Microsoft workers to form company’s first union in the U.S.(wsj.com)
wsj.com
Microsoft workers to form company’s first union in the U.S.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/microsoft-workers-to-form-companys-first-union-in-the-u-s-11672779470
217 comments
I try to work in the game industry when possible.
Unions on the game industry would never work, reason why game industry is so abusive is two fold:
1. A lot of young people believe working with games is only fun, providing endless bodies to be hired and replace the previous young that realized how much it suck that they quit.
2. Games market follow a very strong winner takes all model, a few games have all profits, literally thousands games are released yearly that nobody ever heard of or bought.
As such here is the situation:
1. Very few companies (because of previous point 2) can afford to pay good wages and benefits.
2. The few companies that actually are wealthy, get so much applicants that every year starry eyed talented newbies will join for shit pay. Hell, when I had my own company people wanted to work for free even!
3. If a union starts to form, the company will just get rid of it somehow, even if is extremely bad PR, because people will still willingly throw themselves at such jobs thinking "EA Spouse" description of crunch time is a dream, not a nightmare.
Note: currently unemployed again. I am in love enough with games to want to brave all its shittyness, but I don't have my hopes up that I will get a game job, because my wife is pregnant and I need wages that allow me to take care of 3 people now, and I know in the game industry this is very unlikely. When I first finished university nongames companies offered me usually at least 3x what game industry did for same positions. My first job ended with me getting 5x the highest offer I got from game industry. I accepted it because the game industry offer was lower than my student debt repayments for my Game Design and Production degree...
Unions on the game industry would never work, reason why game industry is so abusive is two fold:
1. A lot of young people believe working with games is only fun, providing endless bodies to be hired and replace the previous young that realized how much it suck that they quit.
2. Games market follow a very strong winner takes all model, a few games have all profits, literally thousands games are released yearly that nobody ever heard of or bought.
As such here is the situation:
1. Very few companies (because of previous point 2) can afford to pay good wages and benefits.
2. The few companies that actually are wealthy, get so much applicants that every year starry eyed talented newbies will join for shit pay. Hell, when I had my own company people wanted to work for free even!
3. If a union starts to form, the company will just get rid of it somehow, even if is extremely bad PR, because people will still willingly throw themselves at such jobs thinking "EA Spouse" description of crunch time is a dream, not a nightmare.
Note: currently unemployed again. I am in love enough with games to want to brave all its shittyness, but I don't have my hopes up that I will get a game job, because my wife is pregnant and I need wages that allow me to take care of 3 people now, and I know in the game industry this is very unlikely. When I first finished university nongames companies offered me usually at least 3x what game industry did for same positions. My first job ended with me getting 5x the highest offer I got from game industry. I accepted it because the game industry offer was lower than my student debt repayments for my Game Design and Production degree...
> 1. A lot of young people believe working with games is only fun, providing endless bodies to be hired and replace the previous young that realized how much it suck that they quit.
> 2. Games market follow a very strong winner takes all model, a few games have all profits, literally thousands games are released yearly that nobody ever heard of or bought.
These are both true of movies, but that is a heavily unionized industry.
> 2. Games market follow a very strong winner takes all model, a few games have all profits, literally thousands games are released yearly that nobody ever heard of or bought.
These are both true of movies, but that is a heavily unionized industry.
The film industry has a lot of young talent trying to break into the industry, but the industry is mostly composed of older people with better sense of their own worth.
The games industry has almost no old talent. There are many non-trivially-sized game studios where nobody working there is over 30.
Presumably, on the film-industry side, this is in part a work of the unions, acting as barriers-to-entry to the industry and thereby limiting the supply of (⇒ increasing the demand for) their existing membership.
Not knowing much about the history of film, I would guess that film-industry unions — besides the blue-collar labor unions, that likely arose organically just as they did everywhere — originally arose out mostly from the natural limited supply of "famous actors" who thus already formed an implicit power bloc within the industry.
The games industry really doesn't have a natural power bloc equivalent to "famous actors." There are some famous directors, but they just go found their own studios if they don't like working conditions elsewhere (since business/people management is already their comparative advantage.)
The games industry has almost no old talent. There are many non-trivially-sized game studios where nobody working there is over 30.
Presumably, on the film-industry side, this is in part a work of the unions, acting as barriers-to-entry to the industry and thereby limiting the supply of (⇒ increasing the demand for) their existing membership.
Not knowing much about the history of film, I would guess that film-industry unions — besides the blue-collar labor unions, that likely arose organically just as they did everywhere — originally arose out mostly from the natural limited supply of "famous actors" who thus already formed an implicit power bloc within the industry.
The games industry really doesn't have a natural power bloc equivalent to "famous actors." There are some famous directors, but they just go found their own studios if they don't like working conditions elsewhere (since business/people management is already their comparative advantage.)
Unions create a wage floor and standards of working conditions which eliminates the main benefit of churning though young and optimistic people trying to break into the industry. That's another reason (besides barriers to entry) that unions are responsible for why the film industry has more "old" talent than games.
Ehhh... the "wage floor" in the film industry is nothing to strive for.
https://www.thelightleaks.com/think-pieces/reality-of-unpaid...
https://www.thelightleaks.com/think-pieces/reality-of-unpaid...
>The games industry has almost no old talent.
Guess I need to tell all the older people in the game industry I know they need to quit.
Guess I need to tell all the older people in the game industry I know they need to quit.
I live in Los Angeles, surrounded by people who work in entertainment. There's also a very heavy gaming company presence here. A lot of the companies will cross-hire, in fact, because there's a lot of overlap (voice-work, art, cgi+vfx, post-production, editing, etc).
Every time, if someone in gaming has the opportunity to take a gig in entertainment, they will choose the entertainment gig.
The industries are very similar, but due to how they evolved they are each a mirror image of the other had each taken a different path to labor organizing. Hollywood was (and in many ways still is) THE most exploitative industry when it came to profit sharing, dangerous+stressful+long working conditions, etc. But at least the unions guarantee certain things like breaks and time off, healthy pay floors (e.g. an entry level writer on a tv show will make $120k that year if they work 8 months, $70k if they work 6 months, etc), health insurance between gigs, a pension, etc, even to their minimum wage workers. Gaming workers can have this too if they realize the profitable game studios literally cannot make a profit without their labor, and organize en masse accordingly.
Every time, if someone in gaming has the opportunity to take a gig in entertainment, they will choose the entertainment gig.
The industries are very similar, but due to how they evolved they are each a mirror image of the other had each taken a different path to labor organizing. Hollywood was (and in many ways still is) THE most exploitative industry when it came to profit sharing, dangerous+stressful+long working conditions, etc. But at least the unions guarantee certain things like breaks and time off, healthy pay floors (e.g. an entry level writer on a tv show will make $120k that year if they work 8 months, $70k if they work 6 months, etc), health insurance between gigs, a pension, etc, even to their minimum wage workers. Gaming workers can have this too if they realize the profitable game studios literally cannot make a profit without their labor, and organize en masse accordingly.
> But at least the unions guarantee certain things like
Except in VFX which is as young as gaming industry and suffers from the same problems.
Except in VFX which is as young as gaming industry and suffers from the same problems.
Well, unfortunately the major VFX houses today are not unionized. There used to be some, but Marvel opened the floodgates to contracting out major VFK work to non-union companies.
I imagine this will be added to the list of grievances animators historically have had with the lack of union protections in recent years, and used as a negotiation chip in the next round of strikes. After all, union films and tv shows cannot use non-union actors or crews in most cases. I imagine there will be a similar rule made that union productions cannot work with non-union vfx agencies, eventually.
I imagine this will be added to the list of grievances animators historically have had with the lack of union protections in recent years, and used as a negotiation chip in the next round of strikes. After all, union films and tv shows cannot use non-union actors or crews in most cases. I imagine there will be a similar rule made that union productions cannot work with non-union vfx agencies, eventually.
Perhaps we need a different revenue model for games.
Book publishing was pretty winner-take-all, until Kindle Unlimited (and its close relative, the many serial-fiction "unlock new chapters with coins" websites and apps) came along, and basically changed everything for many indie authors.
Before, you needed to woo a publisher, because you needed to be in bookstores, because you needed a certain threshold of word-of-mouth to be stirred up around your releases, in order to get sales that would let you make enough to cover your own advances.
But with the Kindle Unlimited model (users pay a flat subscription fee; authors get paid per page read) it's now practical to earn a living just by writing and maybe talking your book up on your own personal social media — no need to find a publisher, no need to make it into bookstores, no need to advertise heavily, no need to make big-hit releases, etc. Just pump out a constant stream of stuff that some people like enough, and you get money.
Could there be a Kindle Unlimited for games? All games are free under subscription; devs get paid proportional to play time?
A quick Google suggests that Apple Arcade might actually be doing this, but Apple Arcade devs are apparently under NDA not to talk about the revenue model. (Maybe because Apple doesn't want the other bigcorps realizing this is working well and being a fast-follower?)
Book publishing was pretty winner-take-all, until Kindle Unlimited (and its close relative, the many serial-fiction "unlock new chapters with coins" websites and apps) came along, and basically changed everything for many indie authors.
Before, you needed to woo a publisher, because you needed to be in bookstores, because you needed a certain threshold of word-of-mouth to be stirred up around your releases, in order to get sales that would let you make enough to cover your own advances.
But with the Kindle Unlimited model (users pay a flat subscription fee; authors get paid per page read) it's now practical to earn a living just by writing and maybe talking your book up on your own personal social media — no need to find a publisher, no need to make it into bookstores, no need to advertise heavily, no need to make big-hit releases, etc. Just pump out a constant stream of stuff that some people like enough, and you get money.
Could there be a Kindle Unlimited for games? All games are free under subscription; devs get paid proportional to play time?
A quick Google suggests that Apple Arcade might actually be doing this, but Apple Arcade devs are apparently under NDA not to talk about the revenue model. (Maybe because Apple doesn't want the other bigcorps realizing this is working well and being a fast-follower?)
Gamepass is probably a better model in terms of utility to people playing games as well as exposure. Apple is not really a big part of traditional gaming, only has a presence in mobile (which is the biggest segment, but not related to the discussion here).
I work in the slot gaming industry. A lot of ex-video game developers end up coming over. May be worth looking into.
>Very few companies (because of previous point 2) can afford to pay good wages and benefits.
Well, it's not ideal, but it's fine if only a few companies can afford to operate in a given field.
Well, it's not ideal, but it's fine if only a few companies can afford to operate in a given field.
> The reason for this dangerous combo? You’re working your dream job.
Doesn't that make it a fair trade? Musicians generally don't make a killing either.
Doesn't that make it a fair trade? Musicians generally don't make a killing either.
I’m not sure it’s fair if the product ends up making a boat loads of money. Games are high risk but a very lucrative industry.
Just look at how successful football players were in getting a slice of the pie. I’d still consider that a dream job.
Just look at how successful football players were in getting a slice of the pie. I’d still consider that a dream job.
(I'm assuming by football you mean American football)
It's not really a fair comparison. The NFL is a monopoly, so there is no way for athletes to vote with their feet. At various times in the past, in order to negotiate the NFLPA has had to decertify in order to sue the league.
The NFL is also not a good proxy, because the average career for an NFL player is 2-3 years, and it is a physically dangerous job.
It's not really a fair comparison. The NFL is a monopoly, so there is no way for athletes to vote with their feet. At various times in the past, in order to negotiate the NFLPA has had to decertify in order to sue the league.
The NFL is also not a good proxy, because the average career for an NFL player is 2-3 years, and it is a physically dangerous job.
The analogy works with European soccer as well though, which isn't as much of a monopoly (given that the European model isn't franchise based).
Soccer does have a pretty big difference though: it isn't particularly dangerous and there are players that participate for a decade and more. That's also why it's not as centralized... Players aren't quiet as endangered when entering, so they're likely more willing to participate in games with smaller payouts.
I would argue that we're overvaluing the level of danger here. All athletes risk their entire career being cut short due to injury. What the European footballing system does (by not being franchised) is allow there to be multiple levels below the "top" level which then justifies the number of children trained in the game so there are careers (of varying degrees of profitability) for many of them.
However what we are discussing is rather the levels of money at the top of such an industry and that concept applies to both sports. Where Ronaldo can earn £25m in a year at Manchester United while still having his "dream job". Football in Europe since the Bosman ruling has allowed its players to share in the wealth of the industry; one could argue that programmers in the gaming industry are not afforded that same. It remains an interesting discussion as to exactly why that is and I think the risks that workers take are not as relevant to the amount of money available in the game and scarcity of the best employees available; which results in such inflationary salaries for the very best employees.
However what we are discussing is rather the levels of money at the top of such an industry and that concept applies to both sports. Where Ronaldo can earn £25m in a year at Manchester United while still having his "dream job". Football in Europe since the Bosman ruling has allowed its players to share in the wealth of the industry; one could argue that programmers in the gaming industry are not afforded that same. It remains an interesting discussion as to exactly why that is and I think the risks that workers take are not as relevant to the amount of money available in the game and scarcity of the best employees available; which results in such inflationary salaries for the very best employees.
Worth noting that Football is a legal cartel, explicitly excluded from antitrust law. You can't really extrapolate much from it as an example.
It's true of association football (soccer) as well, and that's much less cartel-ised. The players have successfully extracted such a high proportion of the surplus that the returns for the club owners as a group are negative.
> Just look at how successful football players were in getting a slice of the pie. I’d still consider that a dream job.
In this case they are the product, and there are a lot of customers. Plenty of people working on the things that make those players valuable, building and staffing stadiums, and filming and broadcasting events worldwide, that don't get a share. Because they aren't the product.
In this case they are the product, and there are a lot of customers. Plenty of people working on the things that make those players valuable, building and staffing stadiums, and filming and broadcasting events worldwide, that don't get a share. Because they aren't the product.
> that don't get a share
They wouldn't have those jobs if the players or the league did not exist. That's their share. They make a lively hood off the product's operations.
They wouldn't have those jobs if the players or the league did not exist. That's their share. They make a lively hood off the product's operations.
I agree. Check the comment I'm replying to for more.
Could you link? I reviewed you comment history and don't know which specific reply you're talking about in this thread. Thanks!
sure but the product is puppets and the devs are arguably the puppeteers.
What do you mean?
Football players aren’t replaceable. At least not at the level people are willing to pay too dollar to watch.
Yes they are. College football gets big ratings every year with replaced players.
> College football gets big ratings every year with replaced players.
We're talking about professionals. If the Chiefs could replace Patrick Mahomes and save themselves $450,000,000 without impacting their business, they would.
We're talking about professionals. If the Chiefs could replace Patrick Mahomes and save themselves $450,000,000 without impacting their business, they would.
The same people that think they're an irreplaceable 10x engineer think athletes are replaceable cogs... imagine that.
And how many Patrick Mahomes is there in Chiefs? Dozen? Dunno amount of players per team in not-football.
