It would be hard to get away with actually decreasing wages and salaries, so they get effectively frozen against rising efficiency and inflation (which we've seen happening for the last 40 years). But soon this becomes the new ceiling, and labor costs must keep getting cut, otherwise profits don't increase (at the expected rate).
That's when we start seeing the laborer take on the costs of working: transportation, uniforms, training, etc. Did you know that car mechanics have to buy their own tools? Can you imagine developing software and having to bring your own computer and devices? Having to own the latest iPhone just to test on, because the company won't provide it but expects iOS compatibility?
This is why labor rights organizations matter. Employers are guided by a very simple algorithm, whose total application to all job markets leads to the immiseration of all people who have to work for a living. This is also why solidarity matters: when we are in a position to make demands of employers, we are morally obligated to make demands also in the name of those employees who are powerless.
First they came for the blue-collars, but I didn't care because my collar was white. Next they came for the wage workers, but I didn't care because I had a salary. When they finally came for me, there was no one else left to care.
A good set of Snap On wrenches are practically family heirlooms. My dad has a set from the 60s that he bought from a family friend, and they’re still going strong.
I personally wouldn’t mind doing BYOD, because I like investing in my own tools for my own purposes as well as employment. All the ceremony and corpware around “company data” is why I use company equipment.
Just another reason to cherish those old tools, they literally don't make them like they used to.
One other thing to mention is that there are companies that make hand tools that outperform snap-on handily these days, even if they struggle against some aged tools. If you are interested in an empirical look at this sort of analysis, side by side, Project Farm on Youtube has covered most hand tools by major brands at this point.
Also worth noting that while the ceiling on quality has lowered, the floor for most major manufacturers seems to have raised as well. A random modern hand tool is usually more likely to break the thing you are working against than to break itself, and I can't even remember the last time I've seen a hammer lose its head, a screwdriver tip get stripped out by a steel screw, a wrench snap at the neck, etc.
One of the things about mechanics hand tools where this is a challenge is that mechanics regularly use tools for purposes outside the specifications, because you need to get the job done, regardless of what happens to currently be in your toolbox. In the past, because tools were overbuilt, this wasn't an issue. For modern tools, they are much tighter in tolerance to their specifications, both in good and bad ways. A simple way to tell is simply weigh the tools, due to techniques like CAD modeling with FEA, you can reduce the materials needed to achieve the same targeted strength specification. Tool from 1960 and Tool from 2022 with the same SKU likely have the same specifications, but are built in /very/ different ways.
With the subscriptions, you're paying $600+ a year, every year, in perpetuity, and you're subjected to invasive DRM that'll do shit like delete fonts you haven't used recently.
Before subscriptions, upgrades were often cheaper than buying new, and you might only buy an upgrade every four or five years (the core requirements of a graphics app don't change majorly, so new versions are more about stability, optimizations, and the occasional niche feature).
... thankfully, there's enough competition in this space that I've managed to completely remove Adobe from my toolset, but it still sucks that I can't even activate my 2013 version of Adobe's Creative Suite (CS6) because the licensing servers no longer function.
I prefer this, as a lot of companies provide crappy equipment. However, this doesn't work beyond the tiniest of companies because any COO worth their salt would flip their lid at having uncontrolled, outside equipment on their network. You really can't be sure about BYOC, especially with tech-savvy workers.
> Did you know that car mechanics have to buy their own tools?
The dealership also provides them with the expensive equipment they need to do their job. Yeah, mechanics have their own tool boxes with the basics, but they don't provide their own lifts, alignment racks, diagnostic software, etc.
It's pretty similar to the system I'm in, I provide my own monitors, keyboards, desk, chair, etc, while my company provides my laptop, software and cloud platform.
There are BYOD companies. They would probably be more common if licensing and security didn't matter.
Yes and no the the own tools thing. It depends on the shop and the type of tools. Their own wrenches, sockets, and other small tools might make sense (especially if they avoid Snap-On). The air tool infrastructure, lifts, alignment rack, tire mounting/balancing machine, etc are all shop supplied.
William Gibson liked the term "Zaibatsu"[0].
See also the textbook definitions of "neoliberalism", and "fascism".
This is pretty much his Aristotle thought the planets moved … by angels/demons motivated by greed.
I loved studying Aristotle, but the man could think himself into a hole.
