Does the game industry have a problem with unionized workers?

[jamail77]

So, I was reading an article on a licensed TV show game getting poor reviews. Somebody made an interesting comment that 1 bad aspect of the game, the writing, could have been good if the writers for the show were allowed to write more for the game. He claimed they were most likely union members however and the game industry has a history of being against unions.

Now, I know the game industry often has their employees working under and/or in poor conditions. But, I've never heard anything about them being against unions. The commentator went so far as to argue that writing in games as a whole would be better if the game industry had less of a beef with unions since he believes most good writers are part of a union, like the WGA (Writer's Guild of America). He did point out that he knew this from being a former developer rather than just a gamer seeing this from the outside without the inside knowledge.

What does everyone here think? Is the game industry as a whole usually, with some exceptions of course, against unions?

 

[TheMysteriousGX]

Let me put it this way:

If a quarter of the "Crunch Time" horror stories are true, as soon as one studio unionised the rest of the studios would unionise by the end of the working day.

And the "Industry" leans on the "doing what you love" crutch harder than the "Bad Cop" leans on a perp.

 

[Rayce Archer]

Not just gaming. All white-collar technical work is non-union. And somehow conservatives have managed to convince the yuppies of the world that this is somehow good.

I work in a skilled technical position, and if I could unionize I would in the blink of an eye. I have ZERO benefit permanence, I'm totally subject to at-will employment, and my recourse if I feel I've been fired unjustly is nil. The guy who collects the contents of the trash compacter at Wal Mart has more job security than I do.

 

[Albino Boo]

Not just gaming. All white-collar technical work is non-union. And somehow conservatives have managed to convince the yuppies of the world that this is somehow good.

I work in a skilled technical position, and if I could unionize I would in the blink of an eye. I have ZERO benefit permanence, I'm totally subject to at-will employment, and my recourse if I feel I've been fired unjustly is nil. The guy who collects the contents of the trash compacter at Wal Mart has more job security than I do.

Or perhaps they are aware that that jobs will done by someone in Bangalore by the end of the week if they start making themselves more expensive to employ. That whole union power worked out so well for Detroit

 

[Tanis]

Unions helped make this nation GREAT.

Child labor?
Gone.
24 hour work days?
Gone.

Etc/etc/etc

The MYTH, really the LIE, that unions are bad is something the morons who think 'trickle down' actually works support.

Unions themselves can become corrupted, but the idea of protecting yourself from some asshat who pines for the day of slave labor...
Yeah, I'll take a little corruption in my union ANY day for some protection.


More OT?
The gaming industry, at least the bigger A/AA/AAA players, are HORRIBLE when it comes to decency.

Between forced, unpaid, overtime.
To firing you for no reason other than, 'eh...the game's out, so we don't need you for the next month or 3'.
To the various mental abuse.
To...etc/etc/etc.

The gaming industry is one of the MOST toxic to work in, unless you're someone higher up or have a VERY specific skill folks want at all times.

Hell, even a TEACHER is a better job.

 

[Knight Captain Kerr]

Game developers like any other kind of employee should be treated fairly. Not all companies treat their employees like crap but some do. What happened to the LA Noire team sounds like a horror story. Employees should be treated fairly, setting up a union isn't the only way for this to happen but it is a way.

If companies have problems with unionised workers or workers standing up for themselves in general it's probably because it means it's harder to exploit their employees for profit.

 

[TallanKhan]

Unionisation is a tricky subject to tackle. Certainly historically labour unions have been a positive force, but predominantly against the context of cultures with no legal protection for workers. The evidence for or against today is much less black and white.

It is certainly a positive is as much as they act as something of a safeguard against the removal of legal protection from workers and can act as a support for workers against unscrupulous employers.

That said, labour unions often oppose the pursuit of efficiencies in working practices as this usually leads to a reduction (at least in the short term) of jobs. Also, the presence of unions can act as a barrier to organisations undertaking any kind of change because their representatives often polarise any consultation with staff.

Overall I don't oppose unionisation but in many cases I don't think they are the forces for positive change that they used to be.

 

[Dagda Mor]

Yeah. Unions have their share of problems, but I think that this industry desperately needs some.

 

[Rayce Archer]

Not just gaming. All white-collar technical work is non-union. And somehow conservatives have managed to convince the yuppies of the world that this is somehow good.

