What Are the Issues in the Workplace in Tet Companies?

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i think that people look for that kind of meeting in the things that they do, and would hope for that from their work place as well. Even though, you know, this is a capitalist system. It's really a transaction, right? You're selling your labor to the company in exchange for for a wage. And i think looking back at the history as well, it's not, i b m, but you can see the opposition to unions all the way back,. Like hp founded back in like the thirties or forties, and how they kind of pioneer the practice of giving employees shares in the company so that they feel more like owners rather than workers.

Paris Marx is joined by ann haeyoung to discuss IBM worker organizing in the 1970s and 1980s against racism and apartheid, and how those stories are important to informing tech organizing in the present.

ann haeyoung is a media artist interested in technology and labor. She is also a former tech worker and organizer, and a graduate student at UCLA.

Tech Won’t Save Us offers a critical perspective on tech, its worldview, and wider society with the goal of inspiring people to demand better tech and a better world. Follow the podcast (@techwontsaveus) and host Paris Marx (@parismarx) on Twitter, and support the show on Patreon.

Find out more about Harbinger Media Network at harbingermedianetwork.com.

Also mentioned in this episode:

ann wrote about IBM organizing for Wired, and put together a four-part series on her research for Tech Workers Coalition.
Science for the People published an article about tech worker organizing in the 1960s and 1970s.
Logic Magazine spoke to Joan Greenbaum about the early days of tech worker organizing.
Tech Won’t Save Us is looking for a producer.

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