Edit: the intelligences move the celestial spheres “as ends” - that is, their being desired (not their desiring) causes them to move the the celestial spheres. Sorry for the confusion on that.
The issue being more, these things are removed without giving anything else in return.
The previous company I was in did mostly require bringing in a personal smartphone to function. As I didn't own one, that caused all kinds of amusing (to me) commotion. Eventually some workarounds were set up.
But that should be non-negotiable. If company needs me to have $FOO to work, company must pay and give me said $FOO.
IANAL at all, but from my own research a few years back, part of the contractor test in North America and other countries is “who is providing and paying for the tools”. And when the answer is “not me”, it’s a strong indicator you’re an employee. Ergo if you’re an employee, the employer must pay for the tools to do the job (as in legally must)
You’re much more likely to keep your tools in working order and not let them walk away if they’re your tools.
Equipment the shop supplies is less likely to walk away. Like a 100gal air compressor or car lift.
I think it is better characterized as demand for labor falling relative to supply of labor. Obviously everyone wants to cut all costs all the time, but whether or not they can depends on supply and demand.
Why would this be obvious? I've worked in companies whose revenue grew so quickly that no one could be bothered to cut existing costs. It literally wouldn't be cost effective to do anything but grow revenue.
Cutting costs is just one half of the equation.
It is possible that in an explosive growth business area with little to zero marginal costs, focusing solely on revenue and ignoring costs in the short term makes sense, but it is not sustainable. Even then, there is never a blank check for labor costs so someone somewhere will notice a number being too high.
Example: a company hires someone, expecting at least a year of labor, two weeks of training. Training cost is amortized across the year if the employee leaves early, the company is obliged to employ the employee for that full year unless terminated with cause.
The scam is to pretend the training has some absurd value relative to the wage, then hold it over the employee to retain their labor, while reserving the right to lay them off whenever it's convenient. Hey, training is on us, you're welcome!
That such arrangements constitute indentured servitude was decided by the Supreme Court in the 19th century. It's no different from the company store.
A bunch of other new hires at that time took a "relocation package" where the company managed everything, including paying the moving company. The total cost to relocate just one individual was supposedly something like $20000. They were liable for that amount if they quit in the first year. This was the point in my career I decided I would never sign anything that left me liable for a bill I can't negotiate.
For context, I had a full move-and-pack for a one bedroom apartment (no temp housing, nothing extra, just the moving service) between two cities ~300mi away and total cost was $6k. Now, it was totally worth it, since I literally did not do any packing what-so-ever. They showed up to a fully furnished apartment with stuff in cabinets/bookshelves, and ~24 hours later they dropped off boxes of stuff and all my furniture in my new location.
This type of relo is much less common these days though, due to rules changes regarding reimbursement for relocation expenses. I think most companies prefer lump sum payments now, since you can't deduct ANYTHING for moving expenses. If a company does provide you $20k in relocation coverage (even if you never see the money), you're now on the hook for an extra $20k in 'income' which you have to pay taxes on.
This is just not true.
The tax rules changed in 2018, any relocation-related expenses are considered taxable as income with no exceptions (unless you're in the military).
And during the red-hot job market and shipping expenses spiking during covid, relocations were sometimes running way more than $20k.
I’ve been trying to convince my wife to move because our house is too big, and we have tons of value in it, but she doesn’t want the work (understandably).
Relocation expenses are deductible, but I don't think furnishing allowances are, e.g.
And then managers wonder why phenomena arise like "Quiet Quitting" and "Let It Rot".
Evidently, very few people think past the intended results of their actions to the secondary or knock-on effects, which can be far more significant.
They pay for the privilege of being able to run antivirus on my workstation.
If you want the employee to own the capital costs, then they better see capital returns as well.
By this logic, should the government also stop helping banks collect debts (eg. garnishing wages or seizing property)? After all, lending is also a "speculative investment" and "Sometimes you invest capital in something and don't see returns".
okay but how is that relevant to this discussion? if the state refuses to assist in debt collection, it effectively makes failing to pay debts legal, which seems to be what you want?
You are right though in that's its just another way to socialise the costs and privatise the profits.
An alternative arrangement to direct employment is that the pilot could pay for his/her own type rating, and work as a contract pilot. But that requires having $100k to plunk down, and taking the risk that the job market will be strong after the type rating.
