6 ms·

Tesla workers speak out: 'Anything pro-union is shut down really fast'

72 points by SmkyMt 8y ago

dmix 8y ago
Not surprising... the opposite would be the exception, this is pretty much the rule in 2018.
- opencl 8y ago
  The US auto industry still has a pretty significant union presence, especially the US-based companies that aren't Tesla. The UAW has ~430k members[1] out of the ~950k total US auto manufacturing workforce[2]. Most of the foreign companies building cars in the US are quite anti-union though. Somewhat ironically the building that is currently Tesla's factory used to be Toyota's only unionized factory. [1] https://uaw.org/uaw-grows-almost-15000-new-members-2017-75000-new-members-since-2009/ https://uaw.org/uaw-grows-almost-15000-new-members-2017-7500... [2] https://www.bls.gov/iag/tgs/iagauto.htm https://www.bls.gov/iag/tgs/iagauto.htm
  - TarpitCarnivore 8y ago
    > Most of the foreign companies building cars in the US are quite anti-union though I would assume this is because of different protected worker rights in the EU vs US. So they probably try to employ similar steps here.
  - masonic 8y ago
    Toyota's only unionized factory To my knowledge, every Toyota factory in Japan is unionized.
    - opencl 8y ago
      Yes, I should have been more specific. Only unionized factory in the US. Japan and Germany both have heavily unionized domestic auto manufacturing workforces, it's just their factories in the US that don't.
rjplatte 8y ago
"Speaking Out" against standard practice, and getting the ear of a reporter because your company makes headlines more often. Yay.
fisherjeff 8y ago
> He added that management quickly finds reasons to fire employees who tout their efforts to form a union and those who are fired are pushed to sign non-disclosure agreements before receiving their last paycheck. I’d hope this is just a misunderstanding of the facts or something, because wow that last part’s just horrifying.
- ABCLAW 8y ago
  This is fairly common. Most severance payments are settlements, of which the first offer is made by the company. Employees can refuse the settlement, then sue their former employer under various wrongful dismissal/common law severance heads, but that requires getting a lawyer, and lawyers are generally more expensive than the few extra months of wages you'll get back. The cost of getting justice is used to scalp workers for a month or two of earnings all the time. ... Unless you were sexually assaulted and offered peanuts, or recorded your immediate supervisor threatening you with physical harm or something. Then lawyering up pays off.
  - fisherjeff 8y ago
    I’m hoping that’s the misunderstanding: Severance != last paycheck.
  - pasbesoin 8y ago
    When/as more and more employees are paid to / held to a standard that keeps them a paycheck or two from insolvency, these mandated non-disclosure/-disparagement/-right-to-sue agreement, in return for severance pay/benefits, have taken on increasing pressure and importance. People in "the tech world" may not experience nor realize the immediate existential threat many people live under, with a job loss. These become another way in which "corporate America" is essentially stifling free speech and individuals' rights. Corporations lobbied heavily to be able to spend unlimited amounts in political campaigns. But, they won't let their workers say a word -- not even about their own direct life experiences.
- danharaj 8y ago
  Wage theft in the US is measured in billions of dollars per year. Imagine what other abuses that aren't so flagrant and easy to quantify proliferate.
java_script 8y ago
If I were a shareholder I'd advise Elon to do something truly epic to distract from this. Like what if instead of the rainbow road easter egg they added a bacon road?
yalph 8y ago
I am progressive as it gets but living in NY and witnessing the current state of MTA plus attitude of other union workers my ideas about unions has changed completely. We have to find better ways to protect our workers without letting them abuse the system.
- guitarbill 8y ago
  Has anyone here as part of their job had to work with a union? My interactions have also been... challenging at best, with a lot of red tape. I chalked it up to a one-off bad experience, but wondering now if it's more common.
- anothergoogler 8y ago
  The article doesn't say anything about NYC or the MTA, did you even read it, or are you replying to the words "pro-union" in the submission title?
  - yalph 8y ago
    Since when discussions on a HN thread are limited to the keyword on an article? It seems like you are the one who did not understand the context of the article. My comment is about relevancy of unions in our day. I apologize if everyone else thinks my comment was off topic.
    - noobermin 8y ago
      Imagine criticizing coffee shops as a whole because you got bad coffee at a starbucks. Is there something inherent to unions that make them generally bad? BTW, the issues with the NY subway have little to do with the TWU and more to do with mismanagement by Cuomo.
    - anothergoogler 8y ago
      Your comment is lazy. You saw "pro-union" in the submission title and delivered a canned anti-union reply. It's discouraging that you've misinterpreted my single-sentence comment and inverted its meaning in your reply just now, but I trust that you can persist through the entire article submission and formulate a relevant reply, if you are motivated to do so.
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
Pica_soO 8y ago
They should try the german solution- have two elected union members in board seats and a part of the company owned by the union.
0max 8y ago
I bet you could get sacked from Tesla for even mentioning the Union of Myanmar
erikpukinskis 8y ago
Shitty if true. If Tesla is anti-union, and they have every right to be, they can just fire people who strike. Firing them before they strike is not ok.
- 394549 8y ago
  > If Tesla is anti-union... they can just fire people who strike. I'm not so sure, it seems like they can't in many circumstances: https://blogs.findlaw.com/law_and_life/2014/10/can-you-be-fired-for-going-on-strike.html https://blogs.findlaw.com/law_and_life/2014/10/can-you-be-fi...
  - erikpukinskis 8y ago
    Weird. So I could get a job and then just hang out outside “striking” and not work and still get paid and they can never fire me? I don’t understand the laws here.
    - 394549 8y ago
      > Weird. So I could get a job and then just hang out outside “striking” and not work and still get paid and they can never fire me? Striking workers don't get paid by the employer while they're striking. That's why unions have "strike funds" -- to keep striking members financially solvent while they strike. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strike_pay https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strike_pay > I don’t understand the laws here. They're meant to protect the rights of employees to strike. If companies were allowed to fire union members just because they're participate in union activities (like strikes), it'd be trivial for management to break union power for the low wage/low skill jobs that most need unions.
      - erikpukinskis 8y ago
        I see. Well in that case it seems like Tesla can just wait for a strike, hire more workers to replace the ones who are striking while keeping the strikers on the books without pay, and then if the strikers ask for their shifts back, just phase them in, while also doing rolling layoffs to get rid of unnecessary workers (strikers or new hires depending on who has the lowest performance). Then unions could defeat this by doing rhythmic striking, but I think Tesla might be in their rights to fire a worker who is repeatedly striking in a systematic way to interfere with Tesla’s hiring.

