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It will be harder for unions to destroy the domestic (US) tech industry than past industries, because of the low barriers to entry. You can force a factory to m

It will be harder for unions to destroy the domestic (US) tech industry than past industries, because of the low barriers to entry. You can force a factory to move to another country, but software development is open and distributed enough that it will remain viable in the face of any attempts to form unions.

bezier-curve 3y ago
How exactly would unions destroy anything? Outsourcing has nothing to do with unions.
- shagmin 3y ago
  I think the idea is there's a curve where the less business friendly the unions are willing to negotiate at, the more likely businesses outsource. And there's some point where so many of the businesses have outsourced everything we basically don't have the infrastructure for it any longer or hiring is scarce.
  - bezier-curve 3y ago
    What specific examples are there of unions resulting in outsourced labor? This wreaks of the same talking points most anti-union propaganda consists of.
    - junofan 3y ago
      My phone company sent a bunch of call center jobs to the Philippines… it’s not really a talking point or anti-union to say that businesses will at least consider alternatives.
      - bezier-curve 3y ago
        The original comment was talking about unions destroying things, so yes it was an anti-union talking point, the bias was clear.
      - kelseyfrog 3y ago
        The biggest thing this explanation would have to accommodate is that the decrease of union membership (in the US) coincides with an increase of outsourcing. There are better explanations such as implications in trade and finance post Bretton-Woods and the neo-liberalism that followed that incentivized busting unions and outsourcing.
    - shagmin 3y ago
      The first example that comes to mind is the textile industry starting in the northeast US where unions are strongest, then moving south where they still had some unions but were much weaker, and eventually going overseas. Could argue the same thing for the US steel industry but I don't know. Or you can also find plenty of companies keeping their legacy business with unions as they are but only expanding forward to places not so friendly to unions - e.g. Boeing opening its latest plant in South Carolina without a union unlike its original counterpart in Seattle. Of course there's already differences in labor costs regardless of unions and other factors at play. I'm for unions in principle and I have family members that have certainly benefited from unions on the one hand but I've known plenty of people in private sector unions that feel like their union dues are only getting someone else richer while they're stuck in dead-end jobs just to make ends meet.
    - MilnerRoute 3y ago
      Some union contracts actually let the union veto the outsourcing of jobs. In those cases unionizing prevents outsourcing.
      - andromeduck 3y ago
        Won't stop competitors from eating their lunch.
- jollofricepeas 3y ago
  Actually… Outsource has everything to do with unions. Union power is limited due to globalization. The future of labor will have to be one in which there is collective bargaining WITHOUT borders. Because big tech will outsource to countries with weak or no unions to keep workers under their thumb. Software engineers will never unionize as they are a privileged worker class. HOWEVER… The massive contracting force of call center employees, content moderators, data trainers and other peoples inside the AI Mechanical Turk at FAANG are todays warehouse factory workers. As wealth inequality grows, this lower class tech worker will unionize if not outright revolt like we saw in China with Apple devise assemblers.
  - xchip 3y ago
    If your job can be outsourced will be outsourced, not because of unions, because of shareholders wanting more profits) Share holders vote and make decisions, why wouldn't workers do the same?

bezier-curve 3y ago

How exactly would unions destroy anything? Outsourcing has nothing to do with unions.

shagmin 3y ago
I think the idea is there's a curve where the less business friendly the unions are willing to negotiate at, the more likely businesses outsource. And there's some point where so many of the businesses have outsourced everything we basically don't have the infrastructure for it any longer or hiring is scarce.
- bezier-curve 3y ago
  What specific examples are there of unions resulting in outsourced labor? This wreaks of the same talking points most anti-union propaganda consists of.
  - junofan 3y ago
    My phone company sent a bunch of call center jobs to the Philippines… it’s not really a talking point or anti-union to say that businesses will at least consider alternatives.
    - bezier-curve 3y ago
      The original comment was talking about unions destroying things, so yes it was an anti-union talking point, the bias was clear.
    - kelseyfrog 3y ago
      The biggest thing this explanation would have to accommodate is that the decrease of union membership (in the US) coincides with an increase of outsourcing. There are better explanations such as implications in trade and finance post Bretton-Woods and the neo-liberalism that followed that incentivized busting unions and outsourcing.
  - shagmin 3y ago
    The first example that comes to mind is the textile industry starting in the northeast US where unions are strongest, then moving south where they still had some unions but were much weaker, and eventually going overseas. Could argue the same thing for the US steel industry but I don't know. Or you can also find plenty of companies keeping their legacy business with unions as they are but only expanding forward to places not so friendly to unions - e.g. Boeing opening its latest plant in South Carolina without a union unlike its original counterpart in Seattle. Of course there's already differences in labor costs regardless of unions and other factors at play. I'm for unions in principle and I have family members that have certainly benefited from unions on the one hand but I've known plenty of people in private sector unions that feel like their union dues are only getting someone else richer while they're stuck in dead-end jobs just to make ends meet.
  - MilnerRoute 3y ago
    Some union contracts actually let the union veto the outsourcing of jobs. In those cases unionizing prevents outsourcing.
    - andromeduck 3y ago
      Won't stop competitors from eating their lunch.
jollofricepeas 3y ago
Actually… Outsource has everything to do with unions. Union power is limited due to globalization. The future of labor will have to be one in which there is collective bargaining WITHOUT borders. Because big tech will outsource to countries with weak or no unions to keep workers under their thumb. Software engineers will never unionize as they are a privileged worker class. HOWEVER… The massive contracting force of call center employees, content moderators, data trainers and other peoples inside the AI Mechanical Turk at FAANG are todays warehouse factory workers. As wealth inequality grows, this lower class tech worker will unionize if not outright revolt like we saw in China with Apple devise assemblers.
- xchip 3y ago
  If your job can be outsourced will be outsourced, not because of unions, because of shareholders wanting more profits) Share holders vote and make decisions, why wouldn't workers do the same?