Slashdot Mirror
Judge Denies Dismissal of No-Poach Conspiracy Case
theodp writes "Testifying before Congress in 2007, Google's HR chief stated: 'We make great efforts to uncover the most talented employees we can find.' But according to the U.S. Dept. of Justice, Google actually went to some lengths to avoid uncovering some of tech's most talented employees, striking up agreements with Apple, Intel, and other corporations to avoid recruiting each other's employees. On Thursday, U.S. District Judge Lucy H. Koh ruled that Google, Apple, Intel, Adobe, Disney, Pixar, Intuit and Lucasfilm must face a lawsuit claiming they violated antitrust laws by entering into no-poaching agreements with each other. 'I don't want to see any obstruction on discovery,' Koh told lawyers during a hearing. According to the head attorney representing the plaintiffs, the total damages could exceed $150 million if just 10,000 entry-level engineers were affected."
I'm for competition and against collusion, but that's supposed to be about the way companies sell products. How is poaching employees supposed to be good for the consumer?
Even worse, parts of the allegations verge on blackballing: it's alleged that when an employer from company A applied to a job at company B, where A & B were part of the "no-poaching" collusion agreement, company B would not only refuse to hire them to avoid poaching, but actually rat the employee out to company A, telling them that this employee tried to apply for a job.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
Some knowledgeable sources close to the discovery process say that there is a secret clause buried in these contracts. Apparently all these companies agreed not to rouse 2000 employees in the middle of the night and herd them back to work for a cup of tea and some biscuits. But Apple found a loop hole, that this clause applies only to USA and not China. That kind of gotcha tactic upset the other players who were overheard saying, "tut, tut, it is not cricket, it is not done" in the Olde Duquesne Country Club. And one of them go so upset he drank a little too much and spilled it all to some friendly guy tending to him as he was throwing up in the men's room. That is how the whole thing came out in the open.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
Edit: I have a confusing sentence in there. When I say, "Unions can force all new hires to become union members (which amounts to the same thing)," I mean it amounts to the same thing Trepidity was saying (closed shop), not the same as what the companies are doing right now.
Unions cannot force employees to become members. They can, however, force employees to pay dues. The reason behind this is that they do not want employees to have an economic incentive to avoid the union. In some states, such as California, they cannot force you to pay the money directly to the union; you may contribute the money to a charity of your choice instead.
Utter bullshit. Legal not moral my ass. "We don't hire blacks" is an IMMORAL position as well as illegal. How's about you try joining the rest of us in the 21st century sometime?
Likewise your utter drivel about any reason whatsoever is exactly what can lead to mass exploitation. All it takes is a little collusion between employers and there's no reason to pay any staff decent wages. Your ideas would drag us back to the feudal era.
I can only speak on my experience with teachers' unions in Washington state, but yes they can. A teacher in WA automatically becomes an "agency fee" member of the teachers' union, must pay dues to the union, must accept the union's collectively bargained salary and benefits packages, and must go on strike when the union says to go on strike. If they become a full member (for a higher due) they get some additional benefits (liability insurance, representation, voting in the union, etc.). But as far as salary and basic benefits bargaining, they get what the union gets. So even if you're "not a part of the union," you're a part of the union.
Aside: teachers' strikes are... weird. Because of how their pay is setup, they keep getting paid and, often, will end up working the same number of days just pushed into summer. Since the public schools aren't making something to sell, they don't have much of an incentive to get the teachers back to work (no lost profits). And the youth crime rate spikes because all the hooligans don't have school and get bored.
(Apparently I'm not the only one who hates teachers' unions.)
I'm a psychologist (amongst other things).