Video Game Makers Don't Need Unions, Unions Need Video Game Makers

The video game industry has always had qualities that would be difficult to find in any other. Developing a video game requires one to create an experience that the consumer takes an active part in, one that must make sense to as many players as possible, while making each and every one of them feel like it is totally unique to them.

Add in all the story-telling inherent to any creative work and the incredible engineering needed to make a video game, and you have an economic endeavor that sits at the perfect center of art, commerce, and science.

In recent months however, gaming has faced challenges that are all too common. Massive video game companies like EA and Activision/Blizzard have laid off thousands of employees en masse as they've shifted priorities. In response, several commentators have called for the industry to pursue a path that has at times correlated with industry decline: unionization. Talk about a non sequitur. 

To be clear, these workers don’t need unions. At least, not as much as union leaders need new members.

From the beginning, the game development profession has endured cycles of rapid hiring followed by mass layoffs. It's a fact of life in video games that as titles are released, a slow period follows until the next batch of games are developed. What's arguably different this time is that the layoffs come as games earn more money than ever, and several of the sector’s blue chip companies have had their questionable labor practices dragged out in public view.

Some commentators claim that game developers need unions because the demand for jobs is greater than the supply. This is utterly laughable.

Perhaps the supply of developer jobs at the companies undergoing layoffs is lower than demand, but that doesn’t mean demand from consumers for new games isn’t overwhelming. Video games generate more revenue worldwide than books, movies, and music combined, and the rate of growth is still climbing. As that growth continues, so will demand for experienced developers. Those let go will surely not lack for jobs down the line.

There are also no competition concerns in the video game industry. Countless individuals and companies worldwide are in the routine process of developing an endless stream of titles for consumers that spent over $40 billion on video games in 2018 alone. That means there’s a near-endless supply of jobs created in the processs of meeting that demand.

Certainly, these laid-off workers can’t work for the companies that let them go anymore. But even if they can’t find work at a similar company, the barrier to entry into the video game business is practically non-existant, and many of these workers can and will go on to start new companies and develop new titles. They definitely won’t all be world-beaters like Minecraft. But in this diverse marketplace, many if not most of these developers are perfectly capable of creating games with a niche fan base that allow them to do it full time.

But what about the workers that remain? What about the ones that want to keep their job but feel they’re being mistreated? There are no obstacles to unionization at video game companies like EA or Activision/Blizzard that one wouldn’t find at any other company. Despite this, efforts to unionize rank-and-file game developers have thus far failed.

The lack of appetite for unionization is understandable. Game developers can more easily change jobs or strike out on their own than most workers, and are also among the highest paid in the country. The average salary at Activision/Blizzard, one of the companies that laid off the most staff, is over $93,000 per year. These workers might see a union as an excessive solution to their grievances.

Regardless, many commentators have pointed to executives at these companies making ten or one hundred times more than workers as proof of an imbalance of power. An imbalance of power certainly does exist, but not there.

Consumers hold almost all the power in the video games industry. The success of titles made by indy developers like Shovel Knight and the relative failure of Triple-A titles like Anthem and Battlefront 2 is the result of consumers voting with their wallets. Gamers have made it clear they want quality games made by skilled, passionate developers allowed to fulfill their creative potential.

Executives must meet these demands or suffer the consequences. Granted, that puts their employees lower on their priority list, but the supremacy of the consumer also means that those employees can almost always find a segment of the market that is hungry for their original games, even if they didn’t spend $100 million to make it.

These workers are already empowered, but not by unions that are only interested in expanding their own power. These workers are empowered by a market where they’re free to make and sell games and the gamers eager to buy them.