7 ms·

To repeat the key info from this case that makes one question the NRLB ruling (from reddit originally): The tweet is https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/998454

To repeat the key info from this case that makes one question the NRLB ruling (from reddit originally): The tweet is https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/998454539941367808 https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/998454539941367808 > Nothing stopping Tesla team at our car plant from voting union. Could do so tmrw if they wanted. But why pay union dues & give up stock options for nothing? Our safety record is 2X better than when plant was UAW & everybody already gets healthcare. where he is talking about the fact that other companies with the UAW do not have stock options for their employees , which he even clarifies in this next tweet https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/999415738967277568 https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/999415738967277568 > Exactly. UAW does not have individual stock ownership as part of the compensation at any other company. This is apparently "intimidation". And as for the guy fired > In another incident, a union-affiliated worker, Jose Moran, accessed Workday, Tesla's internal HR system, to look up information about an employee who opposed the union. Moran took a screenshot of the other worker's Workday page—which included his name, photo, job title, and other information—and texted it to another union-affiliated employee, Richard Ortiz. Ortiz wound up using the anti-union employee's picture in a post on a private Facebook group for pro-union Tesla employees. > Richard Ortiz was fired after the incident , but because Tesla did not have standing rules against browsing employees' profiles on Workday or screenshotting them , apparently that's not allowed.