Lucrative for a select portion of games. Like music or acting, video game is a winner-take-all marketplace (or rather, winner take most). The typical video game developer outside a well-known studio is working long hours for comparatively little pay because it's very likely the game is not going to make very many sales and there's plenty of passionate people willing to make sacrifices to work on video games.
As other commenters pointed out, it's not like playing in the NFL. It's more like being a high school football player trying to get into the NFL. Or an actor trying to get a part in a Hollywood movie. The chances of a company becoming lucrative off games is slim.
As other commenters pointed out, it's not like playing in the NFL. It's more like being a high school football player trying to get into the NFL. Or an actor trying to get a part in a Hollywood movie. The chances of a company becoming lucrative off games is slim.
Aren't the well-known studios also pretty big and the products they make absolutely humongous in simply the man hours? So even then there isn't that much to pay per employee.
There is some outliers, but simply most games either are not popular or even if they are they also take huge amount of labour to develop.
There is some outliers, but simply most games either are not popular or even if they are they also take huge amount of labour to develop.
Not that successful, assuming you're talking about American football. The players as a whole get a bit less than half of all revenue coming in despite being the ones to actually, you know, play the game.
That sounds a lot more successful than most other industries. I don't think software engineers, or retail employees are getting half of the business' revenue. That sounds like a pro union example.
From what I can tell, that's fundamentally because of the limited number of franchises.
The situation is a bit like cabs in NY city before Uber/Lyft - the medallion owners were the ones who were making the real money.
The situation is a bit like cabs in NY city before Uber/Lyft - the medallion owners were the ones who were making the real money.
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Well, they (and the others) should be getting even less. States or cities subsidizing stadiums isn't as beneficial as originally thought. Those making obscene amounts of money from a public resource should probably contribute more to the infrastructure required to make that money.
Being an NFL football player means you are in like the top 0.0001% of players in a very popular sport, so it's natural that you'd have some leverage.
With the added ingredient that fans follow players for a mixture of ability and personal brand. In that sense, it shares some similarities to acting. Names act as box office draws in ways that aren't purely about acting talent.
If a product makes a boatload of money how is it fair to the business to force them to pay more. What if the game instead went over budget and flopped? Should the workers now owe money to the company? Businesses that can figure out how to make the most money with the resources available to them deserve to make that money and it's unfair to take that money from them.
Why would you think that's fair? We don't choose our talents nor our passions. You should get a decent share of however much value you create. How much you like your job doesn't come into it because it's random.
Because not only is it consensual, but developers are actively sacrificing things to be in the game industry. When you have alternatives you aren't being exploited.
> When you have alternatives you aren't being exploited.
That's a narrow definition. Perhaps a better definition is when the other party knows you don't have leverage and takes advantage of it, you're being exploited.
Paying you little, knowing you'd work for a low wage because this is your passion? Exploitation.
Horrible working conditions, wages, and abuse knowing you're an illegal immigrant with no recourse? Exploitation.
Knowing you need the job for visa purposes and asking you to come in for a 2am code review because a new CEO wants to feel like an engineer? Exploitation.
That's a narrow definition. Perhaps a better definition is when the other party knows you don't have leverage and takes advantage of it, you're being exploited.
Paying you little, knowing you'd work for a low wage because this is your passion? Exploitation.
Horrible working conditions, wages, and abuse knowing you're an illegal immigrant with no recourse? Exploitation.
Knowing you need the job for visa purposes and asking you to come in for a 2am code review because a new CEO wants to feel like an engineer? Exploitation.
> Horrible working conditions, wages, and abuse knowing you're an illegal immigrant with no recourse? Exploitation.
Yes. This scenario includes factors that are depriving the worker of agency, chiefly the lack of recourse due to their illegal immigrant status.
> Paying you little, knowing you'd work for a low wage because this is your passion? Exploitation.
No. If the worker is passionate about their job and is willing to tolerate low wages and long hours that's their decision. Agency is not being deprived. The worker should rethink whether working in their dream field is a good decision, and change jobs. If enough people do it, then the company will not be able to fill positions and will have to change labor practices or close shop. But, chances are, there's plenty of people willing to fill this role and the company is simply following the labor market.
> Knowing you need the job for visa purposes and asking you to come in for a 2am code review because a new CEO wants to feel like an engineer? Exploitation.
Maybe. Was this part of the job description? Some companies are upfront about expectations around crunch time or oncall responsibility. Others are not. Are there factors limiting a worker's agency? I'd say it'd be exploitative to change the work responsibilities on someone who has limited agency to change jobs. An H1B worker whose residency is tied to employment, as you suggest, I would consider exploitative.
Most video game development falls in the middle category. The whole industry has a widespread reputation for demanding crunch time - I don't think one would reasonably say they were deceived if asked to crunch near release. They also have skills that are in demand with plenty of other fields. Heck, the company I work in now acquired a video game studio to work on a 3D Geodesy UI, and everyone's salary basically doubled and they were able to work roughly 9-5.
Yes. This scenario includes factors that are depriving the worker of agency, chiefly the lack of recourse due to their illegal immigrant status.
> Paying you little, knowing you'd work for a low wage because this is your passion? Exploitation.
No. If the worker is passionate about their job and is willing to tolerate low wages and long hours that's their decision. Agency is not being deprived. The worker should rethink whether working in their dream field is a good decision, and change jobs. If enough people do it, then the company will not be able to fill positions and will have to change labor practices or close shop. But, chances are, there's plenty of people willing to fill this role and the company is simply following the labor market.
> Knowing you need the job for visa purposes and asking you to come in for a 2am code review because a new CEO wants to feel like an engineer? Exploitation.
Maybe. Was this part of the job description? Some companies are upfront about expectations around crunch time or oncall responsibility. Others are not. Are there factors limiting a worker's agency? I'd say it'd be exploitative to change the work responsibilities on someone who has limited agency to change jobs. An H1B worker whose residency is tied to employment, as you suggest, I would consider exploitative.
Most video game development falls in the middle category. The whole industry has a widespread reputation for demanding crunch time - I don't think one would reasonably say they were deceived if asked to crunch near release. They also have skills that are in demand with plenty of other fields. Heck, the company I work in now acquired a video game studio to work on a 3D Geodesy UI, and everyone's salary basically doubled and they were able to work roughly 9-5.
One of these examples is so unlike the other two that it's outrageous.
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Shrug I would hate to work in the game industry. I've made games as hobby projects. In all honesty, they're the most boring kind of programming I've done. Game testing sounds even worse.
My current work is pretty boring to other people, but I like it. Would it be right for someone in my role who hates the work to make more money?
My current work is pretty boring to other people, but I like it. Would it be right for someone in my role who hates the work to make more money?
Industry should pay more for people that motivated to do the work. That this level of motivation would be used against employees strikes me as more of an indicator that there is a problem with the industry, perhaps collusion among the big players to keep wages low.
That kind of thing (collusion by big players to keep wages low) strikes me as exploitative.
That kind of thing (collusion by big players to keep wages low) strikes me as exploitative.
> We don't choose our talents nor our passions
You choose your job, though. I'm not overly passionate about what I do, but do it for the stress:compensation ratio.
You choose your job, though. I'm not overly passionate about what I do, but do it for the stress:compensation ratio.
That's exactly my point. There are people who do the same job as you and love it. They may not even feel stress. Should they be paid less than you?
Gaming software engineers, relative to a FAANG engineer for example, are willing to work for less money, work in worse conditions due to a tradeoff for working in a field they are fanatically passionate about. It doesn't matter whether they should or should not be, it just is. That's what those engineers are willing to do. Gaming companies exploit this for profit. If you were a for-profit organization you would do the same - the market is telling you to do it. Whether that is evil or not is up for you to decide.
Same thing happens in fashion, media and entertainment.
Same thing happens in fashion, media and entertainment.
>Same thing happens in fashion, media and entertainment.
And many of those industries unionized to prevent the systematic abuse!
If there was a headline
"Abuser abused many girlfriends in a row" you'd excuse their behavior saying there are plenty of other guys out there they could go with instead.
And many of those industries unionized to prevent the systematic abuse!
If there was a headline
"Abuser abused many girlfriends in a row" you'd excuse their behavior saying there are plenty of other guys out there they could go with instead.
> you'd excuse their behavior saying there are plenty of other guys out there they could go with instead.
Where was I excusing it? I was simply laying out the market reality. If you want to say certain classes of professions "deserve" less or more money, then shouldn't we expand this discussion to all professions (teachers, doctors, lawyers, etc.)? No one is really saying they deserve less, but rather that this is the market reality.
If gaming devs want to unionize then that's their prerogative.
Where was I excusing it? I was simply laying out the market reality. If you want to say certain classes of professions "deserve" less or more money, then shouldn't we expand this discussion to all professions (teachers, doctors, lawyers, etc.)? No one is really saying they deserve less, but rather that this is the market reality.
If gaming devs want to unionize then that's their prerogative.
The answer is as simple as supply and demand.
If there are 200,000 devs who want to work in game dev and 4,000 roles then wages will be depressed by over-supply. This is observable in all sorts of industries, often bordering on exploitation of people who desperately want to work in a specific area and are willing to work on low/no wages to get experience.
You'll also see companies over-paying when key skills are hard to source as the natural complement.
If there are 200,000 devs who want to work in game dev and 4,000 roles then wages will be depressed by over-supply. This is observable in all sorts of industries, often bordering on exploitation of people who desperately want to work in a specific area and are willing to work on low/no wages to get experience.
You'll also see companies over-paying when key skills are hard to source as the natural complement.
You're reaching into "cosmic justice" territory, which is a really bad place to be. It's not up to you or anyone else to fix the fact that the universe is inherently "unfair" (re: people with different passions, dispositions, and life situations), and certainly giving any entity sufficient power to attempt to solve for cosmic injustice is simply paving a road to tyranny with golden intentions.
Not at all. I just object to the toxic idea that professions should pay more or less based on how much much people like doing them. Justify salaries based on supply and demand, and value creation.
"Your job is fun/cool/meaningful whereas my work makes me hate myself. Therefore, I deserve more money than you" is an awfully sour worldview.
Working conditions or health and safety, are not up for debate no matter how amazing or terrible the job is.
"Your job is fun/cool/meaningful whereas my work makes me hate myself. Therefore, I deserve more money than you" is an awfully sour worldview.
Working conditions or health and safety, are not up for debate no matter how amazing or terrible the job is.
> should pay more or less based on how much much people like doing them. Justify salaries based on supply and demand, and value creation.
Reread your sentence and think real hard about it because you're saying the same thing, you're just conflating the premise. Gaming devs ARE based on supply and demand. As one of the other comments points out, the demand is outsized relative to other developer positions (e.g. SaaS dev). Simple supply and demand tells us if the demand is higher, then the price goes down. There ya go.
> Therefore, I deserve more money than you
No one is saying this.
Reread your sentence and think real hard about it because you're saying the same thing, you're just conflating the premise. Gaming devs ARE based on supply and demand. As one of the other comments points out, the demand is outsized relative to other developer positions (e.g. SaaS dev). Simple supply and demand tells us if the demand is higher, then the price goes down. There ya go.
> Therefore, I deserve more money than you
No one is saying this.
> you're saying the same thing, you're just conflating the premise
I understand the effect of passion on supply. You might think I'm making a distinction without a difference but I disagree. We shouldn't normalize the idea that well-paying work has to be unpleasant. "It's called 'work' because it's not fun" is a harmful idea.
> No one is saying this.
Read the comment I originally responded to: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34245152
I understand the effect of passion on supply. You might think I'm making a distinction without a difference but I disagree. We shouldn't normalize the idea that well-paying work has to be unpleasant. "It's called 'work' because it's not fun" is a harmful idea.
> No one is saying this.
Read the comment I originally responded to: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34245152
Well right now there are existing entities with too much power, unions provide a second (less) powerful entity to balance the unchecked power of corporate leaders.
It’s not about correcting a cosmic wrong, it’s about people wanting more power and using a tool to get it.
It’s not about correcting a cosmic wrong, it’s about people wanting more power and using a tool to get it.
It really is, though, about correcting cosmic wrongs, because it is the world view you must first hold to believe something "unjust" is occurring when someone voluntarily bargains to work long hours for lower pay to be able to work their dream job. The next step is to pass legislation or push for judicial or executive action to try to "correct" for the injustice. The U.S. already has several very counter-productive pro-union labor laws it has accumulated over the years, and, under democrat presidents like Obama and Biden, the NLRB rules heavily in favor of unions:
https://cei.org/blog/biden-says-he-wants-to-be-the-most-pro-...
https://www.nationalreview.com/2015/12/adversarial-labor-law...
https://www.dailywire.com/news/bidens-pick-for-labor-secreta...
"Biden has already publicly declared he supports changing federal policy so that “there is no Right to Work (laws) allowed anywhere in the country.” President-in-waiting Kamala Harris, likewise, was bitterly critical of the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2018 decision in Janus v. AFSCME, which outlawed mandatory union membership and payment of dues and/or so-called “agency fees” for government employees."
These laws and actions don't make the world more just. On the contrary, they just add new injustices on top of the old ones: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xzYgiOC9cj4
https://cei.org/blog/biden-says-he-wants-to-be-the-most-pro-...
https://www.nationalreview.com/2015/12/adversarial-labor-law...
https://www.dailywire.com/news/bidens-pick-for-labor-secreta...
"Biden has already publicly declared he supports changing federal policy so that “there is no Right to Work (laws) allowed anywhere in the country.” President-in-waiting Kamala Harris, likewise, was bitterly critical of the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2018 decision in Janus v. AFSCME, which outlawed mandatory union membership and payment of dues and/or so-called “agency fees” for government employees."
These laws and actions don't make the world more just. On the contrary, they just add new injustices on top of the old ones: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xzYgiOC9cj4
Should they be paid less is not the right question. The question is would they be willing to do it for less, and the answer is probably yes.
Nope. If I cannot live comfortably with a dream job, I'll work on something else unfortunately. And work on whatever dream I have with whatever time and energy remains, if any.
Otherwise, I'd already be working on the exact things I want to work on, and earn almost nothing (for maybe a long time).
Otherwise, I'd already be working on the exact things I want to work on, and earn almost nothing (for maybe a long time).
Isn't that your decision ? Why are these two situation related so differently:
I quit my boring job as a dev in the banking sector to work in agriculture, hours are longer and money is tighter but it's my dream job ! (Way to go ! Keep working your dream, money is not everything !!!)
I quit my boring job as a dev in the banking sector to work in the gaming industry, hours are longer and money is tighter but it's my dream job ! (OMG you should unionise, it's so exploitative !!!)
I quit my boring job as a dev in the banking sector to work in agriculture, hours are longer and money is tighter but it's my dream job ! (Way to go ! Keep working your dream, money is not everything !!!)
I quit my boring job as a dev in the banking sector to work in the gaming industry, hours are longer and money is tighter but it's my dream job ! (OMG you should unionise, it's so exploitative !!!)
> Isn't that your decision ?
Of course, but that's the whole point. You want to have me? Give me good working conditions! I'm probably not alone.
