Employee Survival Guide® - Employees Are Losing A Big Opportunity to Change Work Forever

Episode Date: June 21, 2022

In this episode of the Employee Survival Guide®, Mark discusses how employees are losing a big opportunity to change work forever.  Employers are rolling back remote working and job flexibility in favor of the old school employment practices from the "before time".  Mark claims employees are not standing up for themselves against employers.  This is a critical moment in history for all employees right before we slam into a recession in the Fall 2022.This episode was written and produced by Mark Carey and edited by Matt Zako. Listen to the Employee Survival Guide podcast latest episode here  https://capclaw.com/employee-survival-guide-podcast/If you enjoyed this episode of the Employee Survival Guide please like us on Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn.  We would really appreciate if you could leave a review of this podcast on your favorite podcast player such as Apple Podcasts.For more information, please contact Carey & Associates, P.C. at 475-242-8317, www.capclaw.com .The content of this website is provided for information purposes only and does not constitute legal advice nor create an attorney-client relationship.  Carey & Associates, P.C. makes no warranty, express or implied, regarding the accuracy of the information contained on this website or to any website to which it is linked to.If you enjoyed this episode of the Employee Survival Guide please like us on Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn. We would really appreciate if you could leave a review of this podcast on your favorite podcast player such as Apple Podcasts. Leaving a review will inform other listeners you found the content on this podcast is important in the area of employment law in the United States. For more information, please contact our employment attorneys at Carey & Associates, P.C. at 203-255-4150, www.capclaw.com.

Hey, it's Mark here, and welcome to the next edition of the Employee Survivor Guide, where I tell you what your employer does not want to know about, and a lot more. Today's topic is called, Employees areosing a Big Opportunity to Change Work Forever. If you listen, just to wait a moment, you'll hear it. The sound of an employer tsunami racing across the country, clawing back the work-life improvements employees gained during the past two and a half years since the pandemic began. Can employees nationwide let this just happen? Do employees have a say in the matter?

This is not a union fix issue. It is a, quote, every employee issue. It is a chance to take a stand, to expand everyone's rights, and possibly eliminate discriminatory behavior. Are we at a pivot point in history to make a lasting change in the workplace? Or is this just another example of the gargantuan power employers have over us all as they roll back the tide? Worse yet, no one really seems to care enough to make the following changes stick. For the first time in decades, if not unprecedented, during the pandemic, employees

have experienced a form of positive social change in the workplace. Employees experienced increased job flexibility, remote working, and work-life balance brought on by the pandemic. Yes, it worked out just fine and employees were even more productive in comparison to the productivity of office work pre-COVID. We all need to collectively thank the role of technology in facilitating this transformation. It was truly a remarkable achievement. Anyone want to get on a Zoom call for a few hours? I thought not. According to a recent survey, more than 80% of American workers say the pandemic provided more clarity about their work-life goals. And 73% of American workers say they feel they can make positive changes to the work-life goals. And 73% of American workers say they feel they can make positive

changes to the work-life balance. This sounds like the groundswell of a populist worker movement, and it is. And you all feel that same way right now. But employers want to crush it before it takes hold. And I'll explain. New social upheaval and racial tensions caused employers to seek diversity initiatives at every level, including the executive suite. Although I saw a few employment cases of race discrimination caused by ill-informed management engaged in kowtow marketing to stay on the quote correct side of the larger social movement, We also saw and now understand that cancel culture is unlawful hate speech and discrimination under federal law, and in many cases, reverse discrimination against white Americans. Any employers and educational institutions who continue to assert

or aid and abet cancel culture practices should expect to be sued by, quote, anyone, end quote, should expect to be sued by, quote, anyone, end quote, adversely affected by racial practices under Federal Statute 42 U.S.C. 1981. By the way, that's a Reconstructionist statute after the Civil War signed by, well, the federal government. We did witness history in 2020 when the Supreme Court declared sexual orientation discrimination unlawful under Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act. In Bostock v. Clayton County, Georgia, the Supreme Court decided to end the bootstrapping claims many had to fight to shoehorn their way under Title VII definition of sex. The case arose independently of the pandemic, but there may have been a warming up of the human and American spirit amongst the court's majority caused by the pandemic similar to that experience in the aftermath of 9-11. Employers must follow this ruling to the letter. Up next was a great

resignation, where 4.5 million employees quit to obtain better paying positions. Who could blame these employees for wanting to make more money in the largest capitalistic economy on earth? For many employees, predominantly service workers, the low minimum wage was too small to make a meaningful economic impact on their lives. The increased wage increases caused by jumping ship to a higher hourly rate job helped to raise living standards and added to the already increased savings rate among a majority of American workers, resulting from the PPP and EDIL loan programs. The federal government and states passed laws for paid femine medical leave during the pandemic, easing the financial pressures on employees, but not on employers,

seeking to fill positions and having to pay for those absences. Many of these financial safety net laws remain today, post-pandemic. Oh wait, I forgot a small improvement. President Biden signed into law the ban on forced arbitration only in sex discrimination cases. This law reversed nearly 97 years of draconian rule under the Federal Arbitration Act, at least with respect to sex discrimination cases. This was the fallout of the Me Too movement and some nasty internal behavior of Fox News revealed to us by Gretchen Carlson, who was committed to the cause that led to the act.

But as dramatic as that news was, the darkness left in place by continued forced arbitration and all other employment discrimination cases is just limitless. After more than two and a half years of remote work and worker flexibility, employers are now taking back control over you and their workplaces, even if remotely. They do not trust you and never have. They eavesdrop on every remote Zoom call and laptop via employee monitoring software that is very sophisticated and undetectable. Employers view employees as subservient to their masters in almost every regard. In the private

sector, you have no freedom of speech or freedom of religion, and your employment rights are diminished to merely at-will toss-outs when undesirable by the employer. Employers do not have to give you a reason for termination. And that is exactly the rule which covers up so much discriminatory bias in the United States. It is an easy out, and frankly, I am shocked BLM supporters and other progressive organizations, such as the NAACP and ACLU, have yet to pick up this widespread discriminatory tool of choice. and ACLU have yet to pick up this widespread discriminatory tool of choice. How long can these groups bury their heads in the sands? We must end the implement-at-will rule. Employers want to go back to the same old fear-based at-will employment of the past.

They will fire you unless you come back to the office to use the office space they have rented or built out before the pandemic. For example, Mr. Musk's directive at Tesla, ordering all employees to return to work or be fired. In my opinion, this was a quick, cheap way to save unemployment benefits by the company and reduce office rents and expenses. And yet another example by Mr. Musk of how companies treat their employees badly. On June 17, 2022, Musk fired at least two employees at SpaceX involved in an internal letter to management complaining of his public demeanor and behavior was tarnishing the company's image. I cannot imagine many employees of the company feeling much trust in their savior Musk after this event. Employers continue to place you on performance improvement plans and then fire you. They want to force you into secretive arbitration hearings and drown you

in legal fees. They want to enforce the non-compete you never negotiated and restrict your ability to earn an income. The pandemic temporarily halted employer efforts to enforce non-competition agreements due to impossibility of enforcement. No court was going to touch a non-compete case during the pandemic, presumptively because jobs and income were sacred. Now that you have been warned about the future, what are you going to do to save the new way of working before it too is canceled? I have some thoughts I'm working on, and I will share them with you soon. If you'd like more information about this podcast, please contact Karen Associates on the web. Have a great week, and I'll talk to you soon.