Change.org workers form a union
text.npr.org
text.npr.org
I honestly had no idea that change.org did anything beyond online petitions or that they had 217 employees. Their website doesn’t say much about how they make money, other than a link to become a member. Are they really pulling in significant amounts of money from contributions, or do they have some other business that isn’t immediately obvious? What am I missing?
https://www.theverge.com/2020/6/10/21286385/change-org-georg...
In a Medium post on Tuesday, more than 90 former Change.org employees called on the company to donate any related funds to Floyd’s family and organizers rather than using the funds to promote the campaign itself.
See https://help.change.org/s/article/Promoted-Petitions-FAQs?la...
BUT they don't do that anymore.
So maybe their revenue is now just advertising or % of donation processing?
Sorry, but is living in the center of a high-end megacity tourist magnet a human right now?
I want to live in the center of Monaco then, please.
I‘ll take that blue yacht over there, thanks.
USA has no unions and the highest pay for software engineers.
American actors and athletes have unions. American actors and athletes are among the highest paid in the world.
USA software engineers are lacking in all of these. Many countries in Europe have those labor benefits as national law and unions are more about enforcing these rights, and protecting the workers from violation of them.
My last two companies gave me 6 months each for parental leave. I also took a lot of sick time. Agree with vacation time though, could be better.
> job safety and security,
Job market in USA for engineers has been really good. Most software engineers i know have 'job safety' in a sense that they can find a job in a couple of weeks or couple of months at most. But randomly getting fired isn't super common from what i've seen.
"at-will" employment is exceedingly rare in developed countries outside of the US.
Not having "at-will" does not automatically guarantees "a lot of rights".
I also don't understand this "Radha Nath, 30, a product designer at the company, said she is paid $16,000 less than she was at her last employer. The union will fight to bring wages across the company to the industry standard, she said." So she wasn't forced to work there...she voluntarily accepted less pay when she started. It's not like they duped her on what her pay would be right?
Isn't that true of every person working somewhere who then votes to unionize?
Which, in my opinion is an interesting take. Many people take pay cuts to work at start ups and it would be irresponsible to think that a 10 or even 200 person company could pay like FAANG. Salaries aren’t static across the industry.
Saying someone accepted a job at a miserly rate doesn't make the rate acceptable. We don't think paying immigrants a fraction of the minimum wage is acceptable, we don't (any more) think that expecting years of unpaid internships is acceptable, and we don't think that the jobs the factory workers first started to unionize against, with terrible wages and unsafe conditions were acceptable, despite all those people "voluntarily" accepting the jobs.
Having a job isn't just "voluntary" for most people. The pressure to have one in order to survive, plus the difficulties, costs and risks associated with switching, gives the employer power over the employees.
In our world of capitalism, the only justification a product needs is that it sells. And sometimes things that don't work or don't work well are superior products, because then customers keep coming back for more to get their desired results.
The multimillion dollar aspect seems to be due to a number of factors, but a large part seems to be the absolutely-scammy "chip-in" request, where they ask petition-signers for money, clearly designed to make them feel like they are donating to the cause, but instead it's simply a promise to display the petition more prominently within the change.org website.
I think it's basically a scam.
https://medium.com/age-of-awareness/the-actual-reason-you-ge...
This isn't my experience. Yes, if you're using a Change.org petition to lobby POTUS, that's dumb. But for local politicos? University administrators? In other words, people sensitive to being publicly embarrassed? I've seen it work.
Anyways, I'd agree that gainful is ideal, but I think most humans prefer to be employed and occupied over having nothing to do.
I'm sure plenty of people here can attest to the cascade of overhiring that happens to startups all the time.
I wouldn't necessarily pull out "armchair experts" type comments for someone expressing curiosity / wondering what they're all up to.
For example, when Instagram was purchased by Facebook they only had 13 employees and now they have something like 500.
