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Sounds more like a political pressure group than a union. No collective bargaining, no workplace issues, only political problems quite removed from the average

• ocdtrekkie 6y ago
  A union isn't just about pay or safety, though for many blue collar jobs, that's the most important issue a union might tackle. They probably could look at pay inequality though, if they get their members to disclose all of that to the union. The biggest question will be whether or not the AWU gets large enough and chooses to use the power to strike. Basically the one power any union has, that individual members can't employ without simply being fired.
  • corty 6y ago
    I don't know about the rest of the world, but the power to strike in Germany is tied strictly to workplace-related issues. You can strike for more pay, better workplace conditions, more or less equality in the workplace. The legality of political strikes is doubtful, especially if the issue isn't a really big national one: https://www.bpb.de/dialog/netzdebatte/219308/ein-bisschen-verboten-politischer-streik https://www.bpb.de/dialog/netzdebatte/219308/ein-bisschen-ve...
    • sammorrowdrums 6y ago
      I know that many Unions get involved in political lobbying though. Regardless of how they get their point across, money is taken and spent on influencing power beyond employers. For example I was part of the Musicians Union in the UK, which has a separate political fund, and members are usually self-employed, but it did create a forum for potential collective action, and for attempting to influence the political discourse.
  • chimeracoder 6y ago
    Most of your comment is correct, except: > The biggest question will be whether or not the AWU gets large enough and chooses to use the power to strike. Basically the one power any union has, that individual members can't employ without simply being fired. That's not true, strictly speaking. A group of people could theoretically strike together without being members of a formally-recognized union. In practice, it's tough to coordinate that, and they may have a more difficult time actually enforcing those rights without a legal and financial structure of support, but it's not true that people have to be members of a union in order to engage in a strike. The law unambiguously grants that power to workers acting in concert with each other, whether or not they are doing so with the formal backing of a union.
    • SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
      While the law does grant individual workers the power to strike, the legal protections are weak enough that it's not really practical even if you trust your employer to respect them. Unless you're striking against a specific unfair labor practice, your employer has the right to simply replace you, and reinstate you only when a new job opening is available.
      • chimeracoder 6y ago
        > While the law does grant individual workers the power to strike, the legal protections are weak enough that it's not really practical even if you trust your employer to respect them. As a counterpoint, tens of thousands of Googlers staged a worldwide walkout two years ago. They were not unionized. They were protected by the same law that protects unionized workers when striking. When Google retaliated against four of those 20,000+ people, the NLRB launched a federal investigation, the same way the NLRB would if they had been unionized. > Unless you're striking against a specific unfair labor practice, your employer has the right to simply replace you, and reinstate you only when a new job opening is available. That's not quite true. If it happened exactly as you describe, that would be a pretty clear-cut wrongful termination lawsuit, and the NLRB would come down pretty hard on the employer.
        • 6y ago
  • sn_master 6y ago
    Yes, as a man I really wish they look at pay inequality at Google. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/04/technology/google-gender-pay-gap.html https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/04/technology/google-gender-...
• myWindoonn 6y ago
  Unions are political pressure groups. The entire point of a union is to pressure employers to not shoot their employees, give them fair wages and working hours, and so on; the union is a political actor on par with the employer. By questioning whether a group of employees really is a union, you are attempting to strip them of federal protection from retaliation.
  • bioinformatics 6y ago
    I am pretty sure the work environment at Google is extremely oppressive, with low salaries and and top-down evil capitalist only approach. After all how can millionaires Google employees can have their voices heard if they don't unionize? Maybe they will demand better snacks in the cafeteria and a new foosball table at the end of the indoor slide.
    • bo0tzz 6y ago
      Unions are not just for the purpose of getting fair pay, but rather about a broad case of being on equal footing with an employer, as stated in the parent comment. Besides, this union is not just for salaried google employees, but also contractors etc - this will include for example cleaners and cafetaria employees, which are much more likely to be in need of the sort of union support that you mention.
    • xtian 6y ago
      Google was one of the participants in a corporate wage-fixing scandal. Do snacks and foosball tables justify that?
      • option 6y ago
        and they got sued for that and lost. No union was involved in holding them accountable
        • xtian 6y ago
          Yeah, they got a small slap on the wrist for that one. My point is the presence of snacks and perks does not preclude the exploitation of labor.
• cactus2093 6y ago
  Members have to pay 1% of their salary to be in it, which is very union-like. I imagine if they dropped the pretense of a union and it was just a non-profit group, they would have a hard time getting that big of a donation from each member. Maybe I'm just being too cynical, but I can't help think this group is playing into the current trendiness of progressive issues, and some number of well-off Googlers are joining because ~$2000 a year is insignificant to them and they support the cause of unions in general even though they don't personally need any of the protections a typical union offers. Not to say this is necessarily a bad thing, non-profits need to market themselves somehow and if they accomplish positive change in Google's policies this way then great.
