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Comment by blululu | Hacker News Reader

There are plenty of examples where unions can be a constructive force in securing good working conditions while promoting good business practices. Given the poor reputation of video game development work this could be a really positive development. That being said, the last time I had a unionized job I was pretty disappointed with the results. They consistently failed to secure cost of living adjustments, and the one time I got a pay bump was to ensure that I would be ineligible for an increase in the federal overtime threshold.

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AAA video game development has many similarities with the production of big budget Hollywood movies. Hollywood was unionized in response to the incredible abuses of "the studio system". I wonder the degree to which the Hollywood union system can be brought to AAA video game studios. One issue is that AAA video game development is more internationalized than Hollywood. Overall I think we are likely to see AAA video game studios unionized since the workers are both treated very poorly, skilled, powerful and are hard to replace.

A common factor between video games, Hollywood, and many other successful unions is that the supply of potential workers outpaces the amount of jobs available. This is the reason why general tech workers are treated better than people doing the exact same thing in the video game industry, because video games are just "cooler" and people are willing to sacrifice to work on them. This shifts the balance of power into the employers favor and allows them to enact policies and standards that are difficult to endure. Unions are a great way to shift that power balance back to neutral or even in favor of the workforce.

This is also why every big tech company pushes coding education so hard.

and immigration (no hate, I'm an immigrant because of it).

USA has a pretty bad track record when it comes to unions. In theory they are great, but in practice they get implemented really poorly.

I think we need to examine how other countries do unions because I agree, the one union I was in for a short time (teachers' union in California - I was basically forced to join even though the job was only temporary) felt like a ball and chain around my ankle taking a cut of my pay more than I felt like it was empowering me.

Employers tend to be a lot more hostile to unions in the US. This manifests with deliberately spread FUD about unions (e.g. the ridiculous Walmart video), covert attempts to sabotage, depiction of schoolteachers as terrorists (by the Kentucky governor) and, in one rather extreme case, aerial bombardment of striking workers.

It’s definitely an issue of perception. Call it a guild instead and gamedevs will flock to join.

Beyond that, you can’t really compare US unions to European ones because of the virulent anti-communism of US politics. In Europe, following the war, left wing coalitions of socialists, communists, and left liberals secured major parliamentary victories for workers. In the US, by contrast, sector-wide bargaining was banned, strikes were limited, and anyone with vaguely Marxist sympathies was purged from politics, the labor movement, and many industries through state intimidation and violence. Any comparison of unions across countries, and the shortcomings of American ones, has to be understood through this historical lens.

Yeah, it's a great feedback loop: pass piles of laws making unions ineffective, then watch as workers complain about how their unions are ineffective. Add propaganda videos (a la walmart) to the mix, and stir.

See also Coca Cola union killings in Colombia.

Why is this grayed out?

Wrongthink?

Lots of people who employ developers and wannabe entrepreneurs on hacker news.

My concern is most of the tech union type initiatives in the US are from ... existing US unions.

These orgnizations are NOT the places to start.

I would say it’s better to use and adapt an existing framework than try to build your own from scratch.

I think the existing framework is largely broken for skilled workers in the US.

These unions have not evolved in decades, they're not going to. Many of these unions actively protect long time workers who are just running out the clock, refuse to advance their skills, and put up barriers to deal with them... to the detriment of new union members, and they do it by design.

Keep in mind once you pick a union ... that's it, there's no need for that union to change, there is no competition.

As the article notes, in effect they have to be, since no one in the games industry has any experience with labour organizing. Outside help from an existing union is the way to jump start the process.

Public sector unions are a completely different ball game than private sector unions.

I whole heartedly believe in worker organization and believe that tech workers should unionize, but it is also true that in a lot of different pieces of this country public sector unionization has been an unmitigated disaster.

In any niche of our society that is not legible to the average person, public sector unions + the morass that is local politics in the US creates a downward spiral between public sector union workers and the politicians they bring into power.

The subway in NYC for example is broken for a number of reasons, but high on that list are the efforts of the transit worker union to block improvements in operational performance and their lobbying for Andrew Cuomo who might be one of the most transit hating governors in the last 100 years of New York politics.