I work in a skilled technical position, and if I could unionize I would in the blink of an eye. I have ZERO benefit permanence, I'm totally subject to at-will employment, and my recourse if I feel I've been fired unjustly is nil. The guy who collects the contents of the trash compacter at Wal Mart has more job security than I do.

Or perhaps they are aware that that jobs will done by someone in Bangalore by the end of the week if they start making themselves more expensive to employ. That whole union power worked out so well for Detroit

Unions are the only reason anyone in Detroit still has a job. Detroit is failing as a city because of over-rapid developmental policies that saw a glut in construction and government staff size while the population declined. For SIXTY YEARS. That's on the government, not organized labor.

And my job is more or less being good at writing in English. When you find me an ESL speaker from Asia who can write as competently as a well-educated native speaker and doesn't already work in a more profitable, specialized field, THEN I'll get worried.

PS: nobody's gonna pay you for playing junior neocon. Just because the folks on top have the money doesn't mean it's gonna trickle down. Maybe try opening your mind.

 

[Albino Boo]

Not just gaming. All white-collar technical work is non-union. And somehow conservatives have managed to convince the yuppies of the world that this is somehow good.

I work in a skilled technical position, and if I could unionize I would in the blink of an eye. I have ZERO benefit permanence, I'm totally subject to at-will employment, and my recourse if I feel I've been fired unjustly is nil. The guy who collects the contents of the trash compacter at Wal Mart has more job security than I do.

Or perhaps they are aware that that jobs will done by someone in Bangalore by the end of the week if they start making themselves more expensive to employ. That whole union power worked out so well for Detroit

Unions are the only reason anyone in Detroit still has a job. Detroit is failing as a city because of over-rapid developmental policies that saw a glut in construction and government staff size while the population declined. For SIXTY YEARS. That's on the government, not organized labor.

And my job is more or less being good at writing in English. When you find me an ESL speaker from Asia who can write as competently as a well-educated native speaker and doesn't already work in a more profitable, specialized field, THEN I'll get worried.

PS: nobody's gonna pay you for playing junior neocon. Just because the folks on top have the money doesn't mean it's gonna trickle down. Maybe try opening your mind.

Hmm lets see you call a success going from 200,000 workers in 1950 to 20,000 today. You call success policies that have halved the cities population in the same time. Yet the non unionised toyota and BMW have increased production to the extent the US accounts for 1/3 of BMW's worldwide output.


I would strongly suggest that before making comments about India that you like to check you facts. English is not a foreign language in Indian, its an official language of the state and acts as common language across India. There are more English speakers in the India than live in the entirety of the United States. English has been taught in schools, in India, for the last 150 years. What Language do you think Gandhi spoke during his legal training in London in 1888. What language do you think the 500,000 ethnic Indians civil servants spoke during the period of British rule?You have successfully proved the weakness of the American education system. In fact three years ago the Dalit caste built a temple to the Goddess English
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-south-asia-12355740

 

[Rayce Archer]

Me: City mismanagement over the past 60 years ruined Detroit, in particular a misdirected growth of housing and services in the face of a shrinking population.

You: Are you nuts? Detroit shrank since the 50s! And had bad policies!

And anyway your knowledge of the automobile industry is almost wholly wrong. The big 3 are each responsible for 70-80k employees, which is growth from the early 2000s. Toyota has produced more cars in the US than anywhere else for over a decade, more so now that about half of their Japanese production has been destroyed, but in US sales they're behind GM and Ford, in spite of those companies union labor and recent woes; in fact Toyota is in the process of a massive scaleback in expenses. Guess what Toyota employees are talking about in light of that? And BMW has a nice EU tax dodge by building parts here and assembling them overseas, but we'll see how that bears out.

As for basic English in India... Yeah. It's just not good enough. I mean I learned Spanish in school, could I get a job writing in Spanish? Hell no. I've dealt with conversational English speakers from a number of countries where English is a "state language," and all of them would require further training to write in it professionally. Competence in English by the standards of a country where it is not the primary language, and a functional business mastery are two totally different things.

None of what you have written is a convincing argument against organized labor. I'm still going to have to write you off as a conservative kneejerk panic monger, albeit one with a uniquely anti-American view of business.

 

[jamail77]

Or perhaps they are aware that that jobs will done by someone in Bangalore by the end of the week if they start making themselves more expensive to employ. That whole union power worked out so well for Detroit

You know I could care less about your political leanings. I have friends from all over the political spectrum because deep down I just concern myself with whether they're good people trying to do good things who are fun to hang out with and can be depended on. We have civil discussions on our different political opinions and, even if I think they're wrong or misguided, I remain civil because I know it's how they try to do good even if I don't believe it does do good. I didn't say that to dismiss your argument by the way. I said that because of what I'm about to ask.

