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> It seems silly to confine the question to Teamster-style unions. You want the answer to that? No, tech workers are not going to create the Tech Teamsters. Tha

> It seems silly to confine the question to Teamster-style unions. You want the answer to that? No, tech workers are not going to create the Tech Teamsters. That's not the important question. The important question is, will tech workers organize, and, when they do, what will that organization look like? That's a question we can speculate productively about. Any union that derives its authority from the NLRA and is overseen by the NLRB will eventually end up looking like the AFL-CIO, SEIU, etc. We have decades of experimentation done by other unions with other organizational structures - all of which have failed - testifying to that. Most professional organizations do not derive their authority or power from the NLRA at all. The activities that they take, as organizations, are outside the scope of the NLRA. Put another way: if the NLRA vanished overnight, they would still operate in the same way, as evidenced by the fact that many of the largest and most successful professional organizations predate the NLRA by decades. The same is not true of most labor unions which derive their power from the NLRA - even the few surviving ones that predated the NLRA restructured in its wake. The fact that the NLRA protects some employee activity in non-unionized workforces is true, but it isn't particularly relevant to answering the question "do you think tech-workers will begin to unionize?", because the professional organizations that you introduced to the discussion do not require the NLRA to function as they do today.

tptacek 9y ago
No, the NLRA doesn't protect "some employee activity" in "non-unionized workforces". The core elements of the law that enable "unions" are available to enable any workplace organization of any form. It's deeply misleading to suggest that a group of employees availing themselves of the protections of the NLRA are putting themselves on a slippery slope to becoming the Teamsters.
- chimeracoder 9y ago
  > It's deeply misleading to suggest that a group of employees availing themselves of the protections of the NLRA are putting themselves on a slippery slope to becoming the Teamsters. That's not what I said. What I said: It's misleading to suggest that professional associations require the NLRA to operate.
  - tptacek 9y ago
    What you appear to be arguing is that it would be better for tech workers if they could be fired for organizing.
    - chimeracoder 9y ago
      > What you appear to be arguing is that it would be better for tech workers if they could be fired for organizing. I've done my best to explain why the NLRA and "labor unions" (as asked in the original question) are completely orthogonal to professional associations (which you mentioned in your reply). I've explained why the rights that the NLRA grants are relevant to labor unions, but are different from the ones that professional associations require and use in their operations. I've explained why bringing up professional associations in a thread specifically about labor unions is a red herring. I've mentioned some of the history, and I've proposed a thought experiment to try and illustrate this difference better. If after all of that, you really, genuinely think the best summary of what I've said is "it would be better for tech workers if they could be fired for organizing," then I don't know what to say. That's an unbelievably uncharitable way to twist the things I've said in good faith.
      - tptacek 9y ago
        If you would stop citing the NLRA and constrain your comments to just unions, we wouldn't have an argument. But you keep implying that the NLRA means unions, and in fact the NLRA is the law that prevents companies from firing their employees for any kind of organizing. It does other things, but you don't have to engage with those other things to get the protection I'm talking about. So when you cite the NLRA as a bad thing, you are literally making the argument I just suggested you were.
        chimeracoder 9y ago
        > So when you cite the NLRA as a bad thing, you are literally making the argument I just suggested you were. I never once cited the NLRA as "a bad thing".
s73ver_ 9y ago
"We have decades of experimentation done by other unions with other organizational structures - all of which have failed - testifying to that." You'll have to provide some backing examples for this. And also an explanation for why you believe the Screen Actors Guild, for one, has failed.
- chimeracoder 9y ago
  > You'll have to provide some backing examples for this. And also an explanation for why you believe the Screen Actors Guild, for one, has failed. SAG-AFTRA largely does operate this way, but aside from that, it also has received a number of special exemptions enshrined in law (both at the state and the federal level).

tptacek 9y ago

No, the NLRA doesn't protect "some employee activity" in "non-unionized workforces". The core elements of the law that enable "unions" are available to enable any workplace organization of any form. It's deeply misleading to suggest that a group of employees availing themselves of the protections of the NLRA are putting themselves on a slippery slope to becoming the Teamsters.

chimeracoder 9y ago
> It's deeply misleading to suggest that a group of employees availing themselves of the protections of the NLRA are putting themselves on a slippery slope to becoming the Teamsters. That's not what I said. What I said: It's misleading to suggest that professional associations require the NLRA to operate.
- tptacek 9y ago
  What you appear to be arguing is that it would be better for tech workers if they could be fired for organizing.
  - chimeracoder 9y ago
    > What you appear to be arguing is that it would be better for tech workers if they could be fired for organizing. I've done my best to explain why the NLRA and "labor unions" (as asked in the original question) are completely orthogonal to professional associations (which you mentioned in your reply). I've explained why the rights that the NLRA grants are relevant to labor unions, but are different from the ones that professional associations require and use in their operations. I've explained why bringing up professional associations in a thread specifically about labor unions is a red herring. I've mentioned some of the history, and I've proposed a thought experiment to try and illustrate this difference better. If after all of that, you really, genuinely think the best summary of what I've said is "it would be better for tech workers if they could be fired for organizing," then I don't know what to say. That's an unbelievably uncharitable way to twist the things I've said in good faith.
    - tptacek 9y ago
      If you would stop citing the NLRA and constrain your comments to just unions, we wouldn't have an argument. But you keep implying that the NLRA means unions, and in fact the NLRA is the law that prevents companies from firing their employees for any kind of organizing. It does other things, but you don't have to engage with those other things to get the protection I'm talking about. So when you cite the NLRA as a bad thing, you are literally making the argument I just suggested you were.
      - chimeracoder 9y ago
        > So when you cite the NLRA as a bad thing, you are literally making the argument I just suggested you were. I never once cited the NLRA as "a bad thing".

s73ver_ 9y ago

"We have decades of experimentation done by other unions with other organizational structures - all of which have failed - testifying to that." You'll have to provide some backing examples for this. And also an explanation for why you believe the Screen Actors Guild, for one, has failed.

chimeracoder 9y ago
> You'll have to provide some backing examples for this. And also an explanation for why you believe the Screen Actors Guild, for one, has failed. SAG-AFTRA largely does operate this way, but aside from that, it also has received a number of special exemptions enshrined in law (both at the state and the federal level).