4 ms·

I used to believe that. But I saw very close how an IT union was taken over by old school, corrupt fat union guys. And they just pander to the lowest common den

by alecco 8y ago

I used to believe that. But I saw very close how an IT union was taken over by old school, corrupt fat union guys. And they just pander to the lowest common denominator. They go against meritocracy. I'd rather pay attention and vote with my feet.

femiagbabiaka 8y ago
agreed, unions have had issues akin to this across the board in the last decade or so, and it's extremely sad (to say the least). active worker participation and leadership of the union is the antidote to that.
maximente 8y ago
"divided we fall" is a cliche but may have some merit here, especially if this will be filled by another starry eyed immigrant visa holder who can be treated as such. the information asymmetry gap is just too high imo. there's other opportunities for organizing labor that don't include old-school unions. screen actors' guild is one example that, e.g., mandates various "newer" members get roles on films and seems to be really well regarded. a guild could serve techies as well. read up on some of michael o church's old blog about his ideas about organized labor in tech, but be careful espousing the same views as it very well might get you into irredeemable trouble.
- 8ytecoder 8y ago
  Agreed. But the fight to keep management in check shouldn't devolve into a fight to keep the union leaders in check. What's the guarantee that won't happen?
  - maximente 8y ago
    i don't know, my first reaction is introduce democratic elements to the system as opposed to seniority but perhaps that's been done. "worst system but best we've had" and all that - at least labor would have a fighting chance
    - dragonwriter 8y ago
      > i don't know, my first reaction is introduce democratic elements to the system as opposed to seniority Unions are almost invariably democratic; where seniority rules are adopted by a union (and this is far from universal), they tend to be adopted democratically,and not to replace democratic control of the union, so these are not opposed concepts.
- tomp 8y ago
  > screen actors' guild is one example that, e.g., mandates various "newer" members get roles on films and seems to be really well regarded. a guild could serve techies as well. But does the profession of acting strive to be meritocratic as much as software development? It appears that fame (which is probably correlated with how good of an actor someone is, but probably only weakly) has a much bigger effect in acting.
  - gotocake 8y ago
    They both seem to pay a lot of lip service while the reality greatly undermines the verbiage. I’d argue that in acting the representation of women is far better than in software development. The degree to which software development is an asocial boy’s club is hard to understate, and the pet theories about intelligence and genetics don’t help, but rather reinforce the farcical nature of the self-serving “meritocracy” narrative.
- wapoamspomw 8y ago
  Getting to be a new member of SAG is almost impossible. I don't think we want that model for developers.
JohnFen 8y ago
> They go against meritocracy. Not necessarily. You can have union representation and maintain a meritocracy at the same time. But I also observe that the industry is not nearly as much of a meritocracy as we like to pretend anyway.
- barry-cotter 8y ago
  Unions are supposed to fight for each of their members equally. As such it is in their interest to eliminate performance based pay as much as possible. Increases in pay should be based on time in job (positively) and likelihood of losing job on time in job (negatively). If you have performance based pay someone who’s three times as good might get paid more, or long serving staff might be let go before the newly hired. That is not what the average union member wants, they want security and stability and they work to get it. Nowhere is a perfect meritocracy but a union that did not actively work against meritocracy would not be working in the interest of its average member.
  - JohnFen 8y ago
    Unions operate according to the rules the union members agree to. There is no "one way" that unions function. A "programmer's union" would be structured according to whatever makes sense to the programmers.
vkou 8y ago
> They go against meritocracy. So does management. The difference is, you can vote shitty union reps off the island.

by alecco 8y ago

femiagbabiaka 8y ago

agreed, unions have had issues akin to this across the board in the last decade or so, and it's extremely sad (to say the least). active worker participation and leadership of the union is the antidote to that.

maximente 8y ago

"divided we fall" is a cliche but may have some merit here, especially if this will be filled by another starry eyed immigrant visa holder who can be treated as such. the information asymmetry gap is just too high imo. there's other opportunities for organizing labor that don't include old-school unions. screen actors' guild is one example that, e.g., mandates various "newer" members get roles on films and seems to be really well regarded. a guild could serve techies as well. read up on some of michael o church's old blog about his ideas about organized labor in tech, but be careful espousing the same views as it very well might get you into irredeemable trouble.

8ytecoder 8y ago
Agreed. But the fight to keep management in check shouldn't devolve into a fight to keep the union leaders in check. What's the guarantee that won't happen?
- maximente 8y ago
  i don't know, my first reaction is introduce democratic elements to the system as opposed to seniority but perhaps that's been done. "worst system but best we've had" and all that - at least labor would have a fighting chance
  - dragonwriter 8y ago
    > i don't know, my first reaction is introduce democratic elements to the system as opposed to seniority Unions are almost invariably democratic; where seniority rules are adopted by a union (and this is far from universal), they tend to be adopted democratically,and not to replace democratic control of the union, so these are not opposed concepts.
tomp 8y ago
> screen actors' guild is one example that, e.g., mandates various "newer" members get roles on films and seems to be really well regarded. a guild could serve techies as well. But does the profession of acting strive to be meritocratic as much as software development? It appears that fame (which is probably correlated with how good of an actor someone is, but probably only weakly) has a much bigger effect in acting.
- gotocake 8y ago
  They both seem to pay a lot of lip service while the reality greatly undermines the verbiage. I’d argue that in acting the representation of women is far better than in software development. The degree to which software development is an asocial boy’s club is hard to understate, and the pet theories about intelligence and genetics don’t help, but rather reinforce the farcical nature of the self-serving “meritocracy” narrative.
wapoamspomw 8y ago
Getting to be a new member of SAG is almost impossible. I don't think we want that model for developers.

JohnFen 8y ago

> They go against meritocracy. Not necessarily. You can have union representation and maintain a meritocracy at the same time. But I also observe that the industry is not nearly as much of a meritocracy as we like to pretend anyway.

barry-cotter 8y ago
Unions are supposed to fight for each of their members equally. As such it is in their interest to eliminate performance based pay as much as possible. Increases in pay should be based on time in job (positively) and likelihood of losing job on time in job (negatively). If you have performance based pay someone who’s three times as good might get paid more, or long serving staff might be let go before the newly hired. That is not what the average union member wants, they want security and stability and they work to get it. Nowhere is a perfect meritocracy but a union that did not actively work against meritocracy would not be working in the interest of its average member.
- JohnFen 8y ago
  Unions operate according to the rules the union members agree to. There is no "one way" that unions function. A "programmer's union" would be structured according to whatever makes sense to the programmers.

vkou 8y ago

> They go against meritocracy. So does management. The difference is, you can vote shitty union reps off the island.