[knucklesandwich]

Tech workers (across all disciplines) need to unionize to combat this kind of thing. As has been pointed out below, HR that is staffed and incentivized by the company management only serves the interests of the management. A union is the only structure that can actually win demands for workers by organizing workers to withhold their labor.

It's not a panacea, and there are several historical examples of union leadership betraying the trust of workers and neglecting the demands of the most marginalized members (such as the UAW in 1941), but a union correctly structured and rooted in worker solidarity is the only proven way to fight management on these kinds of issues.

[home_boi]

I'm of the opinion that the average software engineer in the USA is already overpaid and underworked with excellent benefits and low incentive to unionize.

I'm simplifying it a bit but if you don't like your job, just grab a copy of Cracking the Coding Interview and apply to big companies. The big companies pay very well, have good benefits and interview everyone because of the need for a high head count

[knucklesandwich]

First of all, it should be all tech workers that unionize, not just software engineers. And you should talk to some of your fellow workers and ask if they all think they're being fairly compensated. Even aside from the issue of salary, tech workers are rarely given a fair stake in ownership in the company, and their equity grants often come with lots of clauses to deprive them from what little stake they have.

I suggest you seek out other opinions if you believe tech workers are under-worked. Perhaps this is the case at your job, but the majority of tech workers I know and have worked with are tired of having to put in hours on nights, over the weekends, etc. They're tired of "unlimited vacation" policies not actually guaranteeing them any time to take a vacation. I've had a boss prevent me from leaving at 10PM once before. I mean its not exactly a new realization that many of the most trendy perks for tech companies are ruses to get workers to stay extra hours at the office, that tech companies pursuing the youngest workers often leads to a culture where there's little differentiation between work and company time, etc.

Not to mention that tech workers are often asked to do dubiously ethical things by management. We're asked to automate away the positions of other employees, asked to be lax on security or privacy standards, etc.

Whether or not you believe there are any demands to make, I kind of find it bizarre to suggest that workplace democracy is something tech workers shouldn't demand.

[weberc2]

> And you should talk to some of your fellow workers and ask if they all think they're being fairly compensated. Even aside from the issue of salary, tech workers are rarely given a fair stake in ownership in the company, and their equity grants often come with lots of clauses to deprive them from what little stake they have.

Who decides what is fair? You? Tech workers? Speaking about fairness as though it's objective or straight-forward isn't doing anyone any favors. Speaking generally, if employees aren't getting a fair deal, they should look for better jobs. If they can't find better jobs, they're getting a fair deal. There are certainly anti-competitive exceptions, but nothing posted so far suggests we're in such exceptional territory.

[solidsnack9000]

> If they can't find better jobs, they're getting a fair deal.

In an idealized market, yes. But given incidents like this, it seems like some employees must be being treated for more fairly than others -- which suggests there's no fairness at all.

[weberc2]

I was speaking about fairness across the economy, not fairness within the company. For every Uber there are a dozen companies that actively seek out female employees for diversity purposes. I'm not aware of any data that suggest gender discrimination in the United States (and no, the wage gap is not an example of discrimination, as almost all of it is known to be caused by differing aggregate priorities between the sexes).

[solidsnack9000]

The difference between our points of view seems to be the degree to which we regards Uber as an outlier. I don't; it's one of many companies with this very different "fairness"; so I don't think we can take the market at face value.

[knucklesandwich]

> Who decides what is fair? You? Tech workers? Speaking about fairness as though it's objective or straight-forward isn't doing anyone any favors.

The beauty of a union is there doesn't have to be an objective definition. A union gives you a democratic voice to advocate for what you think is fair. Without organized labor power, your voice is completely ignorable.

> Speaking generally, if employees aren't getting a fair deal, they should look for better jobs. If they can't find better jobs, they're getting a fair deal. There are certainly anti-competitive exceptions, but nothing posted so far suggests we're in such exceptional territory.

This is a completely naive understanding of what finding a job is like. Leaving a job can be a strike against a person in the hiring process, not to mention it consumes a lot of time, leaves someone uncompensated and without benefits during the process, etc. This also assumes engineer competency is something we can effectively gauge in the hiring process or otherwise (just search "hiring" on hacker news to get the general sentiment among engineers about how good we are at this).

Imagine if this was the suggestion given to factory workers and coal miners and the early 20th century (not that I think the worker conditions are comparable, but its illustrative of how naive it is to believe that market forces are sufficient for providing fair compensation). This is a marginalist's definition of "fair" that doesn't jive with any real human person's.

The real question is why you are so fervantly against having a democratic voice in the workplace.

[smsm42]

How is it a beauty? Stupid decision made by 1000 people is better than by one? At least if I make stupid decision I am to blame and I can fix it. If 1000 people make it, I have 1/1000 of infuence (in fact even less if I am not eloquent or persuasive) and can't change anything. Talk about ignorable. I certainly don't need a "democracy" to take my decisions for me. There's a place for it as we can't each personally decide about national defence or building interstate highway, but I can certainly talk to my boss.

[lostboys67]

As an individual you have virtualy zero chance of effecting any change - I have how ever got several thousand people a better pension at British Telecom (I was the secretary for one of the larger BT union branches)

[weberc2]

> The beauty of a union is there doesn't have to be an objective definition. A union gives you a democratic voice to advocate for what you think is fair. Without organized labor power, your voice is completely ignorable.

This is silly; non-union employees have a democratic voice and the ability to advocate for "what they think is fair", and their voices aren't completely ignorable or else everyone would make minimum wage.

