> My empoyer doesn't have a lot of power over me. I'm a programmer not a coal miner.

Respectfully - were you a programmer during the last recession? I only ask because this power dynamic you imply is inherent in being a programmer can change (and has changed) in a matter of weeks and you'll find the entire industry is not hiring, not seeking consultants, and not looking to buy your *aaS product.

There were a lot of desperate programmers during the great recession (and before that, the dotcom bust)

edit: removed age from what should have been a more general question.

You can feel however you want about power, about not joining a union, about not paying dues, but the employer always has more power than the employee; they pay you a small fraction of the value you produce for them, you collect a paycheck at their leisure, and they can replace you more easily than you can find another job.

The employer has a workforce and resources at their disposal, you bring to the table only your time. You can eschew unions all you want, but it's simply untrue to state that "a union is no more pure than management."

I'm sorry you feel condescended to to be told this, presumably yet again. Perhaps we can find a way to preserve your feelings, because condescension isn't my intent; I'm just trying to address a century's worth of anti-union propaganda.

By the way, labor organizing is significantly harder than volunteering at a soup kitchen. In the past, employers have hired private armies (the Pinkertons, etc) to attack and kill labor organizers; these days, despite it being illegal, employers often fire workers for legally-protected labor organizing activity. No one's being fired from a soup kitchen.

> You can feel however you want about power, about not joining a union, about not paying dues, but the employer always has more power than the employee; they pay you a small fraction of the value you produce for them, you collect a paycheck at their leisure, and they can replace you more easily than you can find another job.

"Balance of power between labor and management" doesn't mean 50:50. It means the employee has some leverage.

The employer should have more power than the employee. Just like the president should have more power than the citizen, the general should have more power than the private, and the parent should have more power than the child. Power differentials are necessary.

> The employer has a workforce and resources at their disposal, you bring to the table only your time. You can eschew unions all you want, but it's simply untrue to state that "a union is no more pure than management."

Unions are pure when they are correcting an imbalance of power. They're corrupt when they're are accumulating power for its own sake.

> I'm sorry you feel condescended to to be told this, presumably yet again. Perhaps we can find a way to preserve your feelings, because condescension isn't my intent; I'm just trying to address a century's worth of anti-union propaganda.

After reading this paragraph, I have a really hard time believing that condescension isn't your intent. I don't think "unions are bad," I think they are a valid tool to correct power imbalances but they're just a tool, sometimes there is no power imbalance, and a union for programmers is a terrible idea.

> By the way, labor organizing is significantly harder than volunteering at a soup kitchen. In the past, employers have hired private armies (the Pinkertons, etc) to attack and kill labor organizers; these days, despite it being illegal, employers often fire workers for legally-protected labor organizing activity. No one's being fired from a soup kitchen.

Yeah, we've all heard the stories about Google putting out hits on dissident employees.

Unfortunately, the only reasoning I can see that "a union for programmers is a terrible idea" is that you "don't want to read newsletters or listen to speeches or be involved at all in the grubby etc".

A unionized workplace doesn't mean you 1) need to join the union (closed shops are illegal in the US) or 2) be involved in the "grubby underhanded maneuvering for power" -- in a pragmatic sense because you can't be compelled to join a union, but more importantly because that is not what union activity is.

What I would find far more convincing is an explanation of how a workplace like Google would be worse if it were a union shop. Lower pay? Nope, union shops consistently draw larger salaries for their workers. Less workplace safety? Nope, union shops consistently have fewer injuries than non-union shops. Fixed salary schedule? Nope, a technical union could easily be structured like SAG -- e.g. Tom Cruise doesn't have a salary cap. Can't fire a bad apple? That seems like a bad idea until someone decides you're the bad apple.

I bet that Damore guy would've appreciated having a union rep sitting at the table with him in those HR meetings where they were going over his blog posts or whatever.

> Unfortunately, the only reasoning I can see that "a union for programmers is a terrible idea" is that you "don't want to read newsletters or listen to speeches or be involved at all in the grubby etc".

Really? My argument is very straightforward:

> The solution is a balance of power between labor and management. In my case, I feel I have plenty of power. In the case of Google employees, I feel they have plenty of power. Broadly speaking, programmers (in the US) have plenty of power.

> I don't think "unions are bad," I think they are a valid tool to correct power imbalances but they're just a tool, sometimes there is no power imbalance, and a union for programmers is a terrible idea.

I'm not a cog in a machine. I have a significant amount of control over what I'm working on and who I'm working for and how that work gets done.

> What I would find far more convincing is an explanation of how a workplace like Google would be worse if it were a union shop. Lower pay? Nope, union shops consistently draw larger salaries for their workers. Less workplace safety? Nope, union shops consistently have fewer injuries than non-union shops. Fixed salary schedule? Nope, a technical union could easily be structured like SAG -- e.g. Tom Cruise doesn't have a salary cap. Can't fire a bad apple? That seems like a bad idea until someone decides you're the bad apple.

