6 ms·

8 out of 13,000 employees wanted to circulate a letter complaining about Musk's tweets and the Labor board claims they were "illegally" fired over this. Which l

by imgabe 3y ago

8 out of 13,000 employees wanted to circulate a letter complaining about Musk's tweets and the Labor board claims they were "illegally" fired over this. Which law specifically requires employers to permit every employee to spam the company with their personal grievances? This isn't union organization or whistleblowing. They could use a little more detail on how and why they believe this firing is illegal.

pram 3y ago
https://www.nlrb.gov/about-nlrb/rights-we-protect/the-law/employees/concerted-activity https://www.nlrb.gov/about-nlrb/rights-we-protect/the-law/em...
- Dig1t 3y ago
  >You have the right to act with co-workers to address work-related issues How do Musk’s personal statements/opinions outside of work count as work-related issues? Genuinely asking, I don’t understand how these rules are enforced. Apple has locked down internal communications about non work-related topics on internal slack and email in the wake of RTO discussions. If this is grounds for a lawsuit, I think other companies are probably open to these kinds of lawsuits too.
  - mingus88 3y ago
    Applying admin controls to Slack is completely different than firing employees for raising concerns For starters, firing someone introduces legitimate damage and liability for those damages if done illegally But also, firing a group of people who are organizing seems like it will run afoul of union protection laws. And to your first question, Musk’s social media tantrums have caused a lot of collateral damage for his companies. I believe the Tesla board also raised concerns that his Twitter meltdown had negatively impacted Tesla. It’s not hard to see how.
    - aaomidi 3y ago
      Also what Apple is doing isn't necessarily legal either. Just because someone else was speeding on the road and didn't get a ticket, doesn't mean you won't.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  - disclosureacct 3y ago
    > How do Musk’s personal statements/opinions outside of work count as work-related issues? Are the communications from an account listed as their corporate disclosure account?
    - throwaway2037 3y ago
      My guess: The most senior employees (C-suite and close to it) have special responsibilities and legally much great accountability. What a CEO of a public company says on public media (including Twitter/X) has far greater legal consequences for the company and the CEO than someone a few steps below. This is pretty normal for highly developed countries. Note: Responsibilities may change in different countries depending upon if the company is private or public.
      - disclosureacct 3y ago
        Corporations with shareholders must list specific accounts as disclosure accounts; because otherwise sharing insider business related information is unfair insider advantage. When you list a social media account as a disclosure account for a business, it should then be clear that there's liability to all such communications through such account.
        throwaway2037 3y ago
        While this is true regarding disclosures, my post was mostly about Elon Musk saying stupid things on his personal account. These have a far higher legal impact on his businesses and himself that would be for a lower ranked employee.
bboygravity 3y ago
[flagged]
- frob 3y ago
  It would be intesting to see how their payout compares to the payouts going to Reuters [1], the BBC [2], the Guardian [3], the ever-so-anticapitalist WSJ [4], and a few dozen other establishments reporting on it as well. Makes sense that every journalistic establishment out there is being paid off; hedge funds do have deep pockets. [1] https://www.reuters.com/technology/space/spacex-illegally-fired-workers-critical-elon-musk-us-labor-agency-says-2024-01-03/ https://www.reuters.com/technology/space/spacex-illegally-fi... [2] https://www.bbc.com/news/business-67878940.amp https://www.bbc.com/news/business-67878940.amp [3] https://amp.theguardian.com/technology/2024/jan/03/spacex-employees-fired-elon-musk-labor-board https://amp.theguardian.com/technology/2024/jan/03/spacex-em... [4] https://www.wsj.com/business/labor-board-backs-fired-spacex-employees-2b26f82a https://www.wsj.com/business/labor-board-backs-fired-spacex-...
  - catlover76 3y ago
    This is too subtle for modern times; the only thing tipping me off to the snark is referring to WSJ as "anticapitalist", otherwise I could absolutely believe someone believing this, sadly.
- maxbond 3y ago
  It's clearly newsworthy. Lots of news organizations are reporting on it, not just NYT. I don't think we need to assume that a newspaper is corrupt for reporting that the government published a document, that's a huge part of their job.
  - systemstops 3y ago
    Maybe - but the deluge of anti-Musk articles in the media the last few months is a probably more newsworthy. We can't ignore the fact that after buying Twitter and getting rid of some of the speech restrictions, he has been sued by several federal agencies, lost major federal contracts and all sorts of (questionable) scandals about him are now suddenly being discovered.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
maxbond 3y ago
I spent about fifteen minutes poking around. I'm not sure, but I take the impression this is in fact protected organizing, at least according to the NLRB. It seems like this is seen by NLRB as workers expressing concern and advocating for better working conditions (eg free of Musk's distractions), and the company retaliating against them. (To be clear, I have no idea whether the case has merit or not, my only claim is that NLRB seems to think so.) I took that impression from here. https://www.reuters.com/technology/space/spacex-illegally-fired-workers-critical-elon-musk-us-labor-agency-says-2024-01-03/ https://www.reuters.com/technology/space/spacex-illegally-fi... I tried to find the particular case; according to Reuters' initial coverage (linked in the above article) these charges were filed November 2022, but I couldn't find one from that time on the NLRB website. https://www.nlrb.gov/search/case/Tesla?sort=desc https://www.nlrb.gov/search/case/Tesla?sort=desc As a side note - I don't know what a normal number of NLRB cases is for a large corporation, but this seems like a lot?
- charcircuit 3y ago
  Reading Twitter is not a part of the workplave
  - maxbond 3y ago
    Public statements by your CEO can easily impact your work. Twitter might have a trivial and lighthearted feel, but that doesn't detract. Eg, when Musk tweeted he was taking Tesla public, it was probably very disruptive, regardless of the medium. I think one of the lessons of the last few years has been that things people say on Twitter do, in fact, matter a great deal. ETA: I had a brain fart and thought we were talking about Tesla, but the example is illustrative nonetheless.
- the_doctah 3y ago
  Gonna have a hell of a time proving the boss's tweets have anything to do with working conditions.
  - maxbond 3y ago
gnopgnip 3y ago
A group of employees asking their employer not to joke about sexual harassment is protected concerted activity. That is why it was illegal retaliation to fire them
- imgabe 3y ago
  Kind of a bold statement when looking at the definition of "protected concerted activity" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protected_concerted_activity https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protected_concerted_activity It doesn't say anything about controlling your employers speech on their personal social media accounts.

