As a student studying to be a games developer this would be amazing, I wish I could say I could see this happening. Even where I live, the UK, for every potential unionised developer there will be...
As a student studying to be a games developer this would be amazing, I wish I could say I could see this happening. Even where I live, the UK, for every potential unionised developer there will be 100 more that will work for £25k a year doing 60-80 hour weeks. Their best bet is somehow convincing the majority of senior developer in games studious to unionise, and I don't think even that's possible.
The UK has a concept of a 48 hour working limit, but it's pretty useless since your employment contract will stipulate that you waive the 48 hour limit. You can refuse of course but then you won't find work in the games industry. You could also retract the waiver but this takes 3 months (technically it can be as short as 1 week, but the length of notice required is written in to your waiver so of course they'll go for the longest option). Legally companies aren't allowed to fire you for withdrawing a waiver, but there will be "alternative" reasons eventually.
Perhaps some sort of labour law that enforces these limits is a starting point. There is no reason that overworking people is so common and expected that it makes it way into employment contracts....
your employment contract will stipulate that you waive the 48 hour limit
Perhaps some sort of labour law that enforces these limits is a starting point. There is no reason that overworking people is so common and expected that it makes it way into employment contracts.
They can get away with it too, as there will always be people looking for work - especially in the gaming industry, so if you don't accept these shitty conditions, someone else will.
Basically the iron law of institutions: People will often make decisions to maximize their own power and position within the institution at the expense of the long term health and stability of the...
Basically the iron law of institutions: People will often make decisions to maximize their own power and position within the institution at the expense of the long term health and stability of the institution itself.
Repeat this enough and eventually you get organizations that are corrupt, indifferent to the needs of their rank-and-file, and work at cross purposes to their purported goal. (Unless there is some countervailing force for creative destruction that continuously renews the organization's leadership to adapt with changing times).
When unions were at their peak in the US their leadership was often in bed with the mob and mostly just collaborated with political insiders instead of focusing on worker protections. By the time Reagan came around they had already eroded most of their goodwill and solidarity, so not enough people were willing to stand by them when he started shredding the unions and removing the regulatory apparatus that protected them from competitive deregulation across states that led to a race to the bottom in wages and working conditions.
Part of this is just how labor organizing has worked in the US. The business culture here is unusually hostile to the very concept of labor having a collective say in how the business operates. So labor has had to be on the outside and resort to being oppositional and assertive. It’s the only effective lever they have, but it also doesn’t develop much capacity to thing strategically about how the long term health of the workforce.
In corporatist models, like Germany’s, where labor gets a seat on the board and is factored in as a stakeholder in business operations the unions tend to be more forward looking and concerned with the long term well being of the labor force rather than fixated on short term gains.
It’s also worth noting that countries with national healthcare and pensions render moot a lot of the negotiating space unions in the US are subjected to. They basically have to spend all their time arguing over those two, so there is comparatively little in terms of wages and other benefits they can negotiate for. If these things were just taken care of by the government as a matter of course then labor wouldn’t need to strike and make a fuss over them as often and could just focus on wages and other benefits.
Honestly, almost all of the arguments against unions come from the management and capitalist classes' multi decade information war against them. They're opposed to unions because organized labor...
Honestly, almost all of the arguments against unions come from the management and capitalist classes' multi decade information war against them. They're opposed to unions because organized labor is a threat to both their political and economic power, and collective bargaining is the only way workers can hope to have anything close to leverage.
The reason you don't see them too much anymore (in the US anyway) is because this war has been wildly successful, resulting in a ton of legislation that guts the power of unions, and hampers the ability of workers to form them. For example, laws that mandate non-union workers get the same benefits as union workers in the same position starve the union of dues, and the legal ability for companies to fire employees at any time for no reason certainly puts a chilling effect on talks of unionizing.
Heh, why stop with game developers. I've been wondering how long it'd take for the information technology field to begin forming their own unions.
That's what's trying to get started in New Zealand with the Aotearoa Tech Union.
As a student studying to be a games developer this would be amazing, I wish I could say I could see this happening. Even where I live, the UK, for every potential unionised developer there will be 100 more that will work for £25k a year doing 60-80 hour weeks. Their best bet is somehow convincing the majority of senior developer in games studious to unionise, and I don't think even that's possible.
The UK has a concept of a 48 hour working limit, but it's pretty useless since your employment contract will stipulate that you waive the 48 hour limit. You can refuse of course but then you won't find work in the games industry. You could also retract the waiver but this takes 3 months (technically it can be as short as 1 week, but the length of notice required is written in to your waiver so of course they'll go for the longest option). Legally companies aren't allowed to fire you for withdrawing a waiver, but there will be "alternative" reasons eventually.
Perhaps some sort of labour law that enforces these limits is a starting point. There is no reason that overworking people is so common and expected that it makes it way into employment contracts.
They can get away with it too, as there will always be people looking for work - especially in the gaming industry, so if you don't accept these shitty conditions, someone else will.
Basically the iron law of institutions: People will often make decisions to maximize their own power and position within the institution at the expense of the long term health and stability of the institution itself.
Repeat this enough and eventually you get organizations that are corrupt, indifferent to the needs of their rank-and-file, and work at cross purposes to their purported goal. (Unless there is some countervailing force for creative destruction that continuously renews the organization's leadership to adapt with changing times).
When unions were at their peak in the US their leadership was often in bed with the mob and mostly just collaborated with political insiders instead of focusing on worker protections. By the time Reagan came around they had already eroded most of their goodwill and solidarity, so not enough people were willing to stand by them when he started shredding the unions and removing the regulatory apparatus that protected them from competitive deregulation across states that led to a race to the bottom in wages and working conditions.
Part of this is just how labor organizing has worked in the US. The business culture here is unusually hostile to the very concept of labor having a collective say in how the business operates. So labor has had to be on the outside and resort to being oppositional and assertive. It’s the only effective lever they have, but it also doesn’t develop much capacity to thing strategically about how the long term health of the workforce.
In corporatist models, like Germany’s, where labor gets a seat on the board and is factored in as a stakeholder in business operations the unions tend to be more forward looking and concerned with the long term well being of the labor force rather than fixated on short term gains.
It’s also worth noting that countries with national healthcare and pensions render moot a lot of the negotiating space unions in the US are subjected to. They basically have to spend all their time arguing over those two, so there is comparatively little in terms of wages and other benefits they can negotiate for. If these things were just taken care of by the government as a matter of course then labor wouldn’t need to strike and make a fuss over them as often and could just focus on wages and other benefits.
Honestly, almost all of the arguments against unions come from the management and capitalist classes' multi decade information war against them. They're opposed to unions because organized labor is a threat to both their political and economic power, and collective bargaining is the only way workers can hope to have anything close to leverage.
The reason you don't see them too much anymore (in the US anyway) is because this war has been wildly successful, resulting in a ton of legislation that guts the power of unions, and hampers the ability of workers to form them. For example, laws that mandate non-union workers get the same benefits as union workers in the same position starve the union of dues, and the legal ability for companies to fire employees at any time for no reason certainly puts a chilling effect on talks of unionizing.
This is awesome.
Still waiting for the mainstream media to pick this up and to start hiring editors/journalists for a "Labor" desk.