Perhaps there is some gross advantage to collective bargaining, but unions (in the U.S. at least) seem to discourage productivity, competition, and common sense while fostering corruption. These costs drive employers toward automation or outsourcing, thereby eliminating the very jobs they purport to protect. In my view, the cost of unionizing is too high for all but the most extreme circumstances.

> This is a completely naive understanding of what finding a job is like. Leaving a job can be a strike against a person in the hiring process, not to mention it consumes a lot of time, leaves someone uncompensated and without benefits during the process, etc. This also assumes engineer competency is something we can effectively gauge in the hiring process or otherwise (just search "hiring" on hacker news to get the general sentiment among engineers about how good we are at this).

You're conflating efficiency with fairness. Also, there's no need for an employee to quit before beginning to look for another job.

> Imagine if this was the suggestion given to factory workers and coal miners and the early 20th century (not that I think the worker conditions are comparable, but its illustrative of how naive it is to believe that market forces are sufficient for providing fair compensation). This is a marginalist's definition of "fair" that doesn't jive with any real human person's.

See my previous statement about exceptional circumstances, and take care not to confuse a depressed economy with unfair allocation of resources (although both a shrunken economy and anti-competitive practices contributed to poor conditions during the Great Depression). Maybe market forces alone aren't enough to guarantee fair distribution, but your analogy doesn't demonstrate as much.

> The real question is why you are so fervantly against having a democratic voice in the workplace.

This isn't my position, so I'm not sure how to answer your question... It sounds like you're conflating unionization with "having a democratic voice in the workplace"?

[um_ya]

Unions originated as a way to commoditise labor. It has since grown into a way to keep out freelance competitors, and to force employers into doing things (both of which I don't agree with). In terms of commoditsing labor, tech is a very skill specific profession with no cookie cutter employee to sell, which makes it a bad candidate for unions.

[knucklesandwich]

This notion that there is a wide distribution in engineer competency has come under a lot of criticism for many reasons (not the least of which being that its often used as a cover for discrimination on the basis of gender): https://lwn.net/Articles/641779/ If you believe there to be such a wide distribution in talent and that salaries at your company are commensurately paid, I suggest you ask your employer if they will disclose every employee's salary and the justification for them.

Even if this we take this for granted, its completely untrue that all unions commoditize a trade by flattening pay. There are plenty of unions that have chosen not to put standardized salaries in contracts or have advocated tiered salary agreements or merit pay. Whether or not these are good things, they are things that unions have done and should dispel with the notion that unions are inflexible towards these concerns by workers.

As for your concern that unions "force employers to do things", well I suggest you consider all of the ways your employer can coerce you to do things and whether you actually have a mutualistic relationship. Many workers don't feel that they do.

[jasonlingx]

Rock stars don't need unions.

[Frondo]

Sounds like someone hasn't heard of the American Federation of Musicians.

[slidemodern]

No, but they do need industry-savy managers and agents working for them to ensure they get the best deal.

[unityByFreedom]

It doesn't really matter what unions become in certain cases, does it?

Unions were reinforced by the NLRA to enable workers to bargain collectively. That can mean a lot of things

A union for software engineers is a blank slate. It hasn't been done before. It could be anything someone makes of it.

[pbecotte]

That's... not true. I was in a unionized software development shop at L3 communications in Camden. It was... different. Having a published document showing how the "top performers" were going to get a 3.5% raise this year while the average people would only get 2.5% was odd. Counting my hours (including signing out for lunch and getting management approval for overtime) was very different. Getting paid overtime was nice!

The problem is that if I had stayed there for thirty years, I would have been pretty much guaranteed to make good money. By changing jobs a couple times, I made that same money in 2. So... people who are capable of getting better jobs and willing to risk change simply left, while people looking for stability or who had trouble getting jobs simply stayed. This didn't lead to the type of environment that I enjoyed working in. Your mileage may vary.

[Apocryphon]

Camden, in the UK? Thanks for sharing your experience. Any sort of unionized IT environment in the U.S. is an absolute rarity, if such things exist at all. I don't deny that unions would add an additional layer of complexity and will have unintended drawbacks. But if there were union shops in tech, then at least there will be options for tech workers to choose between stability and rapid growth. Certainly providing the former will help in addressing the ageism in Silicon Valley.

[srpablo]

> I'm of the opinion that the average software engineer in the USA is already overpaid and underworked with excellent benefits and low incentive to unionize.

I happen to agree that, relative to other industries, we're overpaid and get to live pretty lavishly for the little sacrifice that working on building systems with code entails.

That said, when you look at the value we generate for the people we work for, and remember how we are necessary to their wealth generation, I think it's worth having a conversation about organizing.

[rifung]

I don't think the value you generate actually matters in regards to compensation though. What matters is how easy you are to replace.

[ThrustVectoring]

It does, because value generated helps with your best alternative to negotiated agreement. Specifically, there's more money floating around trying to woo freelancers, technical cofounders, etc.

Also, it sets their BATNA as well - how much value they miss out on while working on replacing you.

[rifung]

> Also, it sets their BATNA as well - how much value they miss out on while working on replacing you.

Ah I never thought about that.

I don't really get what you mean with respect to more money to get freelancers and such. Isn't the compensation of freelancers directly related to how much they would have to pay employees anyway? After all, I can only assume that if it's significantly cheaper to hire an employee, they would do so.

I would have thought too that freelancers have some special skillsets, which make them less easy to find, and thus less replaceable as well, but I don't have any data to back that up.

[pbecotte]

It matters. The floor is how easy you are to replace. The ceiling is the marginal value that you provide to the company. Considering how incredibly high that marginal value is, there is a lot of upward pressure at the top of the scale.