I would not relate these two situations differently. Agriculture or gaming industry, working conditions need to allow comfortable living, dream job or not.
I'm not saying anything about unions in my previous comment, but my position is that whether it's a dream job for you should not change anything on your decision to unionize. Not even mentioning unions, you are entitled to require good working conditions regardless.
What's more, your employer has all the incentive to provide you with comfortable living if you could be employed elsewhere with better conditions because you could change your decision to work for them at any time (your situation could change: new child, new housing, medical expense, etc; or even your tastes).
(I'm speaking about comfortable living, not the highest pay you could have somewhere else - even if still gives you some leverage)
What's different in the two situations you expose is that someone working in agriculture has (unfortunately) likely less leverage on their pay negotiation because they would less likely be able to find a place where they would be paid more (if there's no other domain they could work in).
Of course, but that's the whole point. You want to have me? Give me good working conditions! I'm probably not alone.
I would not relate these two situations differently. Agriculture or gaming industry, working conditions need to allow comfortable living, dream job or not.
I'm not saying anything about unions in my previous comment, but my position is that whether it's a dream job for you should not change anything on your decision to unionize. Not even mentioning unions, you are entitled to require good working conditions regardless.
What's more, your employer has all the incentive to provide you with comfortable living if you could be employed elsewhere with better conditions because you could change your decision to work for them at any time (your situation could change: new child, new housing, medical expense, etc; or even your tastes).
(I'm speaking about comfortable living, not the highest pay you could have somewhere else - even if still gives you some leverage)
What's different in the two situations you expose is that someone working in agriculture has (unfortunately) likely less leverage on their pay negotiation because they would less likely be able to find a place where they would be paid more (if there's no other domain they could work in).
> You want to have me? Give me good working conditions! I'm probably not alone.
At those conditions they also very much might not want to have you. And apparently the total package "industry prestige + working condition + pay" is attractive enough for just the right amount of people that they need.
You can argue that it's not a fit for you, but you can't argue that the equilibrium itself that has been reached between the industry and the workers is inherently wrong or that it should magically change in favour of one of the sides.
At those conditions they also very much might not want to have you. And apparently the total package "industry prestige + working condition + pay" is attractive enough for just the right amount of people that they need.
You can argue that it's not a fit for you, but you can't argue that the equilibrium itself that has been reached between the industry and the workers is inherently wrong or that it should magically change in favour of one of the sides.
Note that I was answering to "Doesn't that make it a fair trade?".
I can't argue that things are the way they are (including the equilibrium you are talking about), but that's not I'm trying to do.
"fair" is fairly subjective.
Free market is not necessarily fair (and I don't think it is). That may be part of the reasons why workers are unionizing in the discussed article by the way.
I can't argue that things are the way they are (including the equilibrium you are talking about), but that's not I'm trying to do.
"fair" is fairly subjective.
Free market is not necessarily fair (and I don't think it is). That may be part of the reasons why workers are unionizing in the discussed article by the way.
Precisely. Game developers accept lower standards because they think its worth it. I don't, but they're free to work for less if they want.
I think of it like this:
It's the company's job to maximize shareholder value.
It's the worker's job to maximize worker value.
It's the market's job to push profit to zero.
So the union is like a new force in the equation: they put pressure on the company to give the workers more value.
Which could actually be good for business: if treating workers results in better work product, the shareholders might not push for that (typically markets optimize for quarterly earnings). But the union can secure better conditions for the workers, which might lead to moving to a better local maxima.
It's the company's job to maximize shareholder value.
It's the worker's job to maximize worker value.
It's the market's job to push profit to zero.
So the union is like a new force in the equation: they put pressure on the company to give the workers more value.
Which could actually be good for business: if treating workers results in better work product, the shareholders might not push for that (typically markets optimize for quarterly earnings). But the union can secure better conditions for the workers, which might lead to moving to a better local maxima.
I always think of unions as less a new force in the equation you described and more of a labor side equivalent of the collective organizing and action that happens on the company/shareholder side to maximize value. Instead of individual workers all trying to maximize their value in isolation with the company trying to collectively maximize value for all shareholders, unions ideally make it more of a one-to-one balance of "workers" and "shareholders".
I agree with your general thought that it could be good for business, but I'd take it a small step further and suggest a more comprehensive way to think about what's good for business as encompassing workers and shareholders equally. A situation that optimizes shareholder value at the expense of worker value is not really economically optimal even if that doesn't necessarily damage the business long term. If you can get much better conditions for workers with only a small drop in shareholder value, for example, that could be considered a net win.
I agree with your general thought that it could be good for business, but I'd take it a small step further and suggest a more comprehensive way to think about what's good for business as encompassing workers and shareholders equally. A situation that optimizes shareholder value at the expense of worker value is not really economically optimal even if that doesn't necessarily damage the business long term. If you can get much better conditions for workers with only a small drop in shareholder value, for example, that could be considered a net win.
> only a small drop in shareholder value, for example, that could be considered a net win.
only the shareholders can decide if this is worth a drop. And i would imagine the majority of them would not accept a small drop like that.
only the shareholders can decide if this is worth a drop. And i would imagine the majority of them would not accept a small drop like that.
When shareholders reduce a company to a single metric[shareholder value] the metric becomes meaningless. At that point it doesn't matter.
Musicians and people associated with film media also have collective bargaining via unions.
For example the musicians have the AFM which helped force labels and radio stations to pay royalties to artists.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Federation_of_Music...
For example the musicians have the AFM which helped force labels and radio stations to pay royalties to artists.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Federation_of_Music...
Musicians are generally exploited, too. I don't really see the argument against forming a union just because you enjoy your job. More worker power is a good thing.
Making music is usually not a job. You're making your own intellectual property and sometimes you're successful in selling it.
Should we subsidize other kinds of unsuccessful businesses too?
Should we subsidize other kinds of unsuccessful businesses too?
Musicians are not the ones raking in all the money - the record companies are the ones doing that. There are plenty of articles about how artists would have made more money working at McDonalds while the record company brought in 8-9 digits of revenue. In TLC's case, their 2 albums sold over $100,000,000 yet the 3 artists each received less than $50k. The studio and management companies made bank.
Samples: 0 - https://www.salon.com/2000/06/14/love_7/
1 - http://www.nytimes.com/1996/11/25/business/tlc-settles-suit-...
> The group later revealed that the owner of Pebbitone made them pay $3 million to own the rights to their name.
2 - https://www.cheatsheet.com/entertainment/tlcs-crazysexycool-...
Samples: 0 - https://www.salon.com/2000/06/14/love_7/
1 - http://www.nytimes.com/1996/11/25/business/tlc-settles-suit-...
> The group later revealed that the owner of Pebbitone made them pay $3 million to own the rights to their name.
2 - https://www.cheatsheet.com/entertainment/tlcs-crazysexycool-...
that's not a fair trade off. plenty of other "dream jobs" like athlete, lawyer, doctor, etc. pay gangbusters if you "make it". I'd add the most musicians "don't make it" either
it also goes beyond that, working conditions for game devs are truly abysmal. low wages are just the tip of the iceberg; add it abusive managers, long working hours, etc
it also goes beyond that, working conditions for game devs are truly abysmal. low wages are just the tip of the iceberg; add it abusive managers, long working hours, etc
> Doesn't that make it a fair trade? Musicians generally don't make a killing either.
What are giving me to make it fair?
My feeling of internal satisfaction is genersted in my body, they are not supplying me drugs and cocaine.
Some musicians make a killing and get royalties - who in gane industry gets millions in royalties?
What are giving me to make it fair?
My feeling of internal satisfaction is genersted in my body, they are not supplying me drugs and cocaine.
Some musicians make a killing and get royalties - who in gane industry gets millions in royalties?
No one else generally makes a killing off musicians that aren't also making a killing.
jmyeet(1)
[deleted]
I always try to see into the eyes of all those "stars", "project-managers" and "pr"-talkers, as they try to entice the next generation to wreck themselves, to keep the scam going. Hollywood, Paris, Gamer-town, the beast hungers for fresh flesh and minds. And even if you make it, it will be due to feeding the next generation into the grinder.
You left out Broadway and most professional sports leagues
I am curious about the use of the word "adjacent"
Do you think people writing game software are not software engineers?
Do you think people writing game software are not software engineers?
A lot of game development roles don't involve writing software but are just as exploited, like artists and designers.
They also used the term "subfield".
The Activision/Microsoft merger may get blocked by the FTC[1].
[1] https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/dec/08/us-agency-bl...
[1] https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/dec/08/us-agency-bl...
> The salaries are low, the work is stressful, crunch is high.
Is this because of supply & demand is different from other sectors? Say, people really love building games so they flock to the game industry? I'd imagine that developing games require highly specialized skills: great artistic sense, complex tool chains, deep understanding of maths and physics, and of course excellent programming and engineering skills. Case in point, my friends in the gaming industry routinely reads and implements SIGRAPH papers, or show me cool optimizations they did to all kinds of physics simulations with the NS equation, the constrained particle systems, and etc. It's hard to fathom that such talents get worse work condition that those who build CRUD apps.
Is this because of supply & demand is different from other sectors? Say, people really love building games so they flock to the game industry? I'd imagine that developing games require highly specialized skills: great artistic sense, complex tool chains, deep understanding of maths and physics, and of course excellent programming and engineering skills. Case in point, my friends in the gaming industry routinely reads and implements SIGRAPH papers, or show me cool optimizations they did to all kinds of physics simulations with the NS equation, the constrained particle systems, and etc. It's hard to fathom that such talents get worse work condition that those who build CRUD apps.
Have you ever worked in a company with a union?
Look what just happened to the railroad workers. The US government forced them back to work and gave everything to the companies.
Unions are effectively a corporation running labor. So you go from working for the company to working for your union rep. They then pimp you out and get kick backs. Wanna leave your job for another company or role? Good luck, you drop in seniority and will have your hours and pay cut. When layoffs come, the highest rank in the union decides who gets cut. His golf buddies obviously keep their jobs.
Then you end up like GE or Boeing in a zombie company. Poor management, poor senior engineers, and good, but underpaid low level engineers.
That’s not to say you can’t collaborate and organize. Ive organized my coworkers to make changes before, no union involved.
Look what just happened to the railroad workers. The US government forced them back to work and gave everything to the companies.
Unions are effectively a corporation running labor. So you go from working for the company to working for your union rep. They then pimp you out and get kick backs. Wanna leave your job for another company or role? Good luck, you drop in seniority and will have your hours and pay cut. When layoffs come, the highest rank in the union decides who gets cut. His golf buddies obviously keep their jobs.
Then you end up like GE or Boeing in a zombie company. Poor management, poor senior engineers, and good, but underpaid low level engineers.
That’s not to say you can’t collaborate and organize. Ive organized my coworkers to make changes before, no union involved.
I find it weird that nobody in the US seems to look beyond their country or similar systems for different models regarding this.
Here in Belgium we have some industry specific unions like for rail (idk how the government in the US forces em to do anything).
But most unions are cross industry. They aren't really noticed when working in the context of a specific company too often unless mediation is needed when big lay-offs and shutdowns are happening at big companies or there's safety stuff involved or other such work condition things. They don't really dabble seniority, performance metrics and wages tied to that as far as i'm aware. Whilst they're generally not involved in keeping individuals employed at particular companies they do offer legal services if your company illegally fucks you over or for checking employment contracts or the like, push for huge once in a blue moon strikes if the government considers touching our wage indexation too much. etc.
They are also mostly politically aligned so we have left, liberal, Christian democrat, Flemish nationalist, independent, etc unions essentially competing against each other. Their membership is really cheap probably as a consequence of that.
Here in Belgium we have some industry specific unions like for rail (idk how the government in the US forces em to do anything).
But most unions are cross industry. They aren't really noticed when working in the context of a specific company too often unless mediation is needed when big lay-offs and shutdowns are happening at big companies or there's safety stuff involved or other such work condition things. They don't really dabble seniority, performance metrics and wages tied to that as far as i'm aware. Whilst they're generally not involved in keeping individuals employed at particular companies they do offer legal services if your company illegally fucks you over or for checking employment contracts or the like, push for huge once in a blue moon strikes if the government considers touching our wage indexation too much. etc.
They are also mostly politically aligned so we have left, liberal, Christian democrat, Flemish nationalist, independent, etc unions essentially competing against each other. Their membership is really cheap probably as a consequence of that.
> I find it weird that nobody in the US seems to look beyond their country or similar systems for different models regarding this.
Looking to European models would be great. But the current American union structure is written into federal statute, and there is approximately zero chance of the statute ever being amended.
Looking to European models would be great. But the current American union structure is written into federal statute, and there is approximately zero chance of the statute ever being amended.
> Looking to European models would be great.
Europeans on average earn half of Americans
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_and_terr...
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_European_countries_b...
Software engineers make 4x or more their European counterparts
If unions were effective I’d expect at least somewhat comparable wages… but that’s not the case.
Is it time off it optimized for? I mean that might be fine, but that also means as a union worker you can’t work more and make more. You’re stuck with what the union negotiated.
American unions definitely have their issues. That’s mostly where I’m coming from.
But even European ones, from the data (I’ve never experienced one), doesn’t seem effective.
Europeans on average earn half of Americans
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_and_terr...
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_European_countries_b...
Software engineers make 4x or more their European counterparts
If unions were effective I’d expect at least somewhat comparable wages… but that’s not the case.
Is it time off it optimized for? I mean that might be fine, but that also means as a union worker you can’t work more and make more. You’re stuck with what the union negotiated.
American unions definitely have their issues. That’s mostly where I’m coming from.
But even European ones, from the data (I’ve never experienced one), doesn’t seem effective.
> If unions were effective I’d expect at least somewhat comparable wages… but that’s not the case.
Because wage is all you care for. How about: maternity leave, paid sick leave, child support, paid vacation days, wage protections, etc. etc.? And not just for software engineers, but for everyone?
> that also means as a union worker you can’t work more and make more. You’re stuck with what the union negotiated.
That also means that I cannot be forced to work overtime with no overtime pay.
> But even European ones, from the data (I’ve never experienced one), doesn’t seem effective.
If you only limit your data to only wages, then sure, that data will support whatever narrative you want.
Because wage is all you care for. How about: maternity leave, paid sick leave, child support, paid vacation days, wage protections, etc. etc.? And not just for software engineers, but for everyone?
> that also means as a union worker you can’t work more and make more. You’re stuck with what the union negotiated.
That also means that I cannot be forced to work overtime with no overtime pay.
> But even European ones, from the data (I’ve never experienced one), doesn’t seem effective.
If you only limit your data to only wages, then sure, that data will support whatever narrative you want.
>>Because wage is all you care for.
yes..
>>How about: maternity leave, paid sick leave, child support, paid vacation days, wage protections, etc. etc.?
