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Swedish Tesla strike goes international as Norwegian and Danish unions join in

theregister.com

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Re: Swedish Tesla strike goes international as Norwegian and Danish unions join in

#401

Post by dubbel »

mattlutze wrote: post #298
rch wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the postal carriers are within their rights to refuse to make deliveries in support of Tesla purchases, but the government will need to explain why Tesla shouldn't be allowed to explore alternatives for customers to comply with legal requirements.

I very much support workers collecting in solidarity to support each other. I'm not sure that I like the idea of official agents of a state office, or de facto state office, being authorized to independently choose how to execute their duties. Would it also be permitted for a group of socially conservative postal workers to refuse to deliver wedding licenses or legal documents to same sex partnerships? To determine w…

If the postal service would be that important in the eyes of the Danish and Swedish governments, then they wouldn't have re-structured their postal services as a state owned company, but kept it a state agency.

But they didn't. In turn the postal workers are no longer state officials, which comes with a loss of job security, but instead they gained the right to strike.

You can petition the government to undo this semi-privatization of course.

Strikes are regulated in Denmark and Sweden, and usually need to be organized by a proper union, and can be deemed unjustified by a court - like it happened in this case, until that decision was overturned again. This makes your fears of "socially conservative" "unions" unlikely. :)

Re: Swedish Tesla strike goes international as Norwegian and Danish unions join in

#402

Post by neuromanser »

peterfirefly wrote: post #330
toomuchtodo wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Another way to say this is that people own the government.

No, the unions. That's definitely the case in Sweden but it's no longer quite the case in Denmark. The interests of the people and the interests of the union don't overlap much.

You may want to substantiate the claims, as is this reads as far-right union-busting rhetoric.

Re: Swedish Tesla strike goes international as Norwegian and Danish unions join in

#403

Post by martin8412 »

belltaco wrote: post #125
eckesicle wrote: post #25

> Postal workers even decided not to deliver mail to the electric automaker, including license plates – an action that Musk called "insane". The local court has since put a stop to that action. This is no longer true. A higher court overturned that decision and the license plates are again blocked from reaching Tesla.

PostNord is experiencing a force majeure under Swedish law, i.e a strike. I would think that the govt Transport Agency's exclusive contract with them provides an out with them in cases of force majeure to use alternate means, like allowing Tesla to pick up the plates from the factory or use a different carrier to deliver plates, since plates are mandated by the state and the Transport Agency is required to provide th…

The factory is privately owned, and the workers there can just strike. Tesla isn't getting anything regardless.

Re: Swedish Tesla strike goes international as Norwegian and Danish unions join in

#404

Post by jacquesm »

1970-01-01 wrote: post #183
brightball wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At this point, I honestly just hope the standoff continues because I want to see how many moves each side has. This is really interesting to watch as somebody who isn't affected by it directly. Government workers deciding not to provide services to specific entities or people they are in dispute with is a bridge that I can only assume should have some pretty serious consequences.

The sad truth is there is plenty of room for Musk to make things much worse. I imagine he can deny them SpaceX payloads. Starlink was just made available to them as well. He could throttle or deny their uplinks and downlinks.

Well, he can. But if he does then every other country that currently uses SpaceX for their payloads may end up thinking twice about giving the megalomaniac even more power.

Because: normal people just obey the laws of the countries where they do business.

Musk will end up self destructing over something like this sooner or later, the guy has no sense of when to back down and just keeps on taking on parties with power until he loses and when he loses it will be at a level that he won't be able to recover from. You pick your battles with care, and this is one that was utterly unnecessary. After all the damage the Tesla brand has suffered on account of his Twitter antics (I refuse to call it 'X') he really doesn't need more, especially not in a market that was so far a substantial plank in Tesla's strategy and a country with massive early adoption.

Re: Swedish Tesla strike goes international as Norwegian and Danish unions join in

#405

Post by peterfirefly »

henry2023 wrote: post #248

Unions are simply like GPOs[^1] but with the most valuable asset in any organization. Their workers. It baffles me to read anti-union comments from fellow tech-workers. It's so clear that unions give back a tiny bit of negotiation power into your own hands and yet people side with the exec whose only purpose is to extract as much value from the organization as possible. You are supporting the "competitive labor wage…

It would be wonderful if they were just GPOs. I would be very much in favour of such a state of affairs.

In practice, they are more like mobs, parasites, and treacle and they are -- in practice -- allowed to do all sorts of shady extra-legal things.

3F, the Danish union that supports IF Metall (Swedish union), has a history of performing dangerous sabotage against scaffolding at construction sites that almost got people killed. Just as an example...

