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EU pushes for 'right to disconnect' from work at home

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Re: EU pushes for 'right to disconnect' from work at home

#241
post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There’s no such this as “overtime” in most salaried jobs though. You’re paid just for being an employee, not for hours worked. If there's no concept of overtime in most salaried jobs, there's a problem with your country as well. I'm a salaried, full-time employee and I'm paid to work 37.5 hours a week, no more, no less. And the collective agreement for IT services industry (which is what concerns me as a developer)…

You guys unioned as a cross company group of 1 (or several closely related) functional roles? That’s super interesting! Do any entry level people NOT accept membership to the union or undercut in any way? Do you require your employee to be a “union” shop to work there? I think it’s beautiful your vacation hours are set out, etc. It seems like there could be some issues if every vertical had one of these (“oh no, the…

Joining an union in Finland is voluntary but most collective agreements are just that - collective. They apply whether or not you're in the union for the entire sector. I think most Finns belong to unions though.

Re: EU pushes for 'right to disconnect' from work at home

#242
post #106

You got to admit that the EU at least has the courage to take some controversial measures in the best interest of their people. I can't see this soon enough, I have family that answer emails in vacation all the time, that get phone calls like its nothing. I know people that connect everyday from home to the office network to work one or two hours (extra) otherwise it's impossible to keep up with the workload. Most ma…

What I do: - Unless soone is dying it's not urgent; - I turn my work smartphone and laptop off at the end of the work day and back on in the morning; - My work smartphone switches to DND during lunch break; - Out "work" VOIP is routed to a "out for lunch" message during lunch;

Unless someone is dying it's not urgent.

P.S We don't get overtime so no reason to do any. On extremely rare ocasions I did some extra hours with the condition I take them off next day or that week's Friday.(Ex: Our online trainig server went dead the day before a training course. And yes... after that they bought a spare one. Don't get me started with IT related budget)

Re: EU pushes for 'right to disconnect' from work at home

#243
post #106

You got to admit that the EU at least has the courage to take some controversial measures in the best interest of their people. I can't see this soon enough, I have family that answer emails in vacation all the time, that get phone calls like its nothing. I know people that connect everyday from home to the office network to work one or two hours (extra) otherwise it's impossible to keep up with the workload. Most ma…

I appreciate this is a step but it's a non binding resolution that ... as far as I can tell doesn't have any exact legal language in it?

Re: EU pushes for 'right to disconnect' from work at home

#244
post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I know people that connect everyday from home to the office network to work one or two hours (extra) otherwise it's impossible to keep up with the workload. Then the work doesn't get completed on time! That's bad management not hiring enough people, not the fault of the employee. SMH y'all IT people need a union.

It's the difference between a junior and a senior. The latter has better expectations of what one can get done in an average workday, and the confidence to push back with "sorry, looks like this thing's more work than expected, going to need another two days for it". Btw. Looks like the Great America is woke and hates you for the word 'union' you used in your comment.

> Looks like the Great America is woke and hates you for the word 'union' you used in your comment.

Someday maybe our betters in Europe will understand that the American experience with unions is different than that of Europeans. And that American unions are a very different animal. Until that time, though, keep thinking we're just idiots.

Re: EU pushes for 'right to disconnect' from work at home

#245
post #106

You got to admit that the EU at least has the courage to take some controversial measures in the best interest of their people. I can't see this soon enough, I have family that answer emails in vacation all the time, that get phone calls like its nothing. I know people that connect everyday from home to the office network to work one or two hours (extra) otherwise it's impossible to keep up with the workload. Most ma…

> You got to admit that the EU at least has the courage to take some controversial measures in the best interest of their people.

What eactly do you consider "controversial" in the right to disconnect?

Re: EU pushes for 'right to disconnect' from work at home

#246
post #106

You got to admit that the EU at least has the courage to take some controversial measures in the best interest of their people. I can't see this soon enough, I have family that answer emails in vacation all the time, that get phone calls like its nothing. I know people that connect everyday from home to the office network to work one or two hours (extra) otherwise it's impossible to keep up with the workload. Most ma…

I spent part of my career working in the US, and now I work in Germany, and I can say the labor laws make a huge difference. Some would say this type of law hampers innovation, but at some level if there is not a basic fair playing field set for everyone, there will always be the incentive for some to over-work to get ahead.

Re: EU pushes for 'right to disconnect' from work at home

#247

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do people pretend to be sick to use up their X days? Many people want to have as many days off as they can. If so, you could be in the same situation, call in saying your sick to use all your days then really get sick at the end of the year. If the answer is no, perhaps that is due to cultural differences. It's my impression that folks in Norway are more responsible in many regards compared to Americans.

I think in the end, there is no way around trust. You have to trust the mechanic that they tighten the screws correctly. You have to trust the software developer that they write that does what it should and not something nefarious. You have to trust the salesperson that they don't lie to the customer. Yes, all of these can be checked to some extent, but it will not be possible to fully check everything.

When you said "trust" I wondered who benefits, and my first thought was that the company that doesn't have to deal with the sick days is the winner. The company is trusting to come to work as many days as we physically can?

How is that better than just giving everyone the same number of days to manager as sick or personal for themselves?

Re: EU pushes for 'right to disconnect' from work at home

#248

As a European I hate these types of EU initiatives. Why not let member states decide on this themselves? When Sweden voted to join the EU there was a lot of talk about the subsidiary principle[0], but it seems almost completely forgotten now. I guess one could argue that it affects the internal labour market in some way, but so could pretty much any issue. I would love to see more members of the EU parliament vote ag…

Given that one of the fundamentals of the EU is freedom of movement of workers, workers rights fall right into core competences of EU legislation.

How does this affect freedom of movement of workers? Could we not have freedom of movement with slightly different laws in different countries? Does every little thing relating to the labour market need to be regulated centrally?

It's just one of those things that always goes in one direction. Central regulation is just piled on.

Re: EU pushes for 'right to disconnect' from work at home

#249
post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm fine with that, so long as there is also a reasonable amount of vacation time. The US really needs to get with the times and have basic workers' rights. Currently, the average number of vacation days per year in the US (17 days), is less than the statutory minimum number of days in many countries. Source: https://www.cnbc.com/2018/08/15/statista-how-far-behind-us-i...

So looking at UK labor law, do bank holidays count? "An employer can choose to include bank holidays as part of a worker’s statutory annual leave." https://www.gov.uk/holiday-entitlement-rights Because if so, they don't count in the US. So the US would be 17 days of vacation plus statutory holidays. At my job I get 25 days off, plus 13 statutory holidays, so 38 days a year off, paid.

By law, they don't count. The 28 days might be 20 days of your choice, plus the 8 bank holidays.

Most professional jobs give 28+8 (or more, I had 30+8 which slowly increased to 33+8).

Re: EU pushes for 'right to disconnect' from work at home

#250
post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> “... folks in Norway are more responsible in many regards compared to Americans.” Which is cause and which is consequence? Maybe Norwegians are more responsible at work because employers don’t exploit them so openly and the law gives them more protection.

> Which is cause and which is consequence? Honestly the problem is that its a feedback loop. A trusting culture leads to people being more trustworthy... in the long run. The first company to do it will be taken advantage of. It will take a while for society to then frown on that and apply social pressure which will then in turn unlock more trust etc... but it's a process for sure

I imagine that trust can come and go as decades turn into centuries. It seems that social trust is decreasing in a number of places...
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