
Microsoft Bug Testers Unionized, Then They Were Dismissed - fludlight
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-08-23/microsoft-bug-testers-unionized-then-they-were-dismissed
======
sushid
I realize that it's the article's title, but this seems misleading. The bug
testers were contractors working under the temp agency Lionbridge Technologies
Inc.

After they won their right to unionize, they were eventually laid off because
Microsoft required fewer bug testers for their dwindling Windows Mobile app
store and their agency, Lionbridge, couldn't find additional work for them.

~~~
dsr_
That is the political line from Lionbridge and Microsoft.

Do you think there's something special about QA for Windows Mobile that makes
them unhireable for other QA jobs?

~~~
cwyers
They worked under a contract. The contract ended. They could have gotten
another contract with Microsoft. But they could have gotten a contract with
any other software company, too. Why didn't Lionbridge find another contract?

~~~
weberc2
Not familiar with Lionbridge, but lots of contract companies pretty much serve
one large, local company. It’s often hard to drum up work for a large number
of contractors on demand.

~~~
cwyers
It's probably similarly hard for Microsoft, though, isn't it? It's not like
their ending of the Windows Phone project opened up a bunch of vacancies in
their other QA projects.

~~~
weberc2
I agree. I was responding to your question, "Why didn't LionBridge find them
more work?". If LionBridge principally works with Microsoft (as is common
among contractors) and Microsoft cut QA work, then LionBridge likely couldn't
find work for those contractors.

This may be _especially_ true if those contractors were demanding a certain
salary that is infeasible in LionBridge's market.

------
kitanata
Honestly, I think we should just unionize everyone in the tech field. A single
Union that handles and accepts all software developers, IT operations folks,
software testers, etc and we protect our own and lobby for the laws to benefit
us and our profession. The things these companies do to get around basic
worker rights is deplorable and we need to organize and fight back, and befor
you say you make a ton of money and love what you do so why unionize, ask
yourself how many hours you worked overtime and didn’t get paid for it. Ask
yourself how many times you’ve seen a colleague let go because they had some
medical troubles. Ask yourself how many times a colleague on a visa told you
they felt trapped. Ask yourself how many times you’ve heard of a colleague get
fucked out of their vacation due to a critical issue. Ask yourself how much
power you have to effect change when it comes to just general process and how
we go about our day to day. Ask yourself how many times you’ve felt you’ve
been asked to do something that was unethical and didn’t want to risk the
financial implications and consequences of saying “No”. We need a union. Call
it whatever you want, a guild, a bar, a union. Whatever. The point is, it’s
time to organize and it’s time to start fighting back.

~~~
travisoneill1
I've never been in a union but know people who have. From this small and
biased sample of unions:

\- Pay is based on seniority, not skill

\- You have to please your boss from the company and also the union

I don't want either of these things. If there is a union where this doesn't
happen then I could consider it.

~~~
Frondo
That is a small and biased sample, and ignores a union representing the most
visible people in society: the screen actors' guild.

Think Tom Cruise is paid based on seniority and not skill?

~~~
ChrisLomont
Isn't selecting the SAG an even smaller and biased sample?

~~~
Frondo
I'm showing one very easily understood counterexample to "unions pay based on
seniority" to expand on the parent poster's "small and biased" sample and show
that unions are what their members make of them.

~~~
ChrisLomont
Are the majority of people in unions in a union that bases pay mostly on
seniority?

~~~
Frondo
I dunno, and it doesn't really matter for this conversation.

After all, why would tech workers choose that pay scale when putting together
the rules for their union?

(And, if they did choose that, whose place is it for anyone outside the union
to tell them that's wrong?)

~~~
ChrisLomont
>I dunno, and it doesn't really matter for this conversation.

travis stated pay is based on seniority (implied most, not all). You claimed
his sample was too small, then gave a small sample as counter-evidence. So now
that I ask you if the majority of people in unions are paid based mostly on
seniority you admit you don't even know? And thus claim it's irrelevant?

