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posted by martyb on Monday April 24 2017, @02:16PM   Printer-friendly
from the quantity-over-quality;-money-before-people dept.

Jessica Goodheart authored a story in Capital & Main (co-published by Slate) which reports:

While SolarCity has been an incredible job engine, for some workers the pace of growth has come at a cost. In lawsuits and interviews, workers allege being denied overtime, meal and bathroom breaks, minimum wages, and complain about managers' inattention to quality and safety.

"At first it was good", [former SolarCity employee George] Estrada remembers. But four years later, after SolarCity had exploded in size, from 2,500 employees to more than 15,000, Estrada quit, disillusioned by what he says was the company's focus on meeting sales goals over workmanship and the well-being of its employees.

[...] The industry also includes smaller regional firms such as Sullivan Solar Power in San Diego, where Estrada went to work after leaving SolarCity. Started in 2004, Sullivan Solar Power built its customer base slowly and aimed at creating a highly trained and well-compensated workforce. Estrada would find a different pace of work there, one that he says has allowed him to focus more care on each customer and to build a future as a skilled electrician, able to find work in any industry.

At SolarCity, crews are provided with "panel pay", a bonus system that incentivizes speed by paying installers for every panel they install if that rate is higher than their hourly wage. According to Estrada, the rapid pace led to leaky roofs when holes drilled to secure the panels weren't properly sealed, requiring return visits after customers complained.

[...] Estrada claims he was asked by supervisors to accept bonuses in exchange for not reporting overtime. Because of the pace of work, he was unable to get time off to be with his family, he says. In 2016, he quit, before the company began laying off workers.

[...] Some workers I interviewed spoke highly of the company, crediting SolarCity with providing ample training and promotion opportunities, generous benefits, as well as a chance to be part of an innovative company on the forefront of the move toward clean energy. One former installer, a graduate of Homeboy Industries' training program, described SolarCity as "the best job I ever had" and is now earning $55,000 a year as an inspector for the company. Kevin Midei, who worked as an installer in Maryland in 2015, and who now runs his own business, says SolarCity is "cool" and "forward-looking," and, he says, in reference to the 2016 layoffs, "like any other young industry," it faces ups and downs.

George Estrada, however, is hardly alone in criticizing SolarCity's employment practices. Ravi Whitworth, another installer, and four other plaintiffs, are seeking class action status in an amended complaint filed in March in U.S. District Court in San Francisco, claiming that the company denied them overtime, minimum wages, meal and rest breaks.

The company did not provide its workers access to bathrooms during worktime, requiring them to urinate in bottles or buckets while on the job, according to the lawsuit. The plaintiffs--installers from various parts of California--claim to represent 2,000 workers at the company.

One of the lawsuit's allegations--that SolarCity failed to compensate installers for travel between jobs--was repeated in another lawsuit by former SolarCity crew leader John Zazueta, filed in Los Angeles County Superior Court in 2016.

Zazueta also alleges he was fired by SolarCity after he refused to perform electrical work under conditions he deemed unsafe. His charge echoes Estrada's claim that, when he worked out of the San Diego warehouse, certified electricians "would get fired if they asked too many questions".

Some of the lawsuit allegations are also echoed by "Jake", a Southern California field inspection coordinator for SolarCity who requested that his real name not be used in this article. He confirmed that installers clock out between jobs and also said the company was not always forthcoming with promised wages.

"There's the thing where they promise if you get it done in a certain amount of time, you get this bonus pay, but it never happens", he said.


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  • (Score: 3, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 24 2017, @06:37PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 24 2017, @06:37PM (#498985)

    To have jobs in America, those jobs have to be competitive with workers all over the world

    What you are describing is called The Race to the Bottom.

    There was a time in the USA where we demanded that the world come up to our standards in order to trade with us.
    To do less invoked a tariff which made their lesser standards considerably less profitable.

    Now that "trade deals" are not about higher standards but are simply about enriching the already-rich even further, USA's tariffs have been allowed to go by the wayside.
    This is what comes from Capitalism and the resulting Oligarchy.
    (The disempowerment of labor unions by the ownership class has played a significant part in the changes.)

    Apparently, this downward spiral for The Working Class hasn't yet totally screwed up your life.
    Brace yourself. It'll catch up with you before too long.

    -- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]

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