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A union could ensure better QOL for tech workers by: 1) capturing more of the value the workers create for them, vs. for capital, in direct dollar compensation

A union could ensure better QOL for tech workers by: 1) capturing more of the value the workers create for them, vs. for capital, in direct dollar compensation or in other benefits, by bargaining from a much stronger position than individual workers, and 2) providing easier and more even access to counsel, support, and protection against all sorts of personal and professional abuses, at work, Where #2 is a bucket that holds a whole bunch of really nice stuff, including ensuring management doesn't fail to provide what was won in #1 in lots of small ways that aren't worth fighting for an individual but are for a larger group. Basically the same core things any well-functioning union provides.

toasterlovin 7y ago
Do we live on the same planet? Tech jobs are insanely awesome compared to basically every other job out there. I've consulted for unicorns, the amenities for employees are ridiculous. Employees are incredibly sought after and can (and many do) regularly shop themselves around for better offers.
- shantly 7y ago
  That doesn't mean there isn't more value to extract for workers—very probably there is—or more that could be done to even out availability of things like parental leave, for example, or that an easy, cheap, acceptable route to professional and legal counsel & insurances outside the direct control of the company one is working for wouldn't be very valuable—and besides, the overwhelming majority of tech jobs aren't the kind you're talking about, even restricting ourselves to the US. [EDIT] more to the point, if your company doesn't say things like "you know, this contract pays really well, no need to negotiate for more even if we think we could get it" there's no reason employees should have that kind of attitude about their pay & work conditions.
- CharlesColeman 7y ago
  They get those amenities because the people employing them are making so much more money off of them that the cost is easy to swallow.
  - toasterlovin 7y ago
    So what? The existence of someone else's profit is not justification for it to be taken. The moral justification for unions is that they prevent mistreatment of employees, not that they can transfer as much of the company's profit as possible to employees.
    - shantly 7y ago
      Do you also oppose companies negotiating "unfair" contracts that extract "too much" of some other company's profit? [EDIT] I mean... wow, is it immoral if an individual negotiates with the aim to gain as much pay as possible, or only if workers band together to do so more effectively?
      - toasterlovin 7y ago
        I would oppose a cartel of companies acting in a way that extracts too much money from consumers. We have a whole area of law for dealing with this. Unions are a cartel of employees who use the threat of financial harm to limit the freedom of employers and individual workers from freely entering into mutually beneficial work arrangements. I think this is justified if the purpose is to prevent employers from exploiting workers. I don't think it's justified if their sole purpose is to use power to extract more value from the employer.
        shantly 7y ago
        > Unions are a cartel of employees who use the threat of harm to limit the freedom of employers and individual workers from freely entering into mutually beneficial work arrangements. Individual workers are in a weaker negotiating position than employers, so without a union it's highly likely that, on average, they are receiving lower compensation than they might absent that weaker bargaining position (the short-version explanation being that, in the typical case, it harms an employee more to miss an opportunity than for a company to pass on an employee, simply due to the nature of the two entities). I don't see why employees being in a weak bargaining position does not cause "harm" but their banding together to be in a stronger position does, nor why, given that position, they should be expected to voluntarily make worse deals than they could. Further, we collectively choose, via government, to permit such a thing as a corporation to exist in the first place, so in my view