- manages get promoted
- CEOs justify increasing their salaries and bonuses
- allows taking away valuable employees from [potential] competitors
- when the headcount is big enough, companies acquire serious political weight
- often a branch or even an entire company can be used as training/proving ground to select the best employees to work on more valuable projects
The sweet spot for a startup is if you can look at that big mess of features and find something actually do-able by a small team that can still meet the needs of some portion of your target market.
When you've achieved that, you can then start filling in the rest of the features that will fill the needs of the rest of your market. This is where the headcount can grow significantly, because even small line items in the feature set could involve a big project, yet still be justified because you have enough potential or actual revenue to justify the team growth. Once you're in this phase, the communication overhead of adding people and teams also forces the creation of meta-teams to support the rest of the teams...and there you have it, you now have a lot of people.
In most markets, the average customer is a minority of customers. There is a lot of variety in each niche's demand. Maturity is having market coverage of those niches. Whether that coverage needs to be done by a single company is another question.
They are not all engineers. I’ll bet most are account managers looking after big advertising spenders.
Seems like it's a Ruby/React stack on AWS. Looks like they're trying to grow internationally (hiring "campaigners" in Japan).
I always thought Change.org was mostly known for being a nexus of naiveté and impotence so it's surprising to see enough people willing to pay into it to sustain that kind of headcount.
Like $15m ARR and a $300m valuation isn’t “a website.”
> I live in New York City," she said. "That doesn't go a long way.
So you live in one of the most expensive cities in the world, and then complain when you aren't making enough to live in said city. Either quit the low paying position and find a better paying job or move to somewhere cheaper.
Do we need to subsidize New Yorker's luxury lifestyles? Will New Yorkers subsidize everyone else's plane tickets to get to NYC, and expenses during the visit?
It looks like some positions are required in person - does anyone work there on HN? There is only one NY specific list on their jobs page right now that says remote/NY, but a lot others list specific cities, like San Fran which is expensive too - they say "San Francisco (remote for now)"
I think this combo of Stimi, lack of/expensive childcare, and new automatic child support payments, has forced the debate on where the baseline of a living wage is.
We're pushing past $15 minimum for even Burger King in some places right now. But employers are logically still loathe to pay more, they would rather pay signup bonus' than higher wages.
If wages outpace inflation I'm all for it.
Harsh.
We're extremely well compensated and are dictating changes like forever WFH. We have generous vacation, perks, 401k contribution, ...
I want to get promoted because I work hard, not because of seniority. I want to be able to switch jobs or positions and not have to start at the bottom of the ladder.
Why would we want this?
Edit:
Unions will put pressure on the United States' ability to compete with Europe and other nations. Labor will be less flexible, and it's likely that top talent will be paid much less. Costs, however, will increase and the entire US tech industry will suffer.
We'll switch from nimble meritocracy to a regulated and calcified follower. The rest of the world will catch up. I don't get how that's good for the US.
Also, seeing all of the Europeans in here commenting about an American issue is odd.
> Poché, [...] lives in Manhattan [...] earning just under $50,000 a year.
That doesn't seem like "extremely well compensated"
EDIT: I googled "median salary" in Manhattan (no age qualifier) and you guessed it...it's $50,000
Because in this case it isn't in Europe?
I like the European tradition a lot more than the frequent outcomes with US unions. I've seen US unions where what the original poster describes is totally accurate.
No, but don't try to bullshit us that any new union (and it's negotiated contract) isn't going to end up looking a lot like the unions around it. Doubly so when the employees in question are part of a national union.
>Look at union jobs in Europe for a better example of how things can work out.
Cool. And just as soon as you do the work to make the collective bargaining status quo in the US the same as it is in Europe, we can continue this conversation. Until then, I don't care about this tangent.
>Ask yourself this: Why would you voluntarily forgo leverage to be gained on your employer?
