Following Tesla's announcement last week it was cutting 9 percent of its workforce, mostly salaried positions, an estimated 4,100 jobs, we learn that there may be some wording in Tesla's severance paperwork that will make it difficult for former employees to bring safety issues to light. Bloomberg reports that a proposed severance agreement required the recipient to acknowledge that he or she "had the opportunity to raise any safety concerns, safety complaints, or whistleblower activities against the company, and that if any safety concerns, safety complaints, or whistleblower activities were raised during your employment, they were addressed to your satisfaction." In addition, the agreement would bar the former employee from sharing "business-related" information, require the person to help Tesla defend itself against claims, release any of the employee's claims made against the company, and stipulates that any disputes under the agreement go to individual arbitration.
Worker safety has been a growing issue for Tesla following a report by the news outlet Reveal in April that said Tesla has been leaving employee injuries out of required reports to make its safety record look better. The company has subsequently become the subject of a probe by California's Occupational Safety and Health Administration. Claims by hourly workers of unsafe conditions at Tesla's Fremont, Calif. assembly plant have long dogged the automaker and have fueled efforts to unionize the plant.
A Tesla spokesman told Bloomberg the company uses the language about safety issues to ensure that issues are addressed and that employees who don't believe those words apply to their case should come forward and share their concerns. Labor experts say the language will likely discourage former workers from speaking out, or keep them from being taken seriously if they do.
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Worker safety has been a growing issue for Tesla following a report by the news outlet Reveal in April that said Tesla has been leaving employee injuries out of required reports to make its safety record look better. The company has subsequently become the subject of a probe by California's Occupational Safety and Health Administration. Claims by hourly workers of unsafe conditions at Tesla's Fremont, Calif. assembly plant have long dogged the automaker and have fueled efforts to unionize the plant.
A Tesla spokesman told Bloomberg the company uses the language about safety issues to ensure that issues are addressed and that employees who don't believe those words apply to their case should come forward and share their concerns. Labor experts say the language will likely discourage former workers from speaking out, or keep them from being taken seriously if they do.
Meanwhile, founder Elon Musk spent the weekend on Twitter outlining his views of socialism (summary: socialists lack a sense of humor) along with some disdain for the UAW. The latter came in a tweet with a link to a story about a federal probe of the UAW, which he dismissed sardonically as a " Great organization."By the way, I am actually a socialist. Just not the kind that shifts resources from most productive to least productive, pretending to do good, while actually causing harm. True socialism seeks greatest good for all.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) June 16, 2018
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