It’s not just wage-fixing, tech companies wield an absurd amount of power in other aspects of people’s lives.
I was once let go due for “performance” reasons that involved major company politics behind the scenes. I’d just gotten my annual review from my boss emailed to my work email about a week before my termination, which showed stellar performance across the board.
When I looked into filing for unemployment, I discovered that I needed to dispute the reason for my dismissal since I was let go for cause, which required me to submit evidence. Who doesn’t have access to work emails? Fired people don’t.
My employment agreement stipulated that the employer maintained all rights to my emails, so I was completely SOL.
Being let go for "performance" reasons is not "for cause" in CA. For cause means something serious that violates the employment agreement, like criminal behavior or sexual harassment.
Companies generally don't fire people "for cause" absent cause because that's the best way to guarantee a lawsuit (because as you've pointed out, it has financial repercussions like cutting off the availability of unemployment, and reputational damage to the former employee).
You should be able to subpoena those e-mails and other documents. Depending on your municipality, there is usually a court/tribunal process just for unemployment claims, or you could get an employment lawyer. It is going to eat up some of that unemployment, but it's worth it to not let a company get away with that kind of shit.
Is it, though? I chose to focus on finding the next gig and luckily got one in a couple weeks. The emotional toll of subjecting yourself to the legal system against an entity with a team of lawyers sounds absolutely horrible.
It's worth it. If there is an actual violation, the company didn't just steal money from you. They defrauded the state labor board and the taxpayers of the state. And that's the sort of thing that government lawyers are very interested pursuing.
For future reference, being fired because of performance or incompetency is unlikely to be a valid "for cause" firing that disqualifies one from unemployment benefits. If a person is fired because the employer claims they suck at the job (whether its true or not), they still get unemployment.
Your mileage may vary depending on local laws or recent changes to employment law.
If this was in California, you absolutely could have filed for unemployment, even if you were unemployed for performance reasons. Worst that could've happened is that the unemployment office could've rejected the application. In this case, they likely would've called to interview you and get a statement on why you were terminated, in which case a verbal description would do the trick (mentioning that you had received an excellent performance review just the week before would've been enough for the interviewer).
Source: I've been fired (for "performance") once and laid off twice, for all of which I've applied for unemployment benefits (approved the first two times; rejected the third because I was a contractor and not eligible to be treated as employee-equivalent). I didn't have any written evidence for the "performance" one; I just told the interviewer that after I was terminated my former supervisor had to hire multiple people in my place (which was true).
Long story short: always file for unemployment, even if the chances of approval are slim. The worst they can do is say no.
Leave money negotiations off the table, and you could have a union establish a single consistent process for firing practices that'd protect someone like James Damore from being arbitrarily fired.
I don't agree with what Damore had to say, but that shouldn't matter! I would absolutely support a union-backed fair process for evaluating his or anyone's continued employment, whatever controversial things they write about.
"Union stops arbitrary firing of controversial high-performer Damore" would bring a tear to my eye, no matter who it is.
James Damore was fired for perpetuating gender stereotypes, which he agreed he wouldn't do in the Google code of conduct. Even Damore confirmed this with the press. How would being unionized change that?
AIUI, failing to represent a union member would be a short, fast path to getting a union decertified.
This is one of the major differences between the US and say Germany. There, the union can decide someone is a butthead and decline to help. US unions have no such flexibility. This is down to shenanigans in the 50s involving racial discrimination.
I was once let go due for “performance” reasons that involved major company politics behind the scenes. I’d just gotten my annual review from my boss emailed to my work email about a week before my termination, which showed stellar performance across the board.
When I looked into filing for unemployment, I discovered that I needed to dispute the reason for my dismissal since I was let go for cause, which required me to submit evidence. Who doesn’t have access to work emails? Fired people don’t.
My employment agreement stipulated that the employer maintained all rights to my emails, so I was completely SOL.