Every post on Tesla v IF Metall you dont have to look too far before you see a highly upvoted comment that is stating a lot of things based on preconcieved notions of Unions Vs Anti-union company. Its clear most people here dont really understand what is going on, myself included to be fair.
I think everyone here can agree on good outcomes for the workers. So I’m curious what outcomes the Union want to achieve and what their motivations are.
I’ve herd people suggest Tesla just pull out of Sweden and that would be fine by the union. There are suggestions that the union is hell bend on setting an example with Tesla; that if they dont Unionize, others may realize they dont want to either. These are not good outcomes for the workers; rather good outcomes for Union Leadership who want to hold on to power.
In the end, it would be great if they let workers at Tesla decide; hold a vote and if the majority want to Unionize, they should be allowed to.
This has nothing to do with a majority of workers. No worker ever has to join a union and unions here aren’t company-based, they’re based on the trade sector. All it takes for unions to request a CBA to be agreed upon is for one single worker to complain to the union.
How hard is it to understand that not everything works the same way as it does in your country?
Well, I think it’s the majority of the workers in the bodyshop wanted to join IF Metall but Tesla is not allowing it. Why vote for something when most of the employees already petitioned for it?
Is that true? I see contradictory statements sometimes. Supposedly the workers are happy with their situation and aren’t joining the strike. Would love to see sources that refute that; it’s hard to get facts from a different country in a different continent.
It’s not about unionizing. You don’t unionize in Sweden. Our unions cover sectors.
It’s about the collective agreement. This is the standard here in Sweden. Basically a company will negotiate with a union and they will set the minimum pay and all of the benefits for a period. Usually 4 years then they renegotiate. When a company has signed a CBA then it’s illegal for workers to strike.
This creates a more even playing field and gets rids of worker abuse. While creating stability in the market. Something that had worked for hundred not thousands of companies here in Sweden for over 100 years.
yesterday there was a post that they had backed down. this could almost make me religious. almost. so it continues. cant wait.
I’m not swedish but what are the terms like in the CBA? Will Unions be able to be like “Oh Tesla has good gross margins, how about we force them into an agreement much worse than what Volvo is having” or is it just Elon being Elon?
Just genuinely curious of how things work in Sweden.
It’s the standard IF Metall CBA for car mechanics. It covers things like minimum wage, minimum yearly wage increase (which is usually set to offset inflation, overtime, vacation pay and vacation time (beyond the legal minimum that is) and much, much more. You can find all IF Metalls different CBAs here but they’re all in Swedish though. The one you’d be looking for specifically is, I think, the one called “Motorbranschavtalet”.
Tesla won’t get anything different from what any other car company already has unless they specifically and succesfully negotiate a change to it. Though they don’t have to do that if they don’t want to since negotiations on changes to the CBA happen between employers organisations (which would represent Tesla as well as all the other companies who have signed the CBA) and union organisations (which represent all the unions)
I would love for Tesla to abandon the Swedish car market and have the Union handle all the service and repair of Teslas already in country.
Tesla needs to drop prices in Sweden to the point where a lot of people care more about getting the deal than being in solidarity with a handful of steel workers, or in other words vote with their wallets.
Then, when they can’t get their desired cars because of strikes they will change their mind about unions and that will sway public opinion on this issue.
Lol people would go “thanks for the cheap car, now sign the contract with the union.” There would be absolutely no change at all since everyone knows the only two outcomes from this is either Tesla signs the deal or they get the fuck out of the country.
70% of employees are in a union. Public opinion won’t sway, it’s literally how the system works there.
They don’t default to something like the US, where an HR department plays the game of “what are you looking to make” and then has a 1 on 1 sparring match with the employee to try and get them for as low as cost as possible.
It’s expected for employers to negotiate a CBA with the sector employees as a group in order to set wages for set (ex 4 year) time-frames. It’s common in, way the US, for there to be situations where an employee makes 2x the wage of someone else, and then talking about wage is a forbidden topic within a company so it’s a secret. That just doesn’t fly there. There’s a cultural focus on consensus beyond the job market - it’s a cultural foundation, and it’s important for everyone in a group to be on with the structure and transparent about the org.
It’s an entirely different system. Many of the metalworkers are already part of the sector union, Tesla just refuses to meet for setting up the CBA. It’s not a union taking over a company or anything like that. The unions are sector based and already exist, and the workers are already members.
Union “Mafia” tactics…
Muskia thinks everyone in the world is his bitch
Sad Elmo
There was a lot of crowing by the anti-union crowd just a day ago with the interim decision. Regardless of how this works out in the end, I think this whole episode has made clear if it wasn’t already that the majority of EV buyers and enthusiasts, being upper income people, are remarkably anti-union.
It is truly baffling how people consider the actions of a bunch of rich people (i.e. management at a company) to be justified in anything they do. You will hear the line “They have an obligation to their stockholders”, or just “It’s their money, they can do what they want with it,” in pretty much any scenario where a business does something negative for society or the world at large.
