Whole Foods employees are staging a nationwide 'sick-out' • Hacker News Board

Re: Whole Foods employees are staging a nationwide 'sick-out'

#101

Post by amluto » Wed, Apr 01, 2020, 5:01 AM UTC

alexpetralia wrote: post #94

amluto wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No. All employers should be required to tell employees “if you believe you have a communicable disease that could infect your coworkers or customers, then you MUST NOT come to work, and we or the government will find a way to take care if you.” This should be the case regardless of any pandemic. Allowing an employee with a mild flu to come to work is irresponsible.

What prevents a worker from stating they believe they have coronavirus? Surely you'd agree there is an incentive to do so (stay home and get paid).

Getting this right is probably moderate complicated, but there are plenty of countries that do it:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sick_leave#Germany

Re: Whole Foods employees are staging a nationwide 'sick-out'

#102

Post by cjblomqvist » Wed, Apr 01, 2020, 5:14 AM UTC

knodi123 wrote: post #60

elicash wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd bet that if Amazon agreed to all demands but that one that the workers who organized this would be ECSTATIC. There should be negotiation, back-and-forth. What's frustrating, as somebody not affiliated with the organizing here but has been in similar circumstances, is when the company won't even come to the table to bargain.

> I'd bet that if Amazon agreed to all demands but that one that the workers who organized this would be ECSTATIC. Yeah, except item 1 is "Guaranteed paid leave for all workers who isolate or self-quarantine instead of coming to work." I imagine that if Amazon agreed to that one demand, the workers would be ECSTATIC, because it allows them to get paid whether or not they decide to keep coming to work. I'm not diminis…

You do realize this is the default (guaranteed by the government) in all of Sweden? It's not madness.

Re: Whole Foods employees are staging a nationwide 'sick-out'

#103

Post by bleah1000 » Wed, Apr 01, 2020, 6:56 AM UTC

fallingfrog wrote: post #92

knodi123 wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'd bet that if Amazon agreed to all demands but that one that the workers who organized this would be ECSTATIC. Yeah, except item 1 is "Guaranteed paid leave for all workers who isolate or self-quarantine instead of coming to work." I imagine that if Amazon agreed to that one demand, the workers would be ECSTATIC, because it allows them to get paid whether or not they decide to keep coming to work. I'm not diminis…

My last job offered unlimited paid sick leave, no questions asked, and in all my time there I never heard of anyone abusing it. Your assertions are not based in fact.

If you are being paid well, being treated well by your employer, you might not abuse paid sick leave. Or have a very low rate of it.

If you are not being paid well, maybe people would abuse the policy more often. I don't think you can really compare one company to another, even in the same industry. Company cultures can lead to vastly different outcomes with the same policy.

And, unless you are in HR, there is no way for you to know if people were abusing this perk. I would be willing to bet at least one person was abusing it, but maybe the company never found out, or, more likely, they didn't broadcast the abuse to everyone in the company.

Re: Whole Foods employees are staging a nationwide 'sick-out'

#104

Post by claudiawerner » Wed, Apr 01, 2020, 10:42 AM UTC

34679 wrote: post #99

claudiawerner wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We agree to many unfair things day to day. It's not clear to me that accepting a contract means that the contract describes a fair arrangement. Fairness is also highly subjective; the employer, for instance, likely has a different opinion as to what is or isn't fair compared to the mass of employees. It's quite possible that even you and I have different ideas of what is and isn't fair. This is precisely why philosop…

The only people who need to consider the fairness of a transaction are the parties involved. With their consent to the contract, and the determination that no force was used, we can objectively consider the transaction to be fair. The inherently subjective nature you describe of extending judgement to the masses will never be as true a reflection of fairness as is the parties' own judgement.

>The only people who need to consider the fairness of a transaction are the parties involved

I disagree, and my disagreement is shared by contract and employment law in many places which places restrictions on what can be arranged through a contract. I'm skeptical that the only inputs that "need" considering is the mutual 'consent' of both parties.

Re: Whole Foods employees are staging a nationwide 'sick-out'

#105

Post by fallingfrog » Wed, Apr 01, 2020, 11:10 AM UTC

Nevermark wrote: post #96

fallingfrog wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My last job offered unlimited paid sick leave, no questions asked, and in all my time there I never heard of anyone abusing it. Your assertions are not based in fact.

In this situation workers are taking on risk by showing up due to a pandemic. Did the situation you reference have similar urgent hazardous conditions? Even if that is the case, your counter-example does not produce a counter-fact. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proof_by_example

One example is enough to disprove the assertion that paid sick time would necessarily be abused any time it is given, which is what the original post asserted. If you’re going to be pedantic at least be correct. What you’ve done is move the goalposts.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moving_the_goalposts#Logical...

If the workers in question really are taking this kind of risk, and if their jobs really are essential for the functioning of society, then.. maybe they should be really well paid?

Also, to suggest that in the middle of a pandemic, if a person gets sick they should still have to go to work or lose their job flies in the face of logical reason and the recommendations of the cdc.