[Apocryphon]

Doctors, lawyers, professional athletes, and leading Hollywood actors and actresses might all be overpaid relative to other professions, and yet they all have professional organizations, even unions, representing them. What makes software engineers so exceptional?

[sattoshi]

What do we, collectively, as tech workers want?

[rbaud]

Well, for instance, some amount of power to bargain for better treatment and basic protections, like say a healthy/safe workplace where you don't have to worry about being harassed by a superior and then ignored by HR.

Right now, companies like Uber can treat workers poorly -- apparently at a policy/organizational level even -- because the only thing they feel they have to fear is a bit of bad PR. No one has these workers' backs. HR is concerned with protecting the company. And the workers likely don't have the time, money nor stamina to fight a huge corporation with a lawsuit.

That's why workers need to band together to look out for one another. The deck is already stacked against them.

[Apocryphon]

More equity?

[tyingq]

Pilots too.

[chimeracoder]

> Doctors, ... might all be overpaid relative to other professions, and yet they... have professional organizations, even unions, representing them

Doctors do not have professional organizations or unions representing them.

The AMA is frequently mis-cited by people not familiar with the industry as a union, but it's not one at all. Only 25% of doctors are members of the AMA (most of them only because they require licenses to CPT codes, which the AMA has a monopoly over) and the AMA does not advocate for physicians' interests.

In no meaningful sense does the AMA "represent" doctors at large.

[tommorris]

That's just in the US though. There's a whole world out there that is not the United States.

The British Medical Association certainly claims to be a trade union.

https://www.bma.org.uk/about-us/bma-as-a-trade-union

And they have engaged in collective action - e.g. the junior doctors strike.

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2016/sep/01/what-you-nee...

[epmaybe]

The AMA doesn't advocate for physician interests? How so?

As a student member of the AMA, I can attest that they aren't the most effective organization, but they do plenty to further physician interests.

I think what you're likely getting at is how heterogenous physician interests are considering each specialty.

[chimeracoder]

> The AMA doesn't advocate for physician interests? How so?

The AMA sometimes does things that align with doctors' interests, but only incidentally. It's allegiance is to itself as an institution, not to doctors, and it will further its own interests over doctors' every time the two collide.

As one example listed upthread, they advocate increasing the supply of physicians to lower physician salaries, which is directly against doctors' interests but in line with their own. Similarly, their stranglehold over CPT codes undeniably harms physicians and places them under even more control of payers' interests, but because it provides the AMA with a monopoly stream of revenue, the AMA clutches to it.

> I think what you're likely getting at is how heterogenous physician interests are considering each specialty.

I wasn't, but incidentally, that's the exact problem that unions do have. The leadership has the incentive to throw minority group interests under the bus in order to appease the majority of its membership. Closed shops (the AMA would not be one) are the most ruthless, because the only alternative their members have is to find employment in another industry altogether.

[epmaybe]

I agree that in its current state, the AMA does not do a whole lot for physicians. However, I would argue that if more physicians took an active interest in policies that benefitted all specialties, the AMA wouldn't be this shell of an organization that benefitted themselves more than others.

That being said, maybe sticking with state organizations might be a more fruitful endeavor.

Additionally, while physicians are a heterogenous bunch, there are many issues that almost all physicians agree with. Use the AMA to collectively lobby for those, and stick to the specialty organizations to push for more individual issues.

[kennywinker]

The Apple / Google / Adobe / Intel etc antipoaching lawsuit seems to indicate otherwise.

https://www.cnet.com/news/apple-google-others-settle-anti-po...

[deegles]

I think the average software engineer is underpaid relative to the value that they deliver to a company and the economy in general. Relative to other professions, sure. But I think that if a tech company makes enough to (in one instance) pay out dividends, they have spare cash to raise wages or provide bonuses to those that generated the value in the first place.

[knucklesandwich]

Agreed, I think relatively high compensation is something engineers can get caught up on when discussing the idea of unionizing (though its worth noting that we're paid salaries closer to electricians and plumbers than we are to specialist doctors, not that this is really apples to apples in terms of education required).

Even though we earn good wages, its relatively easy to see that workers are not often reaping the benefits of surplus value and have no ability to weigh in on determinations of how that value is allocated. More importantly, the advantages of a union are not limited to being able to negotiate a better salary, there are lots of workplace conditions that can be pretty oppressive in the tech industry, and unions offer the ability to improve all of them.

[FLUX-YOU]

>I think the average software engineer is underpaid relative to the value that they deliver to a company and the economy in general.

People see the sticker price of things and do some napkin math, but I'd be willing to bet in most cases, if that employee were to make the product on their own (with no help or resources or existing customers), they would not be able to make the same amount of money because they would have to face "new company" risks and statistics. That is pretty bleak.

[st3v3r]

"I'm of the opinion that the average software engineer in the USA is already overpaid and underworked"

Given how much money these companies make directly off of our work, and given the prevalence of death marches across the industry, I cannot take this position seriously.

[lostboys67]

Underworked - with all the unpaid OT going on and they aren ot overpaid when compared to other professions

[QuinnyPig]

Great idea. Go work at a company like, say, Uber?

[home_boi]

And easily switch to similar prestigious company like Stripe.

[unityByFreedom]

That speaks to me. After salary negotiations, HR within companies has never done anything for me when I approached them.

They seemed to be there only to defend the boss and register me as a complainer. It took me several jobs and this post to learn that.

[rosser]

> HR within companies has never done anything for me when I approached them....

