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> Reading this, I'm so glad that in all of the EU it is illegal to fire someone purely based on a software decision. Why do people treat working for a company

> Reading this, I'm so glad that in all of the EU it is illegal to fire someone purely based on a software decision. Why do people treat working for a company as something different from selling any other services or goods? If there was a law that limited your ability to cancel a gym membership or going to a different supermarket, you would rightfully object — it's not a government's business to get involved in your voluntary business transactions. Why treat a company that hires workers differently?

kleiba 5y ago
Your limited ability to cancel a gym membership is an important part of any gym's business model, at least where I live: it bets on people's impulse decision (say, at the beginning of a new year) to get in shape, a desire which often tapers off after a few weeks or months. But if your gym contract has a minimum duration of, say, two years, whether you go there or not, you pay.
kleiba 5y ago
The way it is commonly seen is that workers deserve special protection through the law to make up for the inherent power imbalance between those who employ and those who are employed.
- sneak 5y ago
  This is often repeated, but I don't understand it. What power imbalance? The ability to offer a job is only a power over a worker if the worker has no other options for jobs, which is only the case in a company town or something like that. Then the company gets to decide if the worker starves or not. The labor market in the US is highly liquid, even for unskilled workers. This described power imbalance simply does not exist.
  - _Algernon_ 5y ago
    >The labor market in the US is highly liquid, even for unskilled workers. This described power imbalance simply does not exist. Yes it does. See Amazon preventing workers from unionising.
  - Yoric 5y ago
    I'm not familiar enough with the situation in the US to comment for what's happening on your side of the ocean. In my country, there are laws to protect both sides. Unless an agreement is negotiated, the employee cannot leave without giving a ~2 months notice, the employer cannot fire/layoff withing giving a ~2 months notice. In many cases, though, there is a strong power imbalance. If, for some reason, you decide to sue your (former) employer, or if your (former) employer decides to sue you, you most likely cannot afford the same budget for lawyering up as they can. Also, your main power against your employer (besides possibly unions) is, as you mention, the ability to change job, but that only works when changing job is possible. Both for highly skilled positions and unskilled positions, getting a new job is hard and may require you to move to a new place - something that you may not be able to do if you have children or a working spouse. As anecdotal examples, I know former C*Os of influential companies who have been working make up jobs for several years because they cannot find anything matching their skills, even at much reduced salaries. I know burnt out teachers who do not leave their jobs because nothing matches their skills. I have several friends in IT, or in admin positions, or with lawyer degrees who just cannot find anything or could not find anything for years because they happen to live in the wrong place and cannot leave because that would cost their spouse a job or they would abandon elders, etc. Having myself changed (HN-style) jobs a few times, I can confirm that it's long and certainly not easy, in particular when you also need, at the same time, to care for a young child, or a sick family member, or when you're burnt out, or depressed by a personal crisis, or by the rejections you encounter from potential employers, or by the institutional bullying on unemployed people. I imagine it's even harder as you get older - I'm not looking forward to be labelled too-old-for-HN-style-jobs. All of that is in a G7 country whose unemployment rate is decreasing. Testimonies from friends in neighbouring countries make me feel that it's even worse in many places. Testimonies from friends in the US make me feel it's not as rosy as you describe, at least not in all fields/regions. So... yeah, I believe that there is a power imbalance. You may be in a field and/or location in which you do not witness it, and if this is your case, I'm happy for you. But for many people, it exists.
    - golergka 5y ago
      This: > the employer cannot fire/layoff withing giving a ~2 months notice. Leads to this: > Both for highly skilled positions and unskilled positions, getting a new job is hard
- golergka 5y ago
