4 ms·

The default for the US is "at-will employment", which means that your employer can fire you at any time, no reason needed. The definition of "just cause" would

by dfxm12 2y ago

The default for the US is "at-will employment", which means that your employer can fire you at any time, no reason needed. The definition of "just cause" would be collectively bargained, so both management and the union will understand and agree on what constitutes just cause or not. FWIW, layoffs are regulated differently from firings.

gruez 2y ago
>The default for the US is "at-will employment", which means that your employer can fire you at any time, no reason needed. That seems... fine? In most transaction neither party needs to give "just cause" to terminate a contract. Imagine having to give documentation to move out of your current apartment, for instance. Getting fired is disruptive to someone's finances that some notice/severance would be justified, but "you have to give just cause" (which in practice, means multiple formal write-ups and several months of PIP, even in places without a union contract) seems excessive.
- miltonlost 2y ago
  >>The default for the US is "at-will employment", which means that your employer can fire you at any time, no reason needed. >> That seems... fine? In most transaction neither party needs to give "just cause" to terminate a contract. You like having a sword over your neck at all times that an employer can just swing and take away your salary and your health insurance for any reason at all?
  - gruez 2y ago
    Did you stop reading there and not the subsequent sentence? >Getting fired is disruptive to someone's finances that some notice/severance would be justified
    - miltonlost 2y ago
      Did you stop reading there and not the subsequent independent clause? > but "you have to give just cause" (which in practice, means multiple formal write-ups and several months of PIP, even in places without a union contract) seems excessive. You still said requiring "just cause" is excessive. So you still want an "at-will" sword over your head.
      - gruez 2y ago
        >So you still want an "at-will" sword over your head. That sword is still going to be over your head regardless of at will employment. You could be laid off (no cause needed), the company goes bankrupt, or you become disabled. Where do you draw the line? If you don't want to accept "sword over your head" for firings, why would you accept it for layoffs?
        miltonlost 2y ago
        But whatabout being laid off, whatabout company bankruptcy, and whatabout becoming disabled? MY god, we're talking about at-will employment being a threat to a human's life insurance and salary, and you bring up NON at-will issues? Those are fundamentally different swords than an at-will employment one. Is your manager going to disable your body? How is this even remotely close to a manager being able to fire you for whatever? You're just ignoring the whole "at-will". I'm not talking about a "sword" of any possible negative thing happening to you. Why not bring up asteroids? Or another plague? Or just suddenly a REAL sword beheads me? THe "sword" is solely the at-will. Learn how metaphors work.
        gruez 2y ago
        It's the same sword: loss of income and healthcare. Semantic games aside, if the premise is that we shouldn't accept the risk of losing income/healthcare due to poor performance/internal politics, why would you accept losing income/healthcare due to layoffs (which also involve poor performance/internal politics)? It's fine to argue "people should be shielded from the risk of losing their income/healthcare", but you can't arbitrarily decide when it's fine to apply that principle.
  - renewiltord 2y ago
    To be honest, yeah. I want to reduce the fixed costs of job transfer so that I can be efficiently allocated in the economy because that usually means I can make a lot of money. But I can see how someone who is at a lower skill level would want to raise the friction for hiring - less job mobility is good for them. If someone wants to fire me, I hope they find it easy.
    - miltonlost 2y ago
      > If someone wants to fire me, I hope they find it easy. Wut?
      - gruez 2y ago