The thing you need to keep in mind about HR is this: they aren't there to help you, to have your back. They're there to protect the company from you. Incidental to that, they've traditionally managed the benefits the company is either required or chooses to give you, and acts as a place for you to take concerns such as sexual harassment. But even in those cases, their duty is to the company, not to any individual employee.

[luckydude]

Yep. And I think it takes a while for that to sink in for young people. They are more idealistic and assume that things are set up to be beneficial to everyone. They aren't. HR is there to make sure there is no blowback on the company and they do a lot of shitty things to make that true.

[pm90]

How does one protect oneself in cases of sexual impropriety then? This seems like a pretty dangerous flaw. To be completely honest I've always felt that HR has been the "police" of the workplace, there to keep issues like this from getting out of control (as it most certainly did in the case of OP). Now I feel much more exposed...

[jldugger]

HR's role is to advise management on how to adhere to labor law. Often times they also handle record keeping for legal purposes, including reporting of sexual harassment. But they're not there to protect you. They're there to protect management from itself.

> How does one protect oneself in cases of sexual impropriety then?

Document, document, document. Not because you're going to sue, but because this is rarely a 1-off situation and when the class action comes around you will be prepared with ammunition.

[alexbecker]

Bosses who harass employees and a culture that encourage such things present a much larger risk to the company than a single employee's complaints, so in a well-functioning company their incentives align with policing these issues. But it's still worth keeping in mind that their incentives are not your incentives, and if they have given up on keeping the company culture healthy, their interests will be oppossed to yours.

[ryandrake]

Document everything then lawyer up. I noticed the OP never mentioned contacting a lawyer, which is a total "wow" after reading the story.

[trjordan]

This is true, but I think you've overstating HR's loyalty to other individuals in the company.

When an employees places a complaint against another employee, neither of those parties is "the company", even when one is in management. If the subject of the complaint is breaking laws, HR (who has the company's back) is rightfully incentivized to show that person the door. That person is a liability, and the company will have to pay if it is sued for that individual's behavior.

If you're running the HR to mediate a personal fight, sure, there's a decent chance they'll side with the person with more organizational clout. But if you're bringing to light evidence of legal wrongdoing, HR is _absolutely_ supposed to be on your side. The company needs to know that, and protecting the company looks like firing the offending party.

[vkou]

> When an employees places a complaint against another employee, neither of those parties is "the company", even when one is in management. If the subject of the complaint is breaking laws, HR (who has the company's back) is rightfully incentivized to show that person the door.

Which is exactly what happens... When the harasser is not a 'Top performer' in a culture that claims to reward meritocracy.

[unityByFreedom]

I believe there are some good HR groups out there who truly do look out for the long term interests of their companies.

I think what's good for me, if I'm a hard worker, is also good for the company.

Certainly I'm my best advocate. Even a union couldn't do everything for me.

[NamTaf]

The best way I've heard it discussed is that too many people focus on the wrong word in HR. It's not Human Resources, it's Human Resources. Understanding that seems to be the critical step in getting HR and understanding why they are the way they are.

[Throwadev]

Every time I hear advice along these lines (which is precisely every single time anyone talks about HR), I always wonder what these HR people are taught in school. I think they have Human Resources related majors in school right? And I'm assuming a good amount of the people in HR have studied that, so then is this what they learn in school? To treat employees like shit and lie to them? I'm really curious.

[user5994461]

HR has been fine with me.

Arranging the paperwork to ensign then arranging the paperwork to resign.

Forwarding some more paperwork for taxes, HMRC, benefits, pension and various things that pop up at times.

Arranging interviews, candidates feedback loop, on-site events, university recruiting events, some conferences, offers, etc...

Maybe I just have better than you guys.

[pnathan]

I am utterly persuaded at this point that the software industry workers need a union.

Software engineering hiring practices are profoundly flawed; this is something a union could address at an industry level. It's also deeply problematic for me to take home $fat_paycheck when, say, $sales_guy two tables over is paid minimum wage + commission (disclaimer: I have no knowledge of this occurring at my current company; it happened to a sales guy I know, however). A company of people work together, and should share in the returns as they cover each other's deficiencies.

I'm comfortable asserting that while there are issues with traditional unions, it's possible to improve and make better organizations.

[hueving]

>A company of people work together, and should share in the returns as they cover each other's deficiencies.

This is not an economically rational way to behave, so it's not sustainable for a company to do this and keep talent for high market-value positions. People are compensated based on the minimum required to get them to join and stay at the company, so their compensation is going to be driven by the market value of people with their skills.

Very small companies may be able to afford to pay every employee the cost of a principle software engineer (or whatever the highest position they have is), but this falls apart extremely quickly if the company needs lots of customer support positions or lots of sales people. They end up having to cut compensation to all of the high-end positions and subsequently lose anyone good enough to get jobs that pay market rate.

The majority of companies don't have the profit margins to throw away an extra $100,000 or whatever it takes per employee annually to pay everyone the top position market rate.

>It's also deeply problematic for me to take home $fat_paycheck

What do you say to people that spend years of their life getting advanced degrees in math/physics/CS/whatever that make them experts in the subject matter the company is working on? "That sounds hard, here's the same paycheck as the undergrad working next to you who knows almost nothing in the field."

[pnathan]

You're jumping to conclusions I didn't advocate for...

There's no reason one person who contributes one thing gets to scrape by and one person who contributes another gets to live like a prince. Sales pay the bills of SW devs; SW devs make what Sales sells. Both should be comfortably compensated.

[forgottenpass]

Tech workers (across all disciplines) need to unionize to combat this kind of thing.