by imgabe 3y ago

pram 3y ago

https://www.nlrb.gov/about-nlrb/rights-we-protect/the-law/employees/concerted-activity https://www.nlrb.gov/about-nlrb/rights-we-protect/the-law/em...

Dig1t 3y ago
>You have the right to act with co-workers to address work-related issues How do Musk’s personal statements/opinions outside of work count as work-related issues? Genuinely asking, I don’t understand how these rules are enforced. Apple has locked down internal communications about non work-related topics on internal slack and email in the wake of RTO discussions. If this is grounds for a lawsuit, I think other companies are probably open to these kinds of lawsuits too.
- mingus88 3y ago
  Applying admin controls to Slack is completely different than firing employees for raising concerns For starters, firing someone introduces legitimate damage and liability for those damages if done illegally But also, firing a group of people who are organizing seems like it will run afoul of union protection laws. And to your first question, Musk’s social media tantrums have caused a lot of collateral damage for his companies. I believe the Tesla board also raised concerns that his Twitter meltdown had negatively impacted Tesla. It’s not hard to see how.
  - aaomidi 3y ago
    Also what Apple is doing isn't necessarily legal either. Just because someone else was speeding on the road and didn't get a ticket, doesn't mean you won't.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- disclosureacct 3y ago
  > How do Musk’s personal statements/opinions outside of work count as work-related issues? Are the communications from an account listed as their corporate disclosure account?
  - throwaway2037 3y ago
    My guess: The most senior employees (C-suite and close to it) have special responsibilities and legally much great accountability. What a CEO of a public company says on public media (including Twitter/X) has far greater legal consequences for the company and the CEO than someone a few steps below. This is pretty normal for highly developed countries. Note: Responsibilities may change in different countries depending upon if the company is private or public.
    - disclosureacct 3y ago
      Corporations with shareholders must list specific accounts as disclosure accounts; because otherwise sharing insider business related information is unfair insider advantage. When you list a social media account as a disclosure account for a business, it should then be clear that there's liability to all such communications through such account.
      - throwaway2037 3y ago
        While this is true regarding disclosures, my post was mostly about Elon Musk saying stupid things on his personal account. These have a far higher legal impact on his businesses and himself that would be for a lower ranked employee.

