It’s a different world. The US is a free country. You are free to work wherever they accept you. A job is not a right: you cannot demand anything that someone else must provide you. And people for the most part are free to start a business pretty much whether it should exist or not regardless of anybody else’s opinions.
"sensible" is meaningless. Everyone gets to make up their own def. Parent is correct, the US is a free country, which means beyond some _very_ simple rules we don't try to think for employers, we let the consumers do that. That's the point of a functioning market.
I prominently tell companies why they don't get my business, and Marriott will hear from me next year when I call, waste their time gleefully explaining how I might have used their services but they fired a guy to kowtow to China.
Even better, this is gold on his resume.
In the US we don't pretend we are smarter than other business owners. The socialism route of adding regs to "fix" regs is self defeating. Treating people like fools makes them fools eventually.
Calling the US "a functioning market" is a bit rich.
The US society and politics are way too heavily tilted towards the employers, the people who already wield an disproportionate amount of power over their employees.
If you actually take the time to voice your displeasure over situations like this, you are an extreme outlier. Most people don't give a shit, and even fewer will even hear of stuff like this happening. Even if they do hear about it, they'll forget in a week or two.
In the end, nothing will actually change. Employers will still exploit the employees for profit, and fire people for absolutely no reason at all, while making potential new employees jump through ever more hoops in the desperate hope for a job.
"exploit the employees for profit, and fire people for absolutely no reason at all"
That is a contradiction, the entire point of a company is to make a profit by providing consumers with something they are willing to pay for. Use all the derogatory words you like, in this case "exploit" seems to mean "employ" (which is pretty odd btw), and "no reason at all" seems to mean "like a tweet".
It's a self regulating system, that's capitalism. Marriott screwed up, and now it's on their permanent record. I'm sure they just lost my business, if I use history as a gauge, and assume I live until I am 90, that's high 4 to low 5 figures in today's $'s.
A mark on their permanent record? It'll be out of the news in less than a week, and people won't give a shit anymore. Hell, I bet you'll have forgotten soon enough.
Do you write down and keep track of all your personal boycotts? Do you check the list every time you make a purchase or pay for a service? Sure, if you're like me, you remember stuff like "Nestle wanted to privatize clean drinking water for profit" and "Coca-Cola paid hitmen to assassinate union leaders", and avoid those companies. But "Mariott once fired a guy for liking a tweet"?
Yeah, no. You'll forget soon enough, just like everyone else. And companies like Mariott are counting on it. I know "the Internet never forgets", but that doesn't matter when it's soon drowned out by a million times more random informational noise. It'll stick around, alright. But only as some random mariottsucks.org website, or as a long-forgotten Facebook group.
They fired a guy for accidentally clicking like on a tweet. If the consequences for that action are so severe, why is it even possible in the situation he was put in? Was he briefed ahead of time that his employment was hanging by a thread, pending a single misclick? In any sensible system, he would have been called for a brief talk with his immediate superior, where he would have been given a warning and explained why it was necessary. He certainly wouldn't have been fired outright for something so minor.
Capitalism self-regulates for maximum profit to the fat cats, maximum work effort squeezed from workers for the absolute minimum possible pay. That's why unions are needed, to balance out the power of the employers, through collective bargaining and solidarity.
> I prominently tell companies why they don't get my business, and Marriott will hear from me next year when I call, waste their time gleefully explaining how I might have used their services but they fired a guy to kowtow to China.
Yes, some guy whose entire job is to field customer complaints will listen to you and then hang up the phone and not report your complaint to anyone.
Parent is correct, the US is a free country, which means beyond some _very_ simple rules we don't try to think for employers, we let the consumers do that. That's the point of a functioning market.
This assumes a definition of 'functioning market' that not everyone agrees on. In my view the market and the government serve the well-being of the general population. The US is starting to fail miserably in that area, because income inequality is pretty bad and has steadily been growing since the 1970'ies.
Moreover, the influence of industry lobbying in the US had become enormous and paralyzes democracy. Of course, the industrial complexes and part of the government keeps up the fairytale of 'the US is a free country, if you don't make it, you are not working hard enough, the market is self-regulating', because it is convenient for them. As long as people believe this, they will not object to having no rights and no decent income. If you are a random person, the opportunities of building up a good and secure life are much better in Nothern and Western Europe.
tl;dr: not only the government needs to be kept in check, also the market. Otherwise big companies dictate the policies.
There is a right to work under the responsibility to protect. Industry structure that produces a permanent underclass is a form of violence, and class warfare.
This is a bizarre take on a business relationship between two free entities.
Is an employee allowed to quit? What about the "violence" it does to the company, investors, and fellow employees? Must they stick around to provide continuity? If so, how is this not indenture?
Am I allowed to fire a painter I hire to paint my house if I think he does poor work? Do I need to document his performance and discuss an improvement plan? Does this change if I own a house big enough to keep him painting for a month? For a year?
Employment represents a contract between two parties. Basic freedom of association and contract law means both parties can enter and leave under the terms they negotiate and have a rational self interest in acting in good faith.
In aggregate all the employment just represents society. There is a difference between engaging services and employing someone, and the heavy preference for engaging a human as services is part of the problem. It is no different from engaging a human as a good. If we all play by the same rules, then the contours of the market are not unfairly balanced toward one player. The market and social life are not distinct; contract law should protect all stakeholders as you mentioned.
> Is an employee allowed to quit? What about the "violence" it does to the company, investors, and fellow employees? Must they stick around to provide continuity? If so, how is this not indenture?
Grotesque. Many industries in various countries have a reasonable notice period (say, 3 months), which should give the company enough time to adapt. Nobody considers this "indenture".
> Employment represents a contract between two parties. Basic freedom of association and contract law means both parties can enter and leave under the terms they negotiate and have a rational self interest in acting in good faith.
The difference is that one party, most of the time, can manage without the other. On the other hand, the fired employee still needs to pay rent/feed his family. And depending on the economy/location, finding a different job might take some time (if it's possible at all without retraining).
Three months is fascinating. That's a quarter of a year! We live in different worlds.
I've always found two weeks notice to be more than adequate in most cases and then, only as a courtesy to communicate, transfer in flight work, and alter schedules. If I'm truly mad, I'm resigning and dealing with picking up the slack is not my problem. If an employee tells me they're leaving, I want them gone soon anyway because mentally they've already left the team.
