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Tech Workers of the World Unite?
okidokedork writes "Wired News reports on the lack of unions in the IT workplace. If you could join a union in your workplace, would you?" From the article: "The rich get richer, the shareholder is valued more than the employee, jobs are eliminated in the name of bottom-line efficiency (remember when they called firing people 'right-sizing'?) and the gulf between the rich and the working class grows wider every year. You see this libertarian ethos everywhere, but nowhere more clearly than in the technology sector, where the number of union jobs can be counted on one hand. Tech is the Wild West as far as the job market goes and the robber barons on top of the pile aim to keep it that way. They'll offshore your job to save a few bucks or lay you off at the first sign of a slump, but they're the first to scream, 'You're stifling innovation!' at any attempt to control the industry or provide job security for the people who do the actual work."
That would be one of the worst things to happen to the tech industry.
One problem with Unions is that they often lock you into a fairly small geographic location for most industries - at least if you want to be able to work. My father worked as a union tradesman for 30 years, and had to pass up a lot of work in favor of unemployment because of the bloody stupid union.
Other times he had to go into non-union jobs as a "salter" at the risk of getting his ass seriously kicked - which I think happened once or twice, he wouldn't have told us kids. There wasn't always much choice, either.
What I remember of it as a kid is sneakers that had to be worn until they literally would not stay on my feet because I'd grown so far out of them my feet tore the sole right off. I remember knowing that the bank might come tomorrow to take the house away (we built it ourselves in the sticks near Brooksville Fla; I helped hammer nails, pull wiring, dig the foundation for the concrete slab and trenches for wiring and water pipes, and even roofing and siding - when I was 12 - and yes, we did eventually have to give it up). I remember my father being gone for months at a time so we could eat, traveling from Maine to Nevada, Florida to Washington State. All because we decided to move away from the locale where he held his union ticket. And, no, moving your ticket is NOT as easy as moving your drivers license. Verbal threats of bodily harm tend to put a damper on your willingness to follow legitimate channels to force acceptance too.
Unions tend to be highly political and unless you kiss the right asses, you can kiss your right to work goodbye. They are overblown bureacracies that are NOT run by people who actually work in the industry they are holding under their thumb. They are run by politicians that want to get more power and money (from the guy working for a paycheck) to put into some fund they can trash on the next Enron so everyones plans to retire with a halfway decent pension can watch it go up in smoke.
For the record, my father has stated on more than one occasion that if he had it to do over, he'd have avoided the union like the plague that it is.
The absence of unions in the tech industry is one of the most attractive things about it, in my not so humble opinion. Who needs union thugs defacing your website just because it doesn't have a "designed by Union drones" tag? Aren't there enough malicious hackers out there?
Before anyone starts talking about the "good" unions have done for trade workers, well, sure. They've done some good, but they're no better than the Spanish Inquisitors that did so much "good" in South America. What's so good about something that was accomplished on the blood of simple people just trying to get by? It may not be a violent as the history of the Catholic Church, but the history of unions is violent.
No Frickin thanks. I want my children to do without that kind of life growing up. I may have to pinch pennies, but not when it comes to fucking sneakers for my kids. And I'll damn sure keep it that way if I have any choice.
The only place I'd like to see unions put in place are in politics. That way we could shove some of their own damn medicine down their throats. Then again, it'd become damn impossible to get rid of the useless assholes wasting public resources for personal enjoyment.
Ok, enough of the vitriol. I dare say you get my drift though.