Do you actually think it's okay to pay people such poor wages? If an employer abandons their former employees because they unionized and pays even worse wages to workers in Bangalore, is that okay? No, it is not: There are actually international laws regarding abuse of workers like that.

Believe it or not, it is possible to pay employees more if you maximize the efficiency of your production to cut down costs, which doesn't necessarily require doing something with your employees (Often, most people counter by saying you have to change your workforce to cut down costs when that is not the only way to cut costs), but maybe your machinery or environment or standards. It also helps to charge more for things you've been selling below value; this is done, by the way, to entice more customers to come than usually would and buy the lowered value items in the hopes they'll stick around and buy the accurately priced and overpriced items. A lot of businesses apply this strategy in areas that don't really help them get customers anyway, not that this isn't a good strategy in other commercial areas because it is, but it gets applied universally as if it works across the board when it doesn't. In areas it doesn't help much, raising those prices back up, assuming customer inflow stays the same, would allow for more profit that could go to employees.

But it won't affect writing quality, especially since the problem with games is because of marketers fucking with game stories to increase sales.

That's why I said it was an interesting comment. I always thought games' writing problems went beyond just not being able to get good writers. He claims to be a former developer, but maybe he just gained a misguided perception while working in the industry.

 

[Ihateregistering1]

Do you actually think it's okay to pay people such poor wages? If an employer abandons their former employees because they unionized and pays even worse wages to workers in Bangalore, is that okay? No, it is not: There are actually international laws regarding abuse of workers like that.

Actually, not really.

For starters, 'poor wages' is relative. In the US, we would consider someone making $20k a year to be poor, but that same wage would put them in the top income bracket in Sierra Leone, so you can't look at raw numbers for wage comparisons. Likewise, one must look at what the person in Bangalore's alternative job opportunities would be if they didn't have the options we've talked about. Would they be able to walk right into another job that paid just as well? Or would they be forced to take a job that paid significantly less?

And why is it immoral? If Arvind in Bangalore has a family that he needs to feed, why are the needs of his family less important than the needs of Bob in California?

There's also no international laws regarding it because giving people jobs (as long as the work conditions comply with the country's laws) is not illegal, nor is it considered "abuse".

As for Detroit, it failed based on a toxic combination of overzealous unions, corrupt elected officials, white flight (which took most of their tax base), and piss-poor city management.

 

[jamail77]

snip

I didn't say it didn't still happen. You can tell from the many scandals regarding such practices that it does happen. I just said there are international laws regarding abusing workers; I was speaking generally They could be laws that span across countries, similar laws that multiple countries have in common rather than something stated in, say, the UN's Universal Declaration of Human Rights. They certainly should be more enforced in such circumstances, but, yes, you're right: "Poor wages" is relative and if it falls within that specific country's laws there's not much the international community can do about it most of the time.

It is immoral because Arvind isn't getting the money his family needs to survive. Some money is better than no money certainly, but he obviously deserves more than a wage he and his family can barely live on and poor working conditions. He isn't more important than Bob in California either; they both deserve what they've earned in their respective circumstances. The fact that job opportunities are poor for either is more a sign of the state of their country and/or the state of job security for their respective fields. It doesn't excuse it that there's worse job opportunities for them elsewhere. It's just unfortunate.

 

[Albino Boo]

Or perhaps they are aware that that jobs will done by someone in Bangalore by the end of the week if they start making themselves more expensive to employ. That whole union power worked out so well for Detroit

You know I could care less about your political leanings. I have friends from all over the political spectrum because deep down I just concern myself with whether they're good people trying to do good things who are fun to hang out with and can be depended on. We have civil discussions on our different political opinions and, even if I think they're wrong or misguided, I remain civil because I know it's how they try to do good even if I don't believe it does do good. I didn't say that to dismiss your argument by the way. I said that because of what I'm about to ask.

Do you actually think it's okay to pay people such poor wages? If an employer abandons their former employees because they unionized and pays even worse wages to workers in Bangalore, is that okay? No, it is not: There are actually international laws regarding abuse of workers like that.

