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Comment by iiiggglll | Hacker News Reader

The point about unionization keeping wages up is important, and probably deserves a lot more coverage than it's getting. And on that front, us programmers are fucked, well and truly fucked. We won't unionize ever, because everyone thinks they are the one unique special super-smart snowflake who can do better without the union (here's a hint: we can't all be, and in fact by definition nearly all of us aren't).

Since programmers' egos simply will not allow them to let go of the delusion, we'll be stomped into the ground while the owners laugh at us. In fact, it's already happening (see the recent wage-fixing "scandal").

Enjoy the ride, fellow egomaniacs!

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It's not like Hollywood has a shortage of egotistical special snowflakes. And given the competitiveness of the business, a large chunk of say union film directors really are special snowflakes.

But they realize there's a benefit to having a standard basis for all deals, and standards of work environments, and things producers aren't allowed to do, and things they have to pay extra for.

And there's the flip side too. The tradespeople in the IATSE unions know they are well-paid for their work. They know they're lucky to have gained access to the jobs they have. And so they hold their work to a very high standard. They take an extreme amount of pride in those standards, and they're almost always worth what they cost.

That is to say, there's a way to turn that pride and ego into an asset, and to make it work for a union rather than against it.

You're missing the point. It's not the directors that get Union rates, it's the person that moves the flaps on the lighting unit, the person that saws wood, the person that runs errands, the person that holds a microphone boom.

When planning a movie, the producers work out what staff are needed, get out the rate card and calculate a wages budget. SOURCE: I have been assistant producer on a feature film.

Most of the staff are fungible. Only the heads of department make much of a difference to the quality of your movie (anyone else that doesn't come up to snuff simply doesn't get called back the next day).

Because unlike those other professions, we can always easily leave for something better. In fact, a dozen something betters. An engineer in this industry staying at one place longer than 18 months is pretty rare. There is a lot of ship jumping to get higher pay, less work, more benefits and it is a constant struggle to keep good talent. We don't need unions. In tech, labor does hold the power. We always have the option for taking our ball and going home (start our own company).

And the so called "wage-fixing" was an attempt to slow down the wage arms race that is killing cities like SF with ridiculous rent. It's not sustainable, and it will pop.

>> We don't need unions. In tech, labor does hold the power.

This maxim may have been true 20, 30 years ago, but with an ever-increasing pool of STEM applicants, advances in automation and the juggernaut that is globalization, the pendulum is swinging.

>> We always have the option for taking our ball and going home (start our own company).

No, we don't. Such a simplistic decision like this has never existed in tech other than in grossly inaccurate Hollywood film plots. Starting a tech company comes with an enormous amount of risk and challenges. These risks aren't easily absorbed by most individuals. A person's company may succeed in the end after hard-fought battles, but in all likelihood, most will fail.

How would unionization interfere with any of that? (Why would collective bargaining not still present an ever stronger bargaining position?)

Hi, I'm from Belgium, and we have very strong unions here. There used to be a time when unions were necessary, but that time is long gone (at least here in Belgium). Our unions get extra money for each person on social welfare, and they are currently screwing our economy because the government tries to restore our countries competitiveness.

When the unions go on strike, they block public roads, denying cars and trucks to go to work, and force shops to close down. Don't believe me, see for yourself how a union lady forces a shop to close: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fpVpn2-zOrs (french with dutch subtitles, sorry about that, but you will get the point). In the end the shop lady closed her shop.

Railroads, public transportation and postal offices have an average of 18 strike days a year.

Times have changed, if you don't like your job, quit and work for someone else. Don't like that? Quit and start your own (one-man) company.

And about your original question: unionization screws your economy so there are no jobs left. You lose your bargaining position because companies will look abroad to find workers willing to work.

When my dad went to work on his first day, he was there 15 minutes early, so he started to work when he arrived. A man came up to him and told him "It's not 9 o'clock yet, we don't start working before that". Everyone was standing behind their desks, doing nothing, just standing there, waiting for 9 o'clock. Want to screw your economy? Reduce productivity? Then go ahead and form unions.

About my dad, he worked his entire life at the same company, but because he had a different mindset than all of the other blue collar workers, he became a well-paid white collar worker, including company car etc, without ever being a manager.

What unions really do is put employees and employers as 'us vs them'. We do the least amount of work so you can pay us the least amount of money. Why not look at it as helping each other? A win-win? And if it's not a win-win anymore, find someone else.

Same in Italy. Just the same.

I've only ever had violent and threatening interactions with unions. Why would I ever want to join one?

I've had friends beaten, others threatened. They've consistently threatened other friends with forced membership.

No thanks.

Where the fk do you live? This sounds like the mafia, not a union.

Mafia and unions have very close ties historically, not only in Leone's Once Upon a Time in America.

As for topic generally, unions are like communism (also close ideologically): they may look nice on the paper, but in real world, usually the worst possible solution.

I've only meet career-first scumbags in unions. Generally we in IT tend to stay away from politics and just do our job, which is exactly what unions are about. Plus, who is really trembling for his super-hard-to-get position? If I'll get fired/decide to leave, and I'll just pick from those recruiters spamming my inbox/linkedin periodically. Now if you didn't catch up with trends of last 20 years, you may need to worry a bit...

The two aren't entirely unrelated http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB100014240527023034968045793652...

Collective bargaining grew out of the need to strengthen the weak negotiating position of labour with respect to capital. Labour's negotiating position is weak when labour is abundant and/or capital is short.

In many industries (especially those that dominated the 19th and 20th centuries) labour is abundant because workers are fungible: business owners can keep wages down by threatening to replace workers. This doesn't happen in software engineering because software engineers aren't easy to replace: relevant experience matters and learning curve is steep.

Unlike the capital-intensive industries of the past, software engineering is very light on capital: the initial investment required to start a company is within reach of almost all software engineers.

Thus, in software engineering labour is short and capital abundant and so labour's negotiating position is strong and capital's position is weak. This is one reason why software companies are so generous in benefits and why there are no unions. It has nothing to do with anybody's ego.

"Ask Hollywood producers, and they’ll confirm that there are only a limited number of proven, reliable craftspeople for any given task. Projects tend to come together quickly, with strict deadlines, so those important workers are in a relatively strong negotiating position. Wages among, say, makeup and hair professionals on shoots are much higher than among their counterparts at high-end salons. Similarly, set builders make more than carpenters and electricians working on more traditional construction sites. It helps that, despite the work’s fleeting nature, Hollywood is strongly unionized, which keeps wages high. According to the rate card of the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees Local 728, which represents union film-lighting crews in Los Angeles, even entry-level electricians on a major film set make more than $35 an hour — i.e., more than 40 percent higher than the national average for electricians — and make that wage over 12-hour days."

This is essential. The only reason the worker sees any of the massive amounts of money that are thrown at these projects is because of collective bargaining.

It's an important lesson we should learn given the massive profits our industry sees.

If you're a 10x engineer why don't you demand 10x pay?

The unique snowflakes don't have to unionize, there just has to be enough average programmers who'll do it for it to work. And they'll do it once they realize they're being screwed.

On a related note, unions have been so important for workers in the west, yet there's a lot of developing countries where people just don't realize their importance.

The unique snowflakes don't have to unionize

They may still be forced to pay the agency fees, though.

Or tell you what side jobs you can and can't take. [1]

[1] http://variety.com/2014/biz/news/videogame-composer-blasts-m...

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