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posted by martyb on Friday July 28 2017, @04:17PM   Printer-friendly
from the all-work-and-no-pay dept.

Furious teachers at a recently shuttered Detroit charter school were notified Wednesday that they won't be paid thousands of dollars they earned during the last school year.

"Last Friday, Matchbook Learning became aware that the holders of MTA's outstanding bond debt are refusing to allow use of funds for any summer payroll and instead, are requiring that any available funds be used toward payment of the bond debt," Matchbook's CEO Sajan George told teachers in the email. "We are disappointed and deeply saddened by this development because this means funds will not be there for July or August payroll."

Source Chalkbeat


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  • (Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Friday July 28 2017, @06:07PM (8 children)

    by Runaway1956 (2926) Subscriber Badge on Friday July 28 2017, @06:07PM (#545888) Journal

    Uhhhh - wait a second. Not sure if we have an argument here, or not.

    By "senior" people, are you referring to the real work force, such as maybe the janitor, who has 20+ years of seniority? If you're bashing people who simply have longevity as being responsible for the company going bankrupt, then we have an argument.

    Or, are you referring to management? I can agree about 1000% with that. Especially the CEO who took a 5 million dollar bonus, and divvied up another 3 or 4 million among his immediate subordinates. THOSE bastards are responsible.

    As grandparent stated, that would be tough to push through congress. Even tougher to push through most state capitals. People who have money to invest are very, very special to politicians. The working class is there to make money for the investing classes, after all.

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  • (Score: 5, Insightful) by Grishnakh on Friday July 28 2017, @06:24PM (5 children)

    by Grishnakh (2831) on Friday July 28 2017, @06:24PM (#545897)

    I'm pretty sure he's talking about executive management. They're the ones who make decisions after all, and also are personally liable for the company's actions.

    They should also make the law so that it's criminal not to pay people for their labor. The executives should have to sell their personal assets to make payroll if they have to, lest be tossed in prison and have their assets seized by the state.

    In a nutshell, if you can't afford to pay someone for their labor on time, then don't hire them.

    Some might argue that this will cause companies to lay off people faster (when it sees a high risk they won't be able to make payroll), but IMO that's OK: if the company gets to that state, they're already fucked, and it's better to inform the employees so they can go find new jobs, instead of wasting their time continuing to work but not getting paid for it.

    I also want the law changed so that unemployment payments are *automatic*: when someone gets laid off, they should immediately start receiving unemployment compensation (which their payroll taxes paid for) from the government, instead of having to go downtown and stand in line all day to register for it. I don't have to make a personal visit to the IRS to set up automatic tax withholding from my paycheck, so why should I have to even lift a finger to receive unemployment compensation when I'm laid off?

    • (Score: 2) by edIII on Friday July 28 2017, @07:26PM (3 children)

      by edIII (791) on Friday July 28 2017, @07:26PM (#545927)

      Agree with everything but the implied debtors' prison. That's a double edged sword that will affect the poor and middle class far more than the Elites. It feels good, but vengeance doesn't get you very far.

      Moreover, Elites have far better asset protection schemes so their deep pockets are expensive to gain access to. Meaning, that whatever compensation comes out of them will have a significant chunk eaten up by lawyers. The best you could hope for is a good lawyer on contingency. At the same time you need to hope those executives don't flee to non-extradition countries.

      The simpler answer is to require that executives have payroll accounts always funded in advance, or funded in tandem with work production. At set intervals, or at termination of the work contract, the payroll account automatically settles the DEBT the company has to the worker. Automatically by direct deposit or the accounting department cutting a check. What cannot happen at any point is the executives or investors taking money out. Those payroll accounts are money in, nothing out except payments to workers. It's defacto escrow added to the employer-employee relationship. All you have to do is make it a felony if the executives take money out for other uses, and that no entity other than the workers can receive that money.

      Independent consultants would be shit out of luck, since that is a contract and I don't see us changing contract law to demand work be paid up front. That's up the person to negotiate with the client. Maybe you could require that corporations add escrow to such contracts, but that would be costly regulations propping up the escrow business. In the end that's probably the cost of the freedom that comes with being an independent consultant. Sometimes customers don't pay. The Orange Anus is famous because of it. In those cases I personally would negotiate a lot of milestones where payments are made so that I at least am covering my costs as I go.

