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Tesla Workers Launch Union Campaign in New York

bloomberg.com

141–150 of 194 posts

Re: Tesla Workers Launch Union Campaign in New York

#142
post #139

Not that it matters much as a matter of labor policy, but the factory in question is Gigafactory 2, which is a photovoltaic cell fab that employs (per Wikipedia) 1500 people. They make the roofing products, not cars or batteries.

Per Bloomberg, this is specifically regarding a group of workers who "label data for Tesla’s Autopilot technology."

Re: Tesla Workers Launch Union Campaign in New York

#143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah those parents are all upper middle class. None of them are at all comparable to the owners of a company like VW, Tesla, or Amazon. And none of them were "heirs who own the majority of stock" nor support your claim that "just because the companies change doesn't mean the owners do". Edit to reply: You don't need to tell me about the social mobility of people living in poverty. I was born into a family of construc…

You can call it "upper middle class" all you want, but to the vast majority of the population those folks would simply be "rich". I'm not as concerned as you with the various strata of richness and the mobility between them. I'm much more concerned with the social mobility of people living in poverty, which is pretty bad in the US compared to Europe. [0] Key factor in that? Unions. [0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki…

The thing you're linking doesn't even measure social mobility, it just calls itself a social mobility index.

Re: Tesla Workers Launch Union Campaign in New York

#144

> Workers at the Buffalo plant told Bloomberg that Tesla tracks their computer keystrokes to monitor how they work, prompting some employees to refrain from taking bathroom breaks. It’s honestly kind of mind boggling that this is even legal.

In the absence of labor regulation, employment sprints in the direction of slavery.

Re: Tesla Workers Launch Union Campaign in New York

#145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unions can and do exist in right to work states. The point of a union is not job security. It's about giving workers collective power they may not otherwise have. Historically unions have been painted as extremely antagonistic towards companies in the United States, but there's no reason that has to be true. A well-run union recognizes that their survival is tied to the company's survival, and as long as both sides e…

> Usually that means something like getting a PIP and six weeks to improve performance. Is that such an unreasonable ask? Isn't this what parent took issue with? If you can't fire the underperformers, where's the incentive to get shit done?

> If you can't fire the underperformers, where's the incentive to get shit done?

The assumption with you guys is always three parts:

  1. That the company actors know what good performance is, therefor they can determine underperformance
  2. That underperformance is meaningful in the context (taking care of a sick kid for a month is underperformance, but not meaningful when the kid is no longer sick)
  3. That the company actors are being truthful about the reason
When in reality I know that company actors rarely understand good performance or thus underperformance, they rarely consider meaningfulness, and rarely are they actually telling the truth about the reason.

Re: Tesla Workers Launch Union Campaign in New York

#148
post #144

> Workers at the Buffalo plant told Bloomberg that Tesla tracks their computer keystrokes to monitor how they work, prompting some employees to refrain from taking bathroom breaks. It’s honestly kind of mind boggling that this is even legal.

In the absence of labor regulation, employment sprints in the direction of slavery.

Keyloggers are nothing like chattel slavery. Melodramatic comparisons make labor advocates sound unreasonable. It’s fine to push for less intrusive performance monitoring on its own merits.

Re: Tesla Workers Launch Union Campaign in New York

#149
post #2

As someone who has only worked in "right to work" states, it always strikes me as absurd that people seek "job security" through a 3rd party agency rather than by individual performance and developing personal relationships. Honestly a big part of why I quit my last job was too many unproductive/unreliable coworkers. Am I just Stockholm Syndromed?

When talking about unions the focus is generally on hourly wage jobs where the skills are quite transferable and thus workers’ leverage is less.

A factory worker installing bolts on a panel in some car isn’t gonna get opportunities to show “individual performance” or get to develop “personal relationships” with their supervisor who’s probably managing dozens of people

In context of white collar salaries jobs, esp software engineering I agree with you 100%.

Re: Tesla Workers Launch Union Campaign in New York

#150

> Workers at the Buffalo plant told Bloomberg that Tesla tracks their computer keystrokes to monitor how they work, prompting some employees to refrain from taking bathroom breaks. It’s honestly kind of mind boggling that this is even legal.

why would it be illegal? employees are welcome to find jobs elsewhere
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