Communications Workers of America (CWA) announce an industry-wide video game union

We are going to create a game industry that works for us, one that nourishes its talent and invests in its future, rather than constantly seeking short-term profits.

That's not really the goal of most investors in the current game industry. They want the steepest upward line and don't care about the corpses it leaves in their wake. I wonder if this might actually lead to even more departures from the US. I'd be nice if the industry could be satisfied with more sensible growth strategies, but I'm not too hopeful.

Worker unions are definitely needed. I am glad that they decided to finally create one.

To be honest, I've seen unions cause more problems than they solve. They tend to cost companies more while doing little if anything to improve the quality of work, and it becomes much harder to fire unproductive employees. The biggest gimmick of unions is that they promise to stop the little guy from getting screwed by fat cat CEOs, but that's only because they're getting screwed by fat cat union bosses instead.

Finally an union for that industry.

To be honest, I've seen unions cause more problems than they solve. They tend to cost companies more

Where does this money go?

"Where does this money go?"

In theory, to the workers. In actuality, to the union bosses who take a generous cut in the form of compulsory union dues and other fees.

Where does this money go?

I'm assuming he's referring to how it costs the company more to negotiate fairly. In my opinion, the point of the union is not to make workers more productive nor improve quality of work but rather to give the workers a boost in a very unfair relationship. It's amazing how the fat cats have managed to convince a subset of workers that having a collective voice to challenge the company is bad. Worker's rights have a lot to thank unions for.

Corporations are consolidating and taking employee options away. How do they change jobs, when there are so few other employers to work for? It is good to see employees consolidate to get a better contract.

To be honest, I've seen unions cause more problems than they solve.

While that's not entirely without merit, keep in mind that unions wouldn't be needed if not close to 100% of all companies wouldn't treat their employees like crap.

...keep in mind that unions wouldn't be needed if not close to 100% of all companies wouldn't treat their employees like crap.

Most companies don't treat their employees like crap. That would be counterproductive. I can honestly say that throughout my career, I've worked for around half-a-dozen employers, only one of which treated me like crap, so I did the sensible thing and left. Not surprisingly, the company ceased operation less than a year later.

So in my experience, if you're competent and reliable, you'll be well compensated for your work without having to make a union boss rich.

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The average union in the US nets their employees an additional 10-20% in wages while taking about 1.5-2% in wages for fees every year. I'd say that's a pretty good return for employees.

That's not even accounting for the benefits that aren't wage related.

It depends. Some unions charge more than others, and there are often additional fees on top of the annual dues. Many unions also have a significant upfront cost just to join.

Personally, I've never worked for a union, but I have worked with unions, and in every case, they have made the working experience worse. The union members have, without fail, been entitled and lazy (because they're protected by the union from being fired, they have no incentive to work hard); they'll routinely send four people to do a job that only requires one; if you tell them a job needs to be completed in four hours, they'll take four hours to do it in order to avoid being given more work; if their lunch break is one hour, they'll demand an additional 15 minutes before and 15 minutes after so they have time to wash their hands, get their lunchboxes from their lockers, etc., meaning their lunch hour is really 90 minutes; and so on.

In short, my experience is that unions are bad for business.

In Mountain Man's defence, where I live, we have solid worker protections at the government level and unions are large companies operated like protection rackets leeching money off of workers and using it to lobby the government for private interests, all while making it nearly impossible to fire bad actors who suck up to the union even if they make every other employee miserable and push them to resign (a friend of mine has been going through exactly that repeatedly).

In many third world countries like the US, the situation is quite different (either with regards to standard worker rights or how unions work) and they are definitely still needed, so hopefully this particular one will do some good.

What about the mass immigration of "qualified" coders coming from India and other places that lower wages and push natives out of the labour market. Curiously we never hear a word about that from Unions.

Well, if these immigrants from India are in the union, they have to get paid the same, so the incentive to import them disappears and the negative impacts of their presence in dragging down wages goes away. So unions don't really have to talk about that situation because the presence of unions kind of automatically eliminates it as a problem.

Most companies don't treat their employees like crap.

I am fairly confident that you think that because most of us are conditioned to accept being treated like crap by employers to be "normal", so we just won't expect anything better.

That would be counterproductive.

Not really. Paying workers the lowest possible wages while making them work the longest possible hours, under the worst conditions permitted by law is profitable, because the owners get to keep more of your productivity. If somebody quits, they just hire the next person to exploit while they can.


Last edited by Kimyrielle on 20 Mar 2025 at 5:20 pm UTC

Even though I am extremely sceptical of unions and have to agree with Mountain Man here on most points, I did always find it curious how the games industry never really had one, especially considering all the big corporations it houses by now and how rather, uhm... "progressive", a large portion of the workforce is.

Well, maybe something good will come from it.

Or maybe this will only serve as an excuse for execs to increase prices for games without any of that additional money landing in devs' pockets.

Or something in between.

Well, if these immigrants from India are in the union, they have to get paid the same, so the incentive to import them disappears and the negative impacts of their presence in dragging down wages goes away. So unions don't really have to talk about that situation because the presence of unions kind of automatically eliminates it as a problem.

You somehow assume cheap labor automatically lands in a union. It doesn't unless some law required it to - and I think we can all agree such a law would never pass, especially not in the US.

So the real choice for the company becomes "expensive unionized workforce" vs "cheap labor".
The only real question is if enough cheap labor is available to companies to avoid having to go for unionized workers.
Oddly enough, the US current stance of "US first (and only)" might actually play somewhat into unions' hands.

