Everlane customer experience workers say they were illegally laid off:
Last week, Everlane's consumer experience team was gutted by layoffs in the middle of its union drive, a huge blow to the nascent organizing effort. Now, the former employees are fighting back, accusing the CEO of retaliation and threatening a legal challenge if the employees aren't reinstated.
The team, which primarily operates remotely, announced plans to unionize in late December, as reported by Anna Merlan in Vice. They said the direct-to-consumer clothing company treated them as "disposable" and failed to adequately compensate them for the work they did.
The team spent months gathering the number of signatures needed to form a strong majority — a requirement for unionizing efforts. Finally, on March 23rd, they sent Everlane CEO Michael Preysman a letter announcing they had enough support and asking for voluntary recognition. Four days later, 42 team members — including all of the vocal union supports — were laid off.
Representatives from the Communications Workers of America (CWA) linked the terminations to the team's organizing efforts. "This was not only disappointing, but also unlawful," wrote CWA's San Francisco chapter president Orange Richardson IV in the letter to Preysman (read the full text of the letter here). "We know that Everlane has as its mission radical transparency and ethical treatment and so in light of this we are asking you to reconsider this action, re-hire the terminated remote CX workers, make them whole, and recognize their Union." The letter says the union stands "ready to take appropriate action to defend the rights of remote CX workers." Former employees confirmed to The Verge that this means possibly suing for wrongful termination.
In an Instagram post, Everlane said the decision to lay off the team members was not about union-busting. "The COVID-19 pandemic is unlike anything we could have predicted, and it has left no person or business untouched," the company's CEO wrote. "Everlane is no exception." He added that "firing as a form of union busting is unethical and illegal" and said the company supports workers who wish to unionize.
(Score: 2) by bradley13 on Monday April 06 2020, @11:11AM (6 children)
Even if the people laid off were specifically the organizers: is this actually illegal? The bet that unions make is that - representing so many people - the company cannot afford to lose that many staff. If a union goes on strike and the company is willing to suffer the pain, AFAIK they can fire everyone and bring in new employees. Most famously, this is what Reagan did when the Air Traffic Controllers went on strike: he fired and replaced them all.
Maybe laws in California are different?
Everyone is somebody else's weirdo.
(Score: 2) by EJ on Monday April 06 2020, @11:40AM
I think it depends if it's a "right to work" state. In a "right to work" state, you don't have to join a union to work in a unionized business. In a non-right-to-work state, you can be forced to join a union if you want to get a job in that business.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 06 2020, @12:57PM (2 children)
Pretty sure that there are laws on the books that make retaliation for Unionizing illegal.
If I understand correctly, these laws are part of why we celebrate 'Labor Day.'
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 06 2020, @03:24PM (1 child)
As voluntary, productive activity is the highest
enjoyment known to us, so is compulsory toil the most cruel, degrading
punishment. Nothing is more terrible than being constrained to do some
one thing every day from morning until night against one's will. And
the more a man the worker feels himself, the more hateful must his
work be to him, because he feels the constraint, the aimlessness of it
for himself. Why does he work? For love of work? From a natural
impulse? Not at all!
He works for money, for a thing which has nothing
whatsoever to do with the work itself; and he works so long, moreover,
and in such unbroken monotony, that this alone must make his work a
torture in the first weeks if he has the least human feeling left. The
division of labour has multiplied the brutalising influences of forced
work.
In most branches the worker's activity is reduced to some
paltry, purely mechanical manipulation, repeated minute after minute,
unchanged year after year.[23] How much human feeling, what abilities
can a man retain in his thirtieth year, who has made needle points or
filed toothed wheels twelve hours every day from his early childhood,
living all the time under the conditions forced upon the English
proletarian? It is still the same thing since the introduction of
steam. The worker's activity is made easy, muscular effort is saved,
but the work itself becomes unmeaning and monotonous to the last
degree. It offers no field for mental activity, and claims just enough
of his attention to keep him from thinking of anything else.
And a sentence to such work, to work which takes his whole time for itself,
leaving him scarcely time to eat and sleep, none for physical exercise
in the open air, or the enjoyment of Nature, much less for mental
activity, how can such a sentence help degrading a human being to the
level of a brute? Once more the worker must choose, must either
surrender himself to his fate, become a "good" workman, heed
"faithfully" the interest of the bourgeoisie, in which case he most
certainly becomes a brute, or else he must rebel, fight for his
manhood to the last, and this he can only do in the fight against the
bourgeoisie.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 06 2020, @04:39PM
I don't want to work. I want other people to work and give me money.
- Count Frou-Frou, Blackadder The Third"
(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Monday April 06 2020, @05:31PM (1 child)
Yes, it is illegal.
Discriminating against employees because of their union activities or sympathies (Section 8(a)(3)) [nlrb.gov]
(Score: 2) by srobert on Monday April 06 2020, @07:05PM
Yes, retaliation against employees for attempting to organize a union is illegal under federal labor laws dating back decades. I attempted to organize employees in the company I work for several years ago. The organizing effort failed unfortunately. But I made the attempt blatantly out in the open. I wrote letters and signed my name to them. I notified management that I was attempting to organize and openly declared what our grievances were. The company has never adequately addressed those grievances. But I'm still working there. If the company ever responds by firing me or harassing me, I'll have a pretty tight case as to why they're doing it. I'm not engaged in any other activity that they might fire me.
(Score: 2) by Pslytely Psycho on Monday April 06 2020, @01:41PM (2 children)
I work for a transportation company driving Paratransit buses. We are union represented.
On April 1 we were placed on 'standby.' This qualifies us for full extended unemployment benefits.
A friend, not union, was laid off and will be recalled. He also qualifies for full unemployment and will not have to search for work either (like anyone other than grocery stores and hospitals are hiring).
Seems to me the only reason to fire them is to deny them unemployment benefits. So it does sound like a bit of union-busting to me.
Alex Jones lawyer inspires new TV series: CSI Moron Division.
(Score: 2) by bzipitidoo on Monday April 06 2020, @03:42PM (1 child)
If I understand the summary correctly, they were laid off, not fired.
Not that the distinction isn't academic in many ways. Unemployment ought to be available to all who lost their job (provided they had the job for some minimum amount of time) and weren't highly paid (like, I don't know, over $120k?), regardless of the reason for the job loss. We know that many terminations are unfair, motivated by personal malice, spite, and especially to set an example and instill more fear in the remaining employees. That the fired have to go through a bunch of hoops to demonstrate it wasn't their fault and therefore they're eligible for unemployment, is really mean. It's totally kicking them when they're down. Rubbing salt in the smarting wound of an unfair termination. It's also a huge waste of time. Worse is being "quitted", that is, set up so that you have to quit. Then you're really screwed on the unemployment "bennies". Don't bother trying for it, because everyone just knows that quitting is 100% voluntary.
This termination is, of course, suspiciously convenient.
(Score: 2) by Pslytely Psycho on Monday April 06 2020, @10:58PM
BZZT!
Reading Comprehension Fail on my part!
Too much time on my hands. Think I read something in between this and commenting.
Health and safety to you!
Alex Jones lawyer inspires new TV series: CSI Moron Division.