In this case, the employee may prefer the "indentured servitude" route versus having to front 6 figures to get their own type rating.
Of course many other factors would sway my opinion of the matter into different directions. Who made the decision to change the fleet to Gulfstream multi-engine jets versus single-engine, or from flying cargo to adding the option to carry passengers, etc. Was the pilot already part of the company when these new qualification requirements were added, etc?
So, if you know how to fly Cessna Citations and Hawkers--- and you move to an employer with Gulfstreams, you're going to need expensive, type-specific training.
If you have $100k in type-specific training for what's now a popular jet, your employability and value to new employers grows.
It's zero-sum.
There are other ways to get around this problem either through deferred compensation or through the company being able to retain the certification lisence for a period of time as property that another company or the employee can buy out.
If the pilot is unable to work because of disability, conviction, etc., they're 6 figures in the hole and unable to use the training to get out. Seems like a pretty bad deal.
I have no problems with a business making a job offer contingent on the candidate doing something (i.e. acquiring a rating or finishing a college degree). Presumably the salary you offer would reflect the skills that they have as well (Plus this is way better than student loans since you actually have a legitimate job lined up). But if you want a current employee to have a set of skills or certificates that they don't already, it's on you to do that.
* Google has ~170k employees [1] with ~2.5k job openings [2] (~70x multiplier). clearancejobs.com has 20.5k job openings so with 70x multiplier is roughly 1.5M.
[1]: https://abc.xyz/investor/static/pdf/20220726_alphabet_10Q.pd... [2]: https://careers.google.com/jobs/results/ [3]: https://www.clearancejobs.com/jobs?clearance=4
However, the DoD often does give these types of contracts for other training. A friend had to sign a contract for university training where they agreed to stay on for 3x the training length or reimburse the expenses.
To be clear, "sponsored by a private company" involves that private company paying either the government or some other private company money for you to get your clearance (not too sure how the money exactly moves about).
Sure you need to be working a job that actually requires a clearance to have one (but effectively there is a grace period if you get fired/quit). But if Company A and Company B both have a job that requires Tier 5 then you can move from A->B no problem. IIUC, the Jet example is even worse (for job mobility) because it's a rating for a plane so you'd need to go from a pilot at A to a pilot of that plane at B while for the DoD you could go from a programmer to a manager or janitor and it's all Tier 5.
If that was paid, someone got ripped off. There are plenty of companies offering GIV/GV type ratings in the $20-30K range.
If your business depends on picking up newer pilots "off the streets", then why would you not do the type rating in-house?
The employers could, offer bonus payments for the employees tenure, top of market salaries, equity in the business, or secure private insurance to cover losses if the employee leaves.
Asking an employee, to pay you money so that you can make money from their labor shouldn't be legal.
Consider if you are an aircraft mechanic who is given a set of tools by the employer. Most people don't think it's unreasonable for the employer to ask for those tools back when you quit. In contrast, they can't ask for the training back.
Imagine if you agreed to work as a doctor for a charity if they agreed to pay for your training. Then upon completion of years of training, you quit to go work in the private sector to get more money. That seems like an extreme example, but it illustrates the point.
It would be interesting to see if employers give the equivalent funds as a bonus to an employee who comes onboard pre-trained. My guess is they don't, which would undermine their point somewhat.
It seems like an overall bad policy. If you hold someone against their will, you're bound to risk sub-standard work for the duration of the contract.
I can see the case for repayment agreements if the employer is (say) sending someone to a local university to get an MBA. That training transfers directly to other jobs and its price is set on the open market: you’d pay the same if you self-funded the MBA instead.
On the other hand, niche or employer-specific training doesn’t have either of those properties. Knowing the SOPs at Sally’s Beauty may not help much at other salons, let alone other industries. The price is also arbitrary and the employer has every incentive to inflate it.
The last example in the article, where the employee got a CDL, seems reasonably fair.
The first one though, where a licensed esthetician was charged $1,900 for pro-forma on-site training that she already had, seems like it should be legislated out of existence.
Even so, I’m not sure how legislation would work. It’s once thing if you can point to a license and say the training is unnecessary but I would venture a guess that the majority of training isn’t of that type.
