5 ms·

Well us software engineers can look at some of the ways that unions are run, and decide for ourselves if we like those "benefits". For example, seniority requi

by stale2002 3y ago

Well us software engineers can look at some of the ways that unions are run, and decide for ourselves if we like those "benefits". For example, seniority requirements and enforced degree or qualification requirements don't sound like something I would want, nor would the many other software engineers like myself who didn't go through the "proper" path of getting a CS degree.

candiddevmike 3y ago
Degrees are not a requirement for unions, and most unions try and foster apprenticeship models. Additionally, seniority benefits/protections would be huge for our industry as there is a lot of rampant ageism and young, naive workaholics.
- stale2002 3y ago
  > and most unions try and foster apprenticeship models This is exactly the problem I am talking about. This is a barrier to entry. Instead of being allowed to just apply for a job, and accepting it, you have to "do you time" in a low paid apprenticeship, due to contract requirements that are setup or lobbied for by these unions or guilds. This puts up a barrier to entry to new people wanting to join, because union members want to reduce competition. I am not just talking about degree requirements. Instead, I am talking about any barrier to entry. Unions have a very real and logical reason to put up barriers to entry. It reduces the supply of labor and increases prices for existing members, at the expense of people trying to break into the industry.
  - candiddevmike 3y ago
    There's a lot of stuff you will learn in an apprenticeship that a lot of folks in our industry miss or skip, like soft skills, teamwork, risk/reward, effort/value, etc. I personally think everyone should be required to spend a year or two in tech support hell, or understand why a senior person thinks and researches before they start writing code, for instance. You say barriers to entry, I say putting in the time to ensure you're someone I want to work with in the future.
    - stale2002 3y ago
      > I personally think everyone should be required to spend a year Ok fine. You are free to say that you want barriers to entry and want to prevent people from getting jobs, by making them do all this other stuff. But other people like me do not want that. We do not want to be forced by a union to do all these things, and instead want to be able to negotiate on our own to get a job. Unions should not get in this way of this. And there are a whole lot of other people, just like me, who would never have been able to get into the industry if we were forced to jump through all these hoops and we will not support organizations that pull up the ladder behind us. > You say barriers to entry, I say putting in the time to ensure you're someone I want to work with in the future. Its funny how you are almost directly contradicting your previous statements here. Previously, you tried to argue that degree requirements, or other barriers to entry are not a thing. And now you are giving reason why you actually support those requirements? Do you not see the direct contradiction that you made in like 2 posts? Instead of that, you should have started off by saying "Yes I want there to be requirements, enforced by a union. I want you to be required to get a degree or do an apprenticeship, or a number of other things/ insert random thing X". But you didn't do that. Instead, you disagreed with my factual claim that there are requirements, which you have immediately now backed off from without admitting that your original statement was wrong.
      - deprecative 3y ago
        > A union being an unrelated 3rd party should have no say in that kind of business arrangement. A union is, in fact, a related second party. It is comprised of employees of that employer. You seem to be under a grave misunderstanding of what a union is. I recommend learning about what they are and put the koolaid down.
        deleted 3y ago
        [deleted]
      - candiddevmike 3y ago
        There is already a loose, undefined apprenticeship system in technology with the intern/junior roles. With a union, the pathway would be more defined, not required a college degree, and folks would get paid fairly and not have to job hop to get a raise. We'd also open access/be more inclusive by formally removing the need for college degrees and the HR "must have 15 years of rust experience" shenanigans. We might even get real engineer licensing programs and become an accountable part of society...!
- ThrowawayR2 3y ago