there's no natural or moral argument for the state of their being in a better negotiating position than labor, and even if we go on to arrange things such that they are made weaker than labor, somehow—not just equal or less-dominant—it's gonna take more than the simple fact of things being that way to convince me they're being harmed in some sense that should make me feel bad for them or that some moral wrong is being committed. I don't think corporations, provided their privileges and their very existence by force of law, are being particularly harmed in some sense worthy of moral assignment by having to deal with strong collective bargaining entities for labor, nor that we can call gains in negotiations made by those labor entities unfair or immoral if they aim to gain the best deals they can without also having to label much of Capitalism as such (I might follow you down that road, actually, as I'm not sure it's wrong and it seems, at first glance, consistent, at least).
- Pfhreak 7y ago
  Where does the money from to fund those amenities? The surplus generated from their wage labor. You can pay someone $300,000 a year and expect to make $400,000 from their contributions. It can absolutely be the case the workers are well treated and still be losing their surplus value.
  - toasterlovin 7y ago
    As I replied in another comment, the moral justification for unions is to prevent mistreatment of workers, not to transfer as much of the wealth created by a company to its employees as possible.
    - Pfhreak 7y ago
      I'm not sure who defines 'the moral justification for unions' but I see a moral justification just from balancing the power dynamic between the company and the individual worker. Negotiating as a single worker against a company one has profound disadvantages. > prevent mistreatment of workers, not to transfer as much of the wealth created by a company to its employees as possible. The wealth is created by the workers, not the company. And some would argue that keeping too large of a share of that wealth is, in fact, a mistreatment of workers.
      - shantly 7y ago
        Moreover, I'm finding this notion that some economic actors have more "moral" right to a big slice of the profit-pie than others really hard to pin down. As in, it sure seems like the idea collapses as soon as you breathe in its direction, unless I'm missing something big. [EDIT] that is, I don't follow why it's fine (presumably) for companies to seek to maximize returns, negotiating as a large block of people pooling their labor and capital, but not for workers to do that.
        toasterlovin 7y ago
        I own a business. I have undertaken lots of work and risk to get this business off the ground. Why should someone else, who has risked nothing, be entitled to anything other than a reasonable work environment and wages that both parties agree to if I decide to hire them?
Pfhreak 7y ago
Things I'd consider in addition to the two excellent items you mentioned: 3) Negotiating better IP control. Side projects, open source, etc. are locked down at various companies. 4) Better treatment for oncall. I know folks who have had to work for 17 consecutive hours for an incident and got nothing. 5) Better treatment for crunch -- tech workers in games have this particularly bad, but it's not limited to just that industry. 6) Salary minimums 7) More control over how the company outsources/contracts with workers 8) All sorts of other side benefits that could be collectively funded -- union libraries, training, networks, publications, resources for new professionals, discounts on union developed software, etc. 9) Parental leave, sick time, and other basic benefits Edit: 10) Ensure and oversee processes to protect people who end up on the public stage. If you believe cancel culture is a thing, maybe having a union rep on hand and an established process for managing firings would be in your best interest. 11) Forced arbitration is another thing I'd consider talking with a union about. So many people have this notion of a labor union built on what it means in an industrial context. But there's plenty of other models that could be applied where you don't have to, for example, promote people based on seniority. I wish it was easier to talk about this stuff without people hand waving away the idea immediately.

