Ass kissers and all making $8 an hour or less got to keep their jobs...

[Crazy Dave]

But my cousin and six others who've been at the same company for over ten years got laid off yesterday. Two of the people they kept have only been there two months.

Pay cuts, work harder for less or hit the road. What a country :sarcasm:

[baldguy]

1. No union, I take it?

[Crazy Dave]

5. Not down here in the "right to work" south

Even the jobs that do have unions like the city have no power or influence anymore. A long time ago there was primarily one union for city employees excluding the fire and police departments who typically have their own. The union back then could shut the entire city down but now each branch of the city government has it's own union and there's not much disruption as there was in the past. The public works has their own union, parks and services has their own, waste collection has their own, transportation has their own, etc.

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

2. Similar thing happened to me in '99

when a suck up person was hired at the day care where I worked. The bosses had kept me on because I had lifelong teaching credentials--until one of them finally got hers. Then I wasn't needed (and was costly at $8.10 an hour). So they trumped up false charges against me and forced me out. Got my revenge, though. The suck up drove away ALL the clients except those who had vouchers from the state.

[Crazy Dave]

7. Same thing happened to a friend this past Christmas

Been with the company six years, they hired somebody new that she trained, her car broke down one morning on the way to work and needed repairs that day, she got written up for that with the excuse being she should have called a taxi from the mechanic's and came into work. About three weeks later she had to take her son to the emergency room at 6 a.m. in the morning because he woke up feeling very sick and dizzy while he was getting ready for school. That time she was fired because once again, they told her she could have still come into work later that day. We (friends) all told her she could probably sue the employer but she chose not to. Luckily she did find a new job but for a couple of weeks she was worried.

[mnhtnbb]

3. Sorry to hear. My son has been through 2 layoffs in 3 years. He's now working

for city government. We HOPE they won't be so quick to layoff.

The first time he was laid off, the company kept people they'd hired AFTER they hired him.
NC is "right to work"--which means right to be screwed without a union--state.

[mikelgb]

4. I am the last employee left at the company I work for

I was the least tenured.... and least paid. Struggling for a raise now.

[Warpy]

6. Now you know why the thing the unions fought most for

was seniority, the "last hired, first fired" doctrine that protected older workers who made more money than new hires.

Corporations have little actuarial booklets they use to determine when experienced people can be replaced with trainees and the exercise will save the corporation money.

It seems the worst thing a person can do is be loyal to a company and learn to do a job to the best of his ability. Those will be punished.

[Crazy Dave]

10. I used to work hard and bust my @ss out of pride

The rest of my co-workers at that company laughed and told me that they would work me as hard as I'd let them and there would be no loyalty or payback down the road for it and they were right.

One day me and eleven others got laid off and just like my cousin, they kept two new hires who were worthless.

[Renew Deal]

8. The people that are there 2 months are probably cheap.

It's all about money.

[Crazy Dave]

12. I've seen companies keep people who worked for less...

...but screwed up more work and cost the company more money than the trained veterans they let go. It's hard to believe the stupidity of some business owners who think spending a dollar to save a dime is a good thing.

[mdmc]

9. just business

ask the DLC if they care.

[Ilsa]

11. Your Cuz and his friends will be soooo happy to know that they are

contributing to the increase in Productivity statistics of the American worker.

Yeah, well, fuck that shit.

[enlightenment]

13. Same thing happened at ATT after the 1984

divestiture. Everyone cheered when the feds broke the monopoly and created all those baby Bells, but created some nasty shockwaves for the workers. I had just started working for the company and only managed to avoid the layoffs because my job had already taken the hack before I arrived. In 1985 ('86?) then released almost ALL the technicians - the folks who work the lines and then immediately hired almost the full number back - at half the wage the tenured employees had made.

Then the lay-offs started; like clockwork. I had a little cartoon pinned on my message board: a CEO sitting in his plush office in a NY skyscraper, dictating a memo. The caption read, "Due to the success of our recent downsizing, the company is now out of business."

Of course that was before these companies discovered out-sourcing.

[KitSileya]

14. Exhibit umpteen for why the US is a feudal state.

The fact that workers in the US have absolutely no rights with regards to their hiring, their working, and their firing, is just another reason why the US is in fact a feudal state, only with corporations as feudal lords rather than aristocrats.

One of my pet theories about why Norway, who has a legally mandated 40-hour work week, is one of the most efficient countries whenever they measure productivity, is that in Norway, we don't have the same reason to hate our employers. While not everything is champagne and roses in the relationship between employers and employees, we have recourse to the law should our employers behave illegally. It's not just on paper, and we have many, many more rights than you do in the US. When you know you won't be treated like your cousin was, you're willing to give your best. Your cousin's employer certainly didn't deserve the toil he put in, so why should he give it his all?

Just yesterday there was a news report on Norwegian tv about the biggest dairy in the country which had decreased the workweek to 30 hrs - they'd gained 5% productivity! Sick leaves had decreased 25%, and both employer and employees were happy. When American employers try to squeeze blood from stones, they're not going to get very much. Having their workers work two or even three jobs because the pay for each job isn't enough to live off, means that their workers can't be as productive - they're too tired, too unhappy, and too resentful. That American employers haven't realized this is beyond me, and that American workers have let every little thing they've work for slip thru their fingers - well, that's even more incomprehensible. People gave their lives all over the world so that they could organize - we see little of that spirit now.

[Crazy Dave]

15. What you say is true

When you say people gave their lives and they really did. Since that time instead of people gathering together, standing up for one another and themselves in the hundreds of thousands or even millions, they now choose to elect one person who says they'll fight the fight for them instead.