  I heard this reasoning a lot. I understand logic and intent behind it — certainly a noble one. But I think that it is incorrect because it ignores unintended consequences, like the story with award for catching cobras in India. You're shifting the power balance in an artificial way that doesn't fully change it. You're only shifting it in one particular market; this power balance still exists in other countries. Which creates a potential for arbitrage: instead of hiring people in a country which enacts those measures, hire them elsewhere. You're also not exactly making the employee "more powerful"; you're actually limiting his freedom on the market. You're making his services more expensive to a buyer, and he can do nothing about it. He might have wanted to offer his services at a discount to get an edge above competitors who have more experience, for example; now he's unable to. Do you really think that limiting someone's freedom is empowering? That's how you get 2x salaries for engineers in US as compared to Europe, which leads to many brilliant engineers leaving Europe for US (or working remotely), which, with higher commitment requirement, contributes to the difference in startup scene between Europe and US. Of course, engineers are not the type of workers whom do you think about in such a conversation, but this happens in many other industries as well.
menzoic 5y ago
You can't compare selling goods to employing people in that way. Consider the fact that there are humans on both sides. Businesses can use their power to abuse employees in a way that can't be done to goods. If you are the main source of income for a person, you have massive influence over them. Government creates laws to balance the power. There are countless cases of abuse by employers including physical and sexual. Very different from selling goods or having a gym membership.
oblio 5y ago
Because a company has tens, hundreds or thousands of employees. Employees generally have 1 job (at a time) and 1 career. It's really hard for an employee to screw over a company for good and trivial for companies to completely destroy an employee's career and life. The asymmetry needs to be counterbalanced actively, especially since companies can have people on their payroll 24/7 to fight for more company rights. Employees can't afford that.
herbst 5y ago
I personally don't care, but for all the people living from paycheck to paycheck in a low wage job this is the bare minimum of security they would want from their job. It's important to note that the company gets help from the state shouldn't they be able to pay their workers. So it's not only enforced on the employers but backed by the state
pjc50 5y ago
Humans are humans. Companies are not humans.
dtech 5y ago
A gym deciding to cancel someones membership is a minor nuisance for them, a company deciding to fire someone has potentially life-changing consequences. Remember that for you as - I am assuming - an IT professional getting a new job is easy, for lots of professions not so much.
jhoechtl 5y ago
In many EU jurisdictions being employed means you owe the employer the willingness to accomplish a result not the actual result. Germany is known that once you are in an active work relationship its difficult to get fired. So yes, there is a difference as it is generally frowned upon these days to call people a resource which implies an interchangeable unit of work force.
dougmwne 5y ago
First of all, have an upvote, which is both the agree and disagree button, as long as a person contributes to the conversation. Next, I think you are contributing, because companies really, truly operate as if people were flesh robots and your perspective, rather than being trolling, is actually dominant in corporations. Thirdly, that you could potentially have accepted the narrative that we are fleshbots, ready for exploitation, no different than any other raw material and not needing any more care or consideration than cattle or cotton says something deeply disturbing things about the state of humanism.
- Yoric 5y ago
  > First of all, have an upvote, which is both the agree and disagree button, as long as a person contributes to the conversation. It's a shame that HN makes no difference between "what you're writing has no place here" and "I disagree with you" I remember discussing with people who were experimenting with this kind of mechanism for comments on newspaper websites, but I believe that this hasn't had much success.
tremon 5y ago
What a weird question. I could similarly ask, why do people treat employing workers as something different from animal husbandry? If there was a law that limited your ability to ship, cage or breed your workers like you do cattle, you would rightfully object -- it's not a government's business to get involved in your voluntary business transactions. Why treat a company that employs workers differently from a company that employs cattle? Your question has as much relevance to the question at hand as mine.
- Sharlin 5y ago
  To be fair, livestock do not consent to being livestock.
- golergka 5y ago
  Because humans deserve the right to freedom to accept or deny any voluntary contract. Which legislation that we're talking about is directly infringing on. Just as people should be able to not accept having being treated like cattle, they should be able to accept any form of employment contract if they so choose: it is exactly the same issue.
pitkali 5y ago
Probably because people's livelihoods depend on employment and they have much less power on the markets as individuals than companies.

