Why don’t we have unions?
Related Posts
Best big4 culture for TP in NYC office?
DM for referral at CGI
Enthusiast
The weathers nice and my review que is low.
Pro
Conversation Starter
Additional Posts in Advertising
Any great resume-writer recos? I need help!
New to Fishbowl?
Download the Fishbowl app to
unlock all discussions on Fishbowl.
unlock all discussions on Fishbowl.
Chief
There’s a bowl that discusses unions. Look it up. A whole bunch of complaining but zero action.
Reason 1: We want someone else to do it. We want the benefits and rewards without the risks. Most people are not willing to risk their livelihoods and lose their jobs for attempting to unionize. There’s a real risk that if a group attempts to unionize, they’ll be booted before they get anywhere and there would be a long line of candidates willing to replace them for less money. Especially in this economic climate.
Reason 2: As per above, forming a union is not as easy as people think. Also, let’s say a certain union forms. Just like with SAG, there will always be non-union workers, and agencies easily would just fire the unionized workers and replace them with non union or freelancers. There’s not really a shortage of qualified people.
Reason 3: Think about this, from a holding company’s point of view. If you start getting some workers to form a union and suddenly you’re faced with paying them more, giving them better benefits or limiting their hours, your productivity and profits will likely decrease and running your business will become more expensive. Your shareholders are going to hate that. Wouldn’t it just be easier to offshore those jobs to India or Latin America where wages are much lower to begin with and labor laws are really lax? And also, it gives you more incentive to just replace those troublemakers with AI faster.
Reason 3 - holding companies are already doing this. A union would limit their ability to do such things.
Gen Z’s swing towards the fashy side def not gonna help
“Fashy side” is a good one lmao
Employment law within countries and regions should be what protects the employee, not a union. Unions are just pretending that with a different power structure in control it could somehow benefit you through the joys of more bureaucracy.
You do realize people outside of America exist right?
Rising Star
Because c suites don’t have enough MBAs
Because that would mean even more meetings.
Rising Star
Because we would have to pay dues, standardize our salaries, and further increase the already high barrier to getting a job in advertising.
I couldn’t say tbh. But the total market of creatives far outnumbers the output of brand center. That’s what’s I was getting at before when I said “top shop”. We’re often very self-referential in thinking holdco and flashy indie agencies are the whole advertising ecosystem when we’re just a fraction of all the jobs out there.
Chief
Why don’t I have onions?
Try and start one and my guess is it will be clear why we don’t have them
We do. But we only invite the cool people
If you had unions, then this industry would be harder to get in for new junior talent. I mean you can just get in SAG, it’s tuff.
Realistically this industry is and has always been a race to the bottom and is full of scabs, there would be no reason for anyone to engage with a union if they could just fire everyone and fill those roles for less.
Rising Star
Unions make labor more expensive and output less efficient. Look around — do you see companies interested in getting less work out of agencies, and at a higher cost?
Because we don't know how to make anything other than ads.
Rising Star
Missed the boat in the 1930s
One thing that makes it pretty complicated in my eyes is the number of levels we have.
A union would clarify the levels and functions. That would be a good thing as I believe agencies create levels to limit compensation.
Because the people who have the most sway to make it happen think they would be hurt by it (in the short term). The rockstar CD’s and people who have the big client relationships are concerned they might have to take a pay cut, or need to start paying dues, or bonuses would change rapidly, etc.
Advertising is like the USA. It’s an industry of “temporarily embarrassed millionaires” and most of us don’t want to limit our potential upside in favour of reducing our potential downside.