That's an odd way to demonstrate that your objection has merit.

You can look up the biggest unions in the US, and you will in fact see that a
significant component of pay is seniority based for the majority of people in
US unions.

If you're going to complain that someone is wrong, at least put in some
legwork.

~~~
Frondo
It is irrelevant. How unions structure their pay rules is entirely up to them.

If tech workers unionize, they can decide whatever pay scale they want. Why do
you think that is not so?

And if they choose a pay scale based on seniority, lines of code delivered, or
the weather, what difference does it make to _you_ , someone presumably not a
member of their union?

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erentz
Another example of how Medicare for All would help business. Just remove
healthcare as an employee benefit entirely.

~~~
AnthonyMouse
> Another example of how Medicare for All would help business. Just remove
> healthcare as an employee benefit entirely.

The problem there is that the existing Medicare system is predicated on paying
less for the same things than private insurance and then letting high private
insurance premiums subsidize the Medicare system. Which obviously doesn't work
when everyone is on Medicare, so the cost per Medicare patient would go up at
the same time as you're adding hundreds of millions of people to it.

So the Medicare tax would have to increase dramatically, but the Medicare tax
is pretty regressive. Meanwhile a lot of companies would then get away with
discontinuing their private insurance coverage without increasing employee
compensation by the same amount. So you're basically talking about a huge
transfer of wealth from the middle class to corporations.

We should probably look into some other method of dismantling the employer-
provided healthcare system. Maybe something that involves primarily
catastrophic coverage as a baseline.

~~~
Tyrek
I'm not sure that's how Medicare is 'predicated' \- the fundamental assumption
is that you get to a) reduce administrative overhead due to a centralized
system, and b) using the power of a single-payer system to negotiate lower
fees - it's reducing the profit margin of private insurers, not relying on
them to subsidize Medicare.

~~~
chimeracoder
> I'm not sure that's how Medicare is 'predicated' \- the fundamental
> assumption is that you get to a) reduce administrative overhead due to a
> centralized system, and b) using the power of a single-payer system to
> negotiate lower fees

This fundamental assumption is wrong, because Medicare _doesn 't_ negotiate.
Medicare sets rates by fiat, and providers don't have the ability to negotiate
rates with Medicare the way they negotiate with private payers. Medicare
reimburses rates that are below COGS, which means that providers actually lose
money on Medicare patients and have to cover their losses with the margins
they make on privately-insured patients. (Medicare acknowledges this, and in
fact will pay separate stipends to providers who don't see enough privately-
insured patients to cover the losses on Medicare patients).

OP is correct - Medicare's funding model is _not_ sustainable without private
insurers to provide the difference.

> it's reducing the profit margin of private insurers, not relying on them to
> subsidize Medicare

Uh, where do you think that extra money _goes_?

------
leke
I used to work for LionBridge. They did have quite a few full time positions
when Nokia was flourishing, but when things started to go south with Nokia,
they put pressure on LionBridge to cut their costs, else lose their business
contract. When Microsoft took over Nokia, nothing changed for the better.
People who were forced out of their full-time jobs didn't get them back, and
the people who had permanent zero hour contracts kept the same deal. This is
when I left (because I was only getting a couple of days work a month).

I feel bad for LB because it was Nokia and MS that turned the screws, even
though I think they had the funds to support LB's employees. I also have no
idea why LB couldn't then get the reason Nokia and MS lost their product
support, ie. the Android vendors' business contracts.

~~~
r00fus
I had to look up what a zero-hour contract is [1]. Seriously sounds like a
setup ripe for worker abuse - I mean, yes, according to the standard zero hour
contract, both employer and employee can decline work offered/accepted, but
who do you think has power in this relationship?

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero-
hour_contract](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero-hour_contract)

~~~
leke
> according to the standard zero hour contract, both employer and employee can
> decline work offered/accepted, but who do you think has power in this
> relationship?