Re: Swedish Tesla strike goes international as Norwegian and Danish unions join in

#406

Post by martin8412 »

thecopy wrote: post #297
belltaco wrote: post #269

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Given that PostNord is jointly owned by the Swedish and Danish governments but is not a government agency, it's strange that there would be a law that exclusively forces the Swedish government to use PostNord. There's also nothing in the law that states that plates have to be mailed and cannot be picked up, that's a operational decision by the Transport Agency. It's required by law to provide plates so it will be int…

You may well think that, and i agree with you, but that is how the regulation is, afaik. The plates have to be distributed by mail and Postnord has to be used for it.

The deal is that whoever gets the contract has to deliver to all of the nation, not just where it's profitable. UPS, GPS, DPD etc won't commit to that because they don't earn enough money on that. PostNord is the only one who does, and therefore they're the only ones who can win the contract.

Re: Swedish Tesla strike goes international as Norwegian and Danish unions join in

#407

Post by oh_sigh »

morelisp wrote: post #352
oh_sigh wrote: post #288

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Compare and contrast the reception Swedish mail workers are getting for their behavior, versus Kim Davis, who refused to issue an otherwise non-problematic marriage license(which was part of her job).

Even Davis was ultimately allowed to refuse to issue licenses personally; she just couldn't forbid the deputy clerks from doing it (only one of whom, her son, also refused). She also had an elected position with an oath of office, not an employment contract.

Actually, the judge ordered that the deputy clerks must issue the marriage licenses(save for her son), unless they wanted to be held in contempt of court.

I'm not sure how the path matters much. It contains language along the lines of "I will faithfully execute, to the best of my ability, the office of...."

I'm imagining having religious qualms about certain behaviors would fall under "best of my abilities"

Re: Swedish Tesla strike goes international as Norwegian and Danish unions join in

#408

Post by jacquesm »

1970-01-01 wrote: post #366
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> they should get temporary relief during that suit Sure, from Tesla. We're talking about a purchase and sale between private parties and a contract dispute between private parties.

Well if its 'just Tesla' that is being denied use, then Tesla can hide their main company behind offshore corporations, so dozens of corporations need to be cut simultaneously to stop the plates.

Someone needs to do that work. Cue a strike of the people that are supposed to help with the hiding. Tesla will back out of Sweden or they will play ball. Those are the options.

Re: Swedish Tesla strike goes international as Norwegian and Danish unions join in

#409

Post by peterfirefly »

sampo wrote: post #92
legitster wrote: post #31

I'm coming from a US perspective and trying to understand what is actually happening https://www.ifmetall.se/aktuellt/tesla/ Does IF Metall already represent all of Tesla's employees? Does that mean there are no active Tesla services in Sweden during the strike? If union membership is really the way of life in Sweden, is there anything preventing the government from a legislative solution? Just mandate collective agr…

> If union membership is really the way of life in Sweden, is there anything preventing the government from a legislative solution? Nordic countries actually have relatively weak labour laws. What might be handled in legislation in US (e.g. minimum wage), is handled in collective bargaining agreements, that are negotiated between trade unions and employers' associations. And the trade unions and the employers' associ…

The de facto minimum wage in Northern Europe is actually set by the relatively high unemployment benefits. Few people want to work for less than that.

Most wages are of course higher than that because the market can bear more. Those wages are mostly set by market conditions but the unions and the employers' associations do perform a big ritual every few years (and they do affect the wages a bit). The problem comes in sectors with a high degree of monopsony -- only one or a few big employers. Examples are schools and hospitals -- the unions and various levels of the state apparatus (often including parliament and government) have a large influence on the wages there.

Re: Swedish Tesla strike goes international as Norwegian and Danish unions join in

#410

Post by bayindirh »

robertlagrant wrote: post #321
bayindirh wrote: post #293

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, I’m not. I’m on mobile, and failed to convey my message. What I tried to say is, postal workers are increasing pressure on a company which is treating their workers unfairly, and these workers are connected to the postal workers in a way. So, what postal workers are doing is justified.

I'm not saying that employees shouldn't do certain things if they really don't like a company. Don't buy their products. Post opinions publically. Actually go on strike at your own employer. I'm saying I don't think that refusing individual service to a customer is a good idea. It seems highly prone to groupthink and as it comes at zero cost to the striking party, prone to misuse as well. Actual striking is moderatel…

I mean, in this case this is both their legal right and higher court ruled that it’s legal and doable.

So, who are we to judge? It’s their country and their laws. I just stated that, their laws and the way of action they took resonates with me. That’s all.

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