The Hidden Workforce Expanding Tesla's Factory(extras.mercurynews.com) |
The Hidden Workforce Expanding Tesla's Factory(extras.mercurynews.com) |
I wonder why anyone would repeatedly fly to the US to work for that money. He was maybe getting or was promised something more.
Also funny how they call us an "impoverished country". In my eyes an average Joe has much better quality of life in Slovenia than in the US :). I would say the problems start if you want to me more than the average Joe.
Creating labels and positioning the individual who was hurt as a victim, coming from an "impoverished country" is more attractive then reporting a different ("positive") point of view.
In defense of their reporting, however, they're measuring minimum wage of Slovenia vs minimum wage in USA, which is less, with no context (that you supplied)
I am no native speaker so I could be wrong, but I have looked up the word on Google. I believe that "impoverished" does imply context eg. [1] and is not simply a comparative word. It implies someone is really poor in a way that seriously affects his well-being, requires help from others etc. So when applied to a country, the context should of course matter.
Just a little background, first. The car manufacturers often times aren't the ones designing the machines that build their cars. They come up with general plans for the layout and process and then they hire various engineering companies who specialize in that particular manufacturing process. Obviously they work closely with those companies to ensure that the designs meet their requirements.
Those engineering firms will then design, build, and install the equipment. Some of that work is done by sub-contractors. If the engineering company is based outside of the US (in this case, German-based Eisenmann), they are likely to have local workers (nationally or continentally speaking) that they are used to hiring for their projects (because they're familiar with their work, already have contracts set up, have the language issues more or less worked out, etc.). When they get contracts for the US, they are going to want to use the same group of people instead of the more complicated and risky option of trying to build a local team. This is especially true for physical labor (e.g. installation, setup) because you need those people onsite.
So, often times when there's a big automotive construction project you have lots of foreigners happening to show up to the area with tourist visas. The engineering firm provides housing and vehicles so they don't have to worry about that. And they pay them in the country they're based out of.
The manufacturer probably knows it's going on, but they don't ask questions. And I don't think it should necessarily be their responsibility. Sure, if they were held liable they would pay more attention. But you could say the same thing about the contractor as well. From the article, "The company overseeing Tesla’s expansion project — Eisenmann, a German-based manufacturer of industrial systems — also denied in court that it had legal responsibility for Lesnik." Unless someone (anyone in the chain, really) is fined or punished, no one is going bother worrying about it.
No, this is a complete failure of the government in upholding it's responsibility 'thing'.
This is entirely a result of greedy politicians taking corporate money to write laws enabling this, encouraging government agencies to look the other way, and they need to be held responsible.
Why did jobs move overseas ? If I am a business owner it makes absolutely no sense for me to pay 10x wages just for the privilege of hiring american workers. And if Laws do not change to take into account this differential more and more businesses will leave america.
There's all sorts of things that make absolutely no sense for business owners to do, so we have labor laws because business owners can't be trusted to not fuck everything up for society.
I am tired of this meme "america has the best labor and environmental laws"
cost of things are higher in america due to inefficiencies - not because of better quality ( I know it might be hard for you to believe it ! )
GP was commenting on the expense of hiring American workers and wage competition. While there are some moral arguments for higher labor cost such as (ironically) workplace safety, the necessity for laborers to be able to afford the products they make is just nonsense.
In addition, the pressure from other countries that are able to produce products at a lower cost because of different labor laws/market, it becomes impossible to "do the right thing".
Sure wouldn't be where I'd choose to put a factory otherwise. From what I've read the low-VOC paint requirements in California lead to the Tesla Model S having inferior paint to Ford/etc (but still better than Nissan Leaf); one minor issue but probably representative.
Captain Renault: I'm shocked, shocked to find that gambling is going on in here! [a croupier hands Renault a pile of money] Croupier: Your winnings, sir.
That's fairly standard. The downside, most construction companies will have many COs (Change Order)to supplement the work.
Just because a bid is lower doesn't mean the subcontractor is hiring illegal labor.
Parent company that accepts bid isn't morally responsible to check on their subcontractors. If parent company is responsible, imagine the possibilities? Ever subcontractor would then blame the parent company for just about everything since they're not held responsible.
Did Tesla realize that labor wasn't "legal" during the process? Probably...but what now? Stop building the factory? They have investors that don't care about morals or ethics.
US politicians should address this situation by working to eliminate b1 visa fraud. If it turns out not to be illegal to do this kind of job, we should change the laws to disallow it.
There is no "magic pixie dust" that Eisenmann had, that they used to sprinkle over their materials that would make installation of the mechanical systems any less labor-intensive than their competitors.
Either Tesla knew (but chose wilful blindness) or Tesla is incompetent. Which is it?
Why not? Otherwise, follow the logic: sub-contractor after sub-contractor until you reach the bottom and you've got some fly-by-night operation that you can't hold accountable.
Everyone involved shares the blame, including Tesla
Because its govt's job to enforce labor laws not Tesla's .
Maybe Tesla is responsible from a moral pov .