72 points by SmkyMt 8y ago

dmix 8y ago

Not surprising... the opposite would be the exception, this is pretty much the rule in 2018.

opencl 8y ago
The US auto industry still has a pretty significant union presence, especially the US-based companies that aren't Tesla. The UAW has ~430k members[1] out of the ~950k total US auto manufacturing workforce[2]. Most of the foreign companies building cars in the US are quite anti-union though. Somewhat ironically the building that is currently Tesla's factory used to be Toyota's only unionized factory. [1] https://uaw.org/uaw-grows-almost-15000-new-members-2017-75000-new-members-since-2009/ https://uaw.org/uaw-grows-almost-15000-new-members-2017-7500... [2] https://www.bls.gov/iag/tgs/iagauto.htm https://www.bls.gov/iag/tgs/iagauto.htm
- TarpitCarnivore 8y ago
  > Most of the foreign companies building cars in the US are quite anti-union though I would assume this is because of different protected worker rights in the EU vs US. So they probably try to employ similar steps here.
- masonic 8y ago
  Toyota's only unionized factory To my knowledge, every Toyota factory in Japan is unionized.
  - opencl 8y ago
    Yes, I should have been more specific. Only unionized factory in the US. Japan and Germany both have heavily unionized domestic auto manufacturing workforces, it's just their factories in the US that don't.

rjplatte 8y ago

"Speaking Out" against standard practice, and getting the ear of a reporter because your company makes headlines more often. Yay.

fisherjeff 8y ago

> He added that management quickly finds reasons to fire employees who tout their efforts to form a union and those who are fired are pushed to sign non-disclosure agreements before receiving their last paycheck. I’d hope this is just a misunderstanding of the facts or something, because wow that last part’s just horrifying.

