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Comment by eduah | Hacker News Reader

Yeah, no.

https://www.tesla.com/blog/one-year-in-tesla-update

You don't pass a 4 month long safety inspection by California OSHA by making injured workers continue working.

"News organization" writes article about a company in California under reporting and hiding injuries, leading to a 4 month OSHA investigation that completely clears company of the accusation. Do they retract the accusation, write an article on why they made the previous accusations given we now know they were wrong?

No, they write a new article making new accusations about the company.

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Cal OSHA subsequently launched a new investigation a few weeks ago, on the basis of undisclosed issues that came to light after the completion of the second (summer) inspection.

https://www.businessinsider.com/california-regulators-open-a...

The thing about inspections is that it's quite possible for a company to put on their best face during an inspection, only to resort to their unsafe practices after the inspection concludes. This is, for example, why restaurant inspections are conducted without notice.

The fact that Tesla has survived two inspections doesn't mean anything--companies are expected to pass inspection. However, the fact that they have had 3 inspections in a single year... That is a matter for concern, since CalOSHA generally doesn't inspect a workplace more than once every few years. If they felt that multiple inspections were warranted--especially a new one so soon after finishing a thorough, months-long inspection, that means they have serious concerns about Tesla's safety practices. Given the relative lack of issues pointed out so far by CalOSHA, it's likely that they don't trust management to adhere to safe practices or that they feel that Tesla is changing work practices while inspectors are present.

"the fact that they have had 3 inspections in a single year... That is a matter for concern, since CalOSHA generally doesn't inspect a workplace more than once every few years. If they felt that multiple inspections were warranted--especially a new one so soon after finishing a thorough, months-long inspection, that means they have serious concerns about Tesla's safety practices. "

Or that Tesla's the most shorted stock in history and there's a lot of negative, probable propaganda, being created/distributed to impact the stock price.

Tesla is not the most shorted stock in history. It's not even number one right now. Alibaba has more shorts, by absolute value, and Johnson & Johnson, Pfizer, General Electric and Procter & Gamble have all recently had larger shorts by relative value.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-08-16/musk-call...

The shorts aren't behind a massive conspiracy to destroy Tesla. Hell, this summer, Elon Musk almost destroyed Tesla all on his own and he's Tesla's biggest shareholder.

Tesla's problem is a constant failure to properly execute. It's happened with every model they've made, with every endeavor they've undertaken. They've constantly over-promised and just as constantly under-delivered. (And please, none of this BS about how they're trying to accomplish great things. Other companies are also trying to accomplish great things--and actually succeed in doing so without constantly bragging about what they're trying to do.)

Tesla may have a great vision for cars. But a great vision without proper execution just means having the best seats for watching someone else succeed in their place.

Conspiratorial thinking is a bad look.

On the other hand, we do already have evidence that there are individuals who get a job at Tesla with the sole goal of getting them to unionize and no motivations actually wanting/needing the job.

Are you asserting that union activists are related to a short short seller conspiracy, or are you just suggestively placing those next to each other and hoping that people draw a sinister conclusion?

Union activists join tons of companies to try and unionize them, because get this, they’re union activists. They think unionizing labor is a moral imperative, and so they act as such. You might not like it, but it’s hardly unique to Tesla or a big dark conspiracy.

The article specifically addresses that investigation and its result. It's the subject of the last section, "State regulators not interested".

It includes the fact that the statute of limitations had expired on many of the reported violations. As a result, state legislators ended up changing the window so that it wouldn't happen again in the future for similar reports.

Disclosure: I have friends who now work at Reveal (the news industry being a very small world) but don't know anything about this or other of their stories. As others have pointed out, the article addresses OSHA's investigation into Tesla's injury recordkeeping. And Reveal argues that OSHA was not allowed to fine the company for the other injuries Reveal had reported because "the agency had only about six months from the date of an injury to fine a company" (and the injuries reported by Reveal were already in the past).

