7 ms·

My main objection to unions is that, once they're in a company, employees lose the right to negotiate their own compensation. I want to be able to skip my union

My main objection to unions is that, once they're in a company, employees lose the right to negotiate their own compensation. I want to be able to skip my union dues and deal directly with the company. OR I want to be able to make a union of my own, especially for a functional or values-based subset of coworkers, and have us negotiate separately. This is not just a tech-unions-related complaint, this is a critique of unions as a whole. But yeah. I think that tech workers are in a special place because we have a lot of disposable income. I've gotten over my college-era "can't pay for anything" attitude, and I'm willing to pay for content that could be gotten for free. Entertainment was the first one, but now I'm also supporting some people on patreon and donating to causes. We don't need a union to drive that-- we can just remind tech workers that if we all donate a little, we can make big changes.

alphonsegaston 10y ago
You can create a union to reflect whatever values (e.g. negotiating compensation) you see fit. Don't believe the narratives proffered by anti-union forces for their own benefit. Actors are all in unions and employ an entire sub-class of workers (agents) to negotiate compensation for them.
- stale2002 10y ago
  Cool. How about we base this union on the values of not forcing people to join it? I'd be OK with that. Please keep these efforts focused on voluntary interactions.
  - AndrewKemendo 10y ago
    A union can't force you to join it so in that regard it's completely voluntary. It does however pressure companies to only hire union workers, or pressure the government to give preference to union workers. That's the whole point of a union, to check and co-opt the monopoly/oligopolic power of corporations and the government and giving it to the collective workers. You might philosophically disagree with that approach and think that a more anarchic market is better, but a union is not a violent coercive group.
  - aanm1988 10y ago
    because then it has no power. That's the whole point. Individuals have no power. You can fool yourself into thinking that extra 20k a year you managed to get is power.
    - stale2002 10y ago
      You guys do your own thing and I'll do mine. We'll see who comes out on top with the better job. The power that I have is the ability to up and leave and go somewhere else that offers me a better deal. And I will absolutely use my power of leaving if a group every tries to force me to join a union.
      - aanm1988 10y ago
        No you won't. You can get bored at lunch and just not come back if you want.
        stale2002 10y ago
        Things have worked out quite well for me. The same cannot be said for those trying to force everyone in tech to join a union. Every month I see some hacker new medium post about it, and they never go anywhere.
bosie 10y ago
> employees lose the right to negotiate their own compensation. I have never heard of that. Why would that be?
- nichj 10y ago
  At my last job(not tech), our wages were negotiated with the union at a much lower rate than our competitors and owed dues. We had no control because the union was "representing" us and we could take it or quit.
  - GauntletWizard 10y ago
    Yes. Mandatory unions (And be careful about how you define that, because many would claim they're not while still requiring their pound of flesh[1]) are signified by their monopoly on labor. By maintaining a chokehold on who can supply a vital resource (labor) to businesses, Unions have a history of strangling their patrons - See Detroit. From a distributed systems perspective, Unions represent a single point of failure. I'm entirely in favor of groups banding together to request, nee, demand, rights, pay increases, healthcare. Once they start having 'management' tiers of their own, they're no longer representing you - They're a corporation you work for, contracting to your nominal employer. Just being clearer about it doesn't work - Microsoft hires an army of 'contractors' who are abused in precisely the same way. Nor does having multiple competing pseudo-unions - There's dozens of headhunters to go through to work for microsoft, but they all compete on 'price' and drive wages down[2]. [1]http://www.nrtw.org/required-join-pay-teacher/ http://www.nrtw.org/required-join-pay-teacher/ - "educators cannot be required to do more than pay a union fee (typically called an "agency fee") that equals their share of what the union can prove is its costs of collective bargaining, contract administration, and grievance adjustment" - Which is to say, you don't have to join the union, they just get to negotiate for you, take a cut of your pay, and be the intermediary that represents you - While you've proved your disloyalty to them by not choosing to 'join' them, so they have no actual incentive to do so. See also https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Friedrichs_v._California_Teachers_Ass'n https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Friedrichs_v._California_Teach... [2] The lightly fictionalized https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microserfs https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microserfs, which still rings very true more than 20 years later.
maxxxxx 10y ago
