Trials of the Alphabet Workers Union.
by Israel Aristide
Table of contents
Introduction
In recent years, there has been a noticable increase of interest in unions. Workplace cultures have been shifting, and concerns have been growing about income inequality and workplace rights. More and more, workers have been turning to unions as a means of collective action against these rising issues. These sentiments have been much quieter in the field of tech.
There are a lot of things that all the silicon valley tech giants have in common. From their global reach, to their unique culture, it's very easy to spot which companies originate from the sunny state of California. One of their many similarities is in their lack of unionization. Silicon valley companies employ a number of techniques in order to discourage unionization, such as stigmatization, stock compensation, high wages, and the myth of meritocracy.
Google's hostility towards unions is no different to it's silicon valley sisters, so you can imagine my shock when I discovered that google in fact does have a union called the Alphabet Workers Union (AWU).
A brief history of the AWU
In January of 2021, The Alphabet Workers Union was officially announced, by then it was years in the making internally but had faced resistance from management. So while it was something novel, it was not unexpected due to the years of activism and organizing internally from employees. The AWU was already unique in it's approach from the beginning, it was announced through an op-ed piece published by The New York Times. Secondly, it did not immediately seek to be recognized by the federal government or even Alphabet itself. Chewy Shaw, vice chair of the AWU said "We're not going to make our growth and collective action dependent on labor law." So while their unique structure is admirable, it lacks effectiveness in the real world. With that being said here are some of the many issues that the union faces.
The Trials
1. What the heck is alphabet?
In October of 2015, "Google Inc." restructured itself to become "Alphabet Inc." Google, then became a subsidiary of Alphabet, along with some of their other subsidiaries, Waymo, Googe Fiber, GV, and Calico. The AWU does not actually represent workers from all of these other subsidiaries. Rather, it's focus is on organizing and advocating for Google employees while the other subsidiaries have their own workforce. This brings into question the name of the union itself, because It's unclear who they represent within alphabet.2. Temporary work contractors
One of the biggest barriers to unionization in the tech world - along with union stigmatization, stock compensation, weaponized high wages, and meritocracy - is that companies often have their employees engaged as "Temporary" contractors. They are doing the same work as full time employees, but they don't get the benefits, or job security that their full time colleagues do. U.S labour provisions lack a lot of protections for independent contractors. So when a plurality of google's employees are technically temporary contractors, then things can get messy. Unionization is not easy for these types of workers since their job security is non-existant.
As an example of this, here are some AWU members who were testifying in front of their city council. Their contracts were terminated that day, during the hearing.
This is the exact moment that workers on the @Youtube Music team learned they were being laid off by @Google - as they were testifying in front of their local Austin city council. pic.twitter.com/QKAFyb4jti
— Alphabet Workers Union (AWU-CWA) (@AlphabetWorkers) March 1, 2024
3. NLRB recognition
As of today the AWU as a whole still does not have official recognition by the National Labor Relations Board. This means it cannot actually engage in collective bargaining. The AWU "has been called a minority union and a solidarity union." These terms are used to describe unions that focus on building relationships among workers and exerting pressure through collective action rather than bargaining. However there is not much collective action that can be done with such low membership in the union. Minority unions also have limited legal protection.
4. Low membership
Typically, for unions to be officially recognized with the government, at least 30% of employees need to sign cards for the union. With an employee count of over 130 000, that already brings difficulties with alphabet. The AWU started with only 400 members, and to this day still only has around 1300 members. On top of not being recognized by google or the government, the low membership brings the bargaining power and representation way down.
Alphabet's company structure us purposefully made for it to be as difficult as possible for employees to unionize because all of the subsidiaries are separate entities. There are many many layers of authority, this structure is called decentralized management. Essentially the approach is to divide and conquer.
5. Resistance from management
Alphabet has worked tirelessly to prevent the amount of impact that the AWU can make, despite the company's directive to have an inclusive workplace. Management shows little interest in addressing the union and it's concerns. Google has even in some cases retaliated against employees and union activists. It is only thanks to strong solidarity among union members and support from external organizations such as the Communications Workers of America (CWA) and their Campaign to Organize Digital Employees (CODE) initiative.
Conclusion
The AWU is noble in it's cause, but unfortunately it fails to deliver on real world solutions for it's members thanks to the issues lined out above. that's not to say it wont ever thought! Every day progress is being made to grow the union and make it stronger. Members are steadily rising and it looks like things are optimisic for the future. Let's just hope this does not become a failed venture jusst like much of googles products.