Steve
On Mon, 26 Jul 1999, carvin rothman wrote:
> I work in a cybershop where I make $10/hr for 40 hrs per week and I
> have no health benefits although I am a permanent employee. My
> employers showed me their balance sheets and noted that they themselves
> are deferring their salaries during the company's post-startup phase,
> and that the company has negative cash-flow.
>
> This $10/hr, although sub-market for my skills, is more than I have
> ever made before. Also, there is a very informal work atmosphere - no
> punching clocks, etc.
>
> If this company were to provide market-level or decent pay and
> benefits, it could not afford to exist, some would suggest.
>
> In addition, the Ny Times article touches on the subject, but not very
> explicity: how does a union form that is not based confinement of
> space.
>
>
>
> --- Lisa & Ian Murray <seamus at accessone.com> wrote:
> > Self exploitation of Gen-X continues. The situation
> > is nowhere near as rosy
> > as Greenhouse portrays it.
> >
> > $50,000 a year at 70 hour weeks come to a little
> > over $14 an hour....
> >
> >
> http://www.nytimes.com/library/tech/99/07/biztech/articles/26labo.html
> >
> >
> > July 26, 1999
> >
> >
> > High-Technology Sector Unmoved by Labor's Song
> > By STEVEN GREENHOUSE
> >
> > SEATTLE -- As the labor movement sets its sights on
> > the booming
> > high-technology world, employees like Matt Shea, a
> > 24-year-old software
> > developer, seem ripe for the picking. He often
> > clocks 70-hour weeks, his
> > managers sometimes push him to work past midnight,
> > and he never receives
> > overtime pay.
> >
> > But ask Shea whether he wants a union at his
> > workplace, a thriving Internet
> > start-up called Go2Net, and his response is a
> > puzzled expression that says
> > "Does Not Compute."
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > Dan Lamont for The New York Times
> > Matthew Shea, a software designer for Go2Net in
> > Seattle, says he likes his
> > job, is well compensated and sees no need for a
> > union.
> >
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
> > ----
> >
> >
> > "As far as me personally, and for everyone else
> > here, unions have never come
> > up," said Shea, who said he loved his job,
> > notwithstanding the sweatshop
> > hours. "Everything I want is offered to me here."
> >
> > The American labor movement has belatedly recognized
> > that if it is to
> > reverse the decades-long slide in the percentage of
> > workers belonging to
> > unions, it must make some headway in high
> > technology, the economy's
> > fastest-growing sector. To increase their numbers
> > and their influence in
> > politics and at the bargaining table, unions cannot
> > afford to be shut out of
> > the glamorous, powerful high-tech industry, which
> > accounts for an
> > ever-larger share of the work force.
> >
> > Persuading technology workers to join unions will
> > not be easy, though,
> > because of all that is lavished upon people like
> > Shea. His job gives him
> > valuable stock options, flexible hours, an excellent
> > medical plan, a sense
> > of family and, perhaps most important, the thrill of
> > building something.
> >
> > Labor leaders acknowledge that they face an uphill
> > battle -- only a small
> > fraction of the nation's 2 million computer and
> > software developers,
> > programmers and engineers belongs to labor unions.
> > But organizers are far
> > from packing their bags in Seattle or Silicon
> > Valley. In fact, they are
> > convinced that many high-technology employees will
> > ultimately warm to
> > labor's message that workers need a collective voice
> > to stand up to
> > management.
> >
> > In a public relations coup this spring, union
> > organizers trumpeted one of
> > their first successes in high technology when 16
> > temporary workers at
> > Microsoft became the first group of software workers
> > in a single workplace
> > to call for union representation. Their action
> > reflects a little-understood
> > aspect of high-tech America: While most
> > high-technology workers are
> > contented haves, there are also many discontented
> > have-nots.
> >
> > Most have-nots come from the sea of long-term temps
> > who work at Microsoft
> > and other high-tech companies, and they often
> > complain of being second-class
> > citizens who receive bare-bones benefits and have no
> > job security or stock
> > options. Microsoft employs 20,500 regular workers
> > domestically and 6,000
> > temps, who often call themselves permatemps because
> > they work anywhere from
> > six months to three years at the company, testing
> > software, writing manuals,
> > designing Web pages and developing CD-ROMs.
> >
> > Industry experts estimate that at many companies --
> > including Compaq
> > Computer, Hewlett-Packard and Intel -- more than 10
> > percent of the workers
> > are temps.
> >
> > "The conditions are not the same as where unions
> > have had a lot of success,"
> > said Jonathan Rosenblum, organizing director for the
> > King County Labor
> > Council in Seattle, "but that doesn't mean there
> > aren't a lot of substantive
> > issues that concern high-tech workers and make them
> > feel they want to have a
> > voice in their job."
> >
> > Just as high technology has had vast ripple effects
> > on the way Americans
> > live, it is forcing changes in the American labor
> > movement. Labor's
> > traditional focus has been getting a majority of
> > employees at a work site --
> > usually full-time workers tied for years to a single
> > employer -- to vote for
> > a union then negotiating a contract for them.
> >
> > But unions are finding that this model may be as
> > obsolete in high-tech
> > America as a 286 Intel chip, because workers jump
> > among companies like
> > honeybees from flower to flower.
> >
> > Some labor organizers acknowledge that they may
> > never get a majority of
> > workers at start-ups or at giants like Intel to vote
> > in a union. So they are
> > trying to devise new ways to represent
> > high-technology workers.
> >
> > An innovative example came in February when, seeking
> > to improve benefits for
> > high-tech temps, the AFL-CIO office in Silicon
> > Valley set up an employment
> > agency offering far better benefits than other
> > agencies.
> >
> > "The way we go to work has changed," said Amy Dean,
> > director of the
> > AFL-CIO's Silicon Valley office. "So we, the labor
> > movement, have to create
> > a response that recognizes that the world has
> > changed, while still embracing
> > the values, like equity and giving workers a voice,
> > that labor has always
> > stood for."
> >
> >
> > The Haves: Big Salaries and Benefits
> >
> > or Shea, the 24-year-old software engineer, unions
> > are not so much
> > undesirable as irrelevant.
> >
> > At Go2Net, he has no out-of-pocket costs for his
> > health or dental plan. He
> > is happy with his flexible hours and two weeks of
> > vacation a year. And he
> > loves working at a start-up where he has a strong
> > sense of making a
> > contribution.
> >
> > "My goal has always been to develop software that
> > lots of people use," he
> > said. "Here you can see 10,000 people using your
> > software every day."
> >
> > Nor do his 70-hour weeks make him resent management.
> >
> > "As far as what gets me up in the morning or what
> > makes me stay up so late,
> > that's a pride issue," said Shea, who received a
> > bachelor's degree in
> > computer science from the University of California
> > at San Diego. "Last
> > night, I was up till 4 a.m. testing a new home
> > page."
> >
> >
> === message truncated ===
>
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