In Germany you can negotiate your pay within the union payscale. You can ask the employer to move you up a level. There is nothing stopping them from doing that. Once you have reached the top you are "Ausser Tarif" and can negotiate your salary . The union mainly defines a bottom level salary and also gives a defined path upwards. For most people this is a nice system for a long career.
Shivetya 10y ago
The worst aspect isn't just the right to negotiate your own compensation but doing better work has no reward. Get any decent size shop and your going to have that one person if not two that everyone just carries. then there is that asshole who becomes shop steward and well, you best hope you agree with them. Yeah i am a bit jaded but no thanks. Let alone like it will matter because outsourcing will just become the standard means by which many companies will operate in a 24x7 world where talent to do IT can be anywhere. unlike your local plant our jobs can be done about from anywhere in the world. If you can work your job from home so can someone else
- geofft 10y ago
  > Get any decent size shop and your going to have that one person if not two that everyone just carries. > then there is that asshole who becomes shop steward and well, you best hope you agree with them. But that happens in tech already! And usually that one person is friends with the boss, or a long-term employee who did good work once and is now coasting, or is really good at this one skill that the company doesn't particularly need any more and not at the current stuff, or is a 10x engineer because they spend their time dragging down nine coworkers, or whatever. If anything, a union gives workers more ability to push back against that: I'm not going to call out the one guy the boss likes for being a jerk dragging down the business, because I know they'll find some way to get back. But if my coworkers contractually have my back, I'll be much more inclined to.
  - sverige 10y ago
    It seems apparent that you have never worked in a (traditional) union shop. Management still has power, union bosses have power, but union members end up with two bosses instead of one. Your coworkers aren't going to be able to help you vote out the shop steward who sucks because that is going to be the only name on the ballot. But carry on with your starry-eyed idealism.
Barrin92 10y ago
>My main objection to unions is that, once they're in a company, employees lose the right to negotiate their own compensation. I want to be able to skip my union dues and deal directly with the company. OR I want to be able to make a union of my own, especially for a functional or values-based subset of coworkers, and have us negotiate separately. Bargaining collectively is the whole point of creating a union in the first place. This special snowflake mentality that permeates the tech sector and the myopic individualism is a giant problem.
- stale2002 10y ago
  The moment someone removes my individual right to negotiate is the moment I hand in my resignation and go work somewhere that I do have that right. I will NOT have my coworkers voting on what is "fair" for me to be payed, based on BS metrics like "seniority". If unions were so great, then how come I make more money than any other union based engineering position? I have done just fine negotiating my salary on my own, thank you very much.
  - bigtimeidiot 10y ago
    >I have done just fine negotiating my salary on my own, thank you very much. And many, many other people haven't. Those people will unionize and won't care a lick to see you go.
    - stale2002 10y ago
      Awesome. They can do that, and I will work for the multitude of companies and startups out there that will not unionize. You can't unionize every startup in the world, and non unionized employees will be able to demand a premium. Other people are free to burden themselves with union rules, and I will be free to accept the higher salary that I can command because my competition is hindered. It is a competitive advantage to not be burdened by union rules.
      - Apocryphon 10y ago
AndrewKemendo 10y ago
Well the whole idea of trade associations and unions has it's roots in anarchic-socialism. The idea being that collective bargaining lifts the floor for the worker. The idea here is that the person at the top with outsized bargaining power is voluntarily relinquishing it to the person at the bottom in order to increase general welfare. If you don't believe in that, then that's great, but that's kind of the direction everyone seems to be headed.
- xapata 10y ago
  Even that "top" person might gain bargaining power by being part of a collective.
aanm1988 10y ago
> My main objection to unions is that, once they're in a company, employees lose the right to negotiate their own compensation So don't have the union do that. Have the union worry about coming down on places that fire members for refusing to work 60 hours a week, want you to train your replacement, force shitty unpaid oncall schedules, etc...
- chimeracoder 10y ago
  > So don't have the union do that Unfortunately, it's an all-or-nothing deal. The NLRA is a very rigid law, and once a union has been sanctioned as the exclusive representative of a bargaining unit, they have the authority to do that. It's next to impossible to either decertify or deauthorize a union once it forms, so you not only have to trust the current leadership, but all future leadership that may get elected, to focus only on the things you list and not focus on negotiating your compensation for you.