  > "...seniority benefits/protections would be huge for our industry as there is a lot of rampant ageism and young naive work alcoholics." Already trying to lock out the young, energetic, and ambitious using seniority systems? At least you're honest about it. If you're young and you're considering supporting unionization for developers, keep in mind that people like the parent poster are your future seniors. They're marketing unionization to you to secure their own jobs (which developers who are at least average shouldn't even need to worry about) and then maybe yours as a secondary consideration. [EDIT] I came across an example of the layoff selection process for SPEEA, a union of aerospace engineers, from https://m.kuow.org/stories/boeing-layoffs https://m.kuow.org/stories/boeing-layoffs "At SPEEA, the process is different. Engineers are assigned a ranking by their managers based on their perception of their ability. One is the top rank, 3 is the lowest: new workers are a 3. When there are layoffs, 3s go first. An engineer must work 20 years before they are at least partially shielded from the ranking system. At 20 years, an engineer ranked a 3 gets bumped to a 2. As cuts get deeper they push into the higher ranks." Can't say I'm too enthused about long-termers getting partially shielded from ranking since some of them are likely to be deadwood.
  - candiddevmike 3y ago
    I don't know what causes folks like you to be so selfish and short sighted. You're going to be a long-termer someday (or you'll be in management and work towards exploiting union folks). Your life shouldn't revolve around work. Having the peace of mind of being shielded from layoffs because you've been working for 20+ years is huge. Hot shot developers and the rugged individualism doesn't jive with human life--most of us want to work to live not live to work.
    - AnthonyMouse 3y ago
      But you're not preventing layoffs, you're guaranteeing that they happen to recent employees, who rightly do not prefer this. The same also makes it more expensive for you to switch jobs (you lose your seniority), which reduces your negotiating leverage.
lapcat 3y ago
> enforced degree or qualification requirements don't sound like something I would want, nor would the many other software engineers like myself who didn't go through the "proper" path of getting a CS degree. I don't have a CS degree either, and I'm not sure why you think labor unions would impose them? Degree requirements come from the company, not from the employees.
- stale2002 3y ago
  > I don't have a CS degree either, and I'm not sure why you think labor unions would impose them? Labor organizations lobby for qualifications because it helps people who have them of course. Additional requirements lower the supply of labor, and therefore increase wages for people who have those qualifications. An example of a similar union where this is done is in the screen actors guild. They don't just let anyone in. Instead, they require you to do a certain amount of work before you are allowed to join. The catch-22 of course, is that the union screen actors guild contracts prevent all but a minimal amount of non-union jobs on a certain production, therefore putting up barriers to entry for new people wanting to join the industry. You need to be in the actors guild to be able to work in the industry, and you can't get into the actors guild unless you've already worked as an actor! Catch 22. It all makes perfect sense for the goal of a union to be to decrease the labor supply, thereby helping the existing members. I'm sure other people can come up with similar examples.
  - lapcat 3y ago
    I believe that you are misinformed. Non-members of the union can audition for and get union jobs, and they can work union jobs for up to 30 days before having to join the union. Eligibility to join the union comes after 3 days as a background actor in a union job or 1 day in a speaking role in a union job.
- nvm0n2 3y ago
  > I'm not sure why you think labor unions would impose them Because unions have often in the past imposed various credentialling requirements, followed by quotas on the credentials given, as a way to push up wages. For example the UK health system is wrecked by this. Medical unions insist on very low numbers of school places, too low to meet demand, so the government is forced to rely on immigration to fill the gaps. The unions love this because they're all overtly left wing organizations and want mass migration, also they see immigrants as free Labour voters. But being unable to actually train sufficient doctors is a bad place for the country to be in.

