
After 20000 workers walked out, Google said it got the message. Workers disagree - aaronbrethorst
https://www.recode.net/2018/11/21/18105719/google-walkout-real-change-organizers-protest-discrimination-kara-swisher-recode-decode-podcast
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ralusek
"It’s from every contractor who came to work sick because they have no paid
time off."

You're. A. Contractor. I've contracted for the last 6 years, that's
definitionally one of the elements associated with non-employment. I love
contracting and would never in a million years expect to be paid for time off.

Employment means security, benefits, guaranteed time off, and predictability.
Contracting typically means higher pay, ability to work more or less hours
than 40/wk, typically more flexibility regarding remote work. That's the
nature of each arrangement, they have tradeoffs. That means contracting gets
no security and no paid time off. I, and every other contractor I know, do
this WILLINGLY. I PREFER this to employment.

These people are absolutely out of their mind, my ability to comprehend the
level of imagined self victimization we're willing to tolerate, as if
indulging is anything other than hurting everyone involved, is rapidly
diminishing.

~~~
pasbesoin
Some people here may have a tech-heavy, skewed perspective of what
"contracting" is, these days.

A lot of "contractors" are people working for a middleman company. Whatever
Google's reimbursement rate, the actual workers -- these "contractors" \-- are
receiving at best half of that. The rest goes to the middleman.

If you work "full time", you're supposed to be eligible for benefits from the
contracting company. But, there are lots of ways -- legal, and gray, and
illegal but "Whatchya gonna do about it?" \-- around this.

Years ago, I did temp work for a while. And, no matter how good the temp
worker, many contracting firms had hard and fast, company-wide rules about the
limitations on such temp workers. Why? To avoid any condition under which they
might be judged "full time" or otherwise eligible for any benefits or workers'
rights.

High end contractors can do quite well and be quite happy. Across industry,
including the "tech" industry, a lot of other contractors get all the work
with much less of the benefits.

Who cleans your floor? Who guards the desk? (IIRC, Google brought the latter
back "in-house" some years ago, after realizing that maybe loyalty is an
important part of security.) Who waters the plants?

Those people deserve to have lives, too. Sick days, the ability to take care
of their kids. Etc.

I'll add that while and where I've been a full-time employee, I've taken the
time to get to know many of these people. And it makes for a much more
pleasant working experience.

Harvard MBA grads who are always busy separating "core" function from
everything else (often conveniently dumped into "cost centers"), are, I
believe, doing a lot more destruction than many people realize. Not just to
people, but to the businesses that they warp into heartless "factories".
Tiered systems, the "blessed" and the "rest". Never mind that the place will
fall down without that "rest".

