A Tech Workers’ Bill of Rights
Last updated 16 Dec 2020
Technology wields immense power. It fosters connection, creativity, and curiosity across the globe. Alongside the human connections fostered through tech, however, we see tech companies abusing privacy, reproducing inequality, surveilling already over-policed communities, exploiting workers and the environment, and stoking hatred and violence in our world. It is vital that workers gain the ability to shape the products we build and the work we do.
As tech workers, we represent a range of job roles, work environments, and salary levels. We are the creative, technology, academic, and office workers who deserve a say in the products and services we build. We are warehouse workers facing dangerously inadequate workplace safety protocols. We are customer service representatives squeezed to work more and more hours with insufficient pay and benefits. We are part time, gig and contract workers of all kinds who want to to protect our livelihoods in a highly competitive landscape.
The Tech Workers’ Bill of Rights aims to protect and support everyone under the tech industry umbrella, no matter their job level or title, income, education, background or life experience. Additionally, in an industry where leadership is overwhelmingly homogenous, we strive to amplify the voices of the most vulnerable and oftentimes most invisible workers in this industry.
We commit to prioritizing the voices of those workers who have been marginalized within the tech industry through discrimination based on gender or gender presentation, race, class, age, ability, personal beliefs, immigration status, sexual orientation, neurodiversity and other differences.
The Tech Workers’ Bill of Rights is undergirded by the core values of equity, empowerment, representation accountability, safety, autonomy, fairness, and freedom. Through our Bill of Rights we not only commit to upholding these values, but also to building a more just and equitable future for all tech workers.
Equity
Workers deserve fair and inclusive work environments free from all discrimination. Workers have the right to a harassment-free workplace regardless of race, class, age, ability, personal beliefs, immigration status, sexual orientation, neurodiversity or any other differences. Employers should provide accommodations for workers with disabilities and should work towards creating a diverse and inclusive workplace.
Empowerment
Workers should have input in decision making around their working conditions. Changes in working conditions should not solely be decided by and handed down from the top. Workers should have meaningful input and be included in discussions when working conditions change. This could include but is not limited to, working hours, office/remote conditions, equity, paid time off, benefits, and contracts.
Representation
Workers should have a meaningful say in business decisions, including company strategy and ethical standards. Our responsibility in the tech industry should be to people, communities, and the environment rather than solely to profit. This means that workers should have the protected right to individually and collectively raise concerns about products, initiatives, features, or their intended use that is, in their considered view, unethical.
Accountability
Workers deserve equality and transparency when it comes to hirings, firings, and Human Resource (HR) practices. Workers should have full transparency into hiring practices, employee evaluations, promotions and raises, HR processes (including processes around sexual, racial, and other forms of harassment and discrimination), and salary and benefits, including executive salary and benefits. All workers deserve due process before firing, to know if they are on a performance improvement plan, and the ability to raise questions, concerns, and counterpoints. Workers deserve full transparency and upfront communication when it comes to decisions around restructuring and layoffs.
Safety
Workers have the right to safe working conditions. Workers have the right to a physically and emotionally safe and accessible work environment, with, at minimum, an office space compliant with commonly accepted accessibility practices. Workers have the right to work in a cooperative environment that does not pit workers against one another. If workers feel unsafe coming into the office, employers should make every effort to allow them to work remotely. Workers should be free from overly-broad non-disclosure agreements that silence victims and hide unsafe workplace conditions.
Fairness
Workers deserve equal pay for equal work. Workers should be paid at least a living wage for their work, without regard to any discriminating personal attribute such as those mentioned above. Workers should be free to discuss their compensation with their coworkers without fear of repercussion. Workers have the right to full transparency around promotions and raises, and explicit criteria to achieve them. Regardless of job classification, whether full-time or independent contractor, on-site or remote, workers are entitled to fair and equitable pay and working conditions and should be compensated for any excessive hours worked.
Freedom
Workers should be free to express themselves, dissent, and organize without fear of repercussion or retaliation. Workers have the right to a workplace that is free of retaliation from management or other employees. Regardless of employment status, workers deserve the ability to freely discuss salary and benefits, job security in the face of disagreement, input into employment contracts, and equal protections for organizing. Employers should not conduct active, targeted monitoring of communication between workers. Workers should be free to speak about their lived experiences, without the restrictions of non-disparagement clauses. Workers should never be forced into mandatory arbitration, so as to retain their full legal rights.The Tech Workers’ Bill of Rights is endorsed by:
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