Tesla Employee Calls For Unionization, Musk Says That's 'Morally Outrageous' (arstechnica.com)

"In a Medium post published today, Tesla employee Jose Moran detailed working conditions at the company's Freemont factory and called for the factory workers to unionize with United Auto Workers (UAW)," reports Ars Technica. In response, Elon Musk told Gizmodo via Twitter Direct Messages: "Our understanding is that this guy was paid by the UAW to join Tesla and agitate for a union. Frankly, I find this attack to be morally outrageous. Tesla is the last car company left in California, because costs are so high." Musk went on to blame the UAW for killing the New United Motor Manufacturing, Inc (NUMMI), which sold the Fremont factory to Musk in 2010. Ars Technica reports: Tesla currently employs more than 5,000 non-union workers at its Fremont, CA-based factory. Moran wrote that the workers are often faced with "excessive mandatory overtime" and earn between $17 and $21 hourly, compared with the national average of $25.58 hourly for most autoworkers in the U.S. The Tesla employee noted that the astronomical cost of living in the Bay Area makes $21 an hour difficult to live on. Moran also claimed that the factory's "machinery is often not ergonomically compatible with our bodies," and requires "too much twisting and turning and extra physical movement to do jobs that could be simplified if workers' input were welcomed." He added that at one point, six out of eight people on his team were out on medical leave "due to various work-related injuries."

Comments

Not what he said.

[duckintheface]

RTFA! Musk said that it as "morally outrageous" for someone to sign on as a Tesla employee, not because they wanted the job but because they wanted to be in a position to influence a unionization vote. Musk did not say or imply that unionization was morally outrageous. But that was obvious so the false title was intentional.

Re:Not what he said.

[Mass Overkiller]

Exactly he's complaint is not against Unions per se but against someone who purposely got hired by Tesla for the expressed purpose of instigating Unionization.

Re:Not what he said.

[drinkypoo]

Unionization is no longer needed in the United States.

It's not the best solution; the best solution would be the things you think we have, that we don't. To wit:

There are laws in place to protect worker safety and inflating wages/job protection are the only real things unionization does anymore.

The laws in place which protect worker safety are inadequate, because they do not make unsafe work conditions sufficiently unprofitable for large industries. And there is absolutely zero job protection for non-union workers; in a world which insists that you have a job, there should be some form of job protection.

Wages are too high in the US in two areas.... the lowest paid unionized workers (floor sweepers, fork truck drivers etc) and the highest paid (CEO's).

CEOs don't have a union. The lowest-paid unionized workers are getting paid what we all should be getting paid. The minimum wage has not kept up with inflation in over twenty years, and the inflation is meant not to simply pay a subsistence wage, but to pay a comfortable living wage upon which one could support a family. That's the minimum standard that we want to accept as Americans, because we don't want to see a race to the bottom.

Middle tier skilled labor positions such as welders have good wage parity between union and non-union jobs indicating the wage is FAIR to both the workers and the businesses.

That doesn't actually indicate that at all. You need a lot more information to determine whether a wage is fair.

CEO's wages should be capped at a percentage of average employee wages.

Well, finally you say something that makes sense. Too bad about the rest of your comment. Also, it's too bad that outside education, the administration isn't union, and so this idea is completely off topic.

This would create incentive to raise employee wages

False. They just find other ways to deliver compensation.

Re:Not what he said.

[inhuman_4]

It's one thing to join a company and want to form a union. But it's another thing to join a company with the purpose of getting it's employees to join an existing union. If Musk's accusations are correct, then this man is an agent provocateur sent by UWA. He is there calling for unionization to help UWA expand it's business, not improve the working conditions at Tesla. It's a fake grass roots movement, aka astroturfing. And that is morally outrageous. I don't see that kind of shady business dealing as being any different than taking a bribe.

Re:Not what he said.

[Baleet]

Unions not only lobbied for those laws, they also force non-union shops to improve pay and benefits to compete with union shops. If you depend on a paycheck, you are a worker. If you are a worker who sides with employers against unions, you are like a chicken rooting for KFC.

Re:Not what he said.

[johanw]

Considering the massive support for Hillary in the past elections by some corporations, I'd say that the democratic party provides a similar role.

Re:Not what he said.

[drinkypoo]

It's one thing to join a company and want to form a union. But it's another thing to join a company with the purpose of getting it's employees to join an existing union.

