I think there are two different "programmer archetypes" that help prevent unions from forming. The first you identified: programmers who have conflated, mistake

I think there are two different "programmer archetypes" that help prevent unions from forming. The first you identified: programmers who have conflated, mistakenly, "doing what you love is more important than compensation" with "compensation is unimportant if the work you're doing is something you're passionate about." The second is the cadre of elitist programmers who think they are more intelligent than anybody else, and that therefore if a programmer isn't swimming in money shoved at him by an employer it's because he's not good enough. The egos in the software world dwarf those in the academic world I come from (and that is, believe me, an impressive achievement). Hilariously, it seems to me at least that far more programmers fancy themselves a sort of Programming John Galt (or, perhaps, being a citizen of some Programmer's Lake Woebegon, where all the programmers are above average). They relish competition because they believe, erroneously, that they're working in a meritocracy and that their own skills are so exceptional they will definitely rise to the top anyway.