        The point is that he wants to be employed at a company because the company values him, not because they're forced to keep him around. This shouldn't be an alien concept. In personal relationships, you want your friends/partner to stay around because they like you, not because they're forced to. In other business relationships, you want to get paid because you're delivering value, not because you'd be a pain to get rid of.
        troupo 2y ago
        What stops them from quitting and finding employment elsewhere?
        gruez 2y ago
        The point isn't keeping a job, it's being well liked by others. While it's unlikely to be anyone's overriding objective (I too would rather be employed but hated, than well-liked but starving), it's still something that people care about. More importantly, it shows that he cares about the other side of the transaction, rather than being some sociopath that only cares about what he gets.
        troupo 2y ago
- krainboltgreene 2y ago
  It's not fine. It sucks for just about everyone involved except the business owner.
  - gruez 2y ago
    This fails to consider second order effects. Adding more friction to firings also makes teams less performant (as they fail to get rid of underperforming employees), as makes finding a job more difficult (because companies are more reluctant to hire on the off chance they get a bad employee they can't get rid of). This isn't theoretical. Returns suck for retailers, but they still voluntarily offer it because it entices consumers to buy things they wouldn't otherwise buy.
    - krainboltgreene 2y ago
      There's no evidence that "adding more friction to firings also makes teams less performant". Your statement relies on two assumptions: (1) employers are reliable at determining "underperforming", (2) employers are making choices based of performance. There's no evidence that it makes "finding a job more difficult". There are entire swaths of this earth that have the framework that we're talking about and their job markets are just fine. I know that an online form makes it easy to just position yourself as correct, but you're arguing against reality.
      - gruez 2y ago
        >Your statement relies on two assumptions: (1) employers are reliable at determining "underperforming", (2) employers are making choices based of performance. 1. You could make similar arguments about consumers being qualified to determine product quality. Are retailers dumbasses for wasting money accepting returns? 2. When it comes to hiring/firing decisions, perception of competence is as important (if not more so), as actual competence (if you can even define that). No manager is going to be assuaged by "well actually, you're pretty bad at determining competence, so you should be glad that we're requiring you to file a bunch of paperwork before you can fire someone". >There's no evidence that it makes "finding a job more difficult". There are entire swaths of this earth that have the framework that we're talking about and their job markets are just fine. New hires rate in Europe (with famously stronger labor protections) is around 10% per year in 2022. US meanwhile is more than 4% per month. https://www.cedefop.europa.eu/en/tools/skills-intelligence/recently-hired-workers?year=2022 https://www.cedefop.europa.eu/en/tools/skills-intelligence/r... https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/JTS000000000000000HIR https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/JTS000000000000000HIR
- ElevenLathe 2y ago
  I'm sure the paper feels it's excessive too. The union doesn't. They've already failed to work this out without a strike, so the question now is who can suffer the longest before the other breaks, or is willing to give some other concession in return for getting their way on this issue. In other words, one side will win, or both will compromise. It's just another contract negotiation, like any other between two parties. Unions are allowed to do it with businesses, just like businesses are allowed to do it among themselves. This is literally the ruling ideology of the West and has been for generations, but somehow when a union takes advantage of it, that's radical marxism.