Re: Whole Foods employees are staging a nationwide 'sick-out'

#106

Post by fallingfrog » Wed, Apr 01, 2020, 11:26 AM UTC

bleah1000 wrote: post #103

fallingfrog wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My last job offered unlimited paid sick leave, no questions asked, and in all my time there I never heard of anyone abusing it. Your assertions are not based in fact.

If you are being paid well, being treated well by your employer, you might not abuse paid sick leave. Or have a very low rate of it. If you are not being paid well, maybe people would abuse the policy more often. I don't think you can really compare one company to another, even in the same industry. Company cultures can lead to vastly different outcomes with the same policy. And, unless you are in HR, there is no way…

There may have been someone abusing it, I can only say for sure that it wasn’t anyone I worked with on a daily basis.

I’m one of those who believes that every person, regardless of what the job is, should be well paid and well treated- how much constitutes “well” is a complicated question of course, but as a matter of principle I do find that if the people taking on all these risks is making close to minimum wage, then we are incorrectly pricing their value.

Re: Whole Foods employees are staging a nationwide 'sick-out'

#107

Post by Zenbit_UX » Wed, Apr 01, 2020, 12:29 PM UTC

NovemberWhiskey wrote: post #77

pjc50 wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If it's pandemic, the infected workers have to be sent home to avoid infecting others. This is actually even more important for the essential workers. Otherwise you end up with them all off sick at once.

There's literally no-one here disputing that sick workers should get to stay home. What's being discussed is the proposition that healthy workers who decide to self-isolate should be paid to do so.

If you don't pay them to stay home they'll come back to work sick and infect others. Not everyone can rely on a hefty savings to pay their rent.

Re: Whole Foods employees are staging a nationwide 'sick-out'

#108

Post by knodi123 » Wed, Apr 01, 2020, 2:20 PM UTC

amluto wrote: post #93

knodi123 wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> -Guaranteed paid leave for all workers who isolate or self-quarantine instead of coming to work. > This should be required by law of all employers. All businesses should be required to tell every employee "You don't have to come in to work for the duration of the crisis, unless you feel like it. But you'll get paid regardless."?

No. All employers should be required to tell employees “if you believe you have a communicable disease that could infect your coworkers or customers, then you MUST NOT come to work, and we or the government will find a way to take care if you.” This should be the case regardless of any pandemic. Allowing an employee with a mild flu to come to work is irresponsible.

The comment I replied to was "isolate and self-quarantine". You're talking about self-quarantine, but isolate sounds more like a preventative step.

Re: Whole Foods employees are staging a nationwide 'sick-out'

#109

Post by knodi123 » Wed, Apr 01, 2020, 2:24 PM UTC

elicash wrote: post #62

knodi123 wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'd bet that if Amazon agreed to all demands but that one that the workers who organized this would be ECSTATIC. Yeah, except item 1 is "Guaranteed paid leave for all workers who isolate or self-quarantine instead of coming to work." I imagine that if Amazon agreed to that one demand, the workers would be ECSTATIC, because it allows them to get paid whether or not they decide to keep coming to work. I'm not diminis…

My employer is allowing us to use our paid leave for this purpose, and we haven't seen this. You still only have a limited amount of paid leave per year and so you can use it for this but it means if you get sick later you can't use it for that. Not sure why you added the word "unrestricted." Seems like bad faith.

> My employer is allowing us to use our paid leave for this purpose

It's YOUR paid leave. They are "allowing" you to.... have what they promised you when you took the job. That has nothing to do with the pandemic.

> You still only have a limited amount of paid leave per year

Then what's the concession? If you have 3 sick days in the bank, and you get coronavirus, then what is the "protection" we're even talking about?

> Not sure why you added the word "unrestricted."

Because no one mentioned any restrictions.

> Seems like bad faith.

Sounds like you're about half a step above cussing out a stranger because you disagree with them.

Re: Whole Foods employees are staging a nationwide 'sick-out'

#110

Post by knodi123 » Wed, Apr 01, 2020, 2:28 PM UTC

fallingfrog wrote: post #92

knodi123 wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'd bet that if Amazon agreed to all demands but that one that the workers who organized this would be ECSTATIC. Yeah, except item 1 is "Guaranteed paid leave for all workers who isolate or self-quarantine instead of coming to work." I imagine that if Amazon agreed to that one demand, the workers would be ECSTATIC, because it allows them to get paid whether or not they decide to keep coming to work. I'm not diminis…

My last job offered unlimited paid sick leave, no questions asked, and in all my time there I never heard of anyone abusing it. Your assertions are not based in fact.

> My last job offered unlimited paid sick leave,

If we were talking about sick leave only, then I misinterpreted the comment I replied to. I saw "isolate and self-quarantine" as not only sick leave, but also "feels like staying home for any reason at all as long as you work the word 'coronavirus' in".

> no questions asked, and in all my time there I never heard of anyone abusing it

Was your last job entry-level with no college requirement, and paid by the hour? Have you ever worked through a deadly pandemic before? Your defense is based on an extremely narrow experience that might not exactly apply to grocery store workers during a health crisis..