But assessing fines is one thing -- it's not clear whether the statute of limitations restricts OSHA from considering these past injuries when scrutinizing Tesla's recordkeeping. Reveal certainly implies it does, and Tesla doesn't mention it. Neither Reveal nor Tesla links to the published investigation results. I think it's OK to assume that Tesla isn't going to be punished by OSHA (in this case; several more investigations are still ongoing. But I see no reason until OSHA says otherwise that its investigation "completely clears [Tesla] of the accusation." Only Tesla itself has asserted that, and well, Tesla has been creative in the past at interpreting results; NHTSA having to publicly clarify an Autopilot statistic that Elon Musk eagerly touted comes to mind [0].

Whatever the case, I don't agree with your interpretation of cause-and-effect -- i.e. "No, they write a new article making new accusations". Tesla's statement about OSHA came on Oct. 26 [1], just a little more than a week ago from the submitted article's publish date. While the article does have several confidential sources, it leads with a former employee making litigious claims. The lawyering for this story alone would've taken at least a week, nevermind the time it takes to find the sources and interview them, and to talk to Tesla and check the related sources and documentation. I wouldn't be surprised if this story was at least a couple months in the making, with the timing of its publication only coincidental with Tesla's recent statement.

[0] https://www.wired.com/story/tesla-autopilot-safety-statistic...

[1] https://www.teslarati.com/tesla-releases-workers-safety-upda...

CAL-OSHA had seven investigations of Tesla underway as of Sep. 20th.[1] Including the fingertip amputation.

[1] https://www.businessinsider.com/california-regulators-open-a...

Kind of sad that this is the highest voted comment right now, and that almost all of the responses pointed out the investigation is addressed in the piece. Also "news organization" is weak, this is a site thats won a Peabody(among other awards), as other commenters have also pointed out.

Not to mention the parent commenter has contributed nothing to the site except breathless defences of Musk and Tesla.

I would like to think that HN isn't subjected to brigading[0], but unfortunately there's a lot of money to be made in this topic, regardless of which way the sentiment swings.

When I see things voted up which are misleading, false, or ridiculous, my reaction is typically that of distrust and an expectation of manipulation. But my hope for humanity lies in believing that some posts are simply because the poster was mistaken.

0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vote_brigading

Well, I can see why such inspections have respect from a lot of people. But also keep in mind that a multi-billion dollar company, which might be stronger than any single government organ, will be treated differently than the burger shop around the corner.

Said company has been scamming thousands into buying a Tesla based for past 2 years with the fake "driver is just there for legal reasons" 2016 FSD video

That's pretty inaccurate - I think tesla said they were waiting on the fsd (full self driving) system to be finished, but tesla played up that it also depended on regulatory support - there was a ton of work before tesla finished it, it was just almost done waiting on govt approval. I can only guess that buyers thought it was coming soon, but it wasn't.

Tesla was selling FSD for 3k. Selling something with no guarantee that it even exists does not seem like honest business practice.

It was prepay to get it cheaper now, costs more later. Also came with hardware upgrades if any - they made a new computer, prepay people got it free. I was thinking about not getting it on my car.

Reveal News has previously made claims of unreported/underreported/hidden workplace injuries at Tesla [1], determined to be unfounded after an investigation by CAL OSHA (reported by Elon Musk and Laurie Shelby, Tesla's Vice President of Engineering Health and Safety, during the October 24th, 2018 earnings call at timestamp 19:05 [2]).

@danso: Please consider this the follow up to our earlier discussion on the issue. [3]

[1] https://www.revealnews.org/article/tesla-left-injuries-off-t...

[2] https://edge.media-server.com/m6/p/omd73p8r

[3] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17238737

Randomly came across your comment during some late night procrastination. As others have noted, Reveal asserts that OSHA’s investigation did not address the reported incidents because of the statute of limitations:

> Reveal had documented many other cases of injuries that Tesla had failed to record. But the agency had only about six months from the date of an injury to fine a company. By the time Cal/OSHA concluded its four-month investigation, the statute of limitations had run out.

Of course, it could both be the case that the time limit ran out and Tesla books happen to be fine. But if OSHA doesn’t consider the contrary examples reported on by Reveal, then it’s to be expected they won’t find Tesla at fault.

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