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Amazon to force 'voluntary resignation' on workers who don't relocate

businessinsider.com

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Re: Amazon to force 'voluntary resignation' on workers who don't relocate

#91

Post by taeric »

tptacek wrote: post #86
taeric wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My understanding is you can't get unemployment for quitting, though? Is that not accurate?

If the whole thing about constructive termination is that they're doing this "voluntary resignation" thing to avoid unemployment benefits, then this makes sense. I had the initial impression it was about avoiding having to relocate, but it looks like I misconstrued.

I have the impression a lot of folks just like yelling at companies. As such, I have no doubt your initial impression is a large part of the discourse.

That said, I think it does meaningfully impact the people that are getting terminated. I'm willing to think the company isn't trying to deny unemployment, but if it does have that implication, this is very wrong.

Re: Amazon to force 'voluntary resignation' on workers who don't relocate

#93

Post by andsoitis »

grayhatter wrote: post #72
andsoitis wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The only people who will agree are the ones who sadly have no alternative. Many people will continue to choose to work at Amazon and specifically because they want to be around other colleagues a few days in the week. It is pretty presumptive and insulting to say to someone like that that they're in a "sad" position and they are "victims".

rule #2 of hacker news, never express an opinion different from the hive mind. I don't agree with the other commenters, that you're suffering from Stockholm. So I'm sorry your opinion is getting unfairly trashed the way it is. But like you're not wrong to enjoy working in the office, they're not wrong for wanting to work at home. And it's pretty clear Amazon is being abusive with their policies So not everyone is a v…

> Amazon is being abusive

> stand up against the bully

If one thinks one's employer is a bully and is abusive, isn't the better thing to do is to walk away?

I'd much rather work on cool stuff and get rewarded accordingly, instead of feeling like I'm in an abusive relationship with my employer.

Life just seems much too short to spend it on crap like that.

Re: Amazon to force 'voluntary resignation' on workers who don't relocate

#94

Post by turnsout »

andsoitis wrote: post #93
grayhatter wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

rule #2 of hacker news, never express an opinion different from the hive mind. I don't agree with the other commenters, that you're suffering from Stockholm. So I'm sorry your opinion is getting unfairly trashed the way it is. But like you're not wrong to enjoy working in the office, they're not wrong for wanting to work at home. And it's pretty clear Amazon is being abusive with their policies So not everyone is a v…

> Amazon is being abusive > stand up against the bully If one thinks one's employer is a bully and is abusive, isn't the better thing to do is to walk away? I'd much rather work on cool stuff and get rewarded accordingly, instead of feeling like I'm in an abusive relationship with my employer. Life just seems much too short to spend it on crap like that.

That's an entitled perspective… not everyone has the ability to easily walk away. There are people who have high medical expenses and can't afford a break in coverage, people on H-1B visas, people who are in roles which are not in high demand.

Re: Amazon to force 'voluntary resignation' on workers who don't relocate

#95

Post by tptacek »

taeric wrote: post #91
tptacek wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the whole thing about constructive termination is that they're doing this "voluntary resignation" thing to avoid unemployment benefits, then this makes sense. I had the initial impression it was about avoiding having to relocate, but it looks like I misconstrued.

I have the impression a lot of folks just like yelling at companies. As such, I have no doubt your initial impression is a large part of the discourse. That said, I think it does meaningfully impact the people that are getting terminated. I'm willing to think the company isn't trying to deny unemployment, but if it does have that implication, this is very wrong.

I agree with you. I, too, as too knee-jerk here. Thanks for spelling it out!

Re: Amazon to force 'voluntary resignation' on workers who don't relocate

#96

Post by andsoitis »

turnsout wrote: post #94
andsoitis wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Amazon is being abusive > stand up against the bully If one thinks one's employer is a bully and is abusive, isn't the better thing to do is to walk away? I'd much rather work on cool stuff and get rewarded accordingly, instead of feeling like I'm in an abusive relationship with my employer. Life just seems much too short to spend it on crap like that.

That's an entitled perspective… not everyone has the ability to easily walk away. There are people who have high medical expenses and can't afford a break in coverage, people on H-1B visas, people who are in roles which are not in high demand.

I was on an immigrant visa once and was experiencing undue pressure from my employer, so I know what it feels like. I still had autonomy and could calculate for myself what risk (in this case losing my right to be in the US) I was willing to take.

Maybe another way to think about it that is more productive is to ask yourself: what if my employer goes belly up? What would I do then? What degrees of freedom can I create to de-risk things. After all, my employer is not responsible for my success in life.

Re: Amazon to force 'voluntary resignation' on workers who don't relocate

#97

Post by flappyeagle »

unpwn wrote: post #58
flappyeagle wrote: post #39

Before the flood of remote work die-hards start to flood this thread I want to implore you to spend that energy making better tools for remote collaborating. It’s been 3 years since we started social distancing and exactly nothing is different today vs then. We are still stuck in Notion, Zoom, and Slack. The unlucky ones are on MS Teams. Remote learning is terrible for most people, remote training is similar. Ad hoc…

As if RTO solves this at all. Lots of teams are distributed across the many hubs. Amazon is basically asking a large number of its employees to commute hours into the office, or move across the country, just to sit on chime/slack all day anyway.

It does solve it at all. You might work with someone at a different hub, but most people don't most of the time.

Re: Amazon to force 'voluntary resignation' on workers who don't relocate

#99

Post by 40yearoldman »

zarathustreal wrote: post #69
40yearoldman wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. Let’s do this thing that will likely lower pay and ensure shitty engineers keep jobs they can’t do because of a horribly short sighted view that RTO is not equitable. The issues with Unions is there appears to be no way for a company to hire non union workers. Once this happens you are basically the mob. And hold the company and other employees hostage to mob rule. Which is almost always not driven by logic. The…

What exactly is insane about wanting a software engineering job to allow you to work remotely? Obviously it’s entirely possible to do remotely, I’m curious what I’m missing that makes this insane?

Nothing insane. Its insane to expect a specific company to change its policies for your preferences.

The way it is now some companies are remote others are not. They have different benefits. But what you want to do is strong arm everybody to do it your way.

Some of us don’t want to work remote and don’t want to deal with those who do work remote.

The way it is now allows me to work at companies that don’t offer remote and for you to work at companies that do offer remote.

People demanding remote work by force with unions are basically the lady who wanes to apply Safeway and target coupons at Walmart.

Re: Amazon to force 'voluntary resignation' on workers who don't relocate

#100

Post by seanmcdirmid »

RollAHardSix wrote: post #54
tptacek wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That matters when employees have contracts promising termination only with cause. But these employees are likely all at-will; they can be fired for having the wrong hair cut.

No, I live in an at-will state, you can absolutely file for constructive dismissal. And SHOULD. If you can do your job remotely, have been doing your job remotely, and the company wants to end that? Then the company absolutely needs to be challenged and burdened with showing proof as to why returning to the office is necessary when it does create an unreasonable burden on the employee. For anyone who says this isn't…

Ya, I don’t see Amazon getting out of unemployment in this case. But they can fire at will employees, even if their unemployment premiums will go up as a result, they don’t have to worry about lawsuits otherwise. It still sucks for the employee being dismissed even if they qualify for unemployment.
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