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VAMatt on 13 July 2023
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Ka-pi96 said:
VAMatt said:

I disagree. In fact, in most of the world, it is essentially impossible for a business to exploit employees, if by exploitatuon you mean unreasonable treatment.  Almost everybody is free to leave their job at any time. So if they do not like the way they are treated by their employer, they can, and very often do, go work somewhere else.

In any case, I don't think that's relevant to this merger. Essentially all labor advocates support this deal.

That's incredibly naive.

The world doesn't work like that. It's stupidly easy for businesses to exploit employees and going to work elsewhere isn't a solution. For starters, maybe leaving is part of the problem? I personally had an issue like that last year with a company trying to reduce me to 0 hours but not actually firing me so they could immediately get rid of me without paying a penny. A call to the ministry of labour got that sorted out and forced them to pay me for the notice period however. Governments intervening in businesses works!

Not to mention the fact that most people can't just go and get a better job at a good company. There are an awful lot of bad companies, and if you actually want any company to be willing to offer you really good terms then you really need to have some specific high level skills that are hard to find. That will never be the case for the vast majority of people. When every other job is just as shitty and exploitative because there's no government mandating a minimum wage, overtime pay, holidays etc. then going elsewhere simply isn't an option.

I don't know what world you're living in. Almost everywhere on planet Earth, you're free to leave your job at any time, and there are other options available. That includes the option to start your own business, do gig work, or not work at all. There are virtually no situations where someone is tethered to an employer. If you set yourself up in a way where leaving a job is unreasonable for you, that's on you. That's not on the employer.. There are courts to sort out payment issues, if your employer tries to fuck you on your way out the door.

There certainly are many situations where employers treat employees poorly. My argument does not that everything is always great. My argument is that government is a net negative.  

Anyway, we're not going to agree on this. In your case, government getting involved was a net negative. A company should be able to fire you at any time, for any reason, with no compensation other than that which they have contractually agreed to with you, without threat of government force.  So, unless your employer agreed to some sort of job security for you that wasn't mandated by law, they should have been free to reduce your hours to zero, or just fire you in the middle of day on Monday because they don't like the color of shirt you're wearing.  If they did have some sort of voluntary contract with you, then there are courts to sort that out.