Tesla employees who don’t return to work could lose unemployment benefits

Which concluded that the title here is misleading. The statement from Tesla is just a legal-speak that they don't know. ...but the reality is that if the state isn't allowing you to report to work, then you can continue to file and collect unemployment.

This seems pretty reasonable to me. Ultimately there are many reasons that lockdowns and blanket bans on assembly and commerce can't continue, aside from the collateral damage and the legal questions, anyone who thinks they're even enforceable beyond a few months lives in a fantasy land. Violations are growing by the day.

If we try to just go back to normal, though, a lot of people are going to get sick and die.

The solution has to be policies which seek to protect people from the virus with minimal collateral damage. This is no different from other spheres of public policy - for example we have speed limits on the road, and we have road deaths. We could lower all speed limits to 5mph and prevent all deaths, but the roads would become practically useless and society would grind to a halt. So we've selected limits that we feel are a reasonable compromise between safety and practicality.

The vast majority of COVID-19 fatalities are people who are over 65 and/or have the mentioned chronic conditions. So it makes sense to do everything we can to protect these people.

As an aside, since cars are pretty dangerous, I think we're very lucky that social media and the 24/7 news cycle didn't exist when they were invented. What with the panic these mediums generate, you have to wonder if cars would have gotten off the ground and become commonplace or if they would have just been panic banned.

> chronic health conditions, such as heart disease, lung disease or diabetes."

10-15% of US population has diabetes, ~40% have hypertension. The top two chronic conditions related to covid.

workout, eat healthy , take care of yourself = go back to work.

In the US you often get 10-20 sick days per year, not more.

Edit: This is what I have experienced and I meant this as a ridiculously low number. I had no idea that people would get even less.

Paid time off/sick leave is already rare enough in the US, I don't think tesla has any incentive to really go above and beyond there. They don't need to attract talent using things like compensation and benefits or showing basic human decency in caring about their health during a pandemic. The cult of personality is really strong around Elon (and that's not a diss in any way, he's so powerfully charismatic and driven that he's willed a rocket company and an electric car company into existence). He's got a natural ability to get some of the best technical talent and financiers to believe in him and his vision and spend ridiculously long hours on their mission of saving the world while they could have far more comfortable jobs elsewhere. Why would you complain about long hours and unsafe conditions when you're boss who is basically a real life iron man (to the extent he was actually in the MCU as a cameo) is sleeping on the floor next to you in the factory? You can get away with an awful lot when you're that charismatic (yes of course he doesn't smooth talk and mostly communicate in hesitation technical snippets and weird tweets, a smooth talking clinton/jobs type wouldn't get the same type of bubble he does). I don't know how long that can be maintained, but he's been at it for decades and there are rockets landing on barges and sleek, fast cars charging in people's garages.

There is not much at the federal level and each state does its own thing. California does it better than most. There is a state disability insurance payed through payroll deductions that give up to 52 weeks of coverage and "provides short-term benefits to eligible workers who have a full or partial loss of wages due to a non-work-related illness, injury, or pregnancy." If you qualify it is 52 weeks of coverage. I believe you would qualify if you actually have COVID19 and have to isolate but I don't they will cover you if you are just scared of getting sick.

Also most people with good paying jobs will additionally have private short term and long term disability coverage through their employer. I know someone who had unbearable back pain who had to quit his job and the private long term insurance will cover him for 20 years till he reaches retirement. And if structured right, there are no taxes on this income.

Lower paying job may not provide the private disability benefits so many rely on the social security long term disability benefit but that is not as good as the private one and they are pretty strict in evaluating.

I don't know the details of California's regulations, but if feasible, and if Tesla actually respects and supports these decisions, they should find a way to figure out who wants to be called back and who doesnt and only call back people that are willing and wanting to come back. I don't know if asking first violates any labor laws (I don't know why it would since that's a pretty pro-employee thing, but it might impact the budget and lots of states have very strange regulations like prop 56) but if it doesn't then that would be actually supporting workers.

Yep. Everything is allowed to re-open but because he talked about the lockdowns in a bad way, they want to make an example out of him.

No one else is being forced to return to work (except essential workers and healthcare workers).

Would an article about immigrant workers at meat processing plants get to the HN frontpage?

Unemployment benefits are available not only to people who lost their job, but also to furloughed people, i.e. people who are told by their employer "your services are not needed at this time, and by the way, we aren't able to pay you either, but when we'll need you back, we'll give you a call". Well, now these guys got the call. If they decide to stay at home, should the Government keep paying them unemployment benefits, or not? If yes, then it should be yes, if not, not, but this is Government's problem, not Tesla's problem.