mlindner 6y ago
Because of all of the above I disagree with the ruling. While yes Elon's tweet is borderline "intimidation", the guy was fired for very legitimate reasons, taking internal company information about employees and basically doxxing them on facebook. The NLRB shouldn't be defending doxxers.
- URSpider94 6y ago
  He didn’t Dox them - he didn’t publish their home addresses or phone numbers, he merely said “these people testified on behalf of the company at a state hearing.” This is very clearly protected organizing activity, as documented with multiple case citations in the judge’s ruling. In addition, the employee who was fired didn’t access the internal system. Someone else did, and texted him the photos, which he posted. The person who allegedly accessed the system only got a warning. So, if the concern is the improper access of company systems, then they punished the wrong guy.
seoaeu 6y ago
> Richard Ortiz was fired after the incident , but because Tesla did not have standing rules against browsing employees' profiles on Workday or screenshotting them , apparently that's not allowed. The real question is if they'd have been fired for doing that if they weren't a union organizer. And perhaps more importantly, whether you'd be able to convince a judge that looking up co-workers on an internal directory and/or posting about them privately on Facebook is always a firable offense.
- mlindner 6y ago
  I don't quite get that objection though, why do you need stated rules that a certain internal site is internal information? Everything is assumed to be internal information unless stated otherwise. That violates any HR policy anywhere. More so the guy was putting it on facebook to literally get people to stalk the guy. So I'm surprised he didn't get criminal charges.
  - seoaeu 6y ago
    You don't need the rules to know that sharing information from internal sites might be prohibited. You need them to be able to prove that sharing information like this would get somebody fired. The other possibility (which the NLRB seems to believe) is that Tesla normally would have been OK with this sort of sharing or given only a warning, but this time was specifically looking for an excuse to fire the employee.
  - dundarious 6y ago
    Do you have info on the stalking? It is common practice when organizing a union to note the likely strongly anti-union people, to not solicit them, and inform them last of the effort. I say this because I presumed they were just screenshotting the guy's employment photo and name, and posting in the private group, "don't solicit this guy, he might scupper the effort."
    - adolph 6y ago
      Accessing org info for private purposes seems ethically deficient.
gamblor956 6y ago
Union contracts are employer specific (and in some cases, facility specific), and if the Tesla factory workers unionized, they could negotiate for stock grants. The threat was that Tesla would revoke stock option grants if the workforce unionized, or refuse to negotiate over the availability of stock options, which is illegal under current federal labor regulations. No, most other automakers don't offer stock, because the UAW didn't negotiate that with other automakers. However, for most other automakers, (and indeed, outside of tech generally) stock options are not worth much because the stock doesn't appreciate rapidly and it's not worth the administrative burden of issuing/tracking options for share gains in the fractions of a dollar. Most other automakers do allow employees to purchase (actual) shares of company stock out of pre-tax income, which is generally a huge benefit for companies that actually make money and are valued on fundamentals.
- 1996 6y ago
  > Union contracts are employer specific (and in some cases, facility specific), and if the Tesla factory workers unionized, they could negotiate for stock grants If it was my factory, I would cut the stock grant and fire them all - unionized or not - to end a clear message to the other factories: "you only have one job, while I have more than one factory"
  - gamblor956 6y ago
    Which is illegal under decades-old labor laws...
  - astrange 6y ago
    Congratulations on committing the same crime as in the article?
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
  - slumpt_ 6y ago
    This is mind-bendingly ignorant. Read up on US history.
  - 6y ago
sharkjacobs 6y ago
> why pay union dues & give up stock options for nothing? If you don't think that Elon means employees will lose their stock options if they unionize, then what does he mean?
- elliekelly 6y ago
  “It would be a real shame if something were to happen to those stock options once you unionized, wouldn’t it?”
- jcims 6y ago
  The likelihood that the UAW would roll in, start collecting dues and then do nothing with the comp structure seems extremely small.
- npad 6y ago
  I'm taking it to mean union employees wouldn't get new grants. Which makes sense to me - I have a hard time squaring how you can be in a union with an adversarial relationship to management, whilst at the same time being an owner of the company. It's one or the other.
  - mullingitover 6y ago
    Why are these things at odds? It seems like the ideal outcome for the union would be to have a significant ownership stake in the company and share in its success, rather than have an adversarial relationship and drag down profits. Making the company uncompetitive in the market is bad for the union in the long run.
    - koonsolo 6y ago
      Representatives of the union see the world differently. They don't see collaboration on the same goal, they see rich management exploiting employees to get even richer. So it's really an us vs them mentality. Either I get richer, or you get richer. Don't expect these people to start reasoning about making the company they work for competitive. At least this is the case in europe.
lakecresva 6y ago
> To repeat the key info from this case that makes one question the NRLB ruling... These issues (among others) are addressed at length in the NLRB's decision (https://apps.nlrb.gov/link/document.aspx/09031d45833d3fce https://apps.nlrb.gov/link/document.aspx/09031d45833d3fce) which takes into account probably thousands of pages of briefs, witness statements, and legal analysis. The decision itself is only ~50 pages and is readable without a legal background. The section "credibility findings" which starts on page 32 might interest you. The full docket activity page for the case is here (https://www.nlrb.gov/case/32-CA-197020 https://www.nlrb.gov/case/32-CA-197020).

mlindner 6y ago

Because of all of the above I disagree with the ruling. While yes Elon's tweet is borderline "intimidation", the guy was fired for very legitimate reasons, taking internal company information about employees and basically doxxing them on facebook. The NLRB shouldn't be defending doxxers.

URSpider94 6y ago
He didn’t Dox them - he didn’t publish their home addresses or phone numbers, he merely said “these people testified on behalf of the company at a state hearing.” This is very clearly protected organizing activity, as documented with multiple case citations in the judge’s ruling. In addition, the employee who was fired didn’t access the internal system. Someone else did, and texted him the photos, which he posted. The person who allegedly accessed the system only got a warning. So, if the concern is the improper access of company systems, then they punished the wrong guy.

seoaeu 6y ago

> Richard Ortiz was fired after the incident , but because Tesla did not have standing rules against browsing employees' profiles on Workday or screenshotting them , apparently that's not allowed. The real question is if they'd have been fired for doing that if they weren't a union organizer. And perhaps more importantly, whether you'd be able to convince a judge that looking up co-workers on an internal directory and/or posting about them privately on Facebook is always a firable offense.

