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Would this be legal in any jurisdiction (click-or-be-fired)? I am not familiar with US labour laws, are employees actually at the level of indentured servants considering terms of employment (which I would expect to be a contract between TWO parties)?
Would this be legal in any jurisdiction (click-or-be-fired)? I am not familiar with US labour laws, are employees actually at the level of indentured servants considering terms of employment (which I would expect to be a contract between TWO parties)?
Your employment contract may have terms that override the at-will relationship, in which case the employer has to follow the contract's terms. You may also be unionized, in which case the union will have negotiated termination procedures with your employer. And you may live in a State that has additional rules for terminating contracts.
But as a general rule, I believe this is legal in the US in most cases.
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Would this be legal in any jurisdiction (click-or-be-fired)? I am not familiar with US labour laws, are employees actually at the level of indentured servants considering terms of employment (which I would expect to be a contract between TWO parties)?
There are also very few places providing leave (outside of white-collar positions). For example, my wife was given two weeks off from her job after having my son. The state we lived in only required maternity leave to be implemented at companies having more than 50 employees. Oh, and those two weeks were unpaid.
In some places, taking a vacation longer than three weeks requires the company to stop paying your salary and consider you "abandoning" your job, or submitting special paperwork.
I do not miss the US; moving to the EU was the best decision I ever made.
I am glad to hear that workers rights are being enforced in Europe. As an employee in Germany, it sounds deranged to receive an email saying I have one day to completely change my work contract, or be fired from my job.
It's the main reason I chose to move to Europe instead of the US, despite potentially making more money in the US. I very much appreciate the labor protections in most EU countries.
Companies could even offer that as an option. We pay you $97k with no labour protections, or $68k but we promise to give you all the labour rights that Germany has, including nice long holidays, unions, no unpaid overtime, can't be fired without cause, etc. Your choice.
(And those figures are the median programmer salary in the USA and Germany respectively)
Would this be legal in any jurisdiction (click-or-be-fired)? I am not familiar with US labour laws, are employees actually at the level of indentured servants considering terms of employment (which I would expect to be a contract between TWO parties)?
Would this be legal in any jurisdiction (click-or-be-fired)? I am not familiar with US labour laws, are employees actually at the level of indentured servants considering terms of employment (which I would expect to be a contract between TWO parties)?
Some people do have employment contracts with more consideration but as I understand it that mostly applies to union work and C suite executive positions.
So Musk feels to be above contract law. The whole basis for law based commerce goes out of the window. Musk's world view is incredibly dangerous for a law based country.
This means €550k is a way to low number as punishment. It might be enough as restitution for the employee, but an additional, much stronger and personal punishment should be given to anyone who agreed with this way of working.
It's viable because Twitter/X controls the access to the audiences of their users - if you leave, you lose your network.
I'd like next gen social media platforms to allow transitions from one provider to another. While related, I think this is a different topic than centralized/federated.
I am glad to hear that workers rights are being enforced in Europe. As an employee in Germany, it sounds deranged to receive an email saying I have one day to completely change my work contract, or be fired from my job.
I'm so glad most European countries have robust labour laws which often favour the employee in case of doubt, not the employer. This type of behaviour - unilaterally changing the employment agreement without even specifying them in their entirety! - should never be possible. I hope other employees and EU countries follow suit and slap X with more fines, if this impacted other citizens as well.
I've been on both sides of the fence (mostly in Germany). As an employer, my approach was usually to be nice to employees I wanted to get rid of and to offer them a good severance package proactively. If you push an employee and give them ammunition to sue (and you fail to fool/bully them) it's gonna get a lot more expensive. Not to mention distracting/emotional. Just keep in mind that if you hire an FTE, you'll have to mentally put money aside to exit them at some point in the future. Hiring freelancers is more expensive, but doesn't carry these problems. I tend to mix FTEs and freelancers, partly to distribute the risks and costs.
When talking to people in bad situations with their employer, I'm always surprised how little they know and how easily they're willing to take the short end of the stick. There's a deal between you and the company that specifies what you'll do for them and what you'll get in return, with legal context surrounding it. I think it's also good to be nice and willing to compromise in that situation, but employees generally don't seem to be aware of what a powerful position they're actually in, and don't feel they "deserve" that, or don't want to upset anyone. It's business at the end of the day, contracts. Don't be a bad business person, it's not like CEOs will respect or like you more if you don't put up a fight. Typically the opposite.
The lack of these protections is one thing that, IMHO, warrants the comparatively high US salaries in tech. More risk, more reward - business 101 stuff.