alphonsegaston 10y ago

You can create a union to reflect whatever values (e.g. negotiating compensation) you see fit. Don't believe the narratives proffered by anti-union forces for their own benefit. Actors are all in unions and employ an entire sub-class of workers (agents) to negotiate compensation for them.

stale2002 10y ago
Cool. How about we base this union on the values of not forcing people to join it? I'd be OK with that. Please keep these efforts focused on voluntary interactions.
- AndrewKemendo 10y ago
  A union can't force you to join it so in that regard it's completely voluntary. It does however pressure companies to only hire union workers, or pressure the government to give preference to union workers. That's the whole point of a union, to check and co-opt the monopoly/oligopolic power of corporations and the government and giving it to the collective workers. You might philosophically disagree with that approach and think that a more anarchic market is better, but a union is not a violent coercive group.
- aanm1988 10y ago
  because then it has no power. That's the whole point. Individuals have no power. You can fool yourself into thinking that extra 20k a year you managed to get is power.
  - stale2002 10y ago
    You guys do your own thing and I'll do mine. We'll see who comes out on top with the better job. The power that I have is the ability to up and leave and go somewhere else that offers me a better deal. And I will absolutely use my power of leaving if a group every tries to force me to join a union.
    - aanm1988 10y ago
      No you won't. You can get bored at lunch and just not come back if you want.
      - stale2002 10y ago
        Things have worked out quite well for me. The same cannot be said for those trying to force everyone in tech to join a union. Every month I see some hacker new medium post about it, and they never go anywhere.

bosie 10y ago

> employees lose the right to negotiate their own compensation. I have never heard of that. Why would that be?

nichj 10y ago
At my last job(not tech), our wages were negotiated with the union at a much lower rate than our competitors and owed dues. We had no control because the union was "representing" us and we could take it or quit.
- GauntletWizard 10y ago
  Yes. Mandatory unions (And be careful about how you define that, because many would claim they're not while still requiring their pound of flesh[1]) are signified by their monopoly on labor. By maintaining a chokehold on who can supply a vital resource (labor) to businesses, Unions have a history of strangling their patrons - See Detroit. From a distributed systems perspective, Unions represent a single point of failure. I'm entirely in favor of groups banding together to request, nee, demand, rights, pay increases, healthcare. Once they start having 'management' tiers of their own, they're no longer representing you - They're a corporation you work for, contracting to your nominal employer. Just being clearer about it doesn't work - Microsoft hires an army of 'contractors' who are abused in precisely the same way. Nor does having multiple competing pseudo-unions - There's dozens of headhunters to go through to work for microsoft, but they all compete on 'price' and drive wages down[2]. [1]http://www.nrtw.org/required-join-pay-teacher/ http://www.nrtw.org/required-join-pay-teacher/ - "educators cannot be required to do more than pay a union fee (typically called an "agency fee") that equals their share of what the union can prove is its costs of collective bargaining, contract administration, and grievance adjustment" - Which is to say, you don't have to join the union, they just get to negotiate for you, take a cut of your pay, and be the intermediary that represents you - While you've proved your disloyalty to them by not choosing to 'join' them, so they have no actual incentive to do so. See also https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Friedrichs_v._California_Teachers_Ass'n https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Friedrichs_v._California_Teach... [2] The lightly fictionalized https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microserfs https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microserfs, which still rings very true more than 20 years later.

maxxxxx 10y ago

In Germany you can negotiate your pay within the union payscale. You can ask the employer to move you up a level. There is nothing stopping them from doing that. Once you have reached the top you are "Ausser Tarif" and can negotiate your salary . The union mainly defines a bottom level salary and also gives a defined path upwards. For most people this is a nice system for a long career.

