The problem with union is that it also centralizes the power to the top which also then attracts sociopaths and/or psychopaths who are better are playing the political game.

In principle I support the idea of organized labor, but I hate to admit that every real-world experience of unions I've witnessed (second hand), the union has just been another layer of rent-seeking administration.

I don't know enough about the history and structure to understand if the current tech union movement is more of the same or if there is some reform included.

Came here to say something similar to this. If the industry were to unionize, there are good examples of good unions and good leadership. But I also don't want to pay membership dues so that some executive director of a union makes $900k/year salary so they can show up 5 times out of the year to resolve issues and then disappear and have no experience with software or the industry at all.

My fear is that union leadership will just attract someone from another completely different industry, who has no passion for computing, no experience, but wield tremendous power in how employees and employers conduct business. I'm not OK with that. I don't want some 65 year old curmudgeon MBA type politically connected bozo telling everyone what they can and cannot do. These types of committees and decision making are a killjoy and harm creativity.

There's just no way to guarantee that union leaders are regular folks like us who aren't power hungry but want to truly help the people. It rarely ever ends up attracting clean, nice, good personalities and then end up in cahoots with other nefarious players.

Having said all that, I would like to see a few changes in the industry:

- Interviews. The process is a complete mess right now. If we could standardize on a few things, that would go a long way. Guaranteed yes or no feedback immediately after the last step. Capping the process to just 2 days. You phone call, initial screen. Come in, meet the team, problem solve something real. Lunch. Some more team sessions to solve real problems, and then done at 2PM. Feedback at 4PM. No ghosting, no "oh we hired someone internally", no week long writing assignments and coding sessions to reverse a linked list.

- Salary. Just post the exact salary on the listing, without ranges. And then just tell the candidate up front, this is the salary. That's it. Stop with the tremendous waste of time on the back and forth. RSUs, etc. also posted full transparency. And just say "no negotiations, this is it".

- Layoffs. Provide a good cushion for the person to find a new role, health insurance. We're not asking for much here, just give the young folk less time and older folk more time since ageism is real.

if your union is not democratic, it's not really a union. It's a business scam exploiting union rights. There's a difference between yellow unions (pro-business) and red unions (pro-workers). Just because something is called a union it doesn't mean it's one.