In my particular case, I was still eligible to unemployment subsidy, if my
monthly earnings were lower than that of unemployment benefit, but it came
with a condition. Even though I was allowed to decline offered work, I would
forfeit my unemployment subsidy for three months each time I declined it. This
of course was a condition of the unemployment office, not the company, but the
company knew about it, so yes, the company indeed had power over those who
needed at least the minimum living allowance.

We actually had a homeless guy working there for a while, until they found out
he was homeless.

------
acd
Big company A wants to pay less for a general service, Large company A
outsources the service to smaller company B. Smaller company B in order to
make the service cheaper than Company A could do it themselves, company B cuts
on things like pay, vacation and social benefits. There is no work safety in
company B and everything is by demand "contract" work. In fact employees of
company B is often self employees.

This is usually how it goes around and in globalization it is there is often
someone willing to the work cheaper but with no health care, pensions etc.

------
alokitr
Just as an fyi, there are countries where companies like lionsbridge are not
even allowed to exist. e.g. France.

~~~
brightball
Check on the number of companies that exist in France with 49 employees.

~~~
cpeterso
Thought experiment: what if the US government limited companies to a maximum
number of employees, say 5000?

There would be new inefficiencies, but it might decrease the possibility or
impact of monopolies and encourage competition. There would be a lot more
specialized contractor companies. How much of, say, Google's search service or
Microsoft Windows could be maintained or developed with just 5000 people?

~~~
true_religion
We would end up with massive conglomerates who owned 500+ companies of 4999
people, and if that didn't work you'd just get simple collusion where everyone
knows company A and B are owned by the same person so they try to cooperate
even without being explicitly ordered to.

------
SamReidHughes
If these people can form a union, what's to stop them from forming their own
agency and finding clients? Software testing isn't exactly a capital-intensive
business.

------
CydeWeys
A similar thing happened to SWEs at Lanetix. I was coworkers with several of
them at my previous job. [https://www.sfchronicle.com/business/article/SF-
tech-company...](https://www.sfchronicle.com/business/article/SF-tech-company-
fired-software-engineers-seeking-12541301.php)

Fortunately I've never worked anywhere that had conditions so bad that
organizing was worth thinking about, but I won't rule it out as a possibility
in the future.

------
throw2016
There is a general lack of empathy for these workers and even for those who
get laid off due to globalization and now under a opioid/meth epidemic.

Free market proponents always talk about 'retraining' and other up in the air
initiatives but there is no follow up or details about how these will actually
work in the real world with some base accountability, processes and studies
about how well they worked in the past. And yet all these trade deals without
exception have claw backs and multiple processes protecting their investments
and profits. In this case all the details are covered carefully and it is not
left 'up in the air'.

There are no easy answers here as opinions will shift depending on which side
of the equation you or someone you care about finds themselves in. This is
really about the kind of society and community you want to build and how you
see yourself as a country.

------
Apocryphon
Could we at least agree that tech workers in the video game industry should be
unionized? The anti-union detractors always talk about how cushy engineers
have it and that unions are unnecessary. Well how about the notoriously
horrendous working conditions in games?

------
noobermin
As a lesson for people who want to unionize, this is why larger is better when
it comes to unions.

~~~
zdragnar
Unless you live in MN, where they push tthrough legislation so they can take
medicare money from disabled people.

[https://www.forbes.com/sites/mattpatterson/2017/10/02/in-
min...](https://www.forbes.com/sites/mattpatterson/2017/10/02/in-minnesota-
historic-revolt-against-the-seiu/)

------
devhead
Should tech workers unionize?

~~~
sremani
Tech workers are a global force! Instead of unionizing you would do better by
getting security clearance and become a fed contract worker.

That is the closest thing to building a worker moat, I know of.

~~~
kiliantics
The purpose of a union is to pool the power of all the workers together and
use that combined power to achieve things which the individuals themselves
never could alone. Really big things. Like, we have weekends, maternity leave,
and OSHA thanks to unions big.