Start rant
I' m wondering if Tesla's case will grab headlines in the European "left"press. If so that indicates that populism uses facts to give you the sentiment that you're a victim of capitalism instead of realising the complexity of postmodern times End rant
As for the solution, place huge fines for all companies involved. That would give motive to Tesla to both inspect their construction and include protection clauses in their contracts.
Have you worked in construction before? Non-English speaking employees (especially in California) aren't necessarily an indication that anything is amiss.
Supervision may have made a difference, but I'm not sure. The onus is on the contracted company to do things the right way.
I'm surprised that California building, OSHA , and employment inspectors didn't catch this. If they visited the site as I expect they would have multiple times through construction, and didn't find anything out of the ordinary, it tells you something about the inspections themselves and the degree that the required employment documents were misrepresented.
Review and proper enforcement of 'prevailing wage' requirements.
People in this article were not using H1B though.
>Tesla proudly employs nearly 6,000 American workers from the Bay Area
And for everything else we use subcontractors. Fucking disgusting.
That's a very strong sentiment, sprinkled with ignorance.
I work in hospitality industry and seen the underbelly of food production and construction of QSR locations. I speak from experience.
Sure, everyone wants contracted, union labor and hire Americans but no one is willing to pay for it.
Subcontracting is "Fucking Disgusting"? Okay, how would you like to pay 30% more for your food, clothing, and electronics? Doesn't sound so appealing? Well that's unfortunate.
This isn't a complex problem - the economics doesn't work; American labor isn't hired because American's don't want to pay more for products.
> Review and proper enforcement of 'prevailing wage' requirements.
That is so simple to write...our HR department has to check every employee against many different services to ensure that they're legally allowed to work and are not felons, while constantly hiring. They're over worked and do not have adequate resources. Hiring more folks for HR is out of the question because the business has to be profitable...because...that's how the world works.
However, if we raise prices, we could "Review and proper enforcement of 'prevailing wage' requirements" but then we would be out of business because no one would purchase our product since it would be too expensive.
Statements are easy to make, solutions are tough.
except, s/plausible/voluntary
[1] http://www.franchisetimes.com/news/NLRB-McDonalds-Joint-Empl...
> "Tesla enters into contractual agreements with its general contractors, which allow them to select the resources they need for the job while also requiring them to hire and _pay_ their workers appropriately."
Do you think they did a good job in enforcing their own stated requirement?
Any client who permits people to work in their premises providing them with badges and security passes does minimal background checks. Now tell me what minimal background check would not have found their Visa Status and hence Visa fraud on the basis of B1 Visa person doing hands on job?
Do you still think Tesla was ignorant or closed their eyes purposefully?
Yes, I wouldn't expect workers at Ferrari to be able to afford one but this is the outlier.
I'll believe that when I see it. In fact, I bet it'll be closer to $50,000 than $30,000, which isn't exactly the "everyman's car".
And now that I do a lookup, it's actually very similar to the minimum wage in Wyoming and Georgia.
I agree with you. Even in my last sentence, I didn't refer to Slovenia as "impoverished". The author of the article used the word in the context of juxtaposition of minimum wage, incorrectly, it seems.
It's a never ending carousel of responsibility and cost increase (taxes or COGS - cost of goods sold).
H1B visa fees generates over a billion dollars. After spending in on various generic projects like biometric scanning , 911 responder the rest goes into treasury .
If the govt doesn't want to spend the money on enforcement then what can anyone do.
What absolves them of responsibility? Exchanging money? If the parent company isn't responsible then imagine what happens: every parent company blames subcontractors for everything as the parent could never be responsible since they only commissioned the project.
By that procedure of blame shifting, we could basically blame every Volkswagen customer for the diesel emissions scandal because they should have done their due diligence and realized that an engine couldn't perform that well without cutting corners.
When you go to the grocery store to pick up bananas and coffee and you go for the cheapest of each you can pretty much guarantee that you're purchasing something produced by mistreating workers, spraying of carcinogens, destroying rain forests, etc.
Even if you're not producing it you are supporting it. You might go for the the second cheapest banana, and still not know if it's "good" or "bad", but at least the answer goes from "definitely bad" to "possibly okay".
I understand the realities we live with, but blankly accepting the status quo without at least questioning it shouldn't be defended. Why shouldn't companies be held at least morally/ethically responsible in the same way grocery store customers are, even if none are held legally accountable?
But I don't know that. I don't follow the latest on the sourcing for the banana markets, cucumber markets, whatever. It's ridiculous to expect that everyone could. What about the mushrooms you bought? The cheese? Depending on the location, the cheapest item could easily be an ethically sourced one.
>You might go for the the second cheapest banana, and still not know if it's "good" or "bad", but at least the answer goes from "definitely bad" to "possibly okay".
Not even close. Second cheapest could just as likely be a more inefficient operation of the cheapest abusive one. Transportation/storage of fruits/veggies is one of the highest components of the cost. The price you end up paying in the store is much less related to abuse than you think.
Consider that people pay a premium for 'local' and/or 'organic'. Either of those could have the most abusive labor practices in the industry and you would be paying more for them than the non-local/non-organic fruit while feeling pretty good about yourself at the same time.