by dfxm12 2y ago

gruez 2y ago

>The default for the US is "at-will employment", which means that your employer can fire you at any time, no reason needed. That seems... fine? In most transaction neither party needs to give "just cause" to terminate a contract. Imagine having to give documentation to move out of your current apartment, for instance. Getting fired is disruptive to someone's finances that some notice/severance would be justified, but "you have to give just cause" (which in practice, means multiple formal write-ups and several months of PIP, even in places without a union contract) seems excessive.

miltonlost 2y ago
>>The default for the US is "at-will employment", which means that your employer can fire you at any time, no reason needed. >> That seems... fine? In most transaction neither party needs to give "just cause" to terminate a contract. You like having a sword over your neck at all times that an employer can just swing and take away your salary and your health insurance for any reason at all?
- gruez 2y ago
  Did you stop reading there and not the subsequent sentence? >Getting fired is disruptive to someone's finances that some notice/severance would be justified
  - miltonlost 2y ago
    Did you stop reading there and not the subsequent independent clause? > but "you have to give just cause" (which in practice, means multiple formal write-ups and several months of PIP, even in places without a union contract) seems excessive. You still said requiring "just cause" is excessive. So you still want an "at-will" sword over your head.
    - gruez 2y ago
      >So you still want an "at-will" sword over your head. That sword is still going to be over your head regardless of at will employment. You could be laid off (no cause needed), the company goes bankrupt, or you become disabled. Where do you draw the line? If you don't want to accept "sword over your head" for firings, why would you accept it for layoffs?
      - miltonlost 2y ago
        But whatabout being laid off, whatabout company bankruptcy, and whatabout becoming disabled? MY god, we're talking about at-will employment being a threat to a human's life insurance and salary, and you bring up NON at-will issues? Those are fundamentally different swords than an at-will employment one. Is your manager going to disable your body? How is this even remotely close to a manager being able to fire you for whatever? You're just ignoring the whole "at-will". I'm not talking about a "sword" of any possible negative thing happening to you. Why not bring up asteroids? Or another plague? Or just suddenly a REAL sword beheads me? THe "sword" is solely the at-will. Learn how metaphors work.
        gruez 2y ago
        It's the same sword: loss of income and healthcare. Semantic games aside, if the premise is that we shouldn't accept the risk of losing income/healthcare due to poor performance/internal politics, why would you accept losing income/healthcare due to layoffs (which also involve poor performance/internal politics)? It's fine to argue "people should be shielded from the risk of losing their income/healthcare", but you can't arbitrarily decide when it's fine to apply that principle.
- renewiltord 2y ago
  To be honest, yeah. I want to reduce the fixed costs of job transfer so that I can be efficiently allocated in the economy because that usually means I can make a lot of money. But I can see how someone who is at a lower skill level would want to raise the friction for hiring - less job mobility is good for them. If someone wants to fire me, I hope they find it easy.
  - miltonlost 2y ago
    > If someone wants to fire me, I hope they find it easy. Wut?
    - gruez 2y ago
      The point is that he wants to be employed at a company because the company values him, not because they're forced to keep him around. This shouldn't be an alien concept. In personal relationships, you want your friends/partner to stay around because they like you, not because they're forced to. In other business relationships, you want to get paid because you're delivering value, not because you'd be a pain to get rid of.
      - troupo 2y ago
        What stops them from quitting and finding employment elsewhere?
        gruez 2y ago
        The point isn't keeping a job, it's being well liked by others. While it's unlikely to be anyone's overriding objective (I too would rather be employed but hated, than well-liked but starving), it's still something that people care about. More importantly, it shows that he cares about the other side of the transaction, rather than being some sociopath that only cares about what he gets.
        troupo 2y ago
krainboltgreene 2y ago
It's not fine. It sucks for just about everyone involved except the business owner.
- gruez 2y ago
  This fails to consider second order effects. Adding more friction to firings also makes teams less performant (as they fail to get rid of underperforming employees), as makes finding a job more difficult (because companies are more reluctant to hire on the off chance they get a bad employee they can't get rid of). This isn't theoretical. Returns suck for retailers, but they still voluntarily offer it because it entices consumers to buy things they wouldn't otherwise buy.
  - krainboltgreene 2y ago
    There's no evidence that "adding more friction to firings also makes teams less performant". Your statement relies on two assumptions: (1) employers are reliable at determining "underperforming", (2) employers are making choices based of performance. There's no evidence that it makes "finding a job more difficult". There are entire swaths of this earth that have the framework that we're talking about and their job markets are just fine. I know that an online form makes it easy to just position yourself as correct, but you're arguing against reality.
    - gruez 2y ago
      >Your statement relies on two assumptions: (1) employers are reliable at determining "underperforming", (2) employers are making choices based of performance. 1. You could make similar arguments about consumers being qualified to determine product quality. Are retailers dumbasses for wasting money accepting returns? 2. When it comes to hiring/firing decisions, perception of competence is as important (if not more so), as actual competence (if you can even define that). No manager is going to be assuaged by "well actually, you're pretty bad at determining competence, so you should be glad that we're requiring you to file a bunch of paperwork before you can fire someone". >There's no evidence that it makes "finding a job more difficult". There are entire swaths of this earth that have the framework that we're talking about and their job markets are just fine. New hires rate in Europe (with famously stronger labor protections) is around 10% per year in 2022. US meanwhile is more than 4% per month. https://www.cedefop.europa.eu/en/tools/skills-intelligence/recently-hired-workers?year=2022 https://www.cedefop.europa.eu/en/tools/skills-intelligence/r... https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/JTS000000000000000HIR https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/JTS000000000000000HIR
ElevenLathe 2y ago
I'm sure the paper feels it's excessive too. The union doesn't. They've already failed to work this out without a strike, so the question now is who can suffer the longest before the other breaks, or is willing to give some other concession in return for getting their way on this issue. In other words, one side will win, or both will compromise. It's just another contract negotiation, like any other between two parties. Unions are allowed to do it with businesses, just like businesses are allowed to do it among themselves. This is literally the ruling ideology of the West and has been for generations, but somehow when a union takes advantage of it, that's radical marxism.