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Omaha man ‘liked’ a tweet, then lost his job

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Re: Omaha man ‘liked’ a tweet, then lost his job

#201

Post by katzgrau »

John_KZ wrote: post #184
greglindahl wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of young people in France are on short-term contracts, precisely because long-term employees are hard to fire. Imagine that you are a startup in France, with long-term employees, and suddenly you realize you screwed up, and you have to cut your expenses in half. Today, that means your startup is dead and all employees are screwed, but in the US, your startup continues with a much lower valuation. Which is bette…

Startups are a form of volatile research projects that could be done better in a corporate environment. Startups provide precarious and unstable employment, and on average they fail and lead to unemployment. I personally love working on new, potent ideas, but this is not a viable model of development for society. "Gig economy" is getting out of control, and it's better to kill the startups than to let people abuse th…

Yea I'd disagree. Like the process of evolution, I believe that ideas and the mutation and the proliferation of those ideas are what leads to progress. More seeds.

Re: Omaha man ‘liked’ a tweet, then lost his job

#202

Post by greglindahl »

jlarocco wrote: post #194
greglindahl wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of young people in France are on short-term contracts, precisely because long-term employees are hard to fire. Imagine that you are a startup in France, with long-term employees, and suddenly you realize you screwed up, and you have to cut your expenses in half. Today, that means your startup is dead and all employees are screwed, but in the US, your startup continues with a much lower valuation. Which is bette…

> A lot of young people in France are on short-term contracts, precisely because long-term employees are hard to fire. A lot of American workers are on short-term contracts, too, for nearly the same reasons. > Imagine that you are a startup in France, with long-term employees, and suddenly you realize you screwed up, and you have to cut your expenses in half. Today, that means your startup is dead and all employees a…

By all means, if a country prefers economic suicide for startups instead of birthing the next Silicon Valley, it's a valid choice.

Re: Omaha man ‘liked’ a tweet, then lost his job

#203

Post by KyeRussell »

banned1 wrote: post #70
JPKab wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It gets abused for sure, but more often, businesses get to fire bad employees, and this means they are more likely to give some people a chance who wouldn't get one otherwise. Hiring in certain countries is very risky, because it is so costly to fire a bad employee.

Which is why many companies don’t hire many people in France http://www.nortonrosefulbright.com/knowledge/publications/14...

Proponents of a largely deregulated labour market love talking about France. As someone working in Australia—a country with labour laws that are more sane than France (and definitely the U.S.)—instantly bringing up France just tends to stink of a false dichotomy and a line of rhetoric from people that try to justify the U.S.'s unjustifiably unfair labour laws.

I suggest that people who aren't familiar with Australia's labour laws have a quick look at https://www.fairwork.gov.au/. There are some problems, but it gives you an idea of practical alternatives to at-will employment.

Main relevant takeaways:

- Unfair dismissal legislation preventing employers from terminating employees unless they were grossly negligent, malicious, or didn't respond to performance management.

- Unfair dismissal claim protection for small businesses provided they can show evidence of following a (very short, fair, and easy to read) code with regards to the employee's termination.

It's extremely hard for me to empathise with business owners who openly have issues with these protections. At the very least, it's apparent that this dismissal wouldn't stand in Australia, as it shouldn't. Executives dismissing a support employee—out-of-touch executives who have probably forgotten how important an ongoing income stream is for people on low or even normal incomes—just to save face in a business relationship is in my opinion unjustifiable. Regardless of your view on labour laws I think most people agree on this.

Re: Omaha man ‘liked’ a tweet, then lost his job

#205

Post by philwelch »

YSFEJ4SWJUVU6 wrote: post #178
tinza123 wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is not that hard to imagine being fired by "clicking" likes, let's not oversimplify like this. Official tweeter accounts carry weights. Plus this is not about China at all, what if this is a Nazi tweet? An ISIS tweet? An anti-LGBT tweet? It's either the company's way of dealing with PR problems, or the employee's misconduct, but not about China.

A dictatorship like China raising the issue over Tibet is the equivalent of (an alternative universe) powerful Nazi Germany getting someone fired in the U.S. over liking a tweet about Jewish rights issue.

That’s a terrible analogy. It’s more like the Nazis getting someone fired for liking a tweet about Austria or Czechoslovakia still being a country.

Re: Omaha man ‘liked’ a tweet, then lost his job

#206

Post by ronilan »

tinza123 wrote: post #181
YSFEJ4SWJUVU6 wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A dictatorship like China raising the issue over Tibet is the equivalent of (an alternative universe) powerful Nazi Germany getting someone fired in the U.S. over liking a tweet about Jewish rights issue.

WOW that escalates quickly. I thought the Americans liked capitalism.

> I thought the Americans liked capitalism.

Depends from which account they accidently "liked" it.

Re: Omaha man ‘liked’ a tweet, then lost his job

#208

Post by hueving »

KyeRussell wrote: post #203
banned1 wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which is why many companies don’t hire many people in France http://www.nortonrosefulbright.com/knowledge/publications/14...

Proponents of a largely deregulated labour market love talking about France. As someone working in Australia—a country with labour laws that are more sane than France (and definitely the U.S.)—instantly bringing up France just tends to stink of a false dichotomy and a line of rhetoric from people that try to justify the U.S.'s unjustifiably unfair labour laws. I suggest that people who aren't familiar with Australia'…

>Regardless of your view on labour laws I think most people agree on this.

Not if the other option was China shutting down a bunch of Marriott hotels and hundreds of employees losing their jobs instead.

Re: Omaha man ‘liked’ a tweet, then lost his job

#209

Post by jonathanyc »

Turing_Machine wrote: post #136
jonathanyc wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As an American, I wouldn’t be offended if a Chinese person suggested that all non Native Americans should leave America. I wouldn’t think that would be reasonable, although I would acknowledge that we could do much more to help rectify the situation that still exists today. I would likewise be not offended (but might feel slightly uncomfortable) if someone told me that California, my home state, should be returned to…

"But do you really think it is so unrealistic that many Americans would be offended by such a statement? " You can't control whether someone is offended. You can control whether you fire someone because someone else is offended.

> If you were in China would you really find it insulting that Tibet is considered by some to be its own country?

This is the GP I am replying to. I don’t believe the employee should have been fired.

Re: Omaha man ‘liked’ a tweet, then lost his job

#210

Post by John_KZ »

greglindahl wrote: post #199
John_KZ wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Startups are a form of volatile research projects that could be done better in a corporate environment. Startups provide precarious and unstable employment, and on average they fail and lead to unemployment. I personally love working on new, potent ideas, but this is not a viable model of development for society. "Gig economy" is getting out of control, and it's better to kill the startups than to let people abuse th…

Hey, I'm all in favor of you working on new ideas, but only within an existing corporate environment. But there's plenty of proof that that's a terrible way to advance society at large.

If a number of people(experienced/experts in a field) are willing to volunteer their time and/or capital in exchange for equity/patents/stock, then it's all good. My problem lies with externalizing the cost and risk to employees.

If they need something done and they can't guarantee long-term employment, they can buy commercial services for what they need. Engineering firms and temp offices will be happy to send you a secretary, a software solution or a CAD file with what you asked.

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