The two are clearly different things, and yet the two are clearly related things.

If Musk's accusations are correct, then this man is an agent provocateur sent by UWA. He is there calling for unionization to help UWA expand it's business, not improve the working conditions at Tesla.

Your logic is as faulty as your use of apostrophes. The moral question to be asked (remember, it's Elon that brought this into the realm of morality, and it is the subject we are discussing in this thread — I will resist all efforts to veer off topic) is whether one is justified in seeking employment specifically for the purpose of bringing unionization. I submit that the question hinges upon the following: Does the alleged agent provocateur in question believe that unionization will in fact improve conditions for employees? If so, then seeking employment specifically for the purpose of promoting unionization has the following moral components: deceiving the owner[s] of the business (or by proxy, their agents) while attempting to aid the employees of the business. Therefore, while it remains a morally questionable act, in balance the purpose would be (in my ever-so-humble opinion) essentially moral.

Of course, if the union is a scam, and the agent is in on the scam, then it is an act both reprehensible and illegal as well, and I share Musk's apparent moral outrage. As I have posted in numerous comments in this discussion, I have significant reservations about unions and would prefer to see them replaced with government protections for all workers. However, the likelihood of anything like that happening under a Trump administration (or any Republican, but we can table that argument for the next four to eight years) is basically nil. Under these circumstances, I can hardly justify agitating for the dissolution of worker's unions. I would like to see school administrator's unions eliminated, though. Let all the employees of the school have one union. Executive compensation in American schools today has become beyond outrageous.

Re:Not what he said.

[wisnoskij]

Except he is clearly against both. He is not saying that attack is theoretically morally outrageous. He is saying that both Moran and the UAW union are evil and bad. He is 100% against the union. He believes that unions killed all auto manufacturing in California.

Re:Not what he said.

[guises]

It's funny, there was a story just the other day about H1-B visas which inspired exactly the opposite response in most of the comments. When the union is the country, and the scabs they're keeping out are foreigners, the union is great (as long as you don't call it a union, even though it's doing exactly the same thing).

Re:Not what he said.

[dbIII]

So unions decided not to re-tool and just keep on rolling the same sort of crap down decaying production lines while the Japanese and Germans came in to dominate the automotive market?
I think you got the spelling of MBA wrong and wrote union instead.

Sounds Like He Doesn't Like His Job

[RobotRunAmok]

He should quit. Or move to where the Cost of Living/Wage for His Expertise ratio is friendlier.

Re:Just leave

[Gavagai80]

Or better yet, just skip straight to the developing world so you can even more fully exploit people.

Re:Something is fishy in Denmark

[drinkypoo]

People would get hired on usually by having a sterling resume, or qualifications that put them above the average worker to get hired on. Then after several years start agitating for unionization and so on.

So they work for years and then they want to be treated better and therefore they are a UAW plant who is evil and must be destroyed? I'm going to need more than that.

Re:Being a member of a union

[argStyopa]

I think people should freely be allowed to unionize, but people should also be allowed to NOT be part of the unions if they don't want to be: it's their economic choice, really.

However, I do believe that if a union interposes itself as the collective-bargaining agent for a number of workers, then the union logically should be legally held liable for the conduct of the workers it's representing: ie if productivity falls below normal, etc, the union should be liable to compensate the firm for lost income.

Re:Being a member of a union

[Richard_at_work]

The problem here, and one most non-US readers wont get so I will spell it out and repeat some of what you say, is that in the US most unionisation through majority vote means *total* workforce unionisation, whether individuals want it or not.

Even if you, as a worker, disagree with the union, in most states you are *required* to at least pay dues to the union if you want to continue to work at that employer, even if you never engage with the union in any way. Thats not something that has been foisted on the unions, thats something the unions have wanted - mandated whole workforce dues payments increase their funding.

So yes, unionisation is a right, but its a right which is forced on a lot of people who don't want it and whose only recourse is to quit and find a different job.

So I agree with you that unions should only have to represent members in good standing who pay their union dues, its the laws requiring or allowing 100% union shops against individual employees wishes that need to be gotten rid of.

Re:Being a member of a union

[XxtraLarGe]

I think people should freely be allowed to unionize, but people should also be allowed to NOT be part of the unions if they don't want to be: it's their economic choice, really.

Collectivism only works when it's mandatory--and even then, it doesn't work.