  • est31 6y ago
    It contains about 0.5% of the Gogle proper employees or about 700 people. If it were a Google product, it would have been canned a long time ago with that tiny market share.
    • starclerk 6y ago
      0.5% of a big number is a big number. If it were a Google product, I'm pretty sure they'd be happy to get O(10s of millions) users in the first week (or 0.5% of the billions of existing users).
      • compiler-guy 6y ago
        Only to shut it down a year or two later when growth stalled at 0.6%, as it nearly always does.
    • armoredkitten 6y ago
      It's also a week old. Even Google doesn't can things that quickly.
      • est31 6y ago
        Fair point. I was actually joking here :).
• throw_m239339 6y ago
  > Sounds more like a political pressure group than a union. No collective bargaining, no workplace issues, only political problems quite removed from the average worker at Google. Do they call themselves a union to get legal protection, or is there another reason why they don't just drop the term? Yes, it's effectively a PAC, not a union. Just like at Kickstarter where they were more concerned about people deemed 'conservative' not using the platform to promote comicbooks than anything related to work conditions. A union shouldn't be telling their boss who they can or cannot work with, partner with or have as clients, it's plain insubordination especially when it has absolutely nothing to do with their own compensations or work conditions. Obviously anybody can claim that employer B working with X or Y make their employees of class Z emotionally 'distressed' or 'unsafe'... The irony/hypocrisy here is people claiming 'unions are political' when that thing at google is really just about being partisan, yet these people don't have the courage to call a PAC...a PAC, and hide behind the word 'union'.
  • SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
    I'd argue it's more fashion than a lack of courage. Amazon's equivalent group is called Amazon Workers for Climate Justice - they regularly pressure Amazon on topics that have nothing to do with climate justice, but climate change was a trendy topic when they first organized. Sponsorship and support from the CWA is another factor, although I don't know if it's public how much the AWU is actually getting from that relationship.
  • AnIdiotOnTheNet 6y ago
    > A union shouldn't be telling their boss who they can or cannot work with, partner with or have as clients I don't agree with that assessment. If Google employees have a strong opposition to working with, say, federal agencies to share data they've gathered on users, then I think it makes perfect sense for them bring that concern to the table. Honestly, I don't see why a union shouldn't have the ability to bargain anything it wants to try and bargain. I'm open to someone changing my mind on that.
    • ta76893548 6y ago
• xtian 6y ago
  “Politics” is simply the means by which we distribute power and resources. There is no division between labor organizing and politics. We just think there is in the US because worker movements have been systematically dismantled for decades.
  • tomp 6y ago
    I don't think that's what parent poster meant by "politics"...
  • rayiner 6y ago
    Ironically, college-educated white collar workers (like those at Google) have sped that along by driving a wedge between economic liberals over social issues: https://www.wsj.com/articles/how-trump-won-in-two-dimensions-1502320256 https://www.wsj.com/articles/how-trump-won-in-two-dimensions... When Amazon’s managers are Democrats you think any progress will get made on workers issues?
    • xtian 6y ago
      I don’t think Democrats represent workers’ issues any more than Republicans if that’s what you’re asking. The point of labor organization is to enable workers to leverage their fundamental role in the mechanism of capitalism in order to make demands with teeth. That’s the only way to gain concessions from the establishment political parties.
• chimeracoder 6y ago
  > Sounds more like a political pressure group than a union. No collective bargaining, no workplace issues Collective bargaining for contracts (e.g. compensation) are only one possible role a union can play. It's the most common one in the US for legal and historical reasons, but it's not the only one permitted. Incidentally, the structure of the AWU is actually much more similar to how unions operate in Europe, where unions are not required or expected to have exclusive representation over a bargaining unit, and therefore quite commonly focus on a range of issues, rather than centering mostly on collective bargaining for contracts. The perception that "it's not a union if it only represents a small number of people" or "it's not a union if it doesn't engage in collective bargaining" is a very American perspective (and even then, a perception which is inconsistent with the actual rights granted under the NLRA to minority unions in the US).
• aerosmile 6y ago
  Tesla also didn't start with the Model 3, but instead built a roadster for the rich enthusiasts first (who were more forgiving of the lack in range, charger network, and other issues). It's the old boiling the frog adage. Perhaps the political issues were a better bang for the buck because they were easier to formulate and addressed the needs of the most fanatical base? Once they make any progress in that area (and a quick formulation of the demands is a sign of such progress), the momentum will continue to build.
• whatshisface 6y ago
  Rather than a plan to do that, it could be that if you get together all of the 0.05% most pro-union Google employees, and have them fairly vote to determine their average desires, you'll end up with something different from the average of all Google employees.
• m3kw9 6y ago
  Yeah or an internal political activists group with union powers.
• dbingham 6y ago
  Unions are political pressure groups. Collective bargaining rights are not just limited to worker compensation, they touch on every aspect of business - including how the business wields its power in the larger society.
• seventytwo 6y ago
  A union is literally a political pressure group. This Google group can advocate for wheat ever it wants.