First they need articulable set of goals, based on a sound principled base. With such a base, to unionize or not is an implementation detail. But a union without guiding principles would be exactly the morally bankrupt negotiation tool unions are often accused of being. A union should never be more important to the unionized than the ideals it implements. Because if it ever is, the workers no longer control the union, the union controls the workers.

To that point, I have yet to see "tech" at large, or even software engineers seriously discuss principles for the purpose of a principled professional life. I hear complaints about individual things that are negative on the face have moralistic reasoning applied after the fact. But no guiding vision.

Just like we assume the people in movies poop [0] even though we never see it, an "obviously" unacceptable thing happening leads to have conversations resting on unspoken assumptions that someone solved what a professional environment is off-screen. If we want demands for what a work environment should be like to be taken seriously, we have to figure it out. Upfront, on-screen, and to create something people can believe in.

to combat this kind of thing

fight management on these kinds of issues.

Can you articulate what the KIND of issues are? The category can easily be labeled with synonyms for "bad" and easily have things like a misogynistic work environment placed within the category, but WHAT IS the category. What are the defining lines?

If every developer took the time to figure out what they believe in, or adopted the (e.g.) ACM Code to their professional life, it might not even take a union.

[0] http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/NobodyPoops

[wz1000]

> It's not a panacea, and there are several historical examples of union leadership betraying the trust of workers and neglecting the demands of the most marginalized members (such as the UAW in 1941), but a union correctly structured and rooted in worker solidarity is the only proven way to fight management on these kinds of issues.

Thats why the IWW exists, and they desperately need members. They refuse to cooperate with big business and government, and are based on decentralized worker solidarity and principles of direct action, not the capture of state power. If a union derives its power from the state, it is easily corrupted and subverted.

https://iww.org/unions/dept500/iu560

https://techcrunch.com/2012/11/01/want-to-unionize-developer...

[mysticmarvel]

Good god... I just Google'd the IWW. Their website looks, at a glance, like a militant extreme left group. From the hard white-and-red on black colour scheme through to a photo of two people in fatigues carrying AK-style weapons next to an advert for a highly politically charged event.

If they want more members, they might want to tone down the "militant" imagery. I'm uncomfortable being associated with that.

[wz1000]

The IWW has a long history, and pioneered the American labour movement, being practically the first union to admit women and blacks. It has not been a stranger to government repression in this period, and is decidedly anti government and view all political solutions with distrust. Instead they advocate for direct action. If you don't have anti-authoritarian/anarchist leanings, you probably won't fit in with the philosophy of the IWW.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Everett_massacre

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wesley_Everest

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tulsa_Outrage

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/27/us/27hill.html?_r=0

[knucklesandwich]

Love the wobblies, and from what I understand they've organized one of the few existing tech workers unions, the IWW 560. Definitely very interested in organizing with them.

[TheAdamAndChe]

The problem is that workers don't have leverage like they used to due to globalization and a general labor surplus. We need to think of something that would work better than a union.

[tptacek]

Software developers have incredible leverage right now, perhaps more than any cohort of employees in the country, and while most don't have salary to organize around, there are plenty of other practices --- transparency and liquidity of equity compensation being a great example --- that generate a broad base of support across the whole industry.

People hear the term "union" and they think "shop rules" and "union contract salary". There's no reason that's what has to happen. Substitute "professional association" for "union" and you've got all the degrees of freedom you could want for us all to profit from organization without over-complicating our work lives.

[morgante]

> People hear the term "union" and they think "shop rules" and "union contract salary".

The problem is that a significant number of the people who push "unions" (especially on places like HN) are actually trying to push for those things. Just look in this thread to find people arguing over whether there actually are large differences in developer performance.

If people want a professional association (I do!) let's call it that and avoid all this union talk. Think lawyers, not factories.

[knucklesandwich]

Hi, I assume you're talking about me (the person above expressing some skepticism about the 10x programmer thing). I'm actually open to be proven wrong, but I'm not sure that makes much of a difference in terms of how compensation is justified in the real world (again, ask your employer to provide justification for salaries if you think 10x programmers exist and they are paid as such). Whether or not I'm right, I'm one person with one vote in a union.

A professional association by contrast does not work to help workers in a workplace dispute. It is fundamentally an advocacy group for the profession itself and works to advance it by creating professional standards, lobbying, offering education and certification, etc. The AMA for example, does not engage in collective bargaining with the management of a hospital and has no legal right to compel such a thing under the NLRA. The AMA does however lobby politicians and puts its people on medical boards to limit the supply of doctors. Furthermore a professional organization works at the level of a single profession and doesn't organize workplaces in strikes, which is the major power of a union.

Unions can aggregate under federations that often resemble and provide the same function as professional associations, but a professional association provides almost none of the benefits of a union.

[morgante]

> I'm actually open to be proven wrong, but I'm not sure that makes much of a difference in terms of how compensation is justified in the real world (again, ask your employer to provide justification for salaries if you think 10x programmers exist and they are paid as such).

I've had a fairly thorough knowledge of salaries at many companies I've worked for (currently the founder of my own company) and I'm not sure what your point is. There was absolutely a large variation in salary and it clearly correlated with two factors: performance and negotiation ability. Why exactly do you think employers pay some engineers so much money? Out of the goodness of their hearts? It's due to measurable impact and differences. I've been places where I was producing more than the rest of the team in half the hours (I was in school at the time).

Your arguments about collective bargaining are precisely why I don't want a union. I sure as hell don't want you (or anyone else) bargaining for me or being tied to any generic salary formula. It's hard for me to imagine that if things were done democratically most engineers would vote for me to make what I do.