I have no children, I will never have children, and I rarely get sick, and I hate to travel so none of that matters to me. I am forced by my employer to take the vacation I do get, and my "vacation" is me sitting around my house doing chores or gaming which I do with out vacation time as well
That is the problem with Unions, they often fight for things I do not care about or need. Majoritarianism is always bad for the smallest minority... the individual
>>That also means that I cannot be forced to work overtime with no overtime pay.
Has a highly compensated employee that knows their value to the organizations I work for I have never been forced for work overtime with no pay.
yes..
>>How about: maternity leave, paid sick leave, child support, paid vacation days, wage protections, etc. etc.?
I have no children, I will never have children, and I rarely get sick, and I hate to travel so none of that matters to me. I am forced by my employer to take the vacation I do get, and my "vacation" is me sitting around my house doing chores or gaming which I do with out vacation time as well
That is the problem with Unions, they often fight for things I do not care about or need. Majoritarianism is always bad for the smallest minority... the individual
>>That also means that I cannot be forced to work overtime with no overtime pay.
Has a highly compensated employee that knows their value to the organizations I work for I have never been forced for work overtime with no pay.
> I have no children, I will never have children, and I rarely get sick, and I hate to trave
Ah yes. Because it's only people with children who get sick, need time off work, wage protection or pay for overtime, how could I forget.
> Has a highly compensated employee that knows their value to the organizations I work for I have never been forced for work overtime with no pay.
Me, me, me, I, me, me.
I wonder why overtime and crazy hours are then the norm across so many industries, and parts of industries (including IT).
Ah yes. Because it's only people with children who get sick, need time off work, wage protection or pay for overtime, how could I forget.
> Has a highly compensated employee that knows their value to the organizations I work for I have never been forced for work overtime with no pay.
Me, me, me, I, me, me.
I wonder why overtime and crazy hours are then the norm across so many industries, and parts of industries (including IT).
>>Me, me, me, I, me, me.
You say that like is a bad thing. One should always look out for their own interests. I am unclear why I should not be?
>>I wonder why overtime and crazy hours are then the norm across so many industries
Well I know many documented cases where it is not "required" but the employee feels it is. As a manager I have had to prevent employees from working too much even though I have told them many times it was not required or expected they still did.
>>Because it's only people with children who get sick, need time off work, wage protection or pay for overtime
Not at all, and people that need those things should negotiate them. I have negotiated more vacation time for incoming employees that had that at an important item, I treat each person as an individual and what is good for one employee may not be good for another employee.
I prefer individualism
You say that like is a bad thing. One should always look out for their own interests. I am unclear why I should not be?
>>I wonder why overtime and crazy hours are then the norm across so many industries
Well I know many documented cases where it is not "required" but the employee feels it is. As a manager I have had to prevent employees from working too much even though I have told them many times it was not required or expected they still did.
>>Because it's only people with children who get sick, need time off work, wage protection or pay for overtime
Not at all, and people that need those things should negotiate them. I have negotiated more vacation time for incoming employees that had that at an important item, I treat each person as an individual and what is good for one employee may not be good for another employee.
I prefer individualism
If you're not interested in vacation or sick leave, a union could also help negotiate things that you do value, like [I'm admittedly guessing here] better 401(k) matching, after-tax 401(k) contributions, an ESOP plan, a profit-sharing plan, a more aggressive bonus structure, and so on. Companies are not just going to offer these kinds of things one-off to those few "Captains of Negotiation" and besides, workers shouldn't have to individually negotiate all these things. Yuck!
Whenever a HN union discussion comes up, the arguments against are always "Unions by definition do these things A, B, and C, which I don't like, and don't do D, E, and F, which I would like." Why do we believe this? Is there some law that says all unions must be the same, do the same kinds of things and have the same good and bad attributes?
Whenever a HN union discussion comes up, the arguments against are always "Unions by definition do these things A, B, and C, which I don't like, and don't do D, E, and F, which I would like." Why do we believe this? Is there some law that says all unions must be the same, do the same kinds of things and have the same good and bad attributes?
Unions Negotiation based on majoritarian priorities, so if your desires match the majority of your co-workers then you will be represented in the room
If they do not, your individual wants / needs will be the first on the chopping block in favor of wants / needs that match the majority of workers
>>Companies are not just going to offer these kinds of things one-off to those few "Captains of Negotiation"
Some things they will, some things they can't change by law (i.e the law requires all employees get the same ). Unions rarely move the needle much in my experience for the non-Negotiationable things, which are largely set by things way outside the employment Negotiation. Unions will often take credit for things but in reality it is just PR for the union it was going to happen with or with out the union.
>Why do we believe this?
Most commonly because of direct experience of this happening in real unions.
I have worked in and around manufacturing plants my entire life, I have seen lots of shit from both sides
>>besides, workers shouldn't have to individually negotiate all these things. Yuck!
Why not? I dont understand this mentality where by things should just be given to people. I am continually asking for raises, promotions, etc. I advance because I ask to advance and negotiate my advancement.
Expecting things to just happen for you is a terrible idea, employers are not your parents, they are not "providing" for you, you are trading your labor for money. lets not over complicate this relationship
If they do not, your individual wants / needs will be the first on the chopping block in favor of wants / needs that match the majority of workers
>>Companies are not just going to offer these kinds of things one-off to those few "Captains of Negotiation"
Some things they will, some things they can't change by law (i.e the law requires all employees get the same ). Unions rarely move the needle much in my experience for the non-Negotiationable things, which are largely set by things way outside the employment Negotiation. Unions will often take credit for things but in reality it is just PR for the union it was going to happen with or with out the union.
>Why do we believe this?
Most commonly because of direct experience of this happening in real unions.
I have worked in and around manufacturing plants my entire life, I have seen lots of shit from both sides
>>besides, workers shouldn't have to individually negotiate all these things. Yuck!
Why not? I dont understand this mentality where by things should just be given to people. I am continually asking for raises, promotions, etc. I advance because I ask to advance and negotiate my advancement.
Expecting things to just happen for you is a terrible idea, employers are not your parents, they are not "providing" for you, you are trading your labor for money. lets not over complicate this relationship
> I am unclear why I should not be?
Because yours is a very narrow view that makes you blind to reality and externalities. You, and individual, don't exist in a vacuum.
- when you go to your favorite restaurant or a burger joint, you don't want to be served by an underpaid overworked staff who has been battling pneumonia for two weeks
- when you end up in the hospital, you don't want to be looked after by an underpaid overworked nurse
- when you go to get your car fixed, you don't want the people fixing it to be sick, tired, or worrying about things like whether they have enough money to feed their kids
- ditto for the ground crew servicing the plane you're flying on
- ... the list is endless
> As a manager I
> I have negotiated more vacation time for
> people that need those things should negotiate them.
People can't really negotiate these things because they don't come into these negotiations from a position of power. You, as a manager, and the company you represent have all the power in these negotiations.
You may view yourself as a good benevolent manager and you consider yourself lucky to have worked in companies that are good for some definition of good. This does not scale. You can't expect everyone to be lucky with their work and you can't expect everyone to have a manager who will magnanimously decide you're worthy of an extended vacation time.
You will also not going to be young and healthy forever.
> I prefer individualism
No. You prefer to be an egoist in a society, and reap the benefits that society gives you
Because yours is a very narrow view that makes you blind to reality and externalities. You, and individual, don't exist in a vacuum.
- when you go to your favorite restaurant or a burger joint, you don't want to be served by an underpaid overworked staff who has been battling pneumonia for two weeks
- when you end up in the hospital, you don't want to be looked after by an underpaid overworked nurse
- when you go to get your car fixed, you don't want the people fixing it to be sick, tired, or worrying about things like whether they have enough money to feed their kids
- ditto for the ground crew servicing the plane you're flying on
- ... the list is endless
> As a manager I
> I have negotiated more vacation time for
> people that need those things should negotiate them.
People can't really negotiate these things because they don't come into these negotiations from a position of power. You, as a manager, and the company you represent have all the power in these negotiations.
You may view yourself as a good benevolent manager and you consider yourself lucky to have worked in companies that are good for some definition of good. This does not scale. You can't expect everyone to be lucky with their work and you can't expect everyone to have a manager who will magnanimously decide you're worthy of an extended vacation time.
You will also not going to be young and healthy forever.
> I prefer individualism
No. You prefer to be an egoist in a society, and reap the benefits that society gives you
>>when you go to your favorite restaurant or a burger joint, you don't want to be served by an underpaid overworked staff who has been battling pneumonia for two weeks
No I want to be served by a Robot, and hope mcd;s leads the technology on automation technology to replace humans in the food service space
>>- ... the list is endless
and none of it is relevant and most of them do not work for unions or need unions to get good pay. so....
Union membership in the US have been DROPPING for decades for a reason.
>>You, as a manager, and the company you represent have all the power in these negotiations.
That is bullshit, every time this happen it has been the person we are looking to hire to bring up the things they want / need, All I have done is passed them to HR or my VP to see if the request could be accommodated or not
>>This does not scale. You can't expect everyone to be lucky with their work and you can't expect everyone to have a manager
It does scale but no I do not expect everyone to be "lucky" nor do I think you can eliminate all bad employers even under the EU level of authoritarianism you can not eliminate them all,
I am a capitalist, I believe in capitalism and over all I believe markets are a batter solution to human scale problem that government. History proves me correct and you wrong, history will continue to prove me correct and you wrong
No I want to be served by a Robot, and hope mcd;s leads the technology on automation technology to replace humans in the food service space
>>- ... the list is endless
and none of it is relevant and most of them do not work for unions or need unions to get good pay. so....
Union membership in the US have been DROPPING for decades for a reason.
>>You, as a manager, and the company you represent have all the power in these negotiations.
That is bullshit, every time this happen it has been the person we are looking to hire to bring up the things they want / need, All I have done is passed them to HR or my VP to see if the request could be accommodated or not
>>This does not scale. You can't expect everyone to be lucky with their work and you can't expect everyone to have a manager
It does scale but no I do not expect everyone to be "lucky" nor do I think you can eliminate all bad employers even under the EU level of authoritarianism you can not eliminate them all,
I am a capitalist, I believe in capitalism and over all I believe markets are a batter solution to human scale problem that government. History proves me correct and you wrong, history will continue to prove me correct and you wrong
> No I want to be served by a Robot, and hope mcd;s l
Ah yes. Let's ignore the reality of the now and dream about this glorious robot future.
> and none of it is relevant and most of them do not work for unions or need unions to get good pay.
Just because you say this is irrelevant doesn't make it so
> every time this happen it has been the person we are looking to hire to bring up the things they want / need, All I have done is passed them to HR or my VP
Me: You, as a manager, and the company you represent have all the power in these negotiations.
You: This is bullshit... I pass this on to managers and the company who have all the power to say yes or no to these requests
Moreover, if a person is already working, and for some reason needs an extended vacation, or an extended sick leave etc. they literally have no power over you and your VP, and your company. It's entirely in your power to deny them that request, or have strings attached to the granting of the request etc.
> It does scale but no I do not expect everyone to be "lucky"
Me: Luck doesn't scale
You: It does scale but I don't expect everyone to be lucky
> nor do I think you can eliminate all bad employers even under the EU level of authoritarianism you can not eliminate them all
The US: employers have almost no responsibility towards their workers. There is no end to cases where employees have no to little protections at all
The EU: even with the worst employer you get your sick pay, your vacation, your overtime pay, ...
You: EU is authoritarian, I'd rather wait for robots
This is why I'm saying that your "me, me, I, me, me, me" makes you completely blind to the world. Not to say anything about how little you know about the world outside the U.S. and your lucky little job.
Ah yes. Let's ignore the reality of the now and dream about this glorious robot future.
> and none of it is relevant and most of them do not work for unions or need unions to get good pay.
Just because you say this is irrelevant doesn't make it so
> every time this happen it has been the person we are looking to hire to bring up the things they want / need, All I have done is passed them to HR or my VP
Me: You, as a manager, and the company you represent have all the power in these negotiations.
You: This is bullshit... I pass this on to managers and the company who have all the power to say yes or no to these requests
Moreover, if a person is already working, and for some reason needs an extended vacation, or an extended sick leave etc. they literally have no power over you and your VP, and your company. It's entirely in your power to deny them that request, or have strings attached to the granting of the request etc.
> It does scale but no I do not expect everyone to be "lucky"
Me: Luck doesn't scale
You: It does scale but I don't expect everyone to be lucky
> nor do I think you can eliminate all bad employers even under the EU level of authoritarianism you can not eliminate them all
The US: employers have almost no responsibility towards their workers. There is no end to cases where employees have no to little protections at all
The EU: even with the worst employer you get your sick pay, your vacation, your overtime pay, ...
You: EU is authoritarian, I'd rather wait for robots
This is why I'm saying that your "me, me, I, me, me, me" makes you completely blind to the world. Not to say anything about how little you know about the world outside the U.S. and your lucky little job.
Thank goodness you only need a majority of votes to unionize.
History shows the result of that is often the highly productive staff exits for greener opportunities where they are not penalized for doing more than the minimum not to get fired, and over all the entire operation suffers leading to outsourcing or closing of facilities.
We wish them well! Are those greener pastures the vast majority of startups that fail? Or enormous agile, nimble enterprises I’ve heard so much about (he said with a hint of sarcasm)? Lying to others is one thing, but don’t lie to yourself. A vocal minority is best served by the status quo, and they’ll do fine as consultants. Unions to protect the majority (and the evidence very clearly demonstrates these workers need protection from management and capital), with opportunity for those who would rather not be protected.
The situation is not binary; it is a spectrum.
The situation is not binary; it is a spectrum.
Neither, I normally work for privately held companies with between 200-1000 employees and revenues between 500million and 1 billion per year
That seems to be the sweet spot to not get abused, either by management nor unions. Startups suck, Huge enterprises suck
That seems to be the sweet spot to not get abused, either by management nor unions. Startups suck, Huge enterprises suck
> That seems to be the sweet spot to not get abused, either by management nor unions. Startups suck, Huge enterprises suck
In Europe I've worked for startups, I've worked for corporations. Everywhere I had the same situation: sick pay, vacations etc.
It's amazing that you assume that "getting abused" is the norm and you have to find yourself in some sweet spot to escape that.
In Europe I've worked for startups, I've worked for corporations. Everywhere I had the same situation: sick pay, vacations etc.
It's amazing that you assume that "getting abused" is the norm and you have to find yourself in some sweet spot to escape that.
> I rarely get sick
You have rarely gotten sick thus far in your life.
You have rarely gotten sick thus far in your life.
I don't think that's necessarily related to the prevalence of unions though and where it might be related it is far from the only factor as there are many other at play there from unrelated legislations and governance styles all the way to reserve currencies. Even just the fact that Europe was/is a fractured market preventing the rice of something akin to silicon valley.
Incomes are generally lower, but EU residents generally have a higher standard of living than US residents according to Human Development Indexes. Life expectancy is also better, infant and maternal mortality are lower, test scores are higher, etc.
This is because of the prevalence of socialism, which came about because labor broadly won in Europe. I think Europe's example makes the benefits of unions clear.