Shivetya 10y ago

The worst aspect isn't just the right to negotiate your own compensation but doing better work has no reward. Get any decent size shop and your going to have that one person if not two that everyone just carries. then there is that asshole who becomes shop steward and well, you best hope you agree with them. Yeah i am a bit jaded but no thanks. Let alone like it will matter because outsourcing will just become the standard means by which many companies will operate in a 24x7 world where talent to do IT can be anywhere. unlike your local plant our jobs can be done about from anywhere in the world. If you can work your job from home so can someone else

geofft 10y ago
> Get any decent size shop and your going to have that one person if not two that everyone just carries. > then there is that asshole who becomes shop steward and well, you best hope you agree with them. But that happens in tech already! And usually that one person is friends with the boss, or a long-term employee who did good work once and is now coasting, or is really good at this one skill that the company doesn't particularly need any more and not at the current stuff, or is a 10x engineer because they spend their time dragging down nine coworkers, or whatever. If anything, a union gives workers more ability to push back against that: I'm not going to call out the one guy the boss likes for being a jerk dragging down the business, because I know they'll find some way to get back. But if my coworkers contractually have my back, I'll be much more inclined to.
- sverige 10y ago
  It seems apparent that you have never worked in a (traditional) union shop. Management still has power, union bosses have power, but union members end up with two bosses instead of one. Your coworkers aren't going to be able to help you vote out the shop steward who sucks because that is going to be the only name on the ballot. But carry on with your starry-eyed idealism.

Barrin92 10y ago

>My main objection to unions is that, once they're in a company, employees lose the right to negotiate their own compensation. I want to be able to skip my union dues and deal directly with the company. OR I want to be able to make a union of my own, especially for a functional or values-based subset of coworkers, and have us negotiate separately. Bargaining collectively is the whole point of creating a union in the first place. This special snowflake mentality that permeates the tech sector and the myopic individualism is a giant problem.

stale2002 10y ago
The moment someone removes my individual right to negotiate is the moment I hand in my resignation and go work somewhere that I do have that right. I will NOT have my coworkers voting on what is "fair" for me to be payed, based on BS metrics like "seniority". If unions were so great, then how come I make more money than any other union based engineering position? I have done just fine negotiating my salary on my own, thank you very much.
- bigtimeidiot 10y ago
  >I have done just fine negotiating my salary on my own, thank you very much. And many, many other people haven't. Those people will unionize and won't care a lick to see you go.
  - stale2002 10y ago
    Awesome. They can do that, and I will work for the multitude of companies and startups out there that will not unionize. You can't unionize every startup in the world, and non unionized employees will be able to demand a premium. Other people are free to burden themselves with union rules, and I will be free to accept the higher salary that I can command because my competition is hindered. It is a competitive advantage to not be burdened by union rules.
    - Apocryphon 10y ago

AndrewKemendo 10y ago

Well the whole idea of trade associations and unions has it's roots in anarchic-socialism. The idea being that collective bargaining lifts the floor for the worker. The idea here is that the person at the top with outsized bargaining power is voluntarily relinquishing it to the person at the bottom in order to increase general welfare. If you don't believe in that, then that's great, but that's kind of the direction everyone seems to be headed.

xapata 10y ago
Even that "top" person might gain bargaining power by being part of a collective.

aanm1988 10y ago

> My main objection to unions is that, once they're in a company, employees lose the right to negotiate their own compensation So don't have the union do that. Have the union worry about coming down on places that fire members for refusing to work 60 hours a week, want you to train your replacement, force shitty unpaid oncall schedules, etc...

chimeracoder 10y ago
> So don't have the union do that Unfortunately, it's an all-or-nothing deal. The NLRA is a very rigid law, and once a union has been sanctioned as the exclusive representative of a bargaining unit, they have the authority to do that. It's next to impossible to either decertify or deauthorize a union once it forms, so you not only have to trust the current leadership, but all future leadership that may get elected, to focus only on the things you list and not focus on negotiating your compensation for you.