3 ms·

New York Times Tech Staff to Walk Out, Escalating Union Fight

56 points by ughitsaaron 5y ago

mikestew 5y ago
Management isn't explaining why they would like to restrict "tech workers" to software engineers, leaving out data scientists, et. al. All this article quotes is management's disappointment that this was brought to light. Yes, we know whatever answer is given is going to be bullshit, but at least pretend to try.
71a54xd 5y ago
Looks like the NYT can't even do communism right.
JPKab 5y ago
It should be considered odd that a paper which is so extensive in featuring and promoting social justice (particularly on race) behaves like this. That is until you look at Amazon and other organizations, and realize that they use race essentialism to side-step and distract from class oriented issues like unions. One requires relatively cheap, token demonstrations of fealty. The other requires paying your employees fairly. They pick the former, and everyone just nods along.
- rainonmoon 5y ago
  This is a hallmark of neoliberalism. Progress stops at representation (at most) and never goes as far as equity.
- tootie 5y ago
  I'm pretty sure the NYTimes would very explicitly say they are neutral on all these topics. Editors may be willing to run stories but it's absolutely never company policy.
- Taikonerd 5y ago
  It's like universities -- the faculty lounge tends to be as far-left as you can get, until the grad students try to unionize.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
- anonymousab 5y ago
  I'm reminded of a companywide town hall at a place I worked at years ago. Lots of fluff about company initiatives on IWD, big talk about dedication to equality, token corporate donations to various groups, etc. Mostly light on meaningful actions and change. The usual. Then, during the Q&A segment, someone simply asked if this meant that we could have pay transparency or public averages so we could see how the company was actually doing in terms of equality. The resulting nervous mealymouthed scramble and deflection was a sight to behold. I believe Q&A questions always had to be submitted in advance after that event.
  - JPKab 5y ago
    Something like this is exactly why my former company suddenly changed the q&a to have to go through a middle person before it could be asked to the group. Due to some of the states we operate in is legally required that our CEOs ratio of pay to the average employees disclosed. This company was a software company it's not like we had any warehouse workers or anything and the CEO was droning on about equity and his compensation was 111 times more than the average software engineer. I decided to quit after that and go to a startup. There's nothing more hollow than a corporate sponsored "revolution".

56 points by ughitsaaron 5y ago

Management isn't explaining why they would like to restrict "tech workers" to software engineers, leaving out data scientists, et. al. All this article quotes is management's disappointment that this was brought to light. Yes, we know whatever answer is given is going to be bullshit, but at least pretend to try.

71a54xd 5y ago

Looks like the NYT can't even do communism right.

JPKab 5y ago

It should be considered odd that a paper which is so extensive in featuring and promoting social justice (particularly on race) behaves like this. That is until you look at Amazon and other organizations, and realize that they use race essentialism to side-step and distract from class oriented issues like unions. One requires relatively cheap, token demonstrations of fealty. The other requires paying your employees fairly. They pick the former, and everyone just nods along.

rainonmoon 5y ago
This is a hallmark of neoliberalism. Progress stops at representation (at most) and never goes as far as equity.
tootie 5y ago
I'm pretty sure the NYTimes would very explicitly say they are neutral on all these topics. Editors may be willing to run stories but it's absolutely never company policy.
Taikonerd 5y ago
It's like universities -- the faculty lounge tends to be as far-left as you can get, until the grad students try to unionize.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
anonymousab 5y ago
I'm reminded of a companywide town hall at a place I worked at years ago. Lots of fluff about company initiatives on IWD, big talk about dedication to equality, token corporate donations to various groups, etc. Mostly light on meaningful actions and change. The usual. Then, during the Q&A segment, someone simply asked if this meant that we could have pay transparency or public averages so we could see how the company was actually doing in terms of equality. The resulting nervous mealymouthed scramble and deflection was a sight to behold. I believe Q&A questions always had to be submitted in advance after that event.
- JPKab 5y ago
  Something like this is exactly why my former company suddenly changed the q&a to have to go through a middle person before it could be asked to the group. Due to some of the states we operate in is legally required that our CEOs ratio of pay to the average employees disclosed. This company was a software company it's not like we had any warehouse workers or anything and the CEO was droning on about equity and his compensation was 111 times more than the average software engineer. I decided to quit after that and go to a startup. There's nothing more hollow than a corporate sponsored "revolution".