This is because of the prevalence of socialism, which came about because labor broadly won in Europe. I think Europe's example makes the benefits of unions clear.
The EU has a higher quality of life. The US has a higher standard of living. Quality of life and standard of living are only loosely correlated.
The EU has both a higher quality of life and standard of living. Here's Investopedia's list of stuff [0] you'd measure for standard of living (FWIW it also mentions HDI as a good measure of standard of living, which the EU generally beats the US at, especially IHDI):
- Life expectancy
- Inflation rate
- Number of paid vacation days
- Class disparity
- Poverty rate
- Quality and affordability of housing
- Hours of work required to purchase necessities
- GDP
- Affordable access to quality healthcare
- Quality and availability of education
- Incidence of disease
- Infrastructure
- National economic growth
- Economic and political stability
- Political and religious freedom
- Environmental quality
- Climate
- Safety
Generally other than the GDP/economic growth points, the EU beats the US.
[0]: https://www.investopedia.com/articles/financial-theory/08/st...
- Life expectancy
- Inflation rate
- Number of paid vacation days
- Class disparity
- Poverty rate
- Quality and affordability of housing
- Hours of work required to purchase necessities
- GDP
- Affordable access to quality healthcare
- Quality and availability of education
- Incidence of disease
- Infrastructure
- National economic growth
- Economic and political stability
- Political and religious freedom
- Environmental quality
- Climate
- Safety
Generally other than the GDP/economic growth points, the EU beats the US.
[0]: https://www.investopedia.com/articles/financial-theory/08/st...
The difference in HDI between the US (0.921) and say Denmark (0.948) can be entirely explained by the fact that a large portion of the US population is a formerly enslaved minority, and an even larger portion is recent immigrants from the developing world: https://measureofamerica.org/10yearsandcounting. That has nothing to do with socialism, but historical and geographic factors unusual to the US.
Oh that was a fun read, thank you!
I don't know that it supports your claim that the HDI delta can be "entirely" (or I would even say sufficiently) explained by slavery/immigration:
- There are quite a few Asian immigrants from developing countries (in 2018 the shares were: 13% from Europe/NA, 28% Asia, 25% Latin America, 25% Mexico [0]) and their scores are literally off the charts.
- A lot of states with small Black/Latino population portions have pretty low AHDIs [1]; the bottom 3rd includes Kentucky, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Idaho, Indiana, Nebraska, Wisconsin, and Ohio. On the other hand, DC, North Carolina, and Maryland have very high Black population portions (44%, 32%, and 22% respectively) and they're ranked 5th, 19th, and 20th.
- A more parsimonious explanation of the AHDI rankings is that states with better social safety nets and more labor protections do better than those without. For example, of the 11 states that decline the ACA's Medicaid grant [2], only 2 are in the top half of AHDIs, and the remaining 9 average to rank 39.
- Europe continues to see a huge influx of refugee immigration [3]. If immigration were a part of this story you'd expect this to lower its HDI, but it doesn't. Again it seems pretty clear here that the difference is socialism.
- Just as a matter of course, the AHDI breakdowns don't disambiguate recent immigrants from subsequent generations. There's no doubt the US has a lot of immigration from Central and South America, but they aren't all new, so you can't really make the claim that recent immigration accounts for the lower AHDI amongst them.
- Inequality-adjusted HDI (IHDI) [4] would better address your criticisms because it measures the average person, thereby taking into account recent and historical disadvantages, and here we can see that aside from Greece, Spain, Portugal and Italy (somewhat notorious as a grouping) Europe broadly outdoes the US.
[0]: https://www.pewresearch.org/hispanic/2020/08/20/facts-on-u-s...
[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_by_America...
[2]: https://www.kff.org/health-reform/state-indicator/state-acti...
[3]: https://www.pewresearch.org/global/2016/08/02/number-of-refu...
[4]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_inequalit...
I don't know that it supports your claim that the HDI delta can be "entirely" (or I would even say sufficiently) explained by slavery/immigration:
- There are quite a few Asian immigrants from developing countries (in 2018 the shares were: 13% from Europe/NA, 28% Asia, 25% Latin America, 25% Mexico [0]) and their scores are literally off the charts.
- A lot of states with small Black/Latino population portions have pretty low AHDIs [1]; the bottom 3rd includes Kentucky, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Idaho, Indiana, Nebraska, Wisconsin, and Ohio. On the other hand, DC, North Carolina, and Maryland have very high Black population portions (44%, 32%, and 22% respectively) and they're ranked 5th, 19th, and 20th.
- A more parsimonious explanation of the AHDI rankings is that states with better social safety nets and more labor protections do better than those without. For example, of the 11 states that decline the ACA's Medicaid grant [2], only 2 are in the top half of AHDIs, and the remaining 9 average to rank 39.
- Europe continues to see a huge influx of refugee immigration [3]. If immigration were a part of this story you'd expect this to lower its HDI, but it doesn't. Again it seems pretty clear here that the difference is socialism.
- Just as a matter of course, the AHDI breakdowns don't disambiguate recent immigrants from subsequent generations. There's no doubt the US has a lot of immigration from Central and South America, but they aren't all new, so you can't really make the claim that recent immigration accounts for the lower AHDI amongst them.
- Inequality-adjusted HDI (IHDI) [4] would better address your criticisms because it measures the average person, thereby taking into account recent and historical disadvantages, and here we can see that aside from Greece, Spain, Portugal and Italy (somewhat notorious as a grouping) Europe broadly outdoes the US.
[0]: https://www.pewresearch.org/hispanic/2020/08/20/facts-on-u-s...
[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_by_America...
[2]: https://www.kff.org/health-reform/state-indicator/state-acti...
[3]: https://www.pewresearch.org/global/2016/08/02/number-of-refu...
[4]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_inequalit...
>>I find it weird that nobody in the US seems to look beyond their country or similar systems for different models regarding this.
because American law only allows for American Style Labor Unions, and changing American Law would be politically impossible as the American Style Labor Unions have outsized power in politics
So looking at "other models" is pointless
because American law only allows for American Style Labor Unions, and changing American Law would be politically impossible as the American Style Labor Unions have outsized power in politics
So looking at "other models" is pointless
In the case of rail workers, there is a separate retirement system just for rail workers. Everyone else has a retirement system called "Social Security." If you have earned a retirement benefit (well, it is an annuity) with the railway worker plan, quit to work in a job covered by social security, it is possible to lose your railway annuity. This is why many of the rail workers "don't just quit". Additionally, there are anti "double dipping" laws that reduce your railroad annuity if you get social security.
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I think the problem here is that US lacks a larger framework how unions and employers should solve differences.
Sweden enacted in 1938 (Saltsjöbadsavtalet) a treaty where unions, employers and the government came to an agreement that agreements between unions and employers should be done without government interference. Instead of conflict try instead to find common ground where both parties benefits.
It is of course far from perfect, but I think it is still better than the alternative.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saltsj%C3%B6baden_Agreement
Sweden enacted in 1938 (Saltsjöbadsavtalet) a treaty where unions, employers and the government came to an agreement that agreements between unions and employers should be done without government interference. Instead of conflict try instead to find common ground where both parties benefits.
It is of course far from perfect, but I think it is still better than the alternative.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saltsj%C3%B6baden_Agreement
I work in a white collar union in the US and this has not been my experience at all. I don't "work for my union rep", the "highest rank in the union" wouldn't decide what happens in case of layoffs, very little is based on seniority. Sounds like you have a very warped idea of what union work is like.
This is untrue. I've worked in union shops and work and pay there are very much based on seniority
It's been my experience that seniority does play a role in unions, although it does vary depending on the job. Usually it's first dibs on some benefit, like OT or time off around holidays.
I would love to see a copy of that union contract. I have never seen a Union Contract in the US where by Pay and employment protections where not based on Seniority
I suspect most white collar union work is more like mine. Seniority factors in in the sense that we get annual raises, and the more years you're around, the more annual raises you have received. But e.g. applying for internal jobs, getting OT or time off (as other comments have mentioned) seniority plays no role. Further, there are pay ranges for each job title, so it's quite common that a new hire into a more senior title is getting paid more than an old timer that for whatever reason is still in a more junior title.
Are you not familiar with the Screen Actor's Guild?
Screen Actors Guild is not a traditional employment union in that your membership to SAG is not tied to your employment with given corporation. Members agree to only work with companies that have a contract with the Guild, and most members are "hired" by companies as contractors or via "loan out" companies or other such things not as w2 employees.
This makes the makeup, laws, and conditions of a SAG contract FAR FAR FAR different then what is being talked about here
This makes the makeup, laws, and conditions of a SAG contract FAR FAR FAR different then what is being talked about here
The point is it's possible to have union contracts under US law where pay and title isn't based on tenure. Just because you haven't seen them doesn't mean they can't happen.
I have never seen a competent person elected as president either, I suppose it could happen but it is not likely under our current system of laws
You quite literally do work for your union by definition of unions under US law.
No, I quite literally don't work for my union. They don't sign my check, hire or fire me, manage my day-to-day work, or do anything else that constitutes employment.
You're making an irrelevant comparison. Rail worker unions are unique and governed by the Railway Labor Act:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Railway_Labor_Act
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Railway_Labor_Act
Or you end up like Europe. With long maternity leave, paid sick days, overtime pay etc.
Posts about unions on HN always skew towards negativity because in the US, unions are seen as bad. (Well done corporate america for that PR coup!)
They often can't see the benefits, which are often large and numerous.
They often can't see the benefits, which are often large and numerous.
Unions in the US are bad, in large part because of laws written to force things that way. Unions in Europe work different, but we legally cannot have that type of union so there is no point in discussing how unions don't have to be bad.
That's not a fair generalisation IMO. Most notably, moves to unionise workers at large retail companies in the US such as Amazon can only be a good thing.
Some are bad, sure. Some unions here in the UK are bad too, but the general principle that unions work to protect workers is indisputable.
Some are bad, sure. Some unions here in the UK are bad too, but the general principle that unions work to protect workers is indisputable.
[deleted]
And much lower wages, no?
What good is a high wage when you either don't have the time to use it (crazy working ours/short vacations) or still need to spend it on things like medical care?
Not everyone works at Facebook or Google.
A friend of mine works as a data analyst somewhere near Washington, D.C. They still need to spend a week arguing with insurance companies for any medical emergency. Yeah, thanks, no. Keep your higher wage.
Not everyone works at Facebook or Google.
A friend of mine works as a data analyst somewhere near Washington, D.C. They still need to spend a week arguing with insurance companies for any medical emergency. Yeah, thanks, no. Keep your higher wage.
Not sure about your friend but people generally get good healthcare as professionals. And anyway, that should not be the argument either way, universal healthcare is what one should strive towards, which has nothing to do with union or non-union membership.
> Yeah, thanks, no. Keep your higher wage.
Thank you, I will.
> Yeah, thanks, no. Keep your higher wage.
Thank you, I will.
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The railroad worker is not representative of the average union. It is an extreme outlier.
> That’s not to say you can’t collaborate and organize. Ive organized my coworkers to make changes before, no union involved.
Informal organization (i.e. without the legal protections that formal unions have) only works in industries where the staff isn't fungible. A warehouse, fastfood chain or a lot of IT industry has the advantage for the employer that the staff is fungible. Fire everyone, pay a bit in fines for anti-union activities, and hire fresh staff that won't unionize because they know what happened to the last ones.
Informal organization (i.e. without the legal protections that formal unions have) only works in industries where the staff isn't fungible. A warehouse, fastfood chain or a lot of IT industry has the advantage for the employer that the staff is fungible. Fire everyone, pay a bit in fines for anti-union activities, and hire fresh staff that won't unionize because they know what happened to the last ones.
Unions work best when the people need some amount of training such that you can't just hire new people, but otherwise they are inter-changeable. If you work an assembly line your pace of work is dictated by the slowest station/worker, no matter how good you are at your job you are not better than anyone else. Tech work there are ways you can be better than someone else and so unions don't work as well. (don't confuse with don't work at all, just that they don't work as well because we are not all in it together)
> just that they don't work as well because we are not all in it together
It's one thing to say that in tech people can have different performance levels. But stuff like PTO, actually meaningful sick leave, maternity/paternity leave, retirement benefits, healthcare, workplace safety, overtime work, using people for work they have not been hired, equipped or training for - there everyone is in the same boat, but tech's aversity to unions has an effect like the infamous "crabs in a bucket" mentality.
Even wages... it's not "just" performance levels that dictate these. Unions also serve for those who are not as conflict-happy or those who cannot negotiate due to external factors (e.g. visa enslavement, they have family to take care of and can't afford the potential of being out of work for a couple weeks while they set up new employment)... unions sacrifice a bit of individual wealth for common wealth for everyone.
It's one thing to say that in tech people can have different performance levels. But stuff like PTO, actually meaningful sick leave, maternity/paternity leave, retirement benefits, healthcare, workplace safety, overtime work, using people for work they have not been hired, equipped or training for - there everyone is in the same boat, but tech's aversity to unions has an effect like the infamous "crabs in a bucket" mentality.
Even wages... it's not "just" performance levels that dictate these. Unions also serve for those who are not as conflict-happy or those who cannot negotiate due to external factors (e.g. visa enslavement, they have family to take care of and can't afford the potential of being out of work for a couple weeks while they set up new employment)... unions sacrifice a bit of individual wealth for common wealth for everyone.
None of these downsides are really much different than just being an employee, except without the union, you have lower pay and benefits.
this is close to just straight up misinformation, but I'll point out the fundamental difference that you are ignoring in your analogy. You pay your union rep (via dues). It's not that you work for your union rep, it's that they work for you, just like you work for your company.
Also, aren't unions in the U.S. democratic in the sense that the union members elect their reps? AFAIK you don't vote for company management, so that's another power differential.
"Look what just happened to the railroad workers. The US government forced them back to work and gave everything to the companies." I'm sure the US government is going to step in at some point and force Activision to make a new CoD.
"MS workers" here are 300 QA testers from MS's game division.
I was worried whether their core developers were unionizing or not.
Not yet. Not even the game developers.
I was worried whether their core developers were unionizing or not.
Not yet. Not even the game developers.
Wouldn’t even say games division. They’re part of an acquired studio, Zenimax (parent company of Bethesda), that runs pretty independently.
While the headline is technically correct, it’s obviously clickbaity. Saying Zenimax QA engineers are unionizing doesn’t get as many clicks.
While the headline is technically correct, it’s obviously clickbaity. Saying Zenimax QA engineers are unionizing doesn’t get as many clicks.
The most interesting bit, IMHO, is this:
> In June, Microsoft said it was open to working with any labor unions that want to organize within its workforce, making it an outlier in the tech industry. Last year Amazon.com Inc. contested workers’ efforts to unionize. Microsoft has said it would support workers at Activision Blizzard Inc. who organized last year should its $75 billion deal for the “Call of Duty” developer close.What else are they going to say in public? "Our plan is to engage in union-busting as much as we can legally get away with"? And what one company said is then compared to what another company actually did? Come on! This statement doesn't make MS an outlier, it's simply devoid of information content.