But the second a bunch of workers exercise the absolutely most basic right there is in a free market, that of not working, they are excoriated by these same people. Some of the attitudes in the last thread were as though these workers were withholding medicine for orphans, not just choosing to not work for a company openly hostile to them. Again, Tesla has chosen to do business a certain way, and the workers are choosing to respond. You can debate the legality of both sides however much you want, but it is ridiculous how people put moral judgements out there as if Tesla is owed the labor of Swedish workers.
As nick Hanauer points out, the US is largely infected with a decades strong lingering religious like ideology called market fundamentalism. It’s an entirely false notion that “market” is like a physics or chemistry equation and anything done to disturb it or influence it will reduce efficiency or disturb the “natural” balance. They of course never want to acknowledge all the scales tilting the favor to the corporations.
There are no laws of nature in economics. Just like there are no laws of nature in basketball. People make the rules, and agree to them.There are no laws of chemistry, biology, or physics, that children cannot work in factories. And yet with evidence we find the ROI for society is higher for us all when children are not working in factories, and so deem it so.
Amusingly, if you follow the history, the US was a remarkably strong regulator against ‘natural’ market forces for a very, very long time. The Sherman Antitrust Act in particular has had some of the most impactful results of any such legislation globally for workers and consumers.
It was only after the red scare that everything just… fell apart. Suddenly worker and consumer rights became associated with communism, and communism was bad. It’s been decade after decade of regressive policy after regressive policy since then.
It was largely in the 70s when the ideology came online and then implemented, or rather not enforced, under Reagan, and it just stayed that way. It’s not like the host of laws were revoked, the interpretations changed and a new anti empirical “consumer” test was adopted.
I’m against this policy because the entire concept of sympathy strikes is bullshit. If you go on strike, you don’t work. That’s what a strike is.
Basically everywhere in the world except Sweden, it’s super illegal to keep working but just screw over a single company when you work for some other company like a postal service.
Imagine if Postnord’s union workers decided that they didn’t like something about the biggest hospital company in Sweden, and “sympathy striked” to prevent their medicine from being delivered. Would you be OK with that?
In essentially no country is there really a free market of hospitals. They are pretty much always built at the discretion of what we might term “benevolent” government sponsored cartels, to ensure that there isn’t overlap, because nowhere can support the expense of multiple competing hospitals, much like utilities even when they are private. So the part of “free market” where workers can shop around their labor doesn’t exist in most of healthcare, if they bargain it will always be against a de facto sole provider of the service in any area. So what you have is a one way street in labor disputes. Management can do essentially anything hostile to labor so long as it doesn’t go so far as bringing the public in and then the government. This means they can pay ridiculously bad wages, they can even force workers to provide terrible service, and the laborers have no recourse beyond striking in many places.
Which brings us full circle to where we started, because the public in sane countries like Sweden has long ago realized that striking is really not a good thing in critical industries. It is the sort of thing you want to avoid at all costs, so it is essential that companies in such critical industries do not try to play chicken with labor over things, instead they have a very reasonable system companies and labor work together practically by default.
Am I in sympathy with striking nurses, or other healthcare providers, even if them striking means patients suffer? Yes, entirely, because I know that these people care deeply about patients, it is invariably always difficult way too low paid work, and I have never seen an instance where they took any action like this except when the situation was forced by the actions of the company.
In most of the world there is a law that striking cannot remove life critical care, and it is standard for hospital strikes to keep a skeleton crew for critical patient care while refusing to do any elective or non urgent care and all admin duties.
So no, not delivering medicine to a hospital would not be OK.
Not delivering other items would.
And it would only become a factor in sympathy strikes if the hospital was already on strike…Isn’t medication delivered by other means than the post office? Also a bit of a bad straw man you are setting up there…
“I don’t like sympathy strikes… Won’t someone please think of the hospitals in this very unlikely but emotionally appealing scenario…”
Is basically what you did. It’s straight from the fox news propaganda playbook
Well to be fair, I mentioned orphans and medicine, but only so much to say that people getting high end cars is not something that I think labor has any moral obligation to provide by comparison. And as I explained probably in too much length in my reply to them, even in healthcare labor there are limits to what labor can reasonably be asked, and beyond which not working is equally acceptable, because none of that industry even approaches a free market mechanism anywhere from any angle.
Imagine if Postnord’s union workers decided that they didn’t like something about the biggest hospital company in Sweden, and “sympathy striked” to prevent their medicine from being delivered. Would you be OK with that?
That doesn’t make sense. For it to be a sympathy strike, the workers at the hospital would have to be striking first. If the workers at the hospital are on strike, then the hospital has bigger issues than PostNord.
That’s my point. What if a minority of the workers at the hospital were striking. Say, the x-ray technicians. Would you be OK with PostNord not delivering essential materials to the hospital because the x-ray techs are striking?
You have to understand that TSLA shareholders a very vocal part of this community. If you look at the post history of the anti-union commentators, there is almost always some connection to other Tesla shareholding communities.
