I’m in Europe, and work for an American company. After a few issues in production, they tried to implement an on-call requirement for employees to check the alerts during their out of work hours (5am to 10pm or something stupid like that). I just reminded them that my country has the “Right to disconnect” law, which protects us from having to work outside our required hours.
They changed it to volunteer basis. I refuse to volunteer (because my off time is my time).
When I was younger, I also though I’d be cool to work in America, but once you learn a bit about their conditions, it’s a big nope. Much better lifestyle in small cities with an average salary in EU and the 23 days vacation + 13 - 14 bank holidays. Mental health checks out. 😄
About the Prod on calls, even if you “volunteer”, depending on the country and kind of job, they have to paid those “on call” hours even if there’s no calls at the end, and if there’s work required, the pay is higher.
I’m like you, I wouldn’t exchange my free time no matter what. 🤘
Years ago now I was asked to be on call for a week, 24/7 outside working hours. I was told it would be paid. Being naive I thought I’d be paid at my normal rate.
Turns out the on call rate was based on the likelihood of being called and this project was deemed to be low, after tax I got less than £10 extra for the whole week. It was something like 14 pence an hour.
They had a whole load of restrictions on my life as well, couldn’t be more than an hour from the office, couldn’t be drunk, had to answer the phone within a minute at all times and be able to get on my laptop within 5 minutes.
Refused to do it again after that first week and they ended up having to pay a contractor £400/week instead.
Were you in the UK? if so they robbed you. They need to pay at least minimum wage in the UK even for on call. You are also allowed rest breaks. What they did was unbelievably criminal. Hell if that overtime included times where you were asleep and you were still on call they still need to pay you the National minimum wage for those hours as well.
Only part that wasn’t illegal is the extra restrictions, as you are still working so you can’t exactly treat it as a day off.
A few years back, a company where a friend of mine worked was bought up by an american company. I do not know why they didn’t do their research beforehand, but the new american owners announced they would be expecting the newly bought company to adopt an american work culture. Almost everyone quit. My friend is a programmer. He got a new job offer almost before he was out of the door.
Man, a lot of you Americans need to unionize. None of this happens at my work and it’s precisely because we’re unionized and have a contract that specifically says that our employer is bound by strict rules. Granted, we don’t get a month paid vacation, but we can’t be denied time off, can’t be compelled to be on call, can’t be forced to work overtime and we have PTO accounts, healthcare and a pension that get paid into on a weekly basis.
“but we get paid so much more” /s. I’ve heard this before from people in the tech sector, ignoring the fact that should the shit hit the fan we Americans have no social programs to assist us. I’d take half my pay to get what people in Europe are guaranteed.
Just to fight against the hive mind that America is a uniform hell scape. People from my team routinely dip with only a few days notice for vacations and sometimes because they feel like they need a day off.
Frankly I don’t take my PTO but that’s more of a personal problem than my work’s. I was a workaholic through college because frankly I’m not outstandingly smart.
So unrealistic… No way the guy on the bottom got the time off to go to surgery.
Imagine how mad my former boss was when I was in the hospital for 4 days because the heart issues I didn’t know about were causing me to nearly pass out at work. Then I got a note that let me off for 3 weeks to let the new meds take effect before I went back.
Don’t get me started on how half ass the diagnosis ended up being either. Got a heart transplant 5 years later after seeing a different doctor.
Had you gotten a new heart rhythm, by the way? Was it hard to accommodate to your new heart?
I used to be the second guy, and then realized the system I was working in. America can fuck itself (and it is), I’m off to Europe later this year.
Already chose a country?
Duh! Europe!
I’m so tired
I live and work in Japan, but I’m still in this picture and I hate it… Though my work-life balance has progressively gotten better. I don’t, however, let my subordinates do that; I want them to have real time off. If they answer a slack or something, it’s helpful, but I’d rather they didn’t think about work in their off time. I try to be the leader I wished for.
I still think of work in Japan as endless hours spent at your desk, waiting for your boss to leave so you can leave a bit after, with little recognition and complete loyalty (or at least feigned loyalty) to your bosses and the company as a whole. Is it still the case today?
You actually have to go drinking with your boss after work, you dont get to go home until he does.
Some companies are still like that. Moreover, some people are just like that… and that’s the crux of the issue. Social pressure is huge in Japan, so it’s hard for people who want no part in that to stop when others keep doing it (even if no one orders or even expects them to).
I’m an American with unlimited time off. Took 3 weeks to travel after 4 months at the company. Not every company operating here is a POS.
Yes, but were you paid during those three weeks?
This was my father in-law. He developed sepsis from the foot they had to keep doing surgery on. On his hospital bed where he is hooked up to just about every machine possible, this man was on his laptop doing work and on a cell phone talking to this engineer and that engineer. After his foot was amputated, even on disability he was being called 24/7. He was the most important person in the region, he memorized every fiber optic line and location. His boss was treating him like shit to get him to quit, he didn’t like dad for some reason, so he pushed dad constantly and shamefully. Once dad died, they had the nerve to call us asking if he had any documents that could help them with a project, he was doing the job of 4-5 college graduates and they were barely managing. He only had his high school degree but the man knew his shit. He had an interview lined up at a new higher paying job, he was one week away, and he spent the last few months of his life crying from stress, hating his job, and just in near constant despair, the only thing that he was looking forward to was mine and my wife’s wedding. Corporate America is a vampire and not the sexy kind, the nosferatu kind.
Big part of me clearly knows there is no such thing as a binary right and wrong in life, yet… this is a crystal clear example somehow — and not the only one.
My boss is having his wedding tomorrow. He was supposed to start his vacation earlier this week. He definitely showed up to meetings I GUARANTEE he didn’t need to be in on the first day he was supposed to be gone. Man, we’ve been here longer than you. We can handle it. You’re awesome, but don’t let upper management bully you. Us senior devs sure don’t. Fuck em.
My boss assured me he couldnt make the client meeting last week because he was on vacation. So he phoned in on Teams from the boat dock where he was staying with his family.
And that was self imposed, hes the company owner! Some people just cant let go.
In some countries, Summer is something you have - not just the name of a season you can see from your office window.
Please tell me
Which ones because certainly not my country?
Brazil, Spain, Egypt, Denmark, Argentina…
it’s not just europe, I live in Latin America we have 3+ weeks of payed time off, the us job market is the weirdo
The meme seems to imply that Europeans all get 3+ MONTHS off a year. How do businesses operate if they’re always missing a quarter of their staff?
You hire more people.
Sounds like one of those bullshit jobs. The further you get from actually making something the less valuable skilled workers are to production.
America bad! Europe good! I was really hoping we left this tired joke on Reddit.
Yes.
I’m more middle-left, but this place seems to be going a bit far towards anti-capitalist socialism and anarchy. Capitalism isn’t the problem, greed is. That can be fixed with restrictions on what corporations can get away with - not ad hominems against the founders and CEOs.Edit: 3 months of capitalist bullcrap later, I’m a socialist now…
That said, fuck Spez. That was an executive decision made solely by him.
Also, far anti-corporateism should probably be expected in a community that consists solely of people (mostly geeks) ‘on strike’ because a big company ruined their old platform…
That can be fixed with restrictions on what corporations can get away with
The problem is that capital can and does react to this. Companies will bribe and lobby until they can erode whatever meager guardrails you managed to install, and in the meantime they’ll carefully calculate how much they can break the law before the consequences outweigh the benefits.
As long as capital is the main driver of politics this will keep happening. “Take money out of politics” doesn’t work, either, because capital will erode or evade those laws, too. You do have to look at moving on from capitalism if you want anything more than a small, temporary change.