ABCLAW 8y ago
This is fairly common. Most severance payments are settlements, of which the first offer is made by the company. Employees can refuse the settlement, then sue their former employer under various wrongful dismissal/common law severance heads, but that requires getting a lawyer, and lawyers are generally more expensive than the few extra months of wages you'll get back. The cost of getting justice is used to scalp workers for a month or two of earnings all the time. ... Unless you were sexually assaulted and offered peanuts, or recorded your immediate supervisor threatening you with physical harm or something. Then lawyering up pays off.
- fisherjeff 8y ago
  I’m hoping that’s the misunderstanding: Severance != last paycheck.
- pasbesoin 8y ago
  When/as more and more employees are paid to / held to a standard that keeps them a paycheck or two from insolvency, these mandated non-disclosure/-disparagement/-right-to-sue agreement, in return for severance pay/benefits, have taken on increasing pressure and importance. People in "the tech world" may not experience nor realize the immediate existential threat many people live under, with a job loss. These become another way in which "corporate America" is essentially stifling free speech and individuals' rights. Corporations lobbied heavily to be able to spend unlimited amounts in political campaigns. But, they won't let their workers say a word -- not even about their own direct life experiences.
danharaj 8y ago
Wage theft in the US is measured in billions of dollars per year. Imagine what other abuses that aren't so flagrant and easy to quantify proliferate.

java_script 8y ago

If I were a shareholder I'd advise Elon to do something truly epic to distract from this. Like what if instead of the rainbow road easter egg they added a bacon road?

yalph 8y ago

I am progressive as it gets but living in NY and witnessing the current state of MTA plus attitude of other union workers my ideas about unions has changed completely. We have to find better ways to protect our workers without letting them abuse the system.

guitarbill 8y ago
Has anyone here as part of their job had to work with a union? My interactions have also been... challenging at best, with a lot of red tape. I chalked it up to a one-off bad experience, but wondering now if it's more common.
anothergoogler 8y ago
The article doesn't say anything about NYC or the MTA, did you even read it, or are you replying to the words "pro-union" in the submission title?
- yalph 8y ago
  Since when discussions on a HN thread are limited to the keyword on an article? It seems like you are the one who did not understand the context of the article. My comment is about relevancy of unions in our day. I apologize if everyone else thinks my comment was off topic.
  - noobermin 8y ago
    Imagine criticizing coffee shops as a whole because you got bad coffee at a starbucks. Is there something inherent to unions that make them generally bad? BTW, the issues with the NY subway have little to do with the TWU and more to do with mismanagement by Cuomo.
  - anothergoogler 8y ago
    Your comment is lazy. You saw "pro-union" in the submission title and delivered a canned anti-union reply. It's discouraging that you've misinterpreted my single-sentence comment and inverted its meaning in your reply just now, but I trust that you can persist through the entire article submission and formulate a relevant reply, if you are motivated to do so.

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]

Pica_soO 8y ago

They should try the german solution- have two elected union members in board seats and a part of the company owned by the union.

0max 8y ago

I bet you could get sacked from Tesla for even mentioning the Union of Myanmar

erikpukinskis 8y ago

Shitty if true. If Tesla is anti-union, and they have every right to be, they can just fire people who strike. Firing them before they strike is not ok.

394549 8y ago
> If Tesla is anti-union... they can just fire people who strike. I'm not so sure, it seems like they can't in many circumstances: https://blogs.findlaw.com/law_and_life/2014/10/can-you-be-fired-for-going-on-strike.html https://blogs.findlaw.com/law_and_life/2014/10/can-you-be-fi...
- erikpukinskis 8y ago
  Weird. So I could get a job and then just hang out outside “striking” and not work and still get paid and they can never fire me? I don’t understand the laws here.
  - 394549 8y ago
    > Weird. So I could get a job and then just hang out outside “striking” and not work and still get paid and they can never fire me? Striking workers don't get paid by the employer while they're striking. That's why unions have "strike funds" -- to keep striking members financially solvent while they strike. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strike_pay https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strike_pay > I don’t understand the laws here. They're meant to protect the rights of employees to strike. If companies were allowed to fire union members just because they're participate in union activities (like strikes), it'd be trivial for management to break union power for the low wage/low skill jobs that most need unions.
    - erikpukinskis 8y ago
      I see. Well in that case it seems like Tesla can just wait for a strike, hire more workers to replace the ones who are striking while keeping the strikers on the books without pay, and then if the strikers ask for their shifts back, just phase them in, while also doing rolling layoffs to get rid of unnecessary workers (strikers or new hires depending on who has the lowest performance). Then unions could defeat this by doing rhythmic striking, but I think Tesla might be in their rights to fire a worker who is repeatedly striking in a systematic way to interfere with Tesla’s hiring.