It depends on what the skills are. At one extreme, the employee might pick up actual skills, like how to dye hair. I can also imagine some stuff that's much closer to "onboarding": how to use the in-house booking system, workplace safety training, etc. That doesn't really transfer, either practically or legally. The line is really thin and a cynic might be tempted to blur it to retain employees.
As for legislation, one really bright line might be whether similar training is available to the general public (and at what costs). People enroll in Javascript bootcamps all the time, so an internal one is probably fine--and the repayment should be similar to their costs. If it's MUMPS instead, tough break for the employer.
Then I think this undermines the employees stance that the trainings were unnecessary. The employer is essentially saying licensure isn't enough to ensure their quality standard, so additional training is necessary. (Granted, there's probably a likelihood of legal gamesmanship going on with both sides). To me, it would really depend on how "specific to the shop" it was. Since the lawsuit was dismissed, I'm assuming it was specific enough to be what you classify as "onboarding."
I get your point on the legislation, but just to illustrate my point about the lines being blurry: you brought up MUMPS and that being niche training. However, it's also the program that underlies the Veterans Affairs VISTA platform. Meaning, if you're trained in MUMPS you could foreseeably transfer those skills to one of the largest healthcare networks in the nation, as well as the companies that have gotten billions of dollars to upgrade that system. So even a "niche" program has plenty of wiggle room to determine if it's really transferable. Not only that, they've now trained you on a system that has billions of dollars in demand and little supply of programmers. That seems pretty valuable.
In fact, so many of these pilots prefer this indentured servitude that we've got record numbers! Incredible!
Your last line is like the mocked meme of “if you hate capitalism so much why did you buy a shirt”. The logic doesn’t work. Of course many anti-capitalists are going to consume capitalism because they live here and not everyone can leave.
The same logic would hold for pilots. Regardless of the numbers.
Sometimes doing business sucks. Holding on to your employees against their will in return for money also sucks for everyone involved.
Expensive training by the business is an investment in you. If you sign up for the training, you are telling the business that you will return their investment and benefit them. Thus, there is a degree to which leaving immediately after expensive training can be seen as theft.
This might not gain much sympathy when talking of mega corporations, but consider 48% of US Jobs are for small businesses, where the theft of your training can be much more real.
Edit: If I am a small business, imagine I had 10 employees. Training for a niche industry may be much more expensive because I can’t afford to have a standardized training program, and some employees have to be unproductive to teach the new employee how to be productive. Imagine this costs $8K, and then the employee leaves. Sucks. Now imagine 8 people in a row did this.
Additionally, certain education-related loans do in fact disappear! Loan forgiveness is a real thing.
So you get a junior developer for half the cost for whatever the length of the payback period is OR you get the cost of a couple of junior developers paid to you by that person.
Not to mention, you could only learn that they're severely underpaying you once you get into the industry.
And when you absolutely need a job, you'll get desperate enough to take some bad deals. Because the alternative is destitution.
2. People aren’t perfect. Does everyone know what they’re getting into? Do they know beforehand what kind of salary they’ll get from the company before training? Do they also know how competitive that salary is? Or how good the company is? Maybe it’s the most toxic company ever but is able to hide its negative footprints online.
It's not cool to take free training if you know you will be out shortly.
The reason people go out can be anything, could be something silly like moving house.
"just be a better company" sounds like people live in a fantasy world
It's also not cool to hire people when you know layoffs are coming, but employers do this all the time. But, as you say "just be a better company" is fantasy world belief.
My ex- had this, applied for a job. "We want someone who is going to be here for the long haul, five years plus." She had aspirations for vet school in the next year or two.
To you, that's a commitment from an employee that is fair to expect.
"Is the company committed to giving me a job for the next five years?" ... well, why not?
You're very much in the mindset of "an employee should be happy to have a job".
It’s not cool to force training on someone and then force them to stay or pay it back either. Why does the corporation get off the hook?
Also, the companies should get some sort of insurance. Not screw over individual powerless people.
If you add back a component of risk, you are making the trade a lot less attractive.
More simply put, if it's not something that is readily verifiable and accepted by any other business in the same category, then I understand this as the employers' _choice_ to give their employees this business.
Would we consider the same reimbursement scheme for coffee/snacks and restroom breaks? These also are on paid time which costs the employer, but I don't think (yet) employers are trying to recoup such costs.
