Reply to post:

I wish this quote were true, "As employees, technologists wield enormous power."; but, as a cog on the wheel of a many geared machine I can tell you that for most of us this is not the case. The biggest problem for tech works in NA, imho, is outsourcing and not just to other NA companies but outside the country. This gives companies a huge amount of power over salaries and even whether they are willing to employ in the countries of their origin, from which they take all or the bulk of their income. Companies of almost any size can have their work done in lower cost countries for wages on which we, in developed economies, cannot exist due to cost structures with no equalizing union or regulation to equalize wages. Globalization is only the friend of the wealthy. Those same companies still want to strip money from us though at the highest possible price while selling the same or similar products at greatly reduced prices in lower cost countries. So, what we have now are companies operating globally with no way for workers in developed economies of competing for work at competitive wages. Then there is, of course, technological advancement and the diminishing requirement for the number of employees aside from the non-competitive wage scale in developed economies.