controlling the ability to exer…

There are only 20-35 “companies” that a professional athlete can work at. There are literally hundreds if not thousands of places employing “tech workers”. If companies are colluding, that’s the issue where the government needs to intervene.

The tech collusion case involved most of the industry leaders, and thus presumably the highest payers.

Re: Kickstarter employees vote to unionize

#656

Post by three_seagrass »

thu2111 wrote: post #468
jimbokun wrote: post #449

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, not a monopoly, but Apple, Google, and several other major Silicon Valley corporations did collude to keep developer salaries low.

That was discovered and busted by the government. It appears unions aren't necessary to end wage fixing cartels. And especially, note that unions are wage fixing cartels!

This is survivor bias. That example is only known because it was caught and fixed - there are a myriad of other issues that are unseen by the public that a union could address.

Re: Kickstarter employees vote to unionize

#657

Post by HarryHirsch »

whatshisface wrote: post #522
totaldude87 wrote: post #443

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the tech people/artists working on gaming industry , Uber's male chauvinistic culture and the problems associated with that can be a typical examples of "why tech needs to unionize". So far , the medium.com has been the "systematic problems reporting tool" for tech and that just generates the views and small changes.. In the past decade, i hate to see that the word "unionizing" in itself has become a bad word…

> Uber's male chauvinistic culture and the problems associated with that can be a typical examples of "why tech needs to unionize" Why wouldn't the same employees that are setting Uber's culture set the union culture? The union is a collective bargaining unit that acts on behalf of the workers, not the most moral and upstanding workers, or the most progressive workers, or the workers that represent you personally.

There's always the danger that a faction takes over an organization. (Bipartisan consensus is especially bad, don't run for the hills when you encounter it, instead raise the alarm and protest vociferously.)

Luckily there is institutional experience how to prevent a descent into oligarchic bureaucracy: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Union_Democracy

Re: Kickstarter employees vote to unionize

#658

Post by kerkeslager »

austincheney wrote: post #644
elicash wrote: post #379

1. Why do tech workers need a union? If you want to improve your workplace, you have additional leverage to fight for changes if you're in a union. There's often very little you can do alone. This might be things like pay, or it might be something else entirely. 2. But aren't tech workers elite coddled rich kids who are lucky to make what they receive? I mean, no. But even if so, high pay doesn't stop athletes from j…

> Some issues are systemic across an industry. The biggest problems I have with this industry most developers don't want fixed. So unless a union offers something like a certification, licensing, or credentialing program for its members, like the security industry does, I don't see a union solving the software industry problems most frustrating to me. A license or certification is valuable because it provides a commo…

Developers don't want this because 1) at least in the US, our educational system is prohibitively costly, and your solution proposes putting the cost of that on developers, including not having time off for education, and 2) that's mostly a problem for employers, not developers--I'm quite capable of working with poorly-qualified and poorly-skilled developers and my work looks better by comparison.

You're proposing that developers pay to solve their employers' problem.

I don't think you'd find many developers who object to their employers paying for education and giving them time off to pursue that education.

Re: Kickstarter employees vote to unionize

#659

Post by celdon25 »

refurb wrote: post #527
celdon25 wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I really don't understand this. A career in software is one of the most pampered and lucrative ones I can think of. Due to the shortage of software engineers, we can go anywhere and get a job instantly. There are dozens and dozens of threads on this site about the cancerous software engineering interview techniques in widespread use in the industry. Despite having 15 years of experience and a lot of accomplishments…

You think a union is going to fix the interview process?

My point was more that the "if you don't like your job, you can easily leave" isn't as much of an option for people as many think. If you can manage to get through the interview cancer, you still run the risk of your next job being equally as bad, or worse than before.

I don't think unions are going to be much use here, however, and they may even make things worse. Raising the industry-average cost of an employee means fewer jobs in the industry, meaning even more difficulty for an employee to "just get a job elsewhere if you don't like it".

Re: Kickstarter employees vote to unionize

#660

Post by heavyset_go »

xur17 wrote: post #582
linuxftw wrote: post #410

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The number 1 reason to form a union in the tech world is so a company can't pull a Disney. Replace all your full time workers with imported 'contractors' and force you to train them. Getting rid of the 'contractor' loop hole in tech will be better for everyone.

> The number 1 reason to form a union in the tech world is so a company can't pull a Disney. Replace all your full time workers with imported 'contractors' and force you to train them. How do they force you to train your replacement? There are plenty of jobs in tech right now, you could (and should) just walk out the door if something like that occurs.

Some people have bills to pay and mouths to feed, and don't want their kids going without health insurance for potentially months between jobs. The individual market for health insurance is terrible and COBRA is another expensive liability for someone without a job.
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