6 ms·

You know amazon has over a million employees. Talking to them one and a time and all wearing a red pin seems like a HUGE task. Also, only a tiny minority of em

You know amazon has over a million employees. Talking to them one and a time and all wearing a red pin seems like a HUGE task. Also, only a tiny minority of employees are skilled. They're well paid and looked after. They have large stock options (I think the only pay over 100k at amazon is given in the form of stock). I highly doubt they'll strike for the rest. They've never met them. They don't have anything in common with them. They much closer to management. Don't get me wrong, they have every right to try. I just don't think anything even a tenth this size has been accomplished in the history of labour relations...

freeone3000 6y ago
They're only closer to management in the sense that they make more money and have better conditions. Their livelihood is just as precarious and just as dependent on their bosses for income, and they can be fired just as easily -- and they have their own grievances about scope and purpose of work.
- LatteLazy 6y ago
  That's not actually true. If you're a skilled worker, you're livelihood (and security) comes from your skills. This is the core issue with unions for skilled people. If you work hard and move around, you can make great money and be secure without a union. So why unionise? That's why there is no union of doctors or investment bankers... Imagine you're a dev at amazon, and you get 100k basic and share options worth another 100k. If you throw in with the union, you risk your job. And if you win, they get 2usd an hour more. And your 100k of share options is worthless. How does that sound like a good deal?
  - freeone3000 6y ago
    Professional organizations take their place for regulated professions - so the AMA for doctors and the NIBA for Investment Bankers. But programming isn't a regulated profession. It doesn't have a professional organization. Your "cred" is reputational and based on work history, not on actual credentials or licensure. It's closer in this sense to a trade, like electrical work or plumbing, where members frequently are unionized. Why unionize? Because your facial recognition tech is being used to round up Uigurs, or bomb Yemeni weddings, or bake cakes for gay people. To have actual say over the products you work on, and how they're used.
    - LatteLazy 6y ago
      I don't see the relevance of some professions being regulated. A dev is skilled labour whether they're regulated or not. Being not easily replaceable puts them in the same category as the others I listed. Your points on Why unionise? have wondered a bit if you don't mind me saying. Again, I'm all for people having a moral stance. But if you do, why did you join the Amazon Facial Recognition and Military Tech department? And why would unionising actually stop that work being done, rather than just move it to MS or Apple or Halliburton? And even if you did, why bother including the pickers? They don't care about amazon tech and you wouldn't need them to close the tech centre down...
      - nobodyandproud 6y ago
        > I don't see the relevance of some professions being regulated. A dev is skilled labour whether they're regulated or not. Being not easily replaceable puts them in the same category as the others I listed First you say, Doctors don’t have unions. Then you move the goalpost when it’s pointed out that many skilled professions do have something effectively similar. The reason for having one isn’t just about pay.
        LatteLazy 6y ago
        I'm trying hard here to give the benefit of the doubt. Help me understand: how is the AMA a union? Especially the sort of union people are suggesting for amazon. Specifically: * do they negotiate standard wages, hours and work conditions? * do they organise strikes and other action when they don't get what their members want? * do they also represent unskilled workers, say hospital cleaners (as was being suggested for the amazon Union)? Help me out here. Am I missing something? I'm no expert so I'm happy to be corrected...
        nobodyandproud 6y ago
        Sure: First, throw away the narrow conception of what you think a trade union is. A trade union is simply an organization of workers to achieve a shared goal. That’s it. For many trade associations, safety standards is a big one, and it becomes more important as the trade is more skilled. So for instance, it’s the AMA that promoted the standards of medicine over the century and a half and lobbied to prevent quacks from practicing as “medical doctors”. Do you believe the fragmented and haphazard standards in software today and management’s race to the bottom is beneficial to consumers or to society?