bboygravity 3y ago

[flagged]

frob 3y ago
It would be intesting to see how their payout compares to the payouts going to Reuters [1], the BBC [2], the Guardian [3], the ever-so-anticapitalist WSJ [4], and a few dozen other establishments reporting on it as well. Makes sense that every journalistic establishment out there is being paid off; hedge funds do have deep pockets. [1] https://www.reuters.com/technology/space/spacex-illegally-fired-workers-critical-elon-musk-us-labor-agency-says-2024-01-03/ https://www.reuters.com/technology/space/spacex-illegally-fi... [2] https://www.bbc.com/news/business-67878940.amp https://www.bbc.com/news/business-67878940.amp [3] https://amp.theguardian.com/technology/2024/jan/03/spacex-employees-fired-elon-musk-labor-board https://amp.theguardian.com/technology/2024/jan/03/spacex-em... [4] https://www.wsj.com/business/labor-board-backs-fired-spacex-employees-2b26f82a https://www.wsj.com/business/labor-board-backs-fired-spacex-...
- catlover76 3y ago
  This is too subtle for modern times; the only thing tipping me off to the snark is referring to WSJ as "anticapitalist", otherwise I could absolutely believe someone believing this, sadly.
maxbond 3y ago
It's clearly newsworthy. Lots of news organizations are reporting on it, not just NYT. I don't think we need to assume that a newspaper is corrupt for reporting that the government published a document, that's a huge part of their job.
- systemstops 3y ago
  Maybe - but the deluge of anti-Musk articles in the media the last few months is a probably more newsworthy. We can't ignore the fact that after buying Twitter and getting rid of some of the speech restrictions, he has been sued by several federal agencies, lost major federal contracts and all sorts of (questionable) scandals about him are now suddenly being discovered.

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

maxbond 3y ago

I spent about fifteen minutes poking around. I'm not sure, but I take the impression this is in fact protected organizing, at least according to the NLRB. It seems like this is seen by NLRB as workers expressing concern and advocating for better working conditions (eg free of Musk's distractions), and the company retaliating against them. (To be clear, I have no idea whether the case has merit or not, my only claim is that NLRB seems to think so.) I took that impression from here. https://www.reuters.com/technology/space/spacex-illegally-fired-workers-critical-elon-musk-us-labor-agency-says-2024-01-03/ https://www.reuters.com/technology/space/spacex-illegally-fi... I tried to find the particular case; according to Reuters' initial coverage (linked in the above article) these charges were filed November 2022, but I couldn't find one from that time on the NLRB website. https://www.nlrb.gov/search/case/Tesla?sort=desc https://www.nlrb.gov/search/case/Tesla?sort=desc As a side note - I don't know what a normal number of NLRB cases is for a large corporation, but this seems like a lot?

charcircuit 3y ago
Reading Twitter is not a part of the workplave
- maxbond 3y ago
  Public statements by your CEO can easily impact your work. Twitter might have a trivial and lighthearted feel, but that doesn't detract. Eg, when Musk tweeted he was taking Tesla public, it was probably very disruptive, regardless of the medium. I think one of the lessons of the last few years has been that things people say on Twitter do, in fact, matter a great deal. ETA: I had a brain fart and thought we were talking about Tesla, but the example is illustrative nonetheless.
the_doctah 3y ago
Gonna have a hell of a time proving the boss's tweets have anything to do with working conditions.
- maxbond 3y ago

gnopgnip 3y ago

A group of employees asking their employer not to joke about sexual harassment is protected concerted activity. That is why it was illegal retaliation to fire them

imgabe 3y ago
Kind of a bold statement when looking at the definition of "protected concerted activity" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protected_concerted_activity https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protected_concerted_activity It doesn't say anything about controlling your employers speech on their personal social media accounts.