[bendoernberg]

"It's hard for me to imagine that if things were done democratically most engineers would vote for me to make what I do." It sounds like you feel the current system works out very well for a few elite performers, in a way that the majority of workers would not be comfortable with if they had a say in the matter. I'm curious, how do you see the tension/balance between what benefits the majority of engineers vs. what benefits a small number of elite performers such as yourself?

[chimeracoder]

> The AMA for example, does not engage in collective bargaining with the management of a hospital and has no legal right to compel such a thing under the NLRA. The AMA does however lobby politicians and puts its people on medical boards to limit the supply of doctors.

This is a common misconception.

The AMA does not limit the supply of doctors. The AAMC (used to) limit the supply of doctors, but (a) they have been trying for the last 10+ years to increase that, and (b) the actual number of practicing physicians is bottlenecked by funding for residency positions, which is funded by Medicare, not the AMA or AAMC. The AMA has actually lobbied to increase funding for GME, which would increase the supply of practicing physicians.

The AMA does not represent doctors in any meaningful sense - only 25% of physicians belong to the AMA, and only because membership is required for licensing the CPT codes that those doctors need for billing. The AMA does not consistently advocate for physicians' best interests, and in the last couple of decades, it has actually consistently sided against physicians' best interests.

[knucklesandwich]

The AMA _did_ lobby (I should have clarified that they no longer do this) to restrict medicare funding for residency: http://www.nytimes.com/1997/03/01/us/doctors-assert-there-ar...

http://www.nytimes.com/1986/06/29/business/curbing-the-suppl...

At one point the AMA had about 75% of American doctors as members but has declined for various reasons (growth of specialty professional associations, change of employment in which many doctors have gone from private practices to hospitals which has accompanied a change in political objectives, etc.). The AMA probably does still serve as a professional association in the interest of some segment of doctors, but I take your point that it definitely don't work for doctors writ large. This is actually a good example of why professional associations can be inadequate, because they fundamentally are limited to advocacy for a profession instead of working for gains for a workplace.

[mst]

> A professional association by contrast does not work to help workers in a workplace dispute.

Some don't. Some do.

I am currently a member of one that does, up to and including litigating a case is appropriate.

[knucklesandwich]

Sure, this will often happen if litigation can set some precedent that benefits the profession as a whole. For example the AMA will take up cases that can challenge legal precedent on malpractice damages limits. Sometimes these disputes can be with management, but generally these kind of interventions are done as part of professional advocacy.

However a professional association is effectively limited in what it can do in a labor dispute because management has no obligation to collectively bargain with them, hence this is not really the purpose of professional associations.

[tptacek]

I don't think shop rules are a good idea, or contractually mandated pay scales. I'm not interested in getting into the heads of every single person talking about unionization. It sounds like we agree, and should move on.

[Eridrus]

So what organising principles should a software developer union have?

It's easy to say they could be anything we want it to be, but I'm not sure there's a real consensus on any particular principle.

Lots of people who talk about unions seem to value privacy protections for consumers, but there are clearly software developers writing this software who have a different view.

Ubers reputation has been trash for almost as long as Uber has existed, I feel like most people are there to get rich, do you expect those people to go on strike for a grievance that doesn't affect them?

[knucklesandwich]

Without a fair equity package, none of those employees are going to get any kind of payout from an exit. And given the number of fundraising rounds Uber has undergone: https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/uber/funding-rounds and their difficulty in actually turning a profit: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-08-25/uber-lose... it seems a little questionable that anyone from the rank-and-file is going to get rich at Uber.

A union is what gives you the ability confront management about these kinds of things.

[TheCoelacanth]

There are a lot of labor practices that most software developers would agree on changing: unpaid overtime, unreasonable on-call requirements, lack of transparency in equity compensation, unreasonably short windows for exercising vested stock options after leaving the company.

[tristor]

Thanks to the Fair Labor Standards Act, anyone who is a software engineer is exempt from overtime pay as long as they make at least $455/week on a salary basis.[1] Hint, I don't know any software engineers making less than $23660/yr.

It's a heinously stupid regulation, and it's one which was lobbied for heavily by the tech industry to reduce labor costs. But that is the federal law of the US currently, which means yes you can be required to perform unpaid overtime.

[1]: https://www.dol.gov/whd/overtime/fs17e_computer.pdf

[knucklesandwich]

Not sure if you're agreeing or disagreeing with the person above, but just to clarify: the FLSA doesn't prevent tech workers from collectively bargaining to gain paid overtime as a condition of employment, it just determines the highest wage at which salaried workers are required by law to be paid overtime (which I agree is stupid, and should be a benefit all workers receive).

[tptacek]

Note that you can cease to be exempt if your employer begins treating you as if you were hourly and not salaried --- for instance, docking your pay in small increments, for instance because you went on strike for half a day.

[TheCoelacanth]

Yes, I'm aware. That's why I pointed it out as something that a union could change.

[scott_s]

There is aprofesssional association, but I don't think many non-academics see it as such: the ACM, http://www.acm.org/about-acm/about-the-acm-organization

[jbarham]

> Software developers have incredible leverage right now, perhaps more than any cohort of employees in the country

Hah hah, very cute. A trivial proof that this claim is false: H-1B.

Indentured H-1B visa workers have absolutely zero leverage. American software developers are constantly reminded that if they don't behave and do what they're told that their jobs will be outsourced or they'll be replaced by H-1B workers. I say this as an ex-H-1B holder, who left the US six years ago for Australia (where I'm now a citizen).

Young American programmers will do well to read Norman Matloff's blog at https://normsaysno.wordpress.com/ where he exhaustively documents the abuse of American IT workers and ask themselves how they plan to make a living after the age of 40.