  - nobodyandproud 6y ago
    > That's why there is no union of doctors or investment bankers... Wrong. The AMA sets an even higher bar than any union.
    - wahern 6y ago
      1) I think the point is that all skilled jobs by definition benefit from a barrier to entry. As far as suitability to unionization, it hardly matters whether the barrier is experience, education, or taxi medallions. 2) AFAIU, for many years now the bottleneck in the United States for doctors has mostly been residency slots, which aren't controlled in any manner by the AMA, AFAIK. Skilled nurses are even more supply constrained than doctors despite having relatively lower barriers to entry. The issue there seems to simply be not enough teachers.
      - nobodyandproud 6y ago
        The point is a classic straw man. There’s more reasons to support an influential trade organization other than just pay and job security. - Ethics : Litigating the worst behaviors (Amazon, Facebook, Google, etc.). - Quality and security: There is no cost advantage to supporting security, unless somebody pushes to make it that way. I can’t find a large US bank that supports Yubikey. Also think of the chaos with Experian. - Solidarity with very important (and struggling) fields like investigative journalism. My field destroys jobs and creates others, but quality information is just too important. I can go on.
        wahern 6y ago
        > The point is a classic straw man. It depends on whether you're coming at the question from a prescriptivist or a descriptivist viewpoint. The point about skilled workers isn't a strawman from a descriptivist viewpoint--i.e. understanding why there's less demand for unionization. Even from a prescriptivist viewpoint the point is relevant as to why alternative approaches might be better--e.g. giving consumers and users more power by rolling back limitations on class actions, and statutorily creating new rights of action designed to force companies to internalize more of their costs (e.g. regarding security). Why rely on unions, which are principally designed to look after employee interests, to address issues related to consumers or society as a whole, especially when there are alternatives that empower groups whose self interests are a better fit for your prescriptivist goals? That said, many skilled nurses are unionized. So there's definitely reason to believe that if unskilled Amazon employees become unionized, other skilled employees might follow suit, and that could be a good thing for all the reasons you described.
  - dunce2020 6y ago
    > If you're a skilled worker, you're livelihood (and security) comes from your skills. Didn't protect James Damore.
    - LatteLazy 6y ago
      According to his linked in (first result of googling his name), he got a job at a startup a few weeks after he finished arbitration with Google. So it worked fine for him. He didn't move city or change industry or job. Just went back to work using his skills elsewhere...
      - dunce2020 6y ago
        His "special" skills didn't protect him from getting fired. Not that hard to understand.
amzsdethrowaway 6y ago
I'm an SDE II at Amazon. Posting because I hope other SDEs read this; there is strength in voices. I absolutely will join a strike if Amazon lays off unionizing unskilled workers en masse. The pay is good, but I think you're missing two things. (1) A large portion of Amazon SDEs leave after a year or two anyway. (The lack of vested RSUs in the first two years is typically compensated with an equivalent sign-on bonus, which pays out with each paycheck. So the vesting schedule doesn't particularly incentivize sticking around for no other reason.) (2) Many Amazon SDEs (like that of any FAANG) are millenials, who skew progressive: worker rights are an issue I think many feel strongly about, and many probably have friends who are part of the unskilled labor pool or gig economy. We know if it weren't for software, we'd very well be in the same boat.
- LatteLazy 6y ago
  Thanks, it's good to hear from someone with first hand knowledge. I wasn't aware of the vesting structure and I think you're right that a shorter term planned tenure makes people less risk averse.