mlindner 6y ago
I don't quite get that objection though, why do you need stated rules that a certain internal site is internal information? Everything is assumed to be internal information unless stated otherwise. That violates any HR policy anywhere. More so the guy was putting it on facebook to literally get people to stalk the guy. So I'm surprised he didn't get criminal charges.
- seoaeu 6y ago
  You don't need the rules to know that sharing information from internal sites might be prohibited. You need them to be able to prove that sharing information like this would get somebody fired. The other possibility (which the NLRB seems to believe) is that Tesla normally would have been OK with this sort of sharing or given only a warning, but this time was specifically looking for an excuse to fire the employee.
- dundarious 6y ago
  Do you have info on the stalking? It is common practice when organizing a union to note the likely strongly anti-union people, to not solicit them, and inform them last of the effort. I say this because I presumed they were just screenshotting the guy's employment photo and name, and posting in the private group, "don't solicit this guy, he might scupper the effort."
  - adolph 6y ago
    Accessing org info for private purposes seems ethically deficient.

gamblor956 6y ago

Union contracts are employer specific (and in some cases, facility specific), and if the Tesla factory workers unionized, they could negotiate for stock grants. The threat was that Tesla would revoke stock option grants if the workforce unionized, or refuse to negotiate over the availability of stock options, which is illegal under current federal labor regulations. No, most other automakers don't offer stock, because the UAW didn't negotiate that with other automakers. However, for most other automakers, (and indeed, outside of tech generally) stock options are not worth much because the stock doesn't appreciate rapidly and it's not worth the administrative burden of issuing/tracking options for share gains in the fractions of a dollar. Most other automakers do allow employees to purchase (actual) shares of company stock out of pre-tax income, which is generally a huge benefit for companies that actually make money and are valued on fundamentals.

1996 6y ago
> Union contracts are employer specific (and in some cases, facility specific), and if the Tesla factory workers unionized, they could negotiate for stock grants If it was my factory, I would cut the stock grant and fire them all - unionized or not - to end a clear message to the other factories: "you only have one job, while I have more than one factory"
- gamblor956 6y ago
  Which is illegal under decades-old labor laws...
- astrange 6y ago
  Congratulations on committing the same crime as in the article?
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- slumpt_ 6y ago
  This is mind-bendingly ignorant. Read up on US history.
- 6y ago

sharkjacobs 6y ago

> why pay union dues & give up stock options for nothing? If you don't think that Elon means employees will lose their stock options if they unionize, then what does he mean?

elliekelly 6y ago
“It would be a real shame if something were to happen to those stock options once you unionized, wouldn’t it?”
jcims 6y ago
The likelihood that the UAW would roll in, start collecting dues and then do nothing with the comp structure seems extremely small.
npad 6y ago
I'm taking it to mean union employees wouldn't get new grants. Which makes sense to me - I have a hard time squaring how you can be in a union with an adversarial relationship to management, whilst at the same time being an owner of the company. It's one or the other.
- mullingitover 6y ago
  Why are these things at odds? It seems like the ideal outcome for the union would be to have a significant ownership stake in the company and share in its success, rather than have an adversarial relationship and drag down profits. Making the company uncompetitive in the market is bad for the union in the long run.
  - koonsolo 6y ago
    Representatives of the union see the world differently. They don't see collaboration on the same goal, they see rich management exploiting employees to get even richer. So it's really an us vs them mentality. Either I get richer, or you get richer. Don't expect these people to start reasoning about making the company they work for competitive. At least this is the case in europe.

lakecresva 6y ago

> To repeat the key info from this case that makes one question the NRLB ruling... These issues (among others) are addressed at length in the NLRB's decision (https://apps.nlrb.gov/link/document.aspx/09031d45833d3fce https://apps.nlrb.gov/link/document.aspx/09031d45833d3fce) which takes into account probably thousands of pages of briefs, witness statements, and legal analysis. The decision itself is only ~50 pages and is readable without a legal background. The section "credibility findings" which starts on page 32 might interest you. The full docket activity page for the case is here (https://www.nlrb.gov/case/32-CA-197020 https://www.nlrb.gov/case/32-CA-197020).