Because *I* am not gaining leverage. A bureaucracy that represents me as part of an amalgamation gains leverage. Before I toss my hat in, I need to hear a whole lot more about what that bureaucracy is planning to be, and how it's going to design itself. I don't need to be pitched the possibility this instance could be better than the stereotype. Why not show me the plan on how we're going to make sure this one is a good one?
Let's set goals. Up front and on screen. Then we can decide on the implementation details (such as unionization) needed to get there. When the cart is put before the horse, I don't see how you can tell me with a straight face that the union could ever possibly be anything but exactly the generic stereotypical union that the grandparent poster is afraid of.
Any new organization in human society is going to be the same as previous ones? Does this apply to unions only? Or no progress ever happens in any organization?
Perhaps this isn't the union that will do it, but surely the tech industry can find a way to innovate on unions and labor power. Why everything else and not that?
SWEs have more bargaining power than ever right now (at least in the US, which is the market I'm most familiar with) .
Care to describe what disruption happened and how? Software developers contracts seem pretty similar to any other office worker.
The only big change in employment in the last 15 years happened outside of software development: the gig/sharing economy.
And it's a huge step backwards.
It's nice to have your role in high demand, but all good things must come to an end.
1) Plenty of people in finance, lawyers, and so on have high salary and excellent conditions. Many had highly paid jobs in the same fields 50 years ago. This is nothing close with "disrupting the traditional employer<->employee power dynamic".
2) An this point it's really difficult to assume that you are arguing in good faith.
My main source of leverage comes from my employer's projection of what I'll do for them over the coming year/years. The better picture I paint for them on that point, the more leverage I have.
It's not at all obvious to me that my leverage would be increased by collective bargaining by more than the cost of that outsourcing.
You presume this sort of compensation is enjoyed throughout our industry. It isn't.
They can in some cases do, particularly in the US.
It's still a possibility.
edit: Fair points. I still believe that modern labor is a highly dynamical system. Many workers do need additional support and benefits, but our corner of the world is one of the best compensated and least regulated. Solutions for getting low-paid workers better equity shouldn't be used as a hammer -- workers earning six to seven figures do not need unions. Unions in tech will put downward pressure on our mobility, competitiveness, and compensation.
But you enjoy many of the benefits past union members fought and died for.
We owe a debt to those who worked to get us simple humane things like taking children out of coalmines and getting benefits for working beyond 40 hours per week. Those days are gone. Now they fight to keep people who get drunk on the job or try to tell our factories that some people should stand around and do nothing because asking them to help move some parts from one room to another isn’t in their narrowly defined job description.
Read Shopify's CEO speech about being a team and not a "family". Also read Coinbase CEO. These "tech unions" are PACS, not your traditional worker unions.
I care little about promotions or status, nor does my job mean much to me other than income (it’s what I do with a small part of my life, not who I am), so I’m optimizing for different metrics than others. I have done well enough for a lifetime, and I’d rather spend my energy pulling the rest of folks up (both in comp and quality of life). Don’t wealthy people spend their time on philanthropy when they’re done hustling? I say, “why wait?” and do what you can where you are with what you have.
Compensation has diminishing utility, while I have found compassionate efforts do not. YMMV.
(Onward to legally mandated PTO, fewer day work weeks, wfh, and stronger labor rights for everyone; society grows great when old people plant trees whose shade they know they shall never sit in)
Edit reply to your edit: Top talent is a small minority. You’re basically asking the majority “Why do you want better for all of yourselves at the detriment to the very few amongst us capturing a majority of the gains?”
Unions do not preclude promotions from merit. Unions do not preclude hiring people at the middle of the pay scale. Don't construct a straw man of the worst things you can think of, and package them up as the average union, because it isn't.
Do SWEs in the US actually have any of these problems? Maybe I'm spoiled by my FAANG job but I find it hard to imagine these kinds of work conditions even at a non-FAANG tech company.