> What else are they going to say in public?
Microsoft recognizing the union instead of fighting tooth & nail to destroy it is genuinely novel behavior. They could refuse to recognize the union, or sue to invalidate the ballot, as many, many companies do:
"Activision Blizzard did not respond to workers’ request for recognition of a union formed by quality assurance testers at Raven Software" https://www.washingtonpost.com/video-games/2022/01/25/activi...
"The NLRB found Curaleaf violated federal labor law by refusing to recognize and bargain with workers there, but the company is appealing the decision. Curaleaf had initially challenged the result of the election, which the union won by one vote, but the labor board later ruled in UFCW’s favor." https://www.gmtoday.com/news/illinois/2022-saw-a-wave-of-new...
"The decision ordered Starbucks subsidiary Siren Retail Corp. to negotiate with the new union at its Seattle Roastery restaurant... The company contested the union's victory because the government held an election by mail ballot rather than an in-person election. Starbucks plans to appeal the ruling." https://www.shrm.org/resourcesandtools/legal-and-compliance/...
"Since the workers went public with their union and began to bargain, Trader Joe’s has cut hours of union employees under the guise of the "slow season," while at the same time hiring new workers and giving them full-time schedules." http://www.fightbacknews.org/2023/1/3/minneapolis-newly-orga...
Microsoft recognizing the union instead of fighting tooth & nail to destroy it is genuinely novel behavior. They could refuse to recognize the union, or sue to invalidate the ballot, as many, many companies do:
"Activision Blizzard did not respond to workers’ request for recognition of a union formed by quality assurance testers at Raven Software" https://www.washingtonpost.com/video-games/2022/01/25/activi...
"The NLRB found Curaleaf violated federal labor law by refusing to recognize and bargain with workers there, but the company is appealing the decision. Curaleaf had initially challenged the result of the election, which the union won by one vote, but the labor board later ruled in UFCW’s favor." https://www.gmtoday.com/news/illinois/2022-saw-a-wave-of-new...
"The decision ordered Starbucks subsidiary Siren Retail Corp. to negotiate with the new union at its Seattle Roastery restaurant... The company contested the union's victory because the government held an election by mail ballot rather than an in-person election. Starbucks plans to appeal the ruling." https://www.shrm.org/resourcesandtools/legal-and-compliance/...
"Since the workers went public with their union and began to bargain, Trader Joe’s has cut hours of union employees under the guise of the "slow season," while at the same time hiring new workers and giving them full-time schedules." http://www.fightbacknews.org/2023/1/3/minneapolis-newly-orga...
It's all talk until union negotiations actually start. Talk is cheap, increased wages and benefits are not. When Microsoft is met with demands that will actually cost them, we'll see for real whether Microsoft's actions will comport with their words.
I'm not optimistic. As other commenters pointed out, this union is limited to QA testers who don't have all that much leverage in the company. The people who do already have better paying positions, and aren't all that interested in unionization.
I'm not optimistic. As other commenters pointed out, this union is limited to QA testers who don't have all that much leverage in the company. The people who do already have better paying positions, and aren't all that interested in unionization.
Sure, that's a fair take. But it's still the case that not throwing a massive hissy-fit when employees start talking about unionization is a big departure from how other companies handle it.
...okay, so other companies had a bad time attempting that particular union-busting tactic, resulting in reputational damage (and fines?) Maybe Microsoft learned from this that the odds of success are low. Maybe labour got better at organizing these ballots in a way so they can't be contested. I fail to see how any of that means that they have a soul that's somehow pro-labour, while those other companies are soulless labour-crushing business automatons.
> I fail to see how any of that means that they have a soul that's somehow pro-union
Sorry, can you point me to who made this claim?
Sorry, can you point me to who made this claim?
I was trying to make a very subtle point in a very condensed way.
The initial claim was "statement about openness makes Microsoft an outlier". My counterclaim was "statement is meaningless". Why am I saying that? Because Microsoft is a business, not a person. Persons have souls and hence attributes like "openness" can apply to persons. Businesses are profit-maximizing automatons. They do not have souls. What does it mean for an automaton to be "open" to anything? Nothing, it doesn't make sense at a surface-level. Upon a deeper analysis it gives me pause that it blandly contradicts what their incentives obviously are, namely to win a zero-sum game that they're playing against a union.
The interpretation whereby they're communicating in bad faith is as good or better than the interpretation whereby you can take them at their word when they talk about openness. There is no way to know which of two contradictory interpretations is the truth. Hence the information content is zero (my initial claim).
The initial claim was "statement about openness makes Microsoft an outlier". My counterclaim was "statement is meaningless". Why am I saying that? Because Microsoft is a business, not a person. Persons have souls and hence attributes like "openness" can apply to persons. Businesses are profit-maximizing automatons. They do not have souls. What does it mean for an automaton to be "open" to anything? Nothing, it doesn't make sense at a surface-level. Upon a deeper analysis it gives me pause that it blandly contradicts what their incentives obviously are, namely to win a zero-sum game that they're playing against a union.
The interpretation whereby they're communicating in bad faith is as good or better than the interpretation whereby you can take them at their word when they talk about openness. There is no way to know which of two contradictory interpretations is the truth. Hence the information content is zero (my initial claim).
Well, the president of CWA (the union) also praises them:
> “Microsoft has lived up to its commitment to its workers and let them decide for themselves whether they want a union,” CWA President Chris Shelton said. “Other videogame and tech giants have made a conscious choice to attack, undermine, and demoralize their own employees when they join together to form a union.”...there's an obvious zero-sum game involved when unions negotiate with companies. Think of other zero-sum games like negotiating a price. Have you ever asked a salesperson about a price and heard them say "..the highest I can possibly extract from you"? No? Have you ever heard a salesperson say "I'll get you a great deal!" Yes? Does that convince you that most salespeople are really big on altruism?
Microsoft was required to say this by an agreement they made with CWA: https://cwa-union.org/news/releases/cwa-microsoft-announce-l...
At Zenimax, not Microsoft proper. Bit of a disingenuous headline.
There are times I wish I had a union working for tech in finance. Although it seems like a real contract would fix most of the issues without unions.
These one page "we make the rules and can change them at any time" contracts are bogus. There's no accountability, no fairness. Things become arbitrary. There's no accountability when the company violates it's own policies.
These one page "we make the rules and can change them at any time" contracts are bogus. There's no accountability, no fairness. Things become arbitrary. There's no accountability when the company violates it's own policies.
> Although it seems like a real contract would fix most of the issues without unions.
It’s hard to disentangle these, unions are effectively the only way for non-executive[0] employees (in the US) to get an employment contract that isn’t one-sided in favor of the employer. The primary function of a union is to obtain a contract.
[0] I highly recommend reading the “Executive Severance Plan” section of any publicly traded tech company’s SEC filings, they are fascinating.
It’s hard to disentangle these, unions are effectively the only way for non-executive[0] employees (in the US) to get an employment contract that isn’t one-sided in favor of the employer. The primary function of a union is to obtain a contract.
[0] I highly recommend reading the “Executive Severance Plan” section of any publicly traded tech company’s SEC filings, they are fascinating.
> unions are effectively the only way for non-executive[0] employees (in the US) to get an employment contract that isn’t one-sided in favor of the employer
If they were actually one-sided then no employees would sign them. It's not like there are no alternatives to finance tech.
If they were actually one-sided then no employees would sign them. It's not like there are no alternatives to finance tech.
I’m referring to the employment agreements that are in practice signed by basically everyone who works for a tech company (among other industries). Commonly includes provisions such as intellectual property assignment, non-solicitation, non-disclosure, non-disparagement, and occasionally non-compete (outside of California). These all protect the employer, it’s uncommon for anything in the agreement to protect the employee.
Please do not forget the mandatory arbitration clauses in many of these "agreements".
But are there good alternatives?
I've become cynical. Every job seems like it's the same shit with the same problems and there isn't anything better.
I've become cynical. Every job seems like it's the same shit with the same problems and there isn't anything better.
The terms are never fully even. Even a contract with uneven yet clearly defined terms would be so much better. Most places have decent or even good policies, the problem is those policies are not enforced, or are enforced unevenly.
I tink unions in tech should be established while the industry is still in the gold rush. Sure, tech salaries are very high currently and tech workers tend to have more freedom in their jobs, but who knows for how long this will persist.
Better start building unions now, it's never too early for that.
Better start building unions now, it's never too early for that.
Gold flowing and competition are what make salaries go up to the extent you're talking.
*Assuming the ATVI/MSFT merger goes through, which it might not. The title should really say Activision Blizzard's first union is formed in the US.
No, this news is about a group of Zenimax employees. Zenimax is already owned by Microsoft. This is not related to Ravensoft QA union under ABK that made the news earlier this year.
QA in gaming industry sounds ripe for AI/ML solutions ... Automated testing already exists, but couple AI/ML for QA with free beta testers or super fans, and you can prob eliminate QA departments, or at least cut them down sizably. From what I know, the QA folks in gaming get paid crappy anyway, so its prob not a huge priority for MSFT. This is just some feel good press.
The last time they tried the majority of their testing people were fired.
I'm ambivalent about unions. In general, they sound like a good idea to me, but in practice in the USA, they seem only a step above the mob.
For example, I was browsing /r/antiwork the other day and someone received a bill from their union after they chose to leave the job. The bill demanded the payment of $200 in union dues that were unpaid from their paychecks. The commenter did not have enough money to pay
To put it bluntly... this is exploitation. The responses were that the poster had two options (1) pay the due or (2) never work in any industry for which this is the union (and some other unions may not want you if you're out of date with the other union).
People have a right to work. No private organization, profit or non-profit, should be able to prevent you from doing that. I understand why a union may take a bit off the top of a paycheck, but to demand fixed sums after quitting under threat of never being able to work in that field again? That seems exploitative. We would never let a private for-profit business get away with threatening their employees as such.
Moreover, according to other unions I've interacted with, they claim that if you don't follow union policy, they can 'expel' you from the union after you go through 'trials'. Typically, tnis is if you cross a picket line. Now, I think it's usually in one's best interest to strike if the union is striking. However, this is a free country. No one should be able to prevent you from working. No private organization should be able to put you on trial with the consequence being that, if you lose, you cannot work. While organizations can expel members, that should be the extent of their punishment. Working is a necessity to earn an income. To deprive someone of that because they're not part of your club is morally wrong.
In my opinion, if we allow for closed shops, then unions should be obligated to represent any worker there, whether they have paid any dues or not. Union dues should primarily descend from paychecks. No worker should get a bill. No one should be able to be expelled from a profession simply for not following union labor policy (and realistically, there are only a handful of reasons a janitor ought to be expelled from the profession). Unions ought to be regulated like health insurance companies and be forced to advocate for anyone working in the field.
For example, I was browsing /r/antiwork the other day and someone received a bill from their union after they chose to leave the job. The bill demanded the payment of $200 in union dues that were unpaid from their paychecks. The commenter did not have enough money to pay
To put it bluntly... this is exploitation. The responses were that the poster had two options (1) pay the due or (2) never work in any industry for which this is the union (and some other unions may not want you if you're out of date with the other union).
People have a right to work. No private organization, profit or non-profit, should be able to prevent you from doing that. I understand why a union may take a bit off the top of a paycheck, but to demand fixed sums after quitting under threat of never being able to work in that field again? That seems exploitative. We would never let a private for-profit business get away with threatening their employees as such.
Moreover, according to other unions I've interacted with, they claim that if you don't follow union policy, they can 'expel' you from the union after you go through 'trials'. Typically, tnis is if you cross a picket line. Now, I think it's usually in one's best interest to strike if the union is striking. However, this is a free country. No one should be able to prevent you from working. No private organization should be able to put you on trial with the consequence being that, if you lose, you cannot work. While organizations can expel members, that should be the extent of their punishment. Working is a necessity to earn an income. To deprive someone of that because they're not part of your club is morally wrong.
In my opinion, if we allow for closed shops, then unions should be obligated to represent any worker there, whether they have paid any dues or not. Union dues should primarily descend from paychecks. No worker should get a bill. No one should be able to be expelled from a profession simply for not following union labor policy (and realistically, there are only a handful of reasons a janitor ought to be expelled from the profession). Unions ought to be regulated like health insurance companies and be forced to advocate for anyone working in the field.
The 70s are back. We're approaching a period of strong unions, huge labor conflicts and eventually rampant inflation. At least in Europe.
I've been thinking that the USA would be affected less than Europe, due to weak unions in most sectors, but it's certainly possible for unions to form.
I've been thinking that the USA would be affected less than Europe, due to weak unions in most sectors, but it's certainly possible for unions to form.
The 70s when one earner (even a factory worker) could still afford a house and kids and wealth gaps were way smaller? Better times for sure unless you're very rich.
When working on my 2nd bachelors, this subject came up in some of our sociology courses. The older people remembered exactly when this changed: the 1973 Oil Embargo. For them, this was the time when our mothers had to get a wage-paying job outside the home. Some remembered it as "that's when I had to start pumping my own gas". The people involved were all upper-middle class. My dad was an engineer (in the oil business) and the attire, cigarette smoking and alcohol consumption of Mad Men was reasonably close to my memories.
While many folks would consider factory workers are working class, they were unionized and I'd consider them middle class.
Max income tax bracket in the 70s was 70%. This prevented the income disparity that we've seen since the 1980s.
https://taxfoundation.org/historical-income-tax-rates-bracke...
While many folks would consider factory workers are working class, they were unionized and I'd consider them middle class.
Max income tax bracket in the 70s was 70%. This prevented the income disparity that we've seen since the 1980s.
https://taxfoundation.org/historical-income-tax-rates-bracke...
Being able to afford a house back in the 1970s was less due to factory jobs paying better, and more due to houses being a lot cheaper. Some goods, like computing information systems, have gotten a lot cheaper. Other goods, chiefly housing, education, and healthcare have gotten a lot more expensive. And it's not any easy path to making the latter less expensive: land is finite, a there's a much bigger proportion of people entering college than in the 1970s, and the population distribution is skewing older.
You're forgetting that increases in productivity used to be partially shared with the middle class who enjoyed a rising standard of life as a result. Around that time it changed with the rich keeping all those profits to themselves. If middle class salaries had kept up, houses and education would be affordable.
Higher salaries don't solve shortages. If there's 200 buyers for 150 homes, higher salaries would just let those buyer make larger bids. In order to let the poorest 50 people get homes, we need 50 more homes.
There are dozens of vacant homes in US for each homeless person. The national vacancy rate is something like 10%.
In the US as a whole, sure. But the housing affordability issues aren't across the whole US: it's in specific metros. Houses in Nebraska don't solve the affordability crisis in San Francisco.
Furthermore, people aren't exactly keen on letting homeless people live in their property for free. Hotels in my city experimented with this: they got small checks for housing homeless people during COVID, when lockdown massacred the hospitality market. It was a complete disaster: the rooms were trashed and they lost more money than they received from the government.