Tech workers are indeed a global force and in a world that increasingly
requires global solutions - think climate change, migration crises, etc. - a
union that leverages the power of all tech workers would be really useful
right about now.

------
mg794613
"... gave up on what had been, for people in the software world, an almost
unheard of unionization victory" The 'software world' is not just America,
thank you. Almost every other civilized country thinks this is normal.

------
dsr_
"Political power grows out of the barrel of a gun" \-- attributed to Mao.

The union expected to be dealt with fairly and according to the law; the law
failed them, because the mechanisms of the law were controlled by politics and
Microsoft has political power; the union did not.

~~~
Sag0Sag0
I'm not sure why this is being down voted, it's true.

~~~
ntsplnkv2
People are not quite at the point of revolt.

If the path we are currently on continues, though, it will happen. It's only a
matter of when.

------
exabrial
Were the bug testers working in conditions where said testers were in physical
or psychiatric danger from job hazards? If not, I don't really see an issue
with this.

------
randyrand
what’s the difference between a union and a bunch of small 1 person companies
all deciding to price fix?

~~~
chimeracoder
> what’s the difference between a union and a bunch of small 1 person
> companies all deciding to price fix?

Is this a riddle?

The answer: Both were outlawed by antitrust laws, but labor unions later
lobbied to except one (but not the other).

------
torgian
Article can't be found now?

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torgian
Huh. Article cant be found now?

------
RachelF
I guess this would explain the low quality of Windows updates recently. Almost
every patch Tuesday we patch, and then something that should have been caught
by Microsoft QA breaks.

The increasingly low quality of Microsoft products makes it hard to use in the
enterprise.

------
infocollector
wow! Can't they sue Microsoft and get reinstated? Perhaps using courts?

~~~
justboxing
> Can't they sue Microsoft and get reinstated?

Please stop with this. The last time temp workers sued (and won) [1] the
rippling effect it has had on 100s and 1000s of contractors since then, is
that companies (in Silicon Valley and Bay area atleast) no longer employ
contractors for more than 18 months at a time.

And due to this a lot of contractors since 1998 have had to leave lucrative
contracts at software companies, because the companies that hired them
specifically put this max limit after this lawsuit to shield themselves from
such a law suit.

Personally, I've had to leave 3 separate contracts since 2006 in San
Francisco, solely because the clients had this policy of not hiring temp
workers/ contractors for more than 18 months, so as to avoid any lawsuit from
temp workers suing for employee benefits.

[1] Source: [2000] Microsoft to Pay $97 Million to End Temp Worker Suit
[http://articles.latimes.com/2000/dec/13/business/fi-64817](http://articles.latimes.com/2000/dec/13/business/fi-64817)

~~~
mjevans
The best fix for this is to eliminate the "benefits" corporations see by
hiring temps/part time over just hiring for a full time job.

If a job is really a partial job require pro-rated benefits (and favor the
worker slightly so that it encourages just having full-time jobs).

That might also encourage businesses/the rich to put their political pressure
towards socializing those costs instead of outsourcing them to individual
(temp/part time) employees.

~~~
com2kid
> The best fix for this is to eliminate the "benefits" corporations see by
> hiring temps/part time over just hiring for a full time job.

Having worked at a big tech co, our budget for contractors and vendors was
different than our budget for full time employees.

It wasn't that vendors were even cheaper, the average was close to $100 /
hour, and vendors got paid for every hour they worked! But vendors were easier
to let go if they turned out to not be good, or if (when) the department
budget was cut.

Getting approval for head count could take forever, but if I wanted to hire 3
vendors next week, it was only an issue of "is the money there right now?",
not "will the money be there for years and years to come".

(As an aside, at one point in time the 3rd or 4th highest earning person in
the building was one of my vendors, he was earning over 250K per year for
awhile, all cash!)