[tptacek]

This does not square even a little bit with the software employment market I'm familiar with, not only in California but in the Midwest.

If you believe that H1-B employees are abused in software development shops, that's all the more reason to organize.

[patio11]

I think we're getting a bit of a "you see a trunk, I see a tail" view of a very large elephant here.

Think of the most scutwork of scutwork programming jobs in the industry, or even quasi-programming quasi-IT jobs like, I don't know, Sharepoint administrator at a regional insurance carrier or line programmer at a university (where most projects are "execute a SQL query to get a list of students in a particular course then, and this is the hard part, display it on a web page"). Tata doesn't simply manufacture billions of dollars in services revenue; actual companies pay them actual money to outsource work. Actual companies also pay actual money for Tata to send 6k engineers at $75k apiece to the US. That's like half-a-Google worth of engineers; add in Infosys and you approach a full Google, except at something like 30 cents on the dollar.

AppAmaGooBookSoft consume the H1B program in an entirely different fashion and Tata is more-or-less orthogonal to the startup world. You can fashion a career in software which never touches the ecosystem that Tata is a part of. You can also fashion a career in software which never touches AppAmaGooBookSoft, startups, or software development shops. These two worlds are separated by a titanic gulf in conditions and expectations, and transferring between them is difficult, for much the same reasons as transferring between social classes is difficult. This does not mean that either of the two worlds does not factually exist.

You might never have been explicitly threatened with "We can trivially replace you with cheaper foreign labor." You might not even know anyone who has been, depending on who you generally hang out with. I have been in the room when that threat was made, and (because life is hilarious!) I was the literal face of the threat.

[tptacek]

I acknowledge that there are portions of the industry dominated by outsourced/offshore workers.

What I don't acknowledge is that the parts of the industry that aren't offshored are suddenly going to become offshored as a reaction to labor organization. The idea that strikers will be replaced with H1-Bs is a hollow threat.

[knucklesandwich]

Guest workers aren't a reason not to organize though, they're just a reason it might be more difficult to organize certain shops (though not impossible, take a look at the FLOC who has been able to organize thousands of guest workers).

[jbarham]

> If you believe that H1-B employees are abused...

Of course that would never happen. All American business executives and outsourcing agencies only act with unimpeachable integrity and the highest ethical standards.

(Wait, what is the original subject of this thread again...)

I repeat, for all American programmers under the age of 35, read https://normsaysno.wordpress.com/ to see how your careers are being systematically undermined by your own industry and political leaders. Then make alternative career plans for when you're 40+. You'll thank me later.

[morgante]

> Then make alternative career plans for when you're 40+.

Your alternative careers plans can and should be the possibility of retirement.

It is extremely possible as a software engineer to save enough to retire by the time you're 35.

[bishnu]

It's only leverage because software developers have no solidarity. So yes, an individual can be threatened by this, but in reality the US government only grants 65 000 H-1Bs per year; Such a threat could be made easily irrelevant by even a modicum of organizing.

[unityByFreedom]

What? It's literally your right to vote to join a union. If a majority of coworkers vote for one, you've got a union. Look up the National Labor Relations Act.

[tptacek]

Not only is this true, but the NLRA also bars employer retaliation against concerted actions by employees both to organize and also to take actions in protest of work conditions. It's a huge exception to at-will employment.

I had no idea about any of this stuff until I started talking to the Tech Solidarity people. I'd always thought the reason nobody goes on strike is that you'd simply be fired for doing so. But, no! That was dumb of me! Striking --- really, most forms of employee protest against working conditions --- is protected federally.

I'm particularly interested in how these laws interact with the employment laws for salaried workers. In addition to it being unlawful (in most cases) to fire an employee for striking, it's also (usually) legally risky to dock a salaried employee's pay.

[jbronn]

While technically true, the enforcement is up to the Department of Labor. Do you honestly believe that Puzder (now Acosta) is really going to enforce these rules? It's the whole reason they were chosen for the position in the first place.

[tptacek]

No, enforcement is not up to the Department of Labor. If you're terminated for organizing and protesting against working conditions, your recourse includes the courts.

People should, of course, talk to labor lawyer before organizing. Tech Solidarity is working with several now, and collecting employment contracts from the best-known tech companies in order to provide standardized organizing advice.

[jbronn]

Really? Alright I'll bite. They only promulgate the regulations that are enforced. And if you're being pedantic enough to insist it's the DoJ, then my point still stands under one led by Sessions.

[Alex3917]

> the NLRA also bars employer retaliation against concerted actions by employees both to organize and also to take actions in protest of work conditions.

I also learned about this from the Tech Solidarity people. The key here though is that actions are only protected if they're taken collectively by multiple employees. A single employee protesting can still be fired without recourse.

[mysticmarvel]

This is all totally true.

It is also totally true that you are not squeaky clean in your employment (never been late once? Never missed a deadline?), and that your performance management targets are set by the people against whom you are protesting. You can be performance managed out of a position in months, even if your right to protest is protected and you are literally a Saint in the workplace.

I'm not saying it's right, just that I've seen it done. There is always a way to remove "difficult" employees regardless of protection laws.

[tptacek]

So, I believe this, but what gives me comfort here is having seen companies try to performance-manage people out (for legit reasons!) and fail because of protected-class problems. As soon as you can credibly allege retaliation, your case gets 100x more expensive to dispose of. In two companies, one of which I had a senior role at at the time, I've seen the companies cave and pay out to make them go away.

[mysticmarvel]

This is all totally true.

