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Sure, just quit your job and stop feeding your family or having a house or health insurance. Or upend your entire life to move somewhere else where you'll mostl

Sure, just quit your job and stop feeding your family or having a house or health insurance. Or upend your entire life to move somewhere else where you'll mostly likely be treated similarly because you have no idea how a job will be until you work there for three months. Capitalism rewards those who can wring out the most value for least cost, which is why unions were created. Workers on their own have basically no leverage. Honestly, the fact that tech workers can pack up and leave relatively easily (more easily than most Americans, anyway) is part of the problem.

jm__87 10y ago
The reason I specifically mentioned skilled work is because there is a significant investment on the part of the company hiring. Labor unions are useful for unskilled labor where an individual worker has no bargaining chips and the company can replace someone at low cost. Depending on what you do in the tech industry, it is unlikely this applies to you. You either hire someone with less experience and it takes months before they become useful or you hire someone who has all the skills you already need and it is likely that people with the exact skill set you require are in low supply. Keeping these two points in mind, people who work in tech often have quite a good bargaining position with their employer.
- dvtv75 10y ago
  You would be surprised at just how poorly managed some businesses are, I think. A prior employer has such a bad reputation around the city that even the local IT school refuses to acknowledge that one of their graduates runs the IT department there, and this school is desperate to wave the "We have a successful course!" flag so they can compete with the CS course at the neighboring university. This business hires a few graduates from the course each year, requiring 40 hours a week minimum. The standard of work required immediately would be expected of someone with 5 years experience, and there's no budget for software or hardware, but here's the kicker: the job is actually an internship. There's no pay, but the project is a high-end one. The business is simply getting free labor, and does so regularly. The internships don't lead to a job, although they do provide a professional reference from a business with a terrible reputation. There are no guaranteed bargaining chips.

jm__87 10y ago

The reason I specifically mentioned skilled work is because there is a significant investment on the part of the company hiring. Labor unions are useful for unskilled labor where an individual worker has no bargaining chips and the company can replace someone at low cost. Depending on what you do in the tech industry, it is unlikely this applies to you. You either hire someone with less experience and it takes months before they become useful or you hire someone who has all the skills you already need and it is likely that people with the exact skill set you require are in low supply. Keeping these two points in mind, people who work in tech often have quite a good bargaining position with their employer.

dvtv75 10y ago
You would be surprised at just how poorly managed some businesses are, I think. A prior employer has such a bad reputation around the city that even the local IT school refuses to acknowledge that one of their graduates runs the IT department there, and this school is desperate to wave the "We have a successful course!" flag so they can compete with the CS course at the neighboring university. This business hires a few graduates from the course each year, requiring 40 hours a week minimum. The standard of work required immediately would be expected of someone with 5 years experience, and there's no budget for software or hardware, but here's the kicker: the job is actually an internship. There's no pay, but the project is a high-end one. The business is simply getting free labor, and does so regularly. The internships don't lead to a job, although they do provide a professional reference from a business with a terrible reputation. There are no guaranteed bargaining chips.