Furthermore, people aren't exactly keen on letting homeless people live in their property for free. Hotels in my city experimented with this: they got small checks for housing homeless people during COVID, when lockdown massacred the hospitality market. It was a complete disaster: the rooms were trashed and they lost more money than they received from the government.
Housing affordability issues are indeed across the whole US if you include local wage rates in the equation. The middle class simply can no longer afford the same housing as they could on a single earner wage as they could when tax rates on the rich were 70%. A lot of the problem is hedge funds grabbing up huge numbers of houses across the country and then jacking up the rents using collusion through software. At a 70٪ tax rate that money to grab up so many properties wouldn't even be there.
https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2022/10/company-that-mak...
https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2022/10/company-that-mak...
Good thing there isn't a housing shortage. And most countries easily manage to pay for education and healthcare.
There is indeed a housing shortage, or more specifically shortages in desirable metros. American cities are refusing to build denser residencies, driving up the cost of housing.
Most countries aren't America. Germany, as a point of comparison, had half the share of it's population enrolled in university. Part of this is because of age distribution: America is younger and has more college age people. Also, about 50% of German high schoolers go on to university as compared to 70% of Americans. People keep pointing to the European education system, but my retort is that following Europe's example would entail reducing enrollment considerably.
Healthcare is indeed one place where administrative changes could solve things. Most European countries, along with Japan and South Korea, work by giving citizens a stipend to spend on a healthcare plan from a marketplace of providers (either directly, or indirectly through subsidizing plans). This is largely what Romney was proposing in 2012, but that effort fizzled out. Unfortunately, the one party in America in favor of healthcare reform seems to be laser focused on a fully nationalized healthcare to the exclusion of anything else.
Most countries aren't America. Germany, as a point of comparison, had half the share of it's population enrolled in university. Part of this is because of age distribution: America is younger and has more college age people. Also, about 50% of German high schoolers go on to university as compared to 70% of Americans. People keep pointing to the European education system, but my retort is that following Europe's example would entail reducing enrollment considerably.
Healthcare is indeed one place where administrative changes could solve things. Most European countries, along with Japan and South Korea, work by giving citizens a stipend to spend on a healthcare plan from a marketplace of providers (either directly, or indirectly through subsidizing plans). This is largely what Romney was proposing in 2012, but that effort fizzled out. Unfortunately, the one party in America in favor of healthcare reform seems to be laser focused on a fully nationalized healthcare to the exclusion of anything else.
A "housing shortage in desirable metros" is moving the goal posts. The claim was that unaffordable housing can only be attributed to a shortage and has nothing to do with massively increased wealth gaps nor the shrinking middle class.
"Most countries aren't America" is just an excuse. Most European countries aren't Germany. So by that reasoning most European countries can't afford education or healthcare.
Here's what really makes the US different: most countries don't have America's massive wealth gaps. That's the real cause.
"Most countries aren't America" is just an excuse. Most European countries aren't Germany. So by that reasoning most European countries can't afford education or healthcare.
Here's what really makes the US different: most countries don't have America's massive wealth gaps. That's the real cause.
Most European countries do share similar demographic trends relative to the US as Germany. In fact Germany's enrollment rates are above average.
Again, wealth gaps don't affect the prices of goods. The cost of cars, cell phones, and plenty of other things are largely the same between the US and other developed countries. Housing in the US is plenty cheap outside desirable metros. And Europe similarly has expensive housing in desirable metros. Housing is expensive in Stockholm, the better parts of London, etc.
Again, wealth gaps don't affect the prices of goods. The cost of cars, cell phones, and plenty of other things are largely the same between the US and other developed countries. Housing in the US is plenty cheap outside desirable metros. And Europe similarly has expensive housing in desirable metros. Housing is expensive in Stockholm, the better parts of London, etc.
I just explained how wealth gaps lead to hedge funds buying up huge amounts of properties and how collusion lead to skyrocketing rents. I even gave a source. Debunk that source instead of continuing to insist you're right.
Here's another source supporting my claim.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/if-you-sell-a-house-these-days-...
Here's another source supporting my claim.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/if-you-sell-a-house-these-days-...
I feel like this implication you're positing where unions and labour conflicts can only result in "rampant inflation" is untested.
If anything, it seems that increased unionization lags behind inflation.
Which may not be surprising as high inflation discourages saving, meaning that people are more likely to buy the things they want now to not have to pay much more later, which results in businesses increasing production to fill the increased demand, requiring more labour, and thus labour finds itself in a stronger position.
As the only power unions wield is the threat of stoppage of service, the workers have to be in a strong enough financial position to be able to execute on that – to be able to live without an income for months, if not years – in order to make it a credible threat. This is why unions are typically only found in high paying professions, but during periods where the general labour pool grows stronger then that expands.
Which may not be surprising as high inflation discourages saving, meaning that people are more likely to buy the things they want now to not have to pay much more later, which results in businesses increasing production to fill the increased demand, requiring more labour, and thus labour finds itself in a stronger position.
As the only power unions wield is the threat of stoppage of service, the workers have to be in a strong enough financial position to be able to execute on that – to be able to live without an income for months, if not years – in order to make it a credible threat. This is why unions are typically only found in high paying professions, but during periods where the general labour pool grows stronger then that expands.
> to be able to live without an income for months, if not years – in order to make it a credible threat.
That depends on what service they represent. Those who provide critical services (garbage removal, truck drivers, police, utilities, healthcare, grocery store workers) may make their absence felt very quickly. Also, anyone able to block a key element in a longer supply chain can cause a lot of damage quickly.
It's all about the ability to completely paralyze access to something essential. Let's say every employee at every data center in the US were striking belonged to the same union, and all went on strike at the same time, shutting down all hardware and staying on site to prevent anyone from turning it back on.
The effect would be instant and catastrophic. If there was no way to bring them back, society would collapse in days or hours. Most likely, the police would be used against them (like it was against factory workers in the early 1900s).
It's all about how coordinated, ruthless and willing to risk ignoring the wrath of the employers and government the unions are, as well as how much support they have from the general population.
Not that I'm expecting something this extreme anytime soon. It's more of an illustation of how powerful a strike can be, if taken to he maximum. Since around WW2, strikes have become more of a ritualistic dance, with rules for how far to take the conflict.
Such rules sometimes change, though. And the willingness to escalate conflicts seem to be on the rise.
> If anything, it seems that increased unionization lags behind inflation.
Anyway, I don't disagree that unionization and also union activity level (much of Europe is already unionized) is increased by inflation.
My point is that the labor market conflicts can ALSO cause inflation. And if something is both the cause and the effect of something, then you have a positive feedback loop.
That depends on what service they represent. Those who provide critical services (garbage removal, truck drivers, police, utilities, healthcare, grocery store workers) may make their absence felt very quickly. Also, anyone able to block a key element in a longer supply chain can cause a lot of damage quickly.
It's all about the ability to completely paralyze access to something essential. Let's say every employee at every data center in the US were striking belonged to the same union, and all went on strike at the same time, shutting down all hardware and staying on site to prevent anyone from turning it back on.
The effect would be instant and catastrophic. If there was no way to bring them back, society would collapse in days or hours. Most likely, the police would be used against them (like it was against factory workers in the early 1900s).
It's all about how coordinated, ruthless and willing to risk ignoring the wrath of the employers and government the unions are, as well as how much support they have from the general population.
Not that I'm expecting something this extreme anytime soon. It's more of an illustation of how powerful a strike can be, if taken to he maximum. Since around WW2, strikes have become more of a ritualistic dance, with rules for how far to take the conflict.
Such rules sometimes change, though. And the willingness to escalate conflicts seem to be on the rise.
> If anything, it seems that increased unionization lags behind inflation.
Anyway, I don't disagree that unionization and also union activity level (much of Europe is already unionized) is increased by inflation.
My point is that the labor market conflicts can ALSO cause inflation. And if something is both the cause and the effect of something, then you have a positive feedback loop.
> shutting down all hardware
While there are no doubt jurisdictional variances, unions are typically absolved of responsibility to incidental damage to company property, but purposefully damaging company property is unlikely to stand up. If the machines start to fail without oversight that's one thing, but purposefully shutting them down conveys an explicit intent.
> Most likely, the police would be used against them
No doubt. Such malice is most likely illegal. If the police aren't going to step in when someone is breaking the law, what purpose do they serve?
> society would collapse in days or hours.
You'd really better have your ducks in a row if you're going to cause society to collapse. That's going to require an incredible amount of money upfront. After society has collapsed it will be too late to prepare. So once again, you can't reasonably do this unless you're already rich.
> much of Europe is already unionized
Colour me skeptical. Canada is claimed to be the 6th most unionized country in the world and only ~25% of its workforce is unionized. There are 44 countries in Europe, according to the UN. This suggests that very few workers in Europe are in unions. Maybe I misinterpret what you are trying to say?
> My point is that the labor market conflicts can ALSO cause inflation.
Inflation can only occur if a currency loses value. What mechanism of labour conflict causes a currency to lose value (or lose more value than it would have otherwise)? If anything, I would expect currency to become more valuable as it becomes harder to attain during labour withdrawals.
The labour of industrialization doesn't go back that far in time so we don't have an incredible amount of data to look at, but from what data we do have it would appear that high inflation always precedes union growth. Which, again, seems expected as workers become stronger during the beginnings of high inflation due to the reasons explained above.
Where do we find counterexamples?
While there are no doubt jurisdictional variances, unions are typically absolved of responsibility to incidental damage to company property, but purposefully damaging company property is unlikely to stand up. If the machines start to fail without oversight that's one thing, but purposefully shutting them down conveys an explicit intent.
> Most likely, the police would be used against them
No doubt. Such malice is most likely illegal. If the police aren't going to step in when someone is breaking the law, what purpose do they serve?
> society would collapse in days or hours.
You'd really better have your ducks in a row if you're going to cause society to collapse. That's going to require an incredible amount of money upfront. After society has collapsed it will be too late to prepare. So once again, you can't reasonably do this unless you're already rich.
> much of Europe is already unionized
Colour me skeptical. Canada is claimed to be the 6th most unionized country in the world and only ~25% of its workforce is unionized. There are 44 countries in Europe, according to the UN. This suggests that very few workers in Europe are in unions. Maybe I misinterpret what you are trying to say?
> My point is that the labor market conflicts can ALSO cause inflation.
Inflation can only occur if a currency loses value. What mechanism of labour conflict causes a currency to lose value (or lose more value than it would have otherwise)? If anything, I would expect currency to become more valuable as it becomes harder to attain during labour withdrawals.
The labour of industrialization doesn't go back that far in time so we don't have an incredible amount of data to look at, but from what data we do have it would appear that high inflation always precedes union growth. Which, again, seems expected as workers become stronger during the beginnings of high inflation due to the reasons explained above.
Where do we find counterexamples?
> but purposefully damaging company property is unlikely to stand up.
I'm not sure exactly what the ruling would be, but I would see this as the same as a factory worker stopping the machine he operates. Shutting down a machine is not the same as destroying it.
>> society would collapse in days or hours.
> You'd really better have your ducks in a row if you're going to cause society to collapse. That's going to require an incredible amount of money upfront. After society has collapsed it will be too late to prepare. So once again, you can't reasonably do this unless you're already rich.
By "collapse", I meant a lot of stuff would stop functioning, most temporarily so.
> Colour me skeptical. Canada is claimed to be the 6th most unionized country in the world and only ~25% of its workforce is unionized.
I did look it up. In my part of Europe (Scandinavia), every country has >50% of the workforce in unions. But it varies a lot by country, so I have to retract my generic statement. Still, most European countries have way more unionized workers than the USA.
> Inflation can only occur if a currency loses value.
Inflation (defined by the CPI) happens when there demand for goods and services exceed supply. As prices go up, aggregate demand will gradually decrease until balance is restored.
If this is met by increasing wages, though, demand increases again, bringing the PCI with it, if supply constrained.
> Inflation can only occur if a currency loses value. What mechanism of labour conflict causes a currency to lose value (or lose more value than it would have otherwise)?
Currency has no "essential" value. The value of the currency is defined by what you can buy with it now and what you expect to be able to buy with it in the future. Inflation happens demand for goods and services exceed supply.
> If anything, I would expect currency to become more valuable as it becomes harder to attain during labour withdrawals.
That depends on whether it affects supply or demand for goods and services more. If supply goes down more than demand, it causes inflation (people that go on strike, typically have savings, either personal or in their union). If demand goes down more than supply, it may temporarily reduce it. However, if strikes are successful in leading to wage increases, that will also cause inflation.
> The labour of industrialization doesn't go back that far in time so we don't have an incredible amount of data to look at, but from what data we do have it would appear that high inflation always precedes union growth.
This may or may not be true, as a rule of thumb. Though I'm sure a lot of people also joined unions during deflationary periods around 1930. But even if we assume you're right, it doesn't mean that unions (or rather certain actions commonly taken by unions) can ALSO serve to increase inflation.
Now as someone who lives in a country with more than 50% of the workforce unionized, it seems self-evident to me that unions drive prices up in several different ways. Not only through wages, but also through demanding all sorts of regulations to protect workers.
Also, for the record, I'm not making the argument that those things are all bad. Many union leaders act quite responsibly, and often cooperate with employers and the government to prevent excessive demands.
But unions are ultimately controlled by their members, not leaders. And it's a lot harder to make them accept a 5-10% loss of purchasing power than to stop them from demanding a wage increase that is 5-10% higher than what is sustainable when times are good.
Anyway, my prediction is that we're likely to have more labor market conflicts in 2023 in many places than we've seen since the 80s or even 70s. Time will tell if I'm right.
I'm not sure exactly what the ruling would be, but I would see this as the same as a factory worker stopping the machine he operates. Shutting down a machine is not the same as destroying it.
>> society would collapse in days or hours.
> You'd really better have your ducks in a row if you're going to cause society to collapse. That's going to require an incredible amount of money upfront. After society has collapsed it will be too late to prepare. So once again, you can't reasonably do this unless you're already rich.
By "collapse", I meant a lot of stuff would stop functioning, most temporarily so.
> Colour me skeptical. Canada is claimed to be the 6th most unionized country in the world and only ~25% of its workforce is unionized.
I did look it up. In my part of Europe (Scandinavia), every country has >50% of the workforce in unions. But it varies a lot by country, so I have to retract my generic statement. Still, most European countries have way more unionized workers than the USA.
> Inflation can only occur if a currency loses value.
Inflation (defined by the CPI) happens when there demand for goods and services exceed supply. As prices go up, aggregate demand will gradually decrease until balance is restored.
If this is met by increasing wages, though, demand increases again, bringing the PCI with it, if supply constrained.
> Inflation can only occur if a currency loses value. What mechanism of labour conflict causes a currency to lose value (or lose more value than it would have otherwise)?
Currency has no "essential" value. The value of the currency is defined by what you can buy with it now and what you expect to be able to buy with it in the future. Inflation happens demand for goods and services exceed supply.