freeone3000 6y ago

They're only closer to management in the sense that they make more money and have better conditions. Their livelihood is just as precarious and just as dependent on their bosses for income, and they can be fired just as easily -- and they have their own grievances about scope and purpose of work.

LatteLazy 6y ago
That's not actually true. If you're a skilled worker, you're livelihood (and security) comes from your skills. This is the core issue with unions for skilled people. If you work hard and move around, you can make great money and be secure without a union. So why unionise? That's why there is no union of doctors or investment bankers... Imagine you're a dev at amazon, and you get 100k basic and share options worth another 100k. If you throw in with the union, you risk your job. And if you win, they get 2usd an hour more. And your 100k of share options is worthless. How does that sound like a good deal?
- freeone3000 6y ago
  Professional organizations take their place for regulated professions - so the AMA for doctors and the NIBA for Investment Bankers. But programming isn't a regulated profession. It doesn't have a professional organization. Your "cred" is reputational and based on work history, not on actual credentials or licensure. It's closer in this sense to a trade, like electrical work or plumbing, where members frequently are unionized. Why unionize? Because your facial recognition tech is being used to round up Uigurs, or bomb Yemeni weddings, or bake cakes for gay people. To have actual say over the products you work on, and how they're used.
  - LatteLazy 6y ago
    I don't see the relevance of some professions being regulated. A dev is skilled labour whether they're regulated or not. Being not easily replaceable puts them in the same category as the others I listed. Your points on Why unionise? have wondered a bit if you don't mind me saying. Again, I'm all for people having a moral stance. But if you do, why did you join the Amazon Facial Recognition and Military Tech department? And why would unionising actually stop that work being done, rather than just move it to MS or Apple or Halliburton? And even if you did, why bother including the pickers? They don't care about amazon tech and you wouldn't need them to close the tech centre down...
    - nobodyandproud 6y ago
      > I don't see the relevance of some professions being regulated. A dev is skilled labour whether they're regulated or not. Being not easily replaceable puts them in the same category as the others I listed First you say, Doctors don’t have unions. Then you move the goalpost when it’s pointed out that many skilled professions do have something effectively similar. The reason for having one isn’t just about pay.
      - LatteLazy 6y ago
        I'm trying hard here to give the benefit of the doubt. Help me understand: how is the AMA a union? Especially the sort of union people are suggesting for amazon. Specifically: * do they negotiate standard wages, hours and work conditions? * do they organise strikes and other action when they don't get what their members want? * do they also represent unskilled workers, say hospital cleaners (as was being suggested for the amazon Union)? Help me out here. Am I missing something? I'm no expert so I'm happy to be corrected...
        nobodyandproud 6y ago
        Sure: First, throw away the narrow conception of what you think a trade union is. A trade union is simply an organization of workers to achieve a shared goal. That’s it. For many trade associations, safety standards is a big one, and it becomes more important as the trade is more skilled. So for instance, it’s the AMA that promoted the standards of medicine over the century and a half and lobbied to prevent quacks from practicing as “medical doctors”. Do you believe the fragmented and haphazard standards in software today and management’s race to the bottom is beneficial to consumers or to society?
- nobodyandproud 6y ago
  > That's why there is no union of doctors or investment bankers... Wrong. The AMA sets an even higher bar than any union.
  - wahern 6y ago
    1) I think the point is that all skilled jobs by definition benefit from a barrier to entry. As far as suitability to unionization, it hardly matters whether the barrier is experience, education, or taxi medallions. 2) AFAIU, for many years now the bottleneck in the United States for doctors has mostly been residency slots, which aren't controlled in any manner by the AMA, AFAIK. Skilled nurses are even more supply constrained than doctors despite having relatively lower barriers to entry. The issue there seems to simply be not enough teachers.
    - nobodyandproud 6y ago
      The point is a classic straw man. There’s more reasons to support an influential trade organization other than just pay and job security. - Ethics : Litigating the worst behaviors (Amazon, Facebook, Google, etc.). - Quality and security: There is no cost advantage to supporting security, unless somebody pushes to make it that way. I can’t find a large US bank that supports Yubikey. Also think of the chaos with Experian. - Solidarity with very important (and struggling) fields like investigative journalism. My field destroys jobs and creates others, but quality information is just too important. I can go on.
      - wahern 6y ago
        > The point is a classic straw man. It depends on whether you're coming at the question from a prescriptivist or a descriptivist viewpoint. The point about skilled workers isn't a strawman from a descriptivist viewpoint--i.e. understanding why there's less demand for unionization. Even from a prescriptivist viewpoint the point is relevant as to why alternative approaches might be better--e.g. giving consumers and users more power by rolling back limitations on class actions, and statutorily creating new rights of action designed to force companies to internalize more of their costs (e.g. regarding security). Why rely on unions, which are principally designed to look after employee interests, to address issues related to consumers or society as a whole, especially when there are alternatives that empower groups whose self interests are a better fit for your prescriptivist goals? That said, many skilled nurses are unionized. So there's definitely reason to believe that if unskilled Amazon employees become unionized, other skilled employees might follow suit, and that could be a good thing for all the reasons you described.
- dunce2020 6y ago
  > If you're a skilled worker, you're livelihood (and security) comes from your skills. Didn't protect James Damore.
  - LatteLazy 6y ago
    According to his linked in (first result of googling his name), he got a job at a startup a few weeks after he finished arbitration with Google. So it worked fine for him. He didn't move city or change industry or job. Just went back to work using his skills elsewhere...
    - dunce2020 6y ago
      His "special" skills didn't protect him from getting fired. Not that hard to understand.

amzsdethrowaway 6y ago

I'm an SDE II at Amazon. Posting because I hope other SDEs read this; there is strength in voices. I absolutely will join a strike if Amazon lays off unionizing unskilled workers en masse. The pay is good, but I think you're missing two things. (1) A large portion of Amazon SDEs leave after a year or two anyway. (The lack of vested RSUs in the first two years is typically compensated with an equivalent sign-on bonus, which pays out with each paycheck. So the vesting schedule doesn't particularly incentivize sticking around for no other reason.) (2) Many Amazon SDEs (like that of any FAANG) are millenials, who skew progressive: worker rights are an issue I think many feel strongly about, and many probably have friends who are part of the unskilled labor pool or gig economy. We know if it weren't for software, we'd very well be in the same boat.

LatteLazy 6y ago
Thanks, it's good to hear from someone with first hand knowledge. I wasn't aware of the vesting structure and I think you're right that a shorter term planned tenure makes people less risk averse.