toasterlovin 7y ago

Do we live on the same planet? Tech jobs are insanely awesome compared to basically every other job out there. I've consulted for unicorns, the amenities for employees are ridiculous. Employees are incredibly sought after and can (and many do) regularly shop themselves around for better offers.

shantly 7y ago
That doesn't mean there isn't more value to extract for workers—very probably there is—or more that could be done to even out availability of things like parental leave, for example, or that an easy, cheap, acceptable route to professional and legal counsel & insurances outside the direct control of the company one is working for wouldn't be very valuable—and besides, the overwhelming majority of tech jobs aren't the kind you're talking about, even restricting ourselves to the US. [EDIT] more to the point, if your company doesn't say things like "you know, this contract pays really well, no need to negotiate for more even if we think we could get it" there's no reason employees should have that kind of attitude about their pay & work conditions.
CharlesColeman 7y ago
They get those amenities because the people employing them are making so much more money off of them that the cost is easy to swallow.
- toasterlovin 7y ago
  So what? The existence of someone else's profit is not justification for it to be taken. The moral justification for unions is that they prevent mistreatment of employees, not that they can transfer as much of the company's profit as possible to employees.
  - shantly 7y ago
    Do you also oppose companies negotiating "unfair" contracts that extract "too much" of some other company's profit? [EDIT] I mean... wow, is it immoral if an individual negotiates with the aim to gain as much pay as possible, or only if workers band together to do so more effectively?
    - toasterlovin 7y ago
      I would oppose a cartel of companies acting in a way that extracts too much money from consumers. We have a whole area of law for dealing with this. Unions are a cartel of employees who use the threat of financial harm to limit the freedom of employers and individual workers from freely entering into mutually beneficial work arrangements. I think this is justified if the purpose is to prevent employers from exploiting workers. I don't think it's justified if their sole purpose is to use power to extract more value from the employer.
      - shantly 7y ago
        > Unions are a cartel of employees who use the threat of harm to limit the freedom of employers and individual workers from freely entering into mutually beneficial work arrangements. Individual workers are in a weaker negotiating position than employers, so without a union it's highly likely that, on average, they are receiving lower compensation than they might absent that weaker bargaining position (the short-version explanation being that, in the typical case, it harms an employee more to miss an opportunity than for a company to pass on an employee, simply due to the nature of the two entities). I don't see why employees being in a weak bargaining position does not cause "harm" but their banding together to be in a stronger position does, nor why, given that position, they should be expected to voluntarily make worse deals than they could. Further, we collectively choose, via government, to permit such a thing as a corporation to exist in the first place, so in my view there's no natural or moral argument for the state of their being in a better negotiating position than labor, and even if we go on to arrange things such that they are made weaker than labor, somehow—not just equal or less-dominant—it's gonna take more than the simple fact of things being that way to convince me they're being harmed in some sense that should make me feel bad for them or that some moral wrong is being committed. I don't think corporations, provided their privileges and their very existence by force of law, are being particularly harmed in some sense worthy of moral assignment by having to deal with strong collective bargaining entities for labor, nor that we can call gains in negotiations made by those labor entities unfair or immoral if they aim to gain the best deals they can without also having to label much of Capitalism as such (I might follow you down that road, actually, as I'm not sure it's wrong and it seems, at first glance, consistent, at least).
Pfhreak 7y ago
Where does the money from to fund those amenities? The surplus generated from their wage labor. You can pay someone $300,000 a year and expect to make $400,000 from their contributions. It can absolutely be the case the workers are well treated and still be losing their surplus value.
- toasterlovin 7y ago
  As I replied in another comment, the moral justification for unions is to prevent mistreatment of workers, not to transfer as much of the wealth created by a company to its employees as possible.
  - Pfhreak 7y ago
    I'm not sure who defines 'the moral justification for unions' but I see a moral justification just from balancing the power dynamic between the company and the individual worker. Negotiating as a single worker against a company one has profound disadvantages. > prevent mistreatment of workers, not to transfer as much of the wealth created by a company to its employees as possible. The wealth is created by the workers, not the company. And some would argue that keeping too large of a share of that wealth is, in fact, a mistreatment of workers.
    - shantly 7y ago
      Moreover, I'm finding this notion that some economic actors have more "moral" right to a big slice of the profit-pie than others really hard to pin down. As in, it sure seems like the idea collapses as soon as you breathe in its direction, unless I'm missing something big. [EDIT] that is, I don't follow why it's fine (presumably) for companies to seek to maximize returns, negotiating as a large block of people pooling their labor and capital, but not for workers to do that.
      - toasterlovin 7y ago
        I own a business. I have undertaken lots of work and risk to get this business off the ground. Why should someone else, who has risked nothing, be entitled to anything other than a reasonable work environment and wages that both parties agree to if I decide to hire them?

Pfhreak 7y ago

Things I'd consider in addition to the two excellent items you mentioned: 3) Negotiating better IP control. Side projects, open source, etc. are locked down at various companies. 4) Better treatment for oncall. I know folks who have had to work for 17 consecutive hours for an incident and got nothing. 5) Better treatment for crunch -- tech workers in games have this particularly bad, but it's not limited to just that industry. 6) Salary minimums 7) More control over how the company outsources/contracts with workers 8) All sorts of other side benefits that could be collectively funded -- union libraries, training, networks, publications, resources for new professionals, discounts on union developed software, etc. 9) Parental leave, sick time, and other basic benefits Edit: 10) Ensure and oversee processes to protect people who end up on the public stage. If you believe cancel culture is a thing, maybe having a union rep on hand and an established process for managing firings would be in your best interest. 11) Forced arbitration is another thing I'd consider talking with a union about. So many people have this notion of a labor union built on what it means in an industrial context. But there's plenty of other models that could be applied where you don't have to, for example, promote people based on seniority. I wish it was easier to talk about this stuff without people hand waving away the idea immediately.