> If anything, I would expect currency to become more valuable as it becomes harder to attain during labour withdrawals.
That depends on whether it affects supply or demand for goods and services more. If supply goes down more than demand, it causes inflation (people that go on strike, typically have savings, either personal or in their union). If demand goes down more than supply, it may temporarily reduce it. However, if strikes are successful in leading to wage increases, that will also cause inflation.
> The labour of industrialization doesn't go back that far in time so we don't have an incredible amount of data to look at, but from what data we do have it would appear that high inflation always precedes union growth.
This may or may not be true, as a rule of thumb. Though I'm sure a lot of people also joined unions during deflationary periods around 1930. But even if we assume you're right, it doesn't mean that unions (or rather certain actions commonly taken by unions) can ALSO serve to increase inflation.
Now as someone who lives in a country with more than 50% of the workforce unionized, it seems self-evident to me that unions drive prices up in several different ways. Not only through wages, but also through demanding all sorts of regulations to protect workers.
Also, for the record, I'm not making the argument that those things are all bad. Many union leaders act quite responsibly, and often cooperate with employers and the government to prevent excessive demands.
But unions are ultimately controlled by their members, not leaders. And it's a lot harder to make them accept a 5-10% loss of purchasing power than to stop them from demanding a wage increase that is 5-10% higher than what is sustainable when times are good.
Anyway, my prediction is that we're likely to have more labor market conflicts in 2023 in many places than we've seen since the 80s or even 70s. Time will tell if I'm right.
> I would see this as the same as a factory worker stopping the machine he operates.
A factory machine that requires active involvement by a worker to be useful would have no impact if it were turned off, so even if a company wanted to bring legal action forward because a machine was turned off what would it be over?
> Shutting down a machine is not the same as destroying it.
Whereas the function of the machines here are quite useful even if there isn't a person in the place, at least so long as they continue to run not having staff to maintain them. The service would be damaged and would need to be repaired when people come back.
There is plenty of legal precedence for interruption of service being considered damage. Again, incidental interruption would no doubt side to the unions, but if done with malicious intent I can't see it standing.
> By "collapse", I meant a lot of stuff would stop functioning, most temporarily so.
Temporarily being as long as the employer can stave off hunger. Meaning that you need to be able to stave off hunger even longer if you want to hold the power.
> Currency has no "essential" value.
But it has value.
> The value of the currency is defined by what you can buy with it
Yup. Which is true of everything. Your value of car is defined by what you can buy with it. The value of your house defined by what you can buy with it. If you sell plastic trinkets, the value of those plastic trinkets are defined what you can buy with them.
If your car is traded for 10 chickens, your car's value is considered equal to 10 chickens. If 10 chickens is traded for 5 hours of labour, then your car is considered to have the same value as 10 chickens and 5 hours of labour. If 5 hours of labour is traded for 50 US dollars then 50 US dollars is considered to have the same value as 5 hours of labour, 10 chickens, a your car.
Now let's say that a study found that chicken has magical healing properties and, with greater desire to have chickens, the value of chicken doubled. Now you need either two of your cars to buy 10 chickens or accept that your single car can now only buy five chickens. Likewise, you now need 100 US dollars to buy 10 chickens. This scenario saw chicken inflation, but not currency inflation. The value of the currency remained the same.
It's all the same. Currency is just another thing that gets traded. The only thing unique about currency is that we normally like to talk about value relative to the value of currency. The question: "What's a dollar worth?" is then met with "A dollar!", but that doesn't actually answer the question. So, we use inflation to answer the question instead.
CPI takes a basket of goods and looks to extract uniform price movement across the basket to try and determine what is the currency component. If, say, the price of everything went up by 10% at the same time, you can reasonably conclude that it is the currency that declined in value and not that the value of everything else went up by the same amount at the same time. The latter is statistically unlikely and you can safely say that inflation is 10%. If the price of only one item in the basket went up by 10%, with no change to the rest, it is likely that there was no inflation. The real world isn't nearly as clean and tidy as a HN comment can be, but we try our best.
> This may or may not be true
Which is why we seek counterexamples to find cases where it hasn't been true. Even if technically possible, if it has never happened before, it is not worth presenting as something that likely to happen as has been done earlier in this conversation.
> Anyway, my prediction is that we're likely to have more labor market conflicts in 2023 in many places
It is certainly possible. All signs point to labour becoming stronger, and as indicated earlier, labour is more likely to stand up when they are strong – being in a better position to weather the storm that comes with pushing back. The wildcard is government, which throughout much of the world are working hard to crush labour's growing strength – a number of central banks have made it quite clear that they won't sleep until unemployment is high. If that is successful, labour could lose power before they stand up.
A factory machine that requires active involvement by a worker to be useful would have no impact if it were turned off, so even if a company wanted to bring legal action forward because a machine was turned off what would it be over?
> Shutting down a machine is not the same as destroying it.
Whereas the function of the machines here are quite useful even if there isn't a person in the place, at least so long as they continue to run not having staff to maintain them. The service would be damaged and would need to be repaired when people come back.
There is plenty of legal precedence for interruption of service being considered damage. Again, incidental interruption would no doubt side to the unions, but if done with malicious intent I can't see it standing.
> By "collapse", I meant a lot of stuff would stop functioning, most temporarily so.
Temporarily being as long as the employer can stave off hunger. Meaning that you need to be able to stave off hunger even longer if you want to hold the power.
> Currency has no "essential" value.
But it has value.
> The value of the currency is defined by what you can buy with it
Yup. Which is true of everything. Your value of car is defined by what you can buy with it. The value of your house defined by what you can buy with it. If you sell plastic trinkets, the value of those plastic trinkets are defined what you can buy with them.
If your car is traded for 10 chickens, your car's value is considered equal to 10 chickens. If 10 chickens is traded for 5 hours of labour, then your car is considered to have the same value as 10 chickens and 5 hours of labour. If 5 hours of labour is traded for 50 US dollars then 50 US dollars is considered to have the same value as 5 hours of labour, 10 chickens, a your car.
Now let's say that a study found that chicken has magical healing properties and, with greater desire to have chickens, the value of chicken doubled. Now you need either two of your cars to buy 10 chickens or accept that your single car can now only buy five chickens. Likewise, you now need 100 US dollars to buy 10 chickens. This scenario saw chicken inflation, but not currency inflation. The value of the currency remained the same.
It's all the same. Currency is just another thing that gets traded. The only thing unique about currency is that we normally like to talk about value relative to the value of currency. The question: "What's a dollar worth?" is then met with "A dollar!", but that doesn't actually answer the question. So, we use inflation to answer the question instead.
CPI takes a basket of goods and looks to extract uniform price movement across the basket to try and determine what is the currency component. If, say, the price of everything went up by 10% at the same time, you can reasonably conclude that it is the currency that declined in value and not that the value of everything else went up by the same amount at the same time. The latter is statistically unlikely and you can safely say that inflation is 10%. If the price of only one item in the basket went up by 10%, with no change to the rest, it is likely that there was no inflation. The real world isn't nearly as clean and tidy as a HN comment can be, but we try our best.
> This may or may not be true
Which is why we seek counterexamples to find cases where it hasn't been true. Even if technically possible, if it has never happened before, it is not worth presenting as something that likely to happen as has been done earlier in this conversation.
> Anyway, my prediction is that we're likely to have more labor market conflicts in 2023 in many places
It is certainly possible. All signs point to labour becoming stronger, and as indicated earlier, labour is more likely to stand up when they are strong – being in a better position to weather the storm that comes with pushing back. The wildcard is government, which throughout much of the world are working hard to crush labour's growing strength – a number of central banks have made it quite clear that they won't sleep until unemployment is high. If that is successful, labour could lose power before they stand up.
> If anything, it seems that increased unionization lags behind inflation.
Indeed, I think we could argue inflation is a cause of unionisation as opposed to our OP's position where it is implied that unionisation leads to inflation.
Indeed, I think we could argue inflation is a cause of unionisation as opposed to our OP's position where it is implied that unionisation leads to inflation.
It's not the unions themselves so much as the labor conflicts that can have this effect.
If a factory shuts down due to strike, it doesn't produce anything. If so, the price of whatever it would have produced goes up. Kind of like anything with chips in them when factories and supply chains were closed down during Covid.
And the problem with inflation caused by contracting supply, is that it MUST lead to reduction in aggregate consumption. But workers will typically react poorly to having to cut down consumption. Demagogues will argue that the "Fat Cat" capitalists has enough money to pay higher wages, as if more money leads to more consumer goods being produced. Still, union members tend to listen to the demagogues in time like this.
This leads to strikes, lock out, and reduction in production. Which intensifies supply side constraints and drives inflation further, leading to even more demand for raises, and so on, in a vicious circle.
This happens in a time where the West wants to repatriate strategic production from Asia, where there is a need to re-arm to meet growing security threats from China and Russia, where we're facing a huge wave of elderly that will want a massive increase in spending on healthcare and where the supply of younger working age adults is dwindling.
All these are factors that increase the demand for consumer goods and services (especially healthcare) and goods that compete with consumer good (like weapons) and where more of the goods will be built domestically (like chips).
So unless we can radically improve productivity, each person (on average) will be able to buy less than they're used to or expect.
Let's say there will be 10% less of "everything" available to consumers. Without unions, the market (and possibly government intervention) will allocate this reduction in real income relatively evenly over the population.
But it is kind of in the DNA of most unions to never accept reductions in real wages for the members. If we imagine that every worker was in a union, and everyone got a raise matching inflation from the previous year (including retired people), the new wage would still only allow the pupulation to consume the consumer goods that is actually produced. That would quickly cause prices to go up another 10%, again reducing purchasing power below what people are used to.
Now, add a few strikes into this. Let's say there is a general strike reducing economic output by 5%. This comes on top of the 10%, meaning that now 15% fewer consumer goods are available than people expect, causing prices to go up by 15% that year.
Now, if everyone tries to get back to their own level of consumption by loaning money, that's another 15% money chasing the same goods, which could lead to 30% inflation that year. To prevent that, central banks raise rates to, let's say, 15%.
As these rates enter morgage costs for middle aged people, the pain is magnified further, typically leading to more strikes, businesses going under (permanently removing them as a source of consumer goods), and so on. Unchecked, this can lead to hyperinflation.
Not that I expect it to turn out this bad. Demand is partly elastic. Some people WILL be willing to cut SOME consumption, especially if good investment opportunities open up.
Still, in a market where supply side output of consumer goods goes down by 10%, there exists a huge communication problem when trying to distribute this new reality to the population.
It can be done, though, especially during wartime, consumers may be able to understand that they simply cannot go on consuming as much as before. And if the consumers themselves understand it, the unions probably will too.
In peacetime it's harder, which we see if we look at what happened after the oil crisis in 1973, especially in the UK (where unions were very strong at the time). Labor conflict aggravated the already difficult situation, and played a part in the stagflation that would last for the rest of the decade and much of the next.
Eventually, it was brought under control, partly by new economic growth and partly by Thatcher crushing the strongest unions.
In the 1970's though, the west was in the middle of a demography-driven boom at the time, and with the boomer generation entering the labor market, growth was relatively easy to achieve.
Today, the situation is different. There are few young people to fill the jobs that retiring boomers are leaving. In Europe, the demographic development is more likely to cause economic contraction than growth. So unless something like AGI can cause a huge lift in productivity, we may actually face a long-lasting period where consumption has to stay at levels below what we're used to.
I expect it to take at least 10 years for that to sink in for most people.
If a factory shuts down due to strike, it doesn't produce anything. If so, the price of whatever it would have produced goes up. Kind of like anything with chips in them when factories and supply chains were closed down during Covid.
And the problem with inflation caused by contracting supply, is that it MUST lead to reduction in aggregate consumption. But workers will typically react poorly to having to cut down consumption. Demagogues will argue that the "Fat Cat" capitalists has enough money to pay higher wages, as if more money leads to more consumer goods being produced. Still, union members tend to listen to the demagogues in time like this.
This leads to strikes, lock out, and reduction in production. Which intensifies supply side constraints and drives inflation further, leading to even more demand for raises, and so on, in a vicious circle.
This happens in a time where the West wants to repatriate strategic production from Asia, where there is a need to re-arm to meet growing security threats from China and Russia, where we're facing a huge wave of elderly that will want a massive increase in spending on healthcare and where the supply of younger working age adults is dwindling.
All these are factors that increase the demand for consumer goods and services (especially healthcare) and goods that compete with consumer good (like weapons) and where more of the goods will be built domestically (like chips).
So unless we can radically improve productivity, each person (on average) will be able to buy less than they're used to or expect.
Let's say there will be 10% less of "everything" available to consumers. Without unions, the market (and possibly government intervention) will allocate this reduction in real income relatively evenly over the population.
But it is kind of in the DNA of most unions to never accept reductions in real wages for the members. If we imagine that every worker was in a union, and everyone got a raise matching inflation from the previous year (including retired people), the new wage would still only allow the pupulation to consume the consumer goods that is actually produced. That would quickly cause prices to go up another 10%, again reducing purchasing power below what people are used to.
Now, add a few strikes into this. Let's say there is a general strike reducing economic output by 5%. This comes on top of the 10%, meaning that now 15% fewer consumer goods are available than people expect, causing prices to go up by 15% that year.
Now, if everyone tries to get back to their own level of consumption by loaning money, that's another 15% money chasing the same goods, which could lead to 30% inflation that year. To prevent that, central banks raise rates to, let's say, 15%.
As these rates enter morgage costs for middle aged people, the pain is magnified further, typically leading to more strikes, businesses going under (permanently removing them as a source of consumer goods), and so on. Unchecked, this can lead to hyperinflation.
Not that I expect it to turn out this bad. Demand is partly elastic. Some people WILL be willing to cut SOME consumption, especially if good investment opportunities open up.
Still, in a market where supply side output of consumer goods goes down by 10%, there exists a huge communication problem when trying to distribute this new reality to the population.
It can be done, though, especially during wartime, consumers may be able to understand that they simply cannot go on consuming as much as before. And if the consumers themselves understand it, the unions probably will too.
In peacetime it's harder, which we see if we look at what happened after the oil crisis in 1973, especially in the UK (where unions were very strong at the time). Labor conflict aggravated the already difficult situation, and played a part in the stagflation that would last for the rest of the decade and much of the next.
Eventually, it was brought under control, partly by new economic growth and partly by Thatcher crushing the strongest unions.
In the 1970's though, the west was in the middle of a demography-driven boom at the time, and with the boomer generation entering the labor market, growth was relatively easy to achieve.
Today, the situation is different. There are few young people to fill the jobs that retiring boomers are leaving. In Europe, the demographic development is more likely to cause economic contraction than growth. So unless something like AGI can cause a huge lift in productivity, we may actually face a long-lasting period where consumption has to stay at levels below what we're used to.
I expect it to take at least 10 years for that to sink in for most people.
This is good, I hope the employees at ActivisionBlizzard can finalize their union if they’re purchased by Microsoft.