If we were talking about professional certifications, I would maybe understand some commitment agreement from the employees, but the trainings described are shop specific as per the article. I would not agree that this should require repayment, and seems the courts agree as well.
Is the business offering a similar guarantee to the employee?
I have watched personally multiple household name companies go on hiring sprees when layoffs, that those line and department managers were aware of, were imminent.
Tacoma FD for one locally high visibility action: Advertised for the hiring of 30-44 firefighters. Had a few thousand applicants. Rented the Tacoma Dome for several days for testing applicants. Went through the selection process, got their candidates, put them through nearly six months of full-time training. They all graduate from Academy...
... and come to their station the next morning to get a pink slip. They literally trained these people and let them go the moment they finished training, before they could do one day of actual work.
Because there was no budget to pay them. A budget that had been signed off by the City nearly six months -before- the hiring process began.
A business won't necessarily realize benefit from training, but they do offer a similar guarantee to the workers that they may also not realize a benefit. If things turn out as planned, both will benefit. Benefit is not without risk. Those who can't handle the risk seek shelter elsewhere. Such is life.
I vehemently disagree with this. If your training is so niche as to not be standardized (and thus, have value in the marketplace), you absolutely should not get to go after the employee. If they leave? Tough. Work on retainment if you wish your company to be successful.
With this line of reasoning, every business down to restaurants with fry cooks could argue they are imparting valuable wisdom and thus hold their employees indentured. This is not some hypothetical to me. My ancestors were indentured servants to the Jamestown colony.
So what? This affects your life how?
It sounds like bullshit because it is - employers are trying to get employees to stay, and some use a stick to do so.
IF. In many of these cases, employees show up, are told that they are "required" to undergo training that the company has now enrolled them in and that they will be required to repay.
When you sign a lease you usually can't break the lease without penalty.yes, if a company makes up the training costs for in house training, making it astronomical, then that seems like it'd be up for litigation.
Frankly, then be a better employer. Pay more, foster a better culture, provide better working circumstances. Plenty of people stay at economically shitty places because of a sense of duty, a love for their co workers, a 4 day work week or excellent benefits, etc. Welcome to a competitive market.
Otherwise you'll end up with people who only barely work to not get fined, training new people (and you have to get new people because people leave asap, fine or not, some people might even pay the fine to leave) who are immediately entering a workplace culture where no one wants to be there. Smart enough people to google the company beforehand and see the shitshow in glassdoor reviews et al. will avoid the company, potentially even years after whatever management gets its head out of its ass and rights the ship. A total disaster.
I've seen this as an excuse avoid training people, which seems absurd. It reminds me of the apocryphal discussion between two managers:
Manager 1: "But what if we train them and the leave!?"
Manager 2: "But what if we don't train them and they stay!?"
Training your people is just part of what a good manager does.
I would ask what you're doing as an employer that creates an environment where the people you're paying literally can't wait to get away from you.
* Assumption based on the exact scenario happening every fucking time
Or you should be grateful for the opportunity to be contractually enslaved?
The other example from the article was nursing. Nursing is in huge demand. That woman most certainly had other options.
I worked in Europe. My contract said my company had to give me 3 months notice before quitting.
And I had to give 3 months notice before quitting. If I didn't, I had to pay the company the equivalent of 1 months salary for each month of notice I didn't give. So if I just up and quit, I'd have to pay 3 months salary.
Was I a "indentured servant" too?
That's pretty crazy. So if you apply to a new job you have to tell them: "I can start 3 months from now, no sooner"?
Edit:
This kind of clause seems so counter-productive to the employer. If I was forced to give 3 months notice, I'd be checked out for 2/3+ of that time. What are they going to do? Fire me?
So yeah, when you get a new job you either tell your new employer to wait or you get them to pay off your current contract.
Part of the problem is the people creating the contracts are perfectly willing to place the burden on existing nurses and allow patients to suffer. Even when already short staffed, hospitals are not under much pressure to renegotiate a contract.
But repaying training fees aren't one of them unless they don't make sense.
If you're a cashier and after 2 hours know how to do your job, your employer can't write a contract that says "Training costs $500,000 and you must repay if you quit before 5 years".
Contracts law is well developed and you can't sign a contract where you don't receive consideration. And I assume if such consideration is small, but the obligation is huge, the courts won't enforce it.
Legally speaking it is as you say, but I was asking from a moral perspective.