The lack of unions is due to culture rather than labour laws.
I've spent a lot of time trying to convince IT people to start a voluntary union for their own benefit. In a word, they are too competitive and naieve to make it happen.
IT employees in general could double their average salaries without resorting to labour laws just by starting voluntary unions and doing a modicum of collective bargaining.
Instead they allow themselves to be divided and conquered and they even hide their salaries from co-workers which benefits no one aside from management.
Ideologically, I am against government-enforced unions.
However I am very much in favour of voluntary unions and there is lots of evidence that they can work especially when they behave in reasonable ways that don't threaten the existence of companies. Some corporations will prefer to hire from unions for a variety of reasons including less variability in work quality and higher morale.
Anyway collective bargaining does not have to be enforced in law to be effective.
The real issue is that the most talented and resourceful people in society tend to be the ones who become owners, and they use their talent and influence to convince IT employees that unions are bad.
The average programmer is stubbornly anti-union for no logical reason - the reason is that he's brainwashed by the strong opinions of industry leaders who don't want to pay him what he's worth.
I'm anti-union for a lot of good reasons. They cost money, the leadership is often corrupt, they will sacrifice a part for what they believe is the good of the whole, and they promote seniority over merit. I don't want to be part of another organization that I don't have the time or desire to take an active part in. Workers in our industry have enough skill to get good compensation and benefits.
I don't think there's been one situation in my career where an union would have helped me.
It doesn't even have to be a union in the way you think of it.
It could just be an organization that exerts power on a wide scale without directly negotiating on behalf of the professional.
Look at the difference between Doctors associations, Lawyer associations, and computer science associations.
The most powerful medical authority is a collective body run by doctors, NOT run by the employers of doctors. This is because doctors as a collective have banded together and decided to take collective power.
Computer scientists on the other hand choose not to do this and so the powerful groups are run by corporate interests.
Who represents the voice of the collective programmer? No one really.
A body of software professionals similar to the AMA would raise salaries and provide many other benefits without having to directly negotiate on behalf of the employees.
One thing it could facilitate for instance would be scientific and wide-scale income information sharing which alone would raise the pay of every single software professional. It would level the playing field in negotiations and allow software professionals to capture more of their own productivity.
You are anti-most-current-unions but does that mean you are against the idea of a union? Unions have not always been such bloated top heavy pigs.
> Workers in our industry have enough skill
> to get good compensation and benefits.
This is true but I've found that there is a lot of hidden costs to being a salaried employee, in the form of a lot of pressure to "get things done" so other people can benefit (make more sales). If you are part of a revunue sharing program then that's different, but revenue sharing doesn't seem to be that common.
Chart 16 is a breakdown of salaries for StackOverflow users, nearly all of which are so low that a good developer should be insulted to be offered it. Where, on that chart, do you suppose the Union would decide to set my fair salary based on my experience in the trade? 60k? 80k? 100k?
2. Unions don't have to fit the rigid model you have in your head of the UAW. They can still allow for inequality of pay negotiated on an individual level, but after an initial negotiation on a collective level. Basically you can design the union to still pay higher performers what they are worth and pay low performers a lot less - but with everyone's salaries being increased relative to management.
> 2. Unions don't have to fit the rigid model you have in your head of the UAW.
Maybe not, but let's see some examples that have been significantly better for over 10 years. (And no, teachers unions aren't better.)
I agree that it isn't obvious that unions must necessarily be a disaster in the US, but that's a theory argument and you know what they say about theory and practice....
The precise form of organization can be grown organically to fit the situation, whether you call it a "union" or just as "association"
The point is that programmers should organize so that they can improve the pay and general standard of life of every programmer and so they can increase the quality and value of every programmers output and the esteem of the profession in general.
Programmers should treat their profession with the same seriousness that Doctors, Lawyers, Psychologists, Actuaries, etc treat their professions. They create professional bodies that stand up for their interests whether it is by lobbying, marketing, bargaining, etc.
> The precise form of organization can be grown organically to fit the situation, whether you call it a "union" or just as "association"
How is it that calling something an association will avoid the problems from being a union in the US?
> The point is that programmers should organize so that they can improve the pay
It's poor form to assume your conclusion.
You keep bringing up doctors and lawyers (and you misstate what their professional organizations actually do and overstate their influence), yet your goals for a "programmers association" are more akin to those of teachers unions.
I understand why you want to avoid the comparison with teachers unions, but the only legitmate way to do so is to stop pushing the same thing.
Saying "this will be different" isn't enough. Same means, same ends.
in brazil we have unions (sadly mandatory because of labor laws). it never had a single say on my salary.
but for professions abused by the industry, they did set up a minimum wage they would agree to accept, raising the overall pay among the entire profession.
and i have no idea what charts 16 does to help you point.
I've spent a lot of time trying to convince IT people to start a voluntary union for their own benefit. In a word, they are too competitive and naieve to make it happen.
IT employees in general could double their average salaries without resorting to labour laws just by starting voluntary unions and doing a modicum of collective bargaining.
Instead they allow themselves to be divided and conquered and they even hide their salaries from co-workers which benefits no one aside from management.
Ideologically, I am against government-enforced unions.
However I am very much in favour of voluntary unions and there is lots of evidence that they can work especially when they behave in reasonable ways that don't threaten the existence of companies. Some corporations will prefer to hire from unions for a variety of reasons including less variability in work quality and higher morale.
Anyway collective bargaining does not have to be enforced in law to be effective.
The real issue is that the most talented and resourceful people in society tend to be the ones who become owners, and they use their talent and influence to convince IT employees that unions are bad.
The average programmer is stubbornly anti-union for no logical reason - the reason is that he's brainwashed by the strong opinions of industry leaders who don't want to pay him what he's worth.