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      • (Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Friday July 28 2017, @07:44PM (2 children)

        by Grishnakh (2831) on Friday July 28 2017, @07:44PM (#545945)

        Agree with everything but the implied debtors' prison. That's a double edged sword that will affect the poor and middle class far more than the Elites. It feels good, but vengeance doesn't get you very far.

        The actual law probably should have more nuance in it than what I quickly wrote before, but the idea is that if you're intentionally stiffing employees for their paychecks, you absolutely should go to jail. If the company is going under, the first thing that should be paid is paychecks, nothing else. Not the investors (they come LAST), not the executives/owners, and not even the vendors. If any of those get paid first, the executives should go to jail and have their assets seized. Now if there's honestly not enough money, and this priority was followed correctly, then OK. But usually the employees are stiffed because other debt obligations are paid first, and that's wrong. And I'm still all in favor of requiring the executives to liquidate their assets to make payroll if absolutely necessary; executives and owners should NOT get to keep multimillion-dollar houses and bank accounts if employees aren't getting paid what they're due.

        Moreover, Elites have far better asset protection schemes so their deep pockets are expensive to gain access to.

        Elites aren't immune to bullets. The government should have the power to gain access to any assets these people have, and to use physical force whenever necessary to do so. The government happily does this when regular middle-class people get a court judgment against them, after all (esp. if it's from the IRS).

        The simpler answer is to require that executives have payroll accounts always funded in advance, or funded in tandem with work production.

        Actually, this sounds like a pretty good idea.

        Independent consultants would be shit out of luck, since that is a contract

        Yeah, that's the downside of being an independent contractor instead of a W-2 employee.

        However, I'd also change the laws so that companies cannot hire independent contractors so easily. There's way too many people employed as "independent contractors" who are really de-facto employees, and the employer just doesn't feel like treating them as W-2 employees or having to pay for benefits. You can report these to the IRS (SS-9 form I think) but it never goes anywhere.

        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 29 2017, @04:11PM (1 child)

          by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 29 2017, @04:11PM (#546295)

          Bond holders are not investors. Bond holders are lenders. Borrowing money is one dimension of raising capital -- borrowing money at a specified interest rate with a secured promise to repay the principle. Stock holders, on the other hand, are investors. Stock holders are entitled to a share of the profits and a big win if the organization is financially successful, but they are not promised anything beyond that potential win and are exposed to total loss of invested capital if the organization folds.

          • (Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Monday July 31 2017, @03:53PM

            by Grishnakh (2831) on Monday July 31 2017, @03:53PM (#547202)

            Ok, but as far as I'm concerned, lenders are down at the bottom of the chain too, just above stockholders, but well below employees. Lending is risky, and you can lose your money. If you don't like that, don't lend your money out.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 29 2017, @02:08AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 29 2017, @02:08AM (#546104)

      I live in a pretty crap state, but unemployment is handled all on the web now. At worst, you might have to call and number and wait on hold for a half hour to an hour. Put it on speakerphone, no problem. Somebody who's like family to me has been through the process a few times now. Yeah, it's still a hassle, but you can do it in your PJs these days.

      I agree that unemployment should be automatic. However, we have too many loonies who don't realize how much the government already knows about them (thanks to questionably legal spying) would start screaming "mark of the beast!!!eleven!1!!zomg!" If people want to do something about that, they need to stop voting for politicians that let the various TLAs and police departments get away with that shit (i.e. stop voting for Rs and Ds, like that'll ever happen--watch the R majority in congress expand in 2018 and Trump get re-elected in 2020 and these dipshits will still vote for team D--no better way to waste one's vote than letting the cool, disinterested laws of game theory guide one's actions--succumbed to that myself last November for the first time but never again--never felt that my vote was such a big fucking waste as I did the next day--could have at least voted for Johnson a 2nd time but noooo! fuck game theory, just venting and rambling at this point).

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 28 2017, @11:51PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 28 2017, @11:51PM (#546040)

    Not sure if we have an argument here, or not.

    Not surprising. That you are not sure, that is. How do you deal with so much ignorance and uncertainty?

  • (Score: 2) by Gaaark on Friday July 28 2017, @11:52PM

    by Gaaark (41) on Friday July 28 2017, @11:52PM (#546041) Journal

    Yeah, sorry: by senior, i mean the execs who give themselves and their buddies big bonuses. Junior is the 'plebs' who actually NEED the money but won't be getting it.

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