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I don't think it should be legal to charge employees for training in any form. Either provide it for free, or don't provide it at all. What possible purpose doe
by c3534l 4y ago
I don't think it should be legal to charge employees for training in any form. Either provide it for free, or don't provide it at all. What possible purpose does putting yourself in the middle as both the lender and beneficiary have other than to fascilitate abuse?
- bushbaba 4y agoSo you don't feel that doctors should pay for their education? What about jobs which require paid certifications? But in general I agree. Keep paid education separate from employment. No good can come from conflating the two.
- c3534l 4y agoThat is such a misrepresentation of what I said I think you might have just misread it or something. They should pay for their education with money. If they can't afford medical school, they can take out a loan. That loan shouldn't be a condition of employment payable to your employer. Like I said, either you should get the training yourself or the employer should provide it.
- derbOac 4y agoWhat's interesting is that medical residencies in the US have involved similar controversies as highlighted by the piece that's the focus of this thread. Residents are not allowed to leave their residencies, under threat of being banned from the matching process that's required to enter one. The criticism is this leads to all sorts of abuse from programs, because unhappy residents can't transfer. This is despite the fact residencies are often federally funded, and the residents have already taken out large educational loans for medical school.
- molotovh 4y agoEducation and job training are not the same thing. Education in a field is general knowledge needed to perform in the field regardless of employer. Job training is learning the specific knowledge needed to perform a specific position for a specific employer, including their SOPs, policies, etc.
- throwaway743 4y agoNo, they shouldn't. Higher education should be accessible to all. If the "higher taxes" argument is what's implied, the return on an educated populace would show in GDP, likely reflect in lower crime rates, improvements in quality of life, among other things.
- daniel-cussen 4y agoThen what do people mean when they say that education is higher education? Obviously it means higher than most everyone else.
- throwaway743 4y agoThen what do people mean when they say "HIGH school"? Does that mean they're above others? Joking but what're you getting at? I'm not about playing semantics out of pettiness. My point is that if "post high school" education (aka university) is accessible to/an option for everyone, then everyone benefits, from the individual, to their community, all the way up to GDP/tax dollars. It's not a bullshit blue vs white collar "culture war" talking point, it's a matter of everyone having the same shot at furthering their education via university regardless of whatever their income is/their living situation/what family they were born into.
- nottorp 4y ago> So you don't feel that doctors should pay for their education? Some HN readers do live in countries where higher education is free ish.
- Broken_Hippo 4y agoThis. And when it isn't, everyone suffers. When it is low-cost to free, you get folks that want to be doctors and qualify. When it costs more than a nominal fee, you take those folks and sort them by whoever can afford it, which may not be the best candidates. It also makes it more of an "elite" profession since poor folks are priced out of it. By free, I do mean low-cost to free for the student and funded by taxpayers. Educated people benefit society at large, and especially so when folks are doing public service of different sorts (like doctors).
- kube-system 4y agoI think it could make sense to lower barriers to entry for some highly specialized vocations, like ones that require third party certifications. Especially in times when the job market is not as hot as it is now. In this market, the only explanation for TRAPs seems to be exploitation.
- tbrownaw 4y agoMy employer has a tuition reimbursement program. IIRC it has clawback if you leave within like 6 months. This is obviously different in that it's entirely optional, and relatively sane rates (whatever the real university decides). But because of that clawback I could maybe see it getting caught up in a carelessly written ban.
- wombatpm 4y agoI was at a fortune 300 company that had that. They would routinely WFR the recent MBA grads who were then free and clear of any obligations. Surprise surprise they are no longer a Fortune 500 company
- thr0wawayf00 4y agoIt would be one thing if the clawback is at least fairly itemized and clearly stated up front. What's appalling about these stories is that the dollar amount is completely arbitrary and determined after the employee signs on. I passed on a job opportunity early on in my career because there was a clawback provision in my employment agreement that was very transparent and yet very brutal. I couldn't imagine taking that job and being entrapped by that clawback provision after I'd started.
- UncleEntity 4y agoStuff like truck driving school is expensive. If only people who could pay up front could get a license to drive a truck there would be a lot less truck drivers and stuff wouldn’t get moved around so you can have next day delivery on non-essential goods. Sure, they could change the requirements to make it easier for someone to drive around in a 80,000lbs death machine but is that in anyone’s best interest? What the companies do is put you through enough training to get your license, more training on top of that and stay with them for a year or you have to pay whatever they say it costs[0] for the training. All in all it’s a working system. [0] as spelled out in a contract but really has nothing to do with what it costs to train a person. The company I currently work for has this racket where owner/operators pay the trainees’ wages (along with every other expense to operate the truck) during on the job training for the most part and are pretty aggressive trying to get people to train the new drivers. Annoyingly aggressive.
- Broken_Hippo 4y agoThe system would work if we simply provided low-cost schooling (taxpayer funded). It would keep folks from winding up with a predatory company who may or may not train you well, merely enough. You don't need to make the requirements easier - just lower the barrier to entry in a different way. Not to mention that having enough well-rested folks with a CDL means that everyone is a little more secure, and we are more likely to have enough people to drive busses and transport goods in emergencies. (Yes, I know it'll take more than lowering the schooling costs to fix all this, but it is a start)
- s1k3 4y agoI don’t want to pay for someone else’s schooling.
- goosedragons 4y agoI don't want to pay for roads to your house. I don't go there so I'm not sure why MY valuable tax dollars were wasted on it.
- sokoloff 4y agoPilot training is quite expensive. Getting the 1500 hours of flight experience required to hold an Airline Transport Pilot certificate is even more expensive. It seems like situations like this are ones where "we'll agree to pay $25K for your training and you agree to work for us for two years" is reasonable, particularly since the training costs are generally deductible for the employer, but are often not for the employee.
- alistairSH 4y agoThere are a few differences... - Pilot training comes with a certification for the person that applies to any pilot job. - Pilot training is usually provided by a certified training organization and follows an industry-established curriculum. - The price of the training is discoverable in advance and there is a competitive market for providing the training. Whereas the PetSmart program comes with no certification, doesn't follow a published industry curriculum, and the price is fixed directly by PetSmart with no ability to obtain the training elsewhere. The pilot training situation may not be ideal, but it's clear to me the PetSmart program exists primarily to lock employees into jobs at PetSmart.
- sokoloff 4y agoI agree. I was responding to a post that said “I don't think it should be legal to charge employees for training in any form.”