I would suggest joining unions and encouraging others to join them. With all the nonsense coming out of Google, Microsoft and others regarding wage warfare against their own employees I'm shocked that developers haven't unionized.
>'With all the nonsense coming out of Google, Microsoft and others regarding wage warfare against their own employees I'm shocked that developers haven't unionized.'
I think it's a whole mess of things - outdated misconceptions about unions, overestimating their own abilities, being oblivious to the efforts of employers to commoditize the profession and/or play labor against itself.
I was a member of a union which included developers for a while and it wasn't close to a bad deal for anyone short of perhaps the top 0.5-1% and even that was arguable.
One of the brightest guys, who I know quite well, was endlessly dissatisfied with his not-too-shabby top-end union rate and left seeking more.
Today, not only is he paid notably less (though still comfortably over 100k) has endured layoffs and of course lost the 457, 401 + matching, 5 weeks annual vacation, fast accruing sick leave, 1.5x on-call rate and health plan. In the same period he'd have seen 2 guaranteed longevity increases from the union plus across the board bumps from a revised CBA.
Developers will keep thinking they're all 10xers who'll see their rates quartered by unions until a16z has its way and software development truly is a 'low-skill trade', 'decoupled from ability and experience' [1] and it's too late.
I'd also like to point out that unions would likely offer much greater protection for the likes of Snowden. There would be viable paths to take within the union and would likely result in not having to run off to Russia.
Honestly, it's hard to organize people for any type of movement that are in the top 10-20% of incomes in the country. Yes, we may all be getting screwed, but we're still making bank compared to most.