It is also totally true that you are not squeaky clean in your employment (never been late once? Never missed a deadline?), and that your performance management targets are set by the people against whom you are protesting. You can be performance managed out of a position in months, even if your right to protest is protected and you are literally a Saint in the workplace.

I'm not saying it's right, just that it's true.

[ahh]

Wait a minute, wait a minute: if I just decide I'm not going to work anymore, they can't fire me if I say it's because I'm protesting for higher wages? And they have to keep paying me?

[tptacek]

Google "protected concerted action" and spend $75 on a consult with a labor law attorney. Some catches:

1. The protest has to involve more than one team member, and depending on circumstances that other person possibly can't be a manager.

2. The protest has to be defensibly about some kind of working conditions issue. You need a concrete, defensible ask.

3. You can in fact have your pay docked for not working, though you (probably) can't be fired. But remember, you're an FLSA exempt employee (if you're a developer), so you can make it difficult for them to dock your pay, too.

I probably wouldn't make the protest about higher wages.

[santaclaus]

Ehh, when my previous workplace was voting to unionize I wasn't able to vote because I was a remote worker, and didn't have the disposable income to fly in and vote... being disenfranchised is a drag.

[cf]

Yes but in this particular instance Uber recruits heavily in the Bay Area. If all workers in the Silicon Valley office refused to work and discouraged others to work for Uber it could be quite effective.

[matchagaucho]

It's either unionize or a class action lawsuit. Silicon Valley tends to prefer the latter.

Many IT roles already fall under collective bargaining units (CBU), particularly in the public sector.

If stories like Susan's become common, and there is blatant gender discrimination, then the Government will have no choice but to acknowledge a private-sector CBU and Union.

[parent_dead_on]

Right on brother (sister?)! Most in the industry are believing the management story and working their asses off for a dream that's rarely realized. And when it is, they don't see nearly the payout their more business savvy peers do. The model might be closer to doctors and lawyers than auto workers, but it's clear to me that industry wide solidarity could result in great standard of living and working condition improvements.

[mariojv]

Are there any real efforts around this? A quick Google search doesn't show anything obvious.

I'm also curious if there are any historical examples of "white collar" workers unionizing.

[knucklesandwich]

There's plenty of currently existing unions for professional trade workers. The SEIU, IFPTE, CWA, IBEW, etc. are American unions which represent scientists, engineers, legal assistants, technicians, physicists, nurses, etc. Largely these careers have low union density (as a result of poor uptake of unions throughout the US), but there are plenty of countries (for example many Nordic countries) where its much more common to see these professions unionized.

If you're interested in learning more about how to do this, I suggest you look into one of the following orgs:

- Tech Workers Coalition (https://techworkerscoalition.org/) based in the Bay Area who holds a monthly organizing meeting in SF

- Tech Solidarity (https://techsolidarity.org), which has been holding meetings in a bunch of metropolitan areas for educating tech workers about organizing

[st3v3r]

The Director's Guild, Writer's Guild, and Screen Actors Guild, along with the various professional athlete unions, would be good examples of how it could be done.

[arjie]

Good luck. I'll never join. I know what you guys want (because enough of you have stated it on HN): no more H1Bs and to make sure I never find a job again because I'm a foreigner. I'll scab that union till kingdom come.

[knucklesandwich]

Actually I'd prefer if my country would just naturalize you instead of running you through an exploitative guest worker program that hedges your visa status on continued employment. I have absolutely no desire to prevent you from getting a job (and I'd like the union to have a spot for you and ensure you share in the benefits we create by collectively bargaining).

[arjie]

Sure, you might. But any such union will have a large number of disaffected people and as HN has shown, a large number of these people blame H1B workers.

Their problem is that this visa exists. My problem is getting naturalised. Our incentives are not aligned and they've made that clear.

I want no part of it and I will actively participate in union busting to the greatest of my ability for this reason.

I don't think you can achieve greater than 2% penetration amongst employed engineers and I know that your system will threaten the 1.7% of engineers who are H1B workers. I think I'm in a reasonable position here and I'm not about to weaken myself. And I think everyone else is going to work through the same calculus.

Sorry, it's not you. It's who are likely going to be your comrades.

[knucklesandwich]

No comrades of mine would see guest workers or immigrants as a threat. I wouldn't join a union that didn't stick up for all workers, regardless of their citizenship status.

Maybe we have different perspectives on how popular the anti-immigrant position is in tech (and how many neo-reactionary/dark enlightenment dipshits there are), I guess I'd just ask that you keep an open mind about this and make a decision if and when workers approach you to join a union. I certainly wouldn't knock you for opposing a group that doesn't have your interests at heart, but the union I want to form would take solidarity seriously and would explicitly go to bat for women, people of color, lgbtqia people, disabled people, and immigrants.

[arjie]

Very well. Fair enough.

I would advise any other immigrant reading that if they are approached by union representatives to demand a clause guaranteeing permanent residence reform and removal of the 7% limit before any anti-H1B action is taken. In the absence of this clause, all Indian and Chinese workers (at the least, and everyone probably) are placing themselves at risk of deportation.

Refusal to add such a clause or delay in doing so is evidence of actively undermining your interests.

[zigzigzag]

> No comrades of mine

Ouch. Was that choice of word deliberate?

[sb8244]

The parent comment used that word choice.

[weberc2]

I think if this post teaches us anything, it's that the system works very well, at least for well-performing software engineers. In this case, Susan found a better job with a different company where she presumably won't have to face the same levels of confusion and mistreatment. Unionization seems to come with its own cultural (and procedural) baggage, so I'm wary of invoking needlessly.

[kennywinker]

Suffers in kafkaesque work environment for a year... gets new job. The system works!