Hacker News Reader

Comment by lend000 | Hacker News Reader

You're probably being downvoted because you mentioned unions in a negative light, but your points are factually correct. Unions have a place for protecting unskilled workers, but what happens in game development is quite unique, because these workers are in-demand software engineers who typically have better options working in a less glorified field.

View on HN

Seems pretty analogous to a union like this one: https://www.sagaftra.org/

Actors are certainly not unskilled, many are well paid, and some of the most vocally supportive of the SAG are the extremely well paid ones. They're also involved in an artistic pursuit, and similarly have various other options for converting their talent into cash ("selling out").

The games industry is notorious for crunch hiring and firing, low wages and exhausting work regimes. When work conditions like that prevail, people unionize (good for them imo). If there's anything surprising about it, it's that people put up with it for this long.

Yeah, it's a good idea to learn how to negotiate and good advice to leave a failing company if you can.

But "just learn to negotiate" is really a non-solution if the goal is to transform unacceptable industry wide labor practices.

Not just actors, but pro athletes as well. Unions have been tremendously good for them, forcing owners and leagues to commit to a specific guaranteed revenue split with players. It has not prevented rewarding of outstanding individual performance or even individual contract negotiation (just like actors). Some rules are set by by the union, including at least minimum pay, possibly maximum pay (in sports that have salary caps, it's to promote competitive balance, which acting doesn't have to worry about). But you can still negotiate quite a bit within the allowed bounds.

Most unions in the US are in fact only made up of skilled workers. Your point is just wrong.

I think you'll have a hard time sourcing that claim.

https://www.investopedia.com/articles/personal-finance/07301...

The top 5 appear to be teachers, steelworkers, public service workers, autoworkers, and electrical workers. How many of these would you describe as "unskilled"?

Eh yeah, you're right. I was really thinking about white collar vs blue collar unions.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com