candiddevmike 3y ago

Degrees are not a requirement for unions, and most unions try and foster apprenticeship models. Additionally, seniority benefits/protections would be huge for our industry as there is a lot of rampant ageism and young, naive workaholics.

stale2002 3y ago
> and most unions try and foster apprenticeship models This is exactly the problem I am talking about. This is a barrier to entry. Instead of being allowed to just apply for a job, and accepting it, you have to "do you time" in a low paid apprenticeship, due to contract requirements that are setup or lobbied for by these unions or guilds. This puts up a barrier to entry to new people wanting to join, because union members want to reduce competition. I am not just talking about degree requirements. Instead, I am talking about any barrier to entry. Unions have a very real and logical reason to put up barriers to entry. It reduces the supply of labor and increases prices for existing members, at the expense of people trying to break into the industry.
- candiddevmike 3y ago
  There's a lot of stuff you will learn in an apprenticeship that a lot of folks in our industry miss or skip, like soft skills, teamwork, risk/reward, effort/value, etc. I personally think everyone should be required to spend a year or two in tech support hell, or understand why a senior person thinks and researches before they start writing code, for instance. You say barriers to entry, I say putting in the time to ensure you're someone I want to work with in the future.
  - stale2002 3y ago
    > I personally think everyone should be required to spend a year Ok fine. You are free to say that you want barriers to entry and want to prevent people from getting jobs, by making them do all this other stuff. But other people like me do not want that. We do not want to be forced by a union to do all these things, and instead want to be able to negotiate on our own to get a job. Unions should not get in this way of this. And there are a whole lot of other people, just like me, who would never have been able to get into the industry if we were forced to jump through all these hoops and we will not support organizations that pull up the ladder behind us. > You say barriers to entry, I say putting in the time to ensure you're someone I want to work with in the future. Its funny how you are almost directly contradicting your previous statements here. Previously, you tried to argue that degree requirements, or other barriers to entry are not a thing. And now you are giving reason why you actually support those requirements? Do you not see the direct contradiction that you made in like 2 posts? Instead of that, you should have started off by saying "Yes I want there to be requirements, enforced by a union. I want you to be required to get a degree or do an apprenticeship, or a number of other things/ insert random thing X". But you didn't do that. Instead, you disagreed with my factual claim that there are requirements, which you have immediately now backed off from without admitting that your original statement was wrong.
    - deprecative 3y ago
      > A union being an unrelated 3rd party should have no say in that kind of business arrangement. A union is, in fact, a related second party. It is comprised of employees of that employer. You seem to be under a grave misunderstanding of what a union is. I recommend learning about what they are and put the koolaid down.
      - deleted 3y ago
        [deleted]
    - candiddevmike 3y ago
      There is already a loose, undefined apprenticeship system in technology with the intern/junior roles. With a union, the pathway would be more defined, not required a college degree, and folks would get paid fairly and not have to job hop to get a raise. We'd also open access/be more inclusive by formally removing the need for college degrees and the HR "must have 15 years of rust experience" shenanigans. We might even get real engineer licensing programs and become an accountable part of society...!
ThrowawayR2 3y ago
> "...seniority benefits/protections would be huge for our industry as there is a lot of rampant ageism and young naive work alcoholics." Already trying to lock out the young, energetic, and ambitious using seniority systems? At least you're honest about it. If you're young and you're considering supporting unionization for developers, keep in mind that people like the parent poster are your future seniors. They're marketing unionization to you to secure their own jobs (which developers who are at least average shouldn't even need to worry about) and then maybe yours as a secondary consideration. [EDIT] I came across an example of the layoff selection process for SPEEA, a union of aerospace engineers, from https://m.kuow.org/stories/boeing-layoffs https://m.kuow.org/stories/boeing-layoffs "At SPEEA, the process is different. Engineers are assigned a ranking by their managers based on their perception of their ability. One is the top rank, 3 is the lowest: new workers are a 3. When there are layoffs, 3s go first. An engineer must work 20 years before they are at least partially shielded from the ranking system. At 20 years, an engineer ranked a 3 gets bumped to a 2. As cuts get deeper they push into the higher ranks." Can't say I'm too enthused about long-termers getting partially shielded from ranking since some of them are likely to be deadwood.
- candiddevmike 3y ago
  I don't know what causes folks like you to be so selfish and short sighted. You're going to be a long-termer someday (or you'll be in management and work towards exploiting union folks). Your life shouldn't revolve around work. Having the peace of mind of being shielded from layoffs because you've been working for 20+ years is huge. Hot shot developers and the rugged individualism doesn't jive with human life--most of us want to work to live not live to work.
  - AnthonyMouse 3y ago
    But you're not preventing layoffs, you're guaranteeing that they happen to recent employees, who rightly do not prefer this. The same also makes it more expensive for you to switch jobs (you lose your seniority), which reduces your negotiating leverage.

lapcat 3y ago

> enforced degree or qualification requirements don't sound like something I would want, nor would the many other software engineers like myself who didn't go through the "proper" path of getting a CS degree. I don't have a CS degree either, and I'm not sure why you think labor unions would impose them? Degree requirements come from the company, not from the employees.

stale2002 3y ago
> I don't have a CS degree either, and I'm not sure why you think labor unions would impose them? Labor organizations lobby for qualifications because it helps people who have them of course. Additional requirements lower the supply of labor, and therefore increase wages for people who have those qualifications. An example of a similar union where this is done is in the screen actors guild. They don't just let anyone in. Instead, they require you to do a certain amount of work before you are allowed to join. The catch-22 of course, is that the union screen actors guild contracts prevent all but a minimal amount of non-union jobs on a certain production, therefore putting up barriers to entry for new people wanting to join the industry. You need to be in the actors guild to be able to work in the industry, and you can't get into the actors guild unless you've already worked as an actor! Catch 22. It all makes perfect sense for the goal of a union to be to decrease the labor supply, thereby helping the existing members. I'm sure other people can come up with similar examples.
- lapcat 3y ago
  I believe that you are misinformed. Non-members of the union can audition for and get union jobs, and they can work union jobs for up to 30 days before having to join the union. Eligibility to join the union comes after 3 days as a background actor in a union job or 1 day in a speaking role in a union job.
nvm0n2 3y ago
> I'm not sure why you think labor unions would impose them Because unions have often in the past imposed various credentialling requirements, followed by quotas on the credentials given, as a way to push up wages. For example the UK health system is wrecked by this. Medical unions insist on very low numbers of school places, too low to meet demand, so the government is forced to rely on immigration to fill the gaps. The unions love this because they're all overtly left wing organizations and want mass migration, also they see immigrants as free Labour voters. But being unable to actually train sufficient doctors is a bad place for the country to be in.