This must be US centric yeah? I am in a union in Denmark as an engineer, and was when I was specifically a software engineer too.
I hope it can happen everywhere, it's been great for us in the few years I've been part of it.
this post was submitted on 03 Oct 2026
71 points (91.8% liked)
Ask Lemmy
41772 readers
1523 users here now
A Fediverse community for open-ended, thought provoking questions
Rules: (interactive)
1) Be nice and; have fun
Doxxing, trolling, sealioning, racism, toxicity and dog-whistling are not welcomed in AskLemmy. Remember what your mother said: if you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all. In addition, the site-wide Lemmy.world terms of service also apply here. Please familiarize yourself with them
2) All posts must end with a '?'
This is sort of like Jeopardy. Please phrase all post titles in the form of a proper question ending with ?
3) No spam
Please do not flood the community with nonsense. Actual suspected spammers will be banned on site. No astroturfing.
4) NSFW is okay, within reason
Just remember to tag posts with either a content warning or a [NSFW] tag. Overtly sexual posts are not allowed, please direct them to either !asklemmyafterdark@lemmy.world or !asklemmynsfw@lemmynsfw.com.
NSFW comments should be restricted to posts tagged [NSFW].
5) This is not a support community.
It is not a place for 'how do I?', type questions.
If you have any questions regarding the site itself or would like to report a community, please direct them to Lemmy.world Support or email info@lemmy.world. For other questions check our partnered communities list, or use the search function.
6) No US Politics.
Please don't post about current US Politics. If you need to do this, try !politicaldiscussion@lemmy.world or !uspolitics@lemmy.world
7) No Hit-and-Run questions.
Please don't delete your post for no apparent reason. If you plan on deleting a question later, say so in the post, or if you feel that you have a good reason to remove it, message a mod beforehand. It's not fair to the ones who took their time to answer, and it's not in the spirit of the community.
8) No Bots.
Posts or comments from bots, LLM's, AIs, Neural Networks, Transformers, or Marvin the Paranoid Android are not welcome in AskLemmy. Real humans only please.
Reminder: The terms of service apply here too.
Partnered Communities:
Logo design credit goes to: tubbadu
founded 3 years ago
MODERATORS
Unions in Denmark for developers stay away from anything that isn't directly illegal, though, so they aren't working exactly as a union. The reason was a huge scare back when Prosa had a failed strike way back that started a huge outsourcing of development, so unions stay out of the contractual stuff. They are effectively just a "legal insurance" type of organisation.
IDA? I mean they've helped me with contract negotiations and visa things before?
IDA, yes, it's the case for all tech unions. They will help, yes, but mostly to ensure that the contract is legal and up to par with general expectations of the tech sector, work hours, on-call, and so on. But they won't at any point take your position, only help you understand your position so you have more levy in your negotiations. In other sectors you will see that "overenskomster" has been negotiated by the unions, so e.g. all nurses get the same pay based on experience level, the same days off, the same total hours, the same overtime compensation. You thus don't need to negotiate your contract because the union already negotiated a collective contract. No one gets left behind that way. For tech you need to negotiate that yourself and you have to do it each time you change job.
And nice to know they helped with visa. I can't testify for that personally, so I didn't know they offered assistance with that.
If it was possible to create a union without interacting with each other, it would already be done.
its too disorganized, too many layoffs, fresh graduates and recent layoff people having to find jobs but cant. and the people currently employed in AI? isnt likely going to let go of thier jobs.
LOL
Just do the organising online
I'm in one right now. There's a ton of guilds too in the US.
Got me a raise and fought a RTO sillyness.
Can you share the name of your union
As their jobs keep getting devalued, by AI (whether appropriate or not), and they are increasingly treated as unskilled labor, there will be more pressure to organize in order to mitigate losses in pay and benefits.
they will just hold on to the few senior members(skeleton crew) longer, they dint lay off longer and refuse to hire new people.
That sounds like even more reason for the workers to organize
Tech workers needed to unionize yesterday. The trillion dollar investment to automate away white collar work should have us all organizing. Unfortunately, software engineers tend to be very tepid and don't want to rock the boat. I've also found myself contracting a lot lately which gives me substantially less power to organize. But even the tendency towards contracting is one that disempowers workers and makes them feel disposable.
Unionization desperately needs to happen.
no, especially if they are all getting laid off, or barely getting hired. the time to do it was like 10 years ago, when they were hiring in-demand, even then laying them off will likely negate the union anyways if they arnt hiring them back.
CAIT: Collective Action in Tech and the Tech Workers Coalition are both trying. Support them as best you can.
I am in a union, and I think everyone should join or start one too. It's important to lay the groundwork for a strong union while you are still in a secure position, for the day you may not be. Like tech workers are seeing now.
I've had colleagues who don't see the need to join a union because they have such strong protection in their contract so union memberships are dwindling in some areas... those people are incredibly short-sighted and don't seem to get that a strong union got those protections into their contract before they even started the job, and a weak union can see those strengths becoming hollowed out in time.
Use your strength to protect the weak. If nothing else then because you may one day become weakened yourself.
Some already have. It's illegal to stop it.
Tech workers are more than software engineers.
Am tech worker. Where do I sign?
I remember an old coworker said he was anti union. "I'd just find another job if I didn't like the one I had", he said. Bold claim.
And that was true back then, which was essentially the reason why no one bothered to organize. Tech jobs were one of the highest paying jobs and it was easy to jump ship. Now with companies (stupidly) thinking AI can replace everyone, suddenly tech jobs are no longer as secure as before. And maybe that will finally start pushing workers to organize.
Right? But it was so ... Short sighted, to think it would last forever and you'd never need to organize.
Bold claim
For me it was true all my life.
That's the point where Usa (and probably China) are different than the other parts of the world.
They already do in France. In the video game part of tech, too.
My personal bet would be no. They’ll automate themselves away and slovenly play the corporate game before unionising. As a collective that is. Perhaps there’s lots to say about the culture of the profession, but I suspect it’s just too childish and spoilt.
I was going to say, the Silicon Valley corporate game feels too individualistic for its players to consider unionisation
I used to be in one
Should we? Yes. Will we? Software Engineers are overall too prideful for that
Tech Workers Coalition exists, as does IWW, though neither fit what most folks think of when they think of unions
Nope. They're too economically right wing self-absorbed to unionize.
Speak for yourself. I don't feel that way. Nobody I know or work with feels that way.
Problem isn't the bunch of us, it's the one's who're getting well compensated for their work. Tech has a very uneven pay, plus it's susceptible to outsourcing. If anything Tech would require super globalized union, something that I don't think has a precent.