But overall, my expectation is that this will go well for the higher educated, difficult-to-replace workers and really, really poorly for everyone lower on the ladder.


Last edited by TheSHEEEP on 20 Mar 2025 at 7:17 pm UTC

@TheSHEEEP: Yes, assuming low union density and general anti-union rules, just a few unionized workers cannot create the effect I described. But with high union density, particularly if it's high enough to wield the amount of power unions have historically managed in northern Europe, it does. The political power matters because you end up with things like sectoral bargaining, meaning even non-union workers get the deal the unions negotiate.

I don't think it's a valid anti-union argument to say low levels of unionization will not create all the virtuous effects you get from high levels of unionization.

Even so, if Firm X becomes a union shop, the argument is valid within that firm: You employ someone at that firm, they get to join the union whether they're from India or Turkmenistan or Antarctica.


Last edited by Purple Library Guy on 20 Mar 2025 at 7:34 pm UTC

It's great to see the class divide here in the comments.

While class collaborationism by union leadership and any issues with union bosses or idiots is stupid and annoying. Organized labor is much better than not, and I sure as hell don't feel bad for any privileged middle class anti-labor pissants who've had "bad experiences" dealing with union workers. Really kinda playing a false blame game there too.

Most companies treat their workers like shit and it's bullshit to say otherwise. It's only when you get into more privileged jobs do they tend to not treat their workers as bad. The shit that many working class people have to deal with is far different than the privileged middle class engineering or bourgeois businessperson fantasyland. I've worked for engineering and testing companies, and I've worked shitty retail and industrial jobs as well. Been on both sides of that fence at different times in my life.

If you're working class and argue against organized labor, then you're a class traitor and just as bad as the middle and ruling classes. (Just like how Uncle Toms are just as bad as stupid rednecks.) As far as I'm concerned "the capitalists will sell us the rope we use to hang them" and I truly hope for the worst for enemies of the working class. Whether they be bourgeois and imperialist politicians, anti-labor pissants, bigots, and/or class traitors to the working class. Fuck xenophobia and bigotry! Solidarity with all of the immigrants! Workers of the world, unite!

I believe that creating unions to extend worker's rights will end up with a net negative not only for the consumers, but future potential employees too. (I know that comes off a lot of evil corporate boss opinion, but hear me out)
If unions force companies to make it harder to lay off workers, then it would mean that it's riskier for companies to hire the employee in the first place. So in a case where let's say activision makes a new live service game, but it ultimately flops, they are essentially locked into 2 choices: they have to keep pouring money into the game that flopped to employ the studio, or give the studio even more money to try again with another game.

Due to this increased financial risk of hiring a worker, triple a video game companies will take less risks (something, that we as gamers DON'T want since it discourages games that actually experiment with more gameplay combinations/story)

While it's really sad to see Microsoft shutting down another studio after creating success (referencing hi fi rush), trying to prevent that will reduce the amount of really cool and interesting games with triple a studio money from being released.

It's great to see the class divide here in the comments. [...] class traitor [...] Fuck xenophobia and bigotry! Solidarity with all of the immigrants! Workers of the world, unite!

You seem like a very reasonable, sane and balanced individual and I wish you the best of luck in your endeavours.

I don't think it's a valid anti-union argument to say low levels of unionization will not create all the virtuous effects you get from high levels of unionization.

It is because high levels of unionization are unachievable in a country like the US where the law can A) change at a whim and B) is directly broken and ignored by its own government.
The US have left the sphere of countries with a functioning and reliable government/legal system and for the next decades will most likely be on the whim of whatever the current man in the high castle wants.
Honestly, who is to say such attempts will not just be forcefully disbanded? Does that sound illegal to you? Probably. But do you think that is more or less likely to happen than disbanding eg a ministry of education, firing its own workforce while outright ignoring courts ordering it to stop?
If you control the executive, neither judicative nor legislative can really stop you. It's an absurd place right now, but that's just how it is and the majority of people voted for it (well, at least of those who did go to vote to begin with lol)

And in that situation, low levels of unionization will only lead to the people within those small unions painting targets on their own backs as the only ones who still have reliable political power are those with the money - and they are unlikely to be very supportive of unionization.

Argumenting with theoretically ideal outcomes of unionization in a state of the world/country where such an outcome is unattainable just doesn't make sense to me.
Nor does argumenting with European standards where Europeans have no say whatsoever and are in fact heavily unwelcome (remember: we live in a post-EU-US-friendship world now).

Protecting jobs for the sole sake of protecting jobs is not reasonable.
It only makes sense in the context of an otherwise sustainable industry. And the companies we are talking about here, the ones that let go thousands of their workforce following failure upon failure upon failure, well they are hardly sustainable, are they?
Of course the people getting fired are largely blameless in any of this. But what do you want them to do? Keep people around just because? Ignore the losses they are making? What's the big idea here to justify keeping people around that never should've been hired to such an extent (during Covid) to begin with?

Money doesn't grow on trees.
Obviously, a bigger chunk (like, MUCH bigger) should be taken from overpaid execs and many of THOSE should be let go instead, and I do believe that could definitely save a few jobs.
But A) nowhere near all of them and B) unions do not have the power to enforce that so that's very besides the point I'm afraid.

tl;dr: The problem is real, but I don't see how unions can be the solution. Governments could be, but we are talking about the US here.


Last edited by TheSHEEEP on 21 Mar 2025 at 7:16 am UTC