Your description of how you think it should work is how it actually does work. The Times Tech Guild is not a union in and of itself. It's chapter of The NewsGui

Your description of how you think it should work is how it actually does work. The Times Tech Guild is not a union in and of itself. It's chapter of The NewsGuild of New York (representing news workers in New York), which is a local of The NewsGuild (representing news workers nationally), which is a member of Communication Workers of America (aka CWA, which represents communications workers nationally).