Believe it or not, it is possible to pay employees more if you maximize the efficiency of your production to cut down costs, which doesn't necessarily require doing something with your employees (Often, most people counter by saying you have to change your workforce to cut down costs when that is not the only way to cut costs), but maybe your machinery or environment or standards. It also helps to charge more for things you've been selling below value; this is done, by the way, to entice more customers to come than usually would and buy the lowered value items in the hopes they'll stick around and buy the accurately priced and overpriced items. A lot of businesses apply this strategy in areas that don't really help them get customers anyway, not that this isn't a good strategy in other commercial areas because it is, but it gets applied universally as if it works across the board when it doesn't. In areas it doesn't help much, raising those prices back up, assuming customer inflow stays the same, would allow for more profit that could go to employees.

But it won't affect writing quality, especially since the problem with games is because of marketers fucking with game stories to increase sales.

That's why I said it was an interesting comment. I always thought games' writing problems went beyond just not being able to get good writers. He claims to be a former developer, but maybe he just gained a misguided perception while working in the industry.

These are university educated members 300 million strong Indian middle class, their wages are not low. The cost of living is not the same in in India is it is in the United States, so you can have comfortable middle class existence of wages are 1/3 lower than western equivalent. Bangalore is India's silicon valley and already houses R&D for Airbus, Bosch, Boeing, GE, GM, Google, Microsoft, Mercedes-Benz, Oracle, and Toyota. The city is home to over 10,000 dollar millionaires.

 

[jamail77]

These are university educated members 300 million strong Indian middle class, their wages are not low. The cost of living is not the same in in India is it is in the United States, so you can have comfortable middle class existence of wages are 1/3 lower than western equivalent. Bangalore is India's silicon valley and already houses R&D for Airbus, Bosch, Boeing, GE, GM, Google, Microsoft, Mercedes-Benz, Oracle, and Toyota. The city is home to over 10,000 dollar millionaires.

Ummmmmm. I was addressing your original post in the context of your original post. I barely skimmed your later posts that went into details about that. I assumed you were talking about outsourcing low wages, not outsourcing and then paying something manageable because cost of living is lower there. My mistake.

 

[pokepuke]

All this stuff from people against unions is bullshit. There are plenty of ways to fight for the people, so it's not just a case of "you just GOTTA cater to the corporations or they're gonna take their ball and go home!"

The problem is firstly that the corporations are international. This is essentially letting them off the hook for doing business in the US while not putting their fair share back in. If there were regulations about the flow of money out of the US, assuming the US is the focal point, then this problem would be mitigated. The big corporations just hire cheap labor and export it, while sitting in a small office (not literally, though) in Ireland or some place that doesn't care about what money flows through. If it would actually cost money to outsource, they wouldn't do it, especially because then they would be closer to the point where quality would be a worthwhile endeavor.

These same corporations also have no problem hiring workers in countries that have unions. Would they prefer to not have unionized workforces? Yes. They are definitely fighting against the creation of unions wherever they don't exist yet, but once the cat is out of the bag they have to skin it somehow.

 

[MirenBainesUSMC]

Ahhh too bad it this turned into whether Unions are the best thing since leavened bread or the scourge of the earth.

Quite frankly if I'm being pressed with poor working conditions, there is no one putting a gun to my head to force me to work --- I can quit any time I feel that my health or well being is being damaged. Sure there are consequences and even some will stay due to what they have going on in their situations --- I'm just not someone that will simply put up with Bull Crap. If it gets tough after leaving, oh well --- lesson learned never to get into such a garbage corporation then. Of which I have done three times already in my working life.

I don't think unionization would effect writing, a poster on here already summed it up --- the writing is disturbed by the marketers and big cheeses running the show. They cite the Writer's Guild of America, but from what I've seen, they haven't really done much for writers beyond that one strike which pretty much showed the world that these comedians and comedy/sitcom actors are complete dunces without them. Writers for such mediums will never get the pay they deserve because quite frankly, without them, there is nothing. No scripts. No witty one liners. No content. Zip. Leno and David Letterman looked like complete fools without them... yet even though they did reach somewhat of an agreement, they still don't get what they deserve.

About the only thing I can think of is that it would ease the pressure of deadlines perhaps but in the business of creativity, sometimes your mind doesn't want to cooperate with deadlines. I've always had a problem with people attempting to segment creative art into some object that can be manufactured and sold in time oriented dead lines. Its probably why the writing is 85% garbage in many of these games.

If they want better writing, they need a better company that will pay their worth and let creation take its course --- but try telling that to EA and UBI Soft. Its just like the problems of Hollywood.