Employer and union incentives need to align to some extent. The issue with a lot of public sector unions I see is there is no incentive for the union to be effective. Not like the employer will go bankrupt.

> we need to examine how other countries do unions

The biggest difference is that in other countries, the employee can pick any union they want, while in the US each employer is locked to a single union.

That single difference has a HUGE impact.

The US had a fine track record until they started pushing anti-union propaganda, started having union corruption and corresponding aggressive police crackdowns, and the government abandoned the working class. Now Michigan is a right to work state and free trade has killed thousands of domestic manufacturing jobs.

The video game industry seems like a prime candidate for a union.

But otherwise I agree. Based on my experience a union is just another layer of bureaucracy that ends up defining your job, career path, and etc without you getting to decide. They're just as full of mixed motivations as any employer.

I think something like SAG-AFTRA would be the perfect model. We already function as actors... We audition for coding roles... The recruiters are like managers... Most roles are for 1.5 years...

If the major FAANG companies had an association called the Software Development Industry... Programmers would join a Software Developers Guild... Annually the guild would negotiate with the Software Development Industry and create daily minimum rates, safe working conditions, and worker protections for software developers. (what kind of protections... I think assuring workers can operate and compete freely... No anti competitive behaviors such as refraining from soliciting one another’s employees in order to avert a salary war)

If FAANG doesn't do it, I would not be surprised other firms push for it as a way to compete for talent.

Imagine, instead of figuring out cap tables and trying to prevent getting screwed by dilution... imagine if that task was delegated to the Guild and they could hire people to negotiate for that and monitor that on an ongoing basis.

Imagine if those options could be captured in a defined benefit plan or packaged in some other way where professionals could be hired to manage the risks inherent with taking options from a startup.

I think too many people think about dockworkers and construction workers when unions are discussed. Please review the SAG agreements here:

https://www.sagaftra.org/files/20172020wagesTV.pdf

https://www.wrapbook.com/essential-guide-sag-rates/#SAG%20Te...

If you are a great programmer you might charge 8x the daily minimum. No one is forcing you to accept the minimum, but you should not have to accept anything below the minimum.

If you could delegate tasks to the guild to monitor the financial health of your employer, manage your stock option negotiation, and negotiate a daily minimum each year... you could offload a lot complicated issues and at least focus on your work... At a certain point a manager could assist with these tasks as well, especially if you are 8x the daily minimum.

The daily minimum is to make sure no one takes advantage of people (ie, young employees at startups)...

People think that their specific workplace issues will be fixed by a union, but unions are run by people and you can get a weak union rep just like you'd get a bad boss, except that your paying directly for the rep. Or there might be rules on the book but no one enforces them or the rest of your union doesn't think your ideas are important enough to be included.

I cannot vote to remove my boss though.

your anecdote seems to support the case for stronger more populated unions with better negotiation outcomes.

Sounds like you just had a bad union or said union was handicapped. A lot of unions now are not even "allowed" to strike, which is THE tool to secure better working conditions.

and what were your total union dues during this period ? Because if the union failed to get you a COLA increase then the dues would have put you in the red.

I worked in the video game industry for several years.

Being "in the red" over dues wouldn't be on by top-100 list of things to care about.

The regularly use worker hostile behavior - Two famous examples are eternal crunch times and laying off entire teams after shipping a game, even after luring them from other companies with promises they wouldn't.

Eventually, I left that industry entirely, which was unfortunate. I loved what I was making, but I hated what they could get away with doing to the workers.

It reminded me of Hollywood - So many young actors wanted the job, they knew they could mistreat them, and regularly did.

A union would be excellent here. Don't get caught up on the money part.

I am not making the argument against unions, perhaps the example provided above. Not all unions are created equal. Unions can be a good thing to enact change and are proven to work in creative fields as Hollywood could attest. That being said, Hollywood seems to take dump on many post production services and VFX which traditionally don't have unions. The nature of the work also allows for the work to be farmed out to companies all over the world.

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