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Comment by hnthrowaway0315 | Hacker News Reader

No, they know. They can't do anything about it under the current legal framework, though.

I don’t see why you should be able to do anything about this legally as an employee. As a shareholder you have more of a claim.

In the Netherlands there is work from home legislation. Legally requiring it to be allowed, where possible and reasonable.

The reasoning is that it reduces traffic and reduces stress.

This existed since 2000 ish. It has expanded since covid. I now only go to the office once every two weeks. Used to be two times a week.

It’s been really interesting how quickly we’ve forgotten how much air quality and greenhouse emissions slowed during the pandemic. If you’re looking for a quick climate change mitigation it’s hard to beat not requiring people to commute when the job doesn’t require it.

An ethically aligned company goes to reasonable lengths to allow employees to become shareholders.

Never at a level that would influence company direction, though, even if all the employees banded together.

Which just sounds like a union, anyway. So why not just unionize instead...

It sounds just like a co-op or an employee-owned business.

Now, I love me a good union - and there’s something to be said about a healthy tension between management and labour in terms of keeping management a bit more honest, just like management and capital - but in smaller orgs, a co-op will probably do the job.

This implies that employee and owner goals can’t ever align.

Ethically they’d return all profits to all employees regardless of ownership instead of leaching off the value of their labor

That isn't ethical, that is a magical fairy realm where everyone else has 0% profit margins and you get 100% of the profit.

It’s only a fairy realm because the capitalists have won. There is no reason the world couldn’t work like this beyond human nature being what it is

Legally, no. Ethically, probably. Socially, yes. A group of employees who feel they are being exploited by an inequitable treatment of their their management would have a lot more options than take your pittance or leave.

There is a very easy way to do something about it, don't work for those companies.

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