As software is increasingly commoditized over the next 5 decades we'll see a huge degradation in employee compensation even as profits for these companies continue to grow.
Does that mean a union should be built solely to put pressure to end open offices? No, but it does indicate that there are near-universal issues in the industry that such a union or professional association can address. Because without any organizing, management will just continue the status quo. There’s not even the added competition of some firms deciding to offer personal offices or at least cubicles as an alternative to woo candidates.
It’s an example of something in industry that everyone complains about but no one can successfully challenge.
It's very well known that people leave FAANGs in general due to stress.
Google seems to be better in some ways, but I met plenty of ex-Googlers complaining about the stress and the competitive environment.
Depends on the union and how long it's been in operation and their goals. Some unions demand and get ridiculous perks. You may have heard of the "rubber room" - a.k.a. paying employees not to work. That happened.
As long as the employer consents, and the union reps consent, and the majority of the union approves a bargain, then I don't think there's anything inherently wrong with getting paid to not work.
[EDIT] in short, in some situations you get to replace the typical "well, just leave!" response to management trying to fuck you over, with "... don't leave, because they won't be able to fuck you over, and if they try they'll be the ones having a bad day". Which is nice.
In theory maybe but in practice this has always seemed to be the case for me (admittedly a brit). Here there are literally queues to be eligible. There is a list of names and it's sorted by company start date.
Doctors, psychiatrists, and lawyers have professional associations. Professional athletes and Hollywood actors (as well as other film industry workers) are also unionized.
- Setting quality standards. Ensuring people are properly trained and so on. E.g. Preventing Boeing from offshoring development of the MCAS to engineers paid $9 an hour.
- Setting ethical standards. E.g. Preventing car pollution "defeat device". Providing legal support for whistleblowers.
- Fighting ageism. It's provably widespread in SV.
- Fighting the no-poaching agreements. Many FAANGs were found to be colluding.
- Sighing exploitative immigration rules like the H1B "leash" that creates a class of underpaid workers.
> We'll switch from nimble meritocracy to a regulated and calcified follower
This is an absurd claim. Any human organization can be calcified or stay nimble. Unions are not different.
Are VW engineers not part of a union/workers' council? If they are, um...
Because that behavior is widespread across the whole industry, across many countries and across 4/5 decades:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defeat_device
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diesel_emissions_scandal
Unions, just like any other non-governative organization, are just as powerful as people support them.
> So my theory of the sequence of events in a nutshell is this:
1. Engineers write code to get around a difficult design problem in order to keep the project moving forward.
2. The design team runs out of time to fix the problem and faces a classic dilemma: delay the program, at a cost of millions, or bury the code to buy time to work on a solution.
3. Once the timeline passes the point at which metal is cut, the die is literally cast and the engines are destined for production, no matter what. At this point, the only career saving option for the engineers involved is to say nothing, and just hope they can get away with it.
https://www.nytimes.com/2015/12/14/business/the-engineering-...
> The two men who have led Volkswagen and shaped its culture much of the past 20 years are Ferdinand Piëch, the chief executive from 1993 until 2002, and Martin Winterkorn, the chief executive from 2007 until his resignation after the scandal became public.
Mr. Piëch, a grandson of Mr. Porsche, is an engineer who made his name shaping Audi to take on BMW and Mercedes-Benz. His tenure came to be defined by his toughness and willingness to demote or dismiss people who were not performing well.
> Some critics argue that after 20 years under Mr. Piëch and Mr. Winterkorn, Volkswagen had become a place where subordinates were fearful of contradicting their superiors and were afraid to admit failure. “There is a self-righteousness which led down this terrible path,” said David Bach, a senior lecturer at the Yale School of Management who has followed the Volkswagen case.
Bernd Osterloh, chairman of the Volkswagen workers council, wrote a letter to the staff suggesting flaws in company culture. “We need in the future a climate in which problems aren’t hidden but can be openly communicated to superiors,” he wrote.