kleiba 5y ago

Your limited ability to cancel a gym membership is an important part of any gym's business model, at least where I live: it bets on people's impulse decision (say, at the beginning of a new year) to get in shape, a desire which often tapers off after a few weeks or months. But if your gym contract has a minimum duration of, say, two years, whether you go there or not, you pay.

kleiba 5y ago

The way it is commonly seen is that workers deserve special protection through the law to make up for the inherent power imbalance between those who employ and those who are employed.

sneak 5y ago
This is often repeated, but I don't understand it. What power imbalance? The ability to offer a job is only a power over a worker if the worker has no other options for jobs, which is only the case in a company town or something like that. Then the company gets to decide if the worker starves or not. The labor market in the US is highly liquid, even for unskilled workers. This described power imbalance simply does not exist.
- _Algernon_ 5y ago
  >The labor market in the US is highly liquid, even for unskilled workers. This described power imbalance simply does not exist. Yes it does. See Amazon preventing workers from unionising.
- Yoric 5y ago
  I'm not familiar enough with the situation in the US to comment for what's happening on your side of the ocean. In my country, there are laws to protect both sides. Unless an agreement is negotiated, the employee cannot leave without giving a ~2 months notice, the employer cannot fire/layoff withing giving a ~2 months notice. In many cases, though, there is a strong power imbalance. If, for some reason, you decide to sue your (former) employer, or if your (former) employer decides to sue you, you most likely cannot afford the same budget for lawyering up as they can. Also, your main power against your employer (besides possibly unions) is, as you mention, the ability to change job, but that only works when changing job is possible. Both for highly skilled positions and unskilled positions, getting a new job is hard and may require you to move to a new place - something that you may not be able to do if you have children or a working spouse. As anecdotal examples, I know former C*Os of influential companies who have been working make up jobs for several years because they cannot find anything matching their skills, even at much reduced salaries. I know burnt out teachers who do not leave their jobs because nothing matches their skills. I have several friends in IT, or in admin positions, or with lawyer degrees who just cannot find anything or could not find anything for years because they happen to live in the wrong place and cannot leave because that would cost their spouse a job or they would abandon elders, etc. Having myself changed (HN-style) jobs a few times, I can confirm that it's long and certainly not easy, in particular when you also need, at the same time, to care for a young child, or a sick family member, or when you're burnt out, or depressed by a personal crisis, or by the rejections you encounter from potential employers, or by the institutional bullying on unemployed people. I imagine it's even harder as you get older - I'm not looking forward to be labelled too-old-for-HN-style-jobs. All of that is in a G7 country whose unemployment rate is decreasing. Testimonies from friends in neighbouring countries make me feel that it's even worse in many places. Testimonies from friends in the US make me feel it's not as rosy as you describe, at least not in all fields/regions. So... yeah, I believe that there is a power imbalance. You may be in a field and/or location in which you do not witness it, and if this is your case, I'm happy for you. But for many people, it exists.
  - golergka 5y ago
    This: > the employer cannot fire/layoff withing giving a ~2 months notice. Leads to this: > Both for highly skilled positions and unskilled positions, getting a new job is hard
golergka 5y ago
I heard this reasoning a lot. I understand logic and intent behind it — certainly a noble one. But I think that it is incorrect because it ignores unintended consequences, like the story with award for catching cobras in India. You're shifting the power balance in an artificial way that doesn't fully change it. You're only shifting it in one particular market; this power balance still exists in other countries. Which creates a potential for arbitrage: instead of hiring people in a country which enacts those measures, hire them elsewhere. You're also not exactly making the employee "more powerful"; you're actually limiting his freedom on the market. You're making his services more expensive to a buyer, and he can do nothing about it. He might have wanted to offer his services at a discount to get an edge above competitors who have more experience, for example; now he's unable to. Do you really think that limiting someone's freedom is empowering? That's how you get 2x salaries for engineers in US as compared to Europe, which leads to many brilliant engineers leaving Europe for US (or working remotely), which, with higher commitment requirement, contributes to the difference in startup scene between Europe and US. Of course, engineers are not the type of workers whom do you think about in such a conversation, but this happens in many other industries as well.

menzoic 5y ago

You can't compare selling goods to employing people in that way. Consider the fact that there are humans on both sides. Businesses can use their power to abuse employees in a way that can't be done to goods. If you are the main source of income for a person, you have massive influence over them. Government creates laws to balance the power. There are countless cases of abuse by employers including physical and sexual. Very different from selling goods or having a gym membership.

oblio 5y ago

Because a company has tens, hundreds or thousands of employees. Employees generally have 1 job (at a time) and 1 career. It's really hard for an employee to screw over a company for good and trivial for companies to completely destroy an employee's career and life. The asymmetry needs to be counterbalanced actively, especially since companies can have people on their payroll 24/7 to fight for more company rights. Employees can't afford that.

herbst 5y ago

I personally don't care, but for all the people living from paycheck to paycheck in a low wage job this is the bare minimum of security they would want from their job. It's important to note that the company gets help from the state shouldn't they be able to pay their workers. So it's not only enforced on the employers but backed by the state

pjc50 5y ago

Humans are humans. Companies are not humans.

dtech 5y ago

A gym deciding to cancel someones membership is a minor nuisance for them, a company deciding to fire someone has potentially life-changing consequences. Remember that for you as - I am assuming - an IT professional getting a new job is easy, for lots of professions not so much.

jhoechtl 5y ago

In many EU jurisdictions being employed means you owe the employer the willingness to accomplish a result not the actual result. Germany is known that once you are in an active work relationship its difficult to get fired. So yes, there is a difference as it is generally frowned upon these days to call people a resource which implies an interchangeable unit of work force.

dougmwne 5y ago

First of all, have an upvote, which is both the agree and disagree button, as long as a person contributes to the conversation. Next, I think you are contributing, because companies really, truly operate as if people were flesh robots and your perspective, rather than being trolling, is actually dominant in corporations. Thirdly, that you could potentially have accepted the narrative that we are fleshbots, ready for exploitation, no different than any other raw material and not needing any more care or consideration than cattle or cotton says something deeply disturbing things about the state of humanism.

Yoric 5y ago
> First of all, have an upvote, which is both the agree and disagree button, as long as a person contributes to the conversation. It's a shame that HN makes no difference between "what you're writing has no place here" and "I disagree with you" I remember discussing with people who were experimenting with this kind of mechanism for comments on newspaper websites, but I believe that this hasn't had much success.

tremon 5y ago

What a weird question. I could similarly ask, why do people treat employing workers as something different from animal husbandry? If there was a law that limited your ability to ship, cage or breed your workers like you do cattle, you would rightfully object -- it's not a government's business to get involved in your voluntary business transactions. Why treat a company that employs workers differently from a company that employs cattle? Your question has as much relevance to the question at hand as mine.

Sharlin 5y ago
To be fair, livestock do not consent to being livestock.
golergka 5y ago
Because humans deserve the right to freedom to accept or deny any voluntary contract. Which legislation that we're talking about is directly infringing on. Just as people should be able to not accept having being treated like cattle, they should be able to accept any form of employment contract if they so choose: it is exactly the same issue.

pitkali 5y ago

Probably because people's livelihoods depend on employment and they have much less power on the markets as individuals than companies.