This is exactly my point. Unionization for programmers is about MORE money, LESS work, and LESS accountability. It's an employee cartel. The idea that agitating for a union is a moral endeavor is laughable. It's a moral endeavor when you're a serf or a coal miner.

"Unionization for programmers is about MORE money, LESS work, and LESS accountability."

Correct, and it is certainly your right to wish for less money and more work, even if that is an unorthodox position to take. Perhaps unfair to advocate on behalf of your coworkers for, in your own words, less money and more work, however.

> Perhaps unfair to advocate on behalf of your coworkers...

I'm under the impression that once a union takes hold of a company, you're required to join the union to work there. That was certainly the case when my spouse was a teacher.

So, then, isn't fighting for a union shop also unfairly advocating on behalf of your coworkers?

That has not been true since 1947, when Taft-Hartley banned closed shops.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Closed_shop#United_States

As for advocating for organizing at your workplace being unfair to your coworkers: they are not required to join, but as union shops consistently pay better, are safer, and provide better protections against arbitrary firing, I would still be comfortable advocating for those conditions for my coworkers.

What if your punch in, put on the blinders, work 8 hours, punch out, go home; emotionally-deatched approach has you building tools to enable censorship in China? Or what if you end up working on [insert your personal morally objectionable issue of choice]?

Your employer doesn't have power over you, but you have power over them. Organization is about choosing not to exercise that power by leaving for greener pastures and letting the company rinse and repeat with the next cycle of college graduates, but by staying and choosing to influence the direction of the company in a positive way. You can choose to do your 8 hours every day and devote a full one-third of your life - the only life you get - to someone else's work that you don't have a stake in. But that just seems like the stupid, easy way out.

> What if your punch in, put on the blinders, work 8 hours, punch out, go home; emotionally-deatched approach has you building tools to enable censorship in China?

If I thought that the company was doing something deeply unethical then I'd quit. I'm comfortable saying "I don't want to work for a company that is complicit in X bad thing". But we have to understand that "complicit" and "bad" are not easy to define. Each individual should decide what those words mean and collectivizing these decisions is a massive mistake.

> Your employer doesn't have power over you, but you have power over them. Organization is about choosing not to exercise that power by leaving for greener pastures and letting the company rinse and repeat with the next cycle of college graduates, but by staying and choosing to influence the direction of the company in a positive way.

I don't want to "influence the direction of the company" in the way that you mean. I want to influence its culture by speaking and writing precisely and being nice. But I don't want to make the kinds of decisions you're talking about. I don't know what a "positive direction" is (I don't think you do either). We are constantly acting into an uncertain future and the idea that "the laborers are the good guys who know what's positive" is infantile. I already said what I think about that: if labor gets too much power to "influence the direction of the company," labor will abuse that power (less work, more pay). If management has all the power, management will abuse its power (more work, less pay). The answer is a balance of power and I don't think we, in software, are doing too bad.

> You can choose to do your 8 hours every day and devote a full one-third of your life - the only life you get - to someone else's work that you don't have a stake in. But that just seems like the stupid, easy way out.

If I want to take the plunge and choose what I do with 8 hours a day, I'm sure as hell not going to choose "working for someone else". By "working for someone else" I am making a very clear decision to avoid risk. I'm fine with this decision. You're trying to have it both ways. You want the control without the risk and, sorry, but you don't get to do that.

>If I thought that the company was doing something deeply unethical then I'd quit.

And the deeply unethical behavior would continue to happen.

>Each individual should decide what those words mean and collectivizing these decisions is a massive mistake.

You have to make a compromise here. As an individual you don't have much power to stop those unethical behaviors, and as a group you do.

>You want the control without the risk and, sorry, but you don't get to do that.

No, you can have this. By collectivizing.

Don't volunteer at a soup kitchen as a software engineer if you want to do good. Volunteer at a soup kitchen if you want to get some warm fuzzies. It's near a complete waste of your time from a doing good standpoint. You have a highly in demand, specialised skillset. Use it to earn money and donate to a soup kitchen (or a more efficient charity) instead.

Hardness of an activity or it involving things you don't want to see have no bearing to its goodness.

That's a utilitarian definition of "goodness," which can be useful (though not always). But it's not how people actually experience "goodness".

It's like suggesting that everyone should give gifts of 100 dollars to each other for Christmas. No one wants that. People aren't rational agents with utility functions or, if they are, the utility functions are unknown, vary from person to person, and are not solely based on material well-being (my guess is that they're mostly based on the esteem we estimate that we have in the eyes of our peers).

Pick a problem in your community, directly contribute to its solution, and you will be happier plus the people around you will respect you more. If you give money, that won't be the case. You can insist on a strict utilitarian perspective but you're fighting reality and you can't rewire your brain.

If "If you want to do good, volunteer at a soup kitchen. Of course that would be hard and would involve looking at things you'd rather not see." was not meant as a criticism for not acting in a utilitarian way then my apologies, I misunderstood your comment.