These people aren’t anti-union because they have deeply held ideological beliefs regarding socioeconomics; they are people with a clear and direct motivation to support Tesla’s profit margin by supporting whatever position is most convenient at the time. There is no separating their belief system from that of the business itself.
I think this whole episode has made clear if it wasn’t already that the majority of EV buyers and enthusiasts, being upper income people, are remarkably anti-union.
American EV buyers.
I mean that’s the case with Sweden too. Tesla is the most popular EV - by far - in Sweden, so clearly its consumers don’t care about unions either and hence the “boot wearers” term.
It’s the same die hard koolty members every time
Its roughly the same on the other side. Its usually an anti-corporation, anti-1%, anti-Tesla or Musk in this case cheering for the Union.
Even the post you responded to; there is a lot of things being said that are just projections of that person’s understanding of what a Union is and what is being faught for.
I dont think anyone can argue against good outcomes for the workers; and so far, I’m not convinced that is the driving motivation of the this particular Union. If instead, their motivations are to perserve the strength of the Union so that the leadership holds on to power and influence, then thats not a good outcome for the worker.
I’m Tesla shareholder and I would fully support Tesla signing CBA. Less profit is better than no profit if they decide to leave Sweden. It is already more costly to implement workarounds for all the blockades than to sign CBA for 130 people. Shareholders certainly should prefer Tesla to make most profit possible and currently that would be by signing CBA.
The hilarious part of this is that of all the striking unions, the postal service is the one that they’ve decided to complain the most about - if I were them, I’d be worrying about companies like Hydro Extrusions, who are the only supplier in Europe for the parts they supply to Giga Berlin, and have announced they’re going to stop production for Tesla this Friday.
It seems we’re swiftly moving from “fuck around” to the “find out” phase.
The ruling yesterday was about ordering Transportstyrelsen to allow the plate manufacturer to hand out plates before they go to Postnord.
The ruling today is about what should happen to the plates that already went to Postnord.
The ruling from yesterday is still in effect.
I see no setback.
I see no setback.
I mean it is still an obvious setback since many plates has already gone to Postnord, and those will be stuck there.
28 plates. (Or 28 pairs of plates. I am not sure.)
You could post something to explain that in here, but you’ll only get a fraction of the votes the Tesla-hate version gets.
I like to consider myself neutral on this. I just want the facts correct.
Disclaimer: I am a Tesla shareholder, but I am also pro union. The relationship between unions and employer organizations works very well here in Scandinavia. I think Tesla are insane to pick this fight. They will lose in the end, because the conflict will just be expanded until they have no wiggle room left.
It’s a fight I’ve been struggling to figure out, since what little I’ve seen about it is from one heavily biased side or another.
Like, it seems from what I’ve been hearing like everyone except Tesla workers are on strike for this. That a majority of Tesla workers themselves just aren’t interested in the union for whatever reasons. But then why is Tesla both being pressured to, and so strongly resisting something that seems to involve only a portion of their workers?
Garbage workers in Toronto would go on strike every 3-4 years just because they could. The union dues covered workers wages during the strike and workers got paid more after the new contract. It got painful for taxpayers for the workers to continually go on strike every few years. The municipal workers were fired and the contract was transferred to a private company.
A private company that is surely doing a much better job and much more cheaply /s
Add to that that the fired workers had to be paid unemployment benefits and then likely got jobs with lower wages, so they pay less taxes, the standard of living of their kids has gone down, etc.
It baffles me how many people think firing workers making a decent (but relatively extremely low) wage to hire workers earning minimum wage and having to work three jobs to survive can be a win for society, but here we are.
In Sweden unionized workers can’t strike while their contract is in effect. A CBA, which the workers are asking for, makes it illegal for them to strike unless the CBA is broken by the employer and even then it’s not likely that they’d strike. The CBA has a term limit and when it nears the end they renegotiate.
This is why striking is not very common in the Nordic’s but it is in France.
The worst postal service in the Western World vs worst car company.
Here’s how much the Swedish union “cares” about workers: The head of the Swedish Trade Union would rather see those workers without jobs than have Tesla not be in a union. DISGUSTING.
"In an interview, Susanna Gideonsson, who heads the Swedish trade union federation fighting Tesla, sounded remarkably confident. “This will end with the employees winning a collective bargaining agreement, one way or another,” she said. And if they don’t? “Then Tesla can leave the country.” "
That doesn’t say anything about the workers not having jobs.
If there was a CBA in place these workers would get help finding new jobs. So absolutely, the union care about them having jobs.
That’s a denial of the obivious fact that If tesla leaves those worker will be without a job… At Tesla. If Tesla were to shut down it’s business in Sweden, what would happen to the jobs of those people who currently work there (all of them, and not just the mechanics)?
Your seem to be inferring the workers could find jobs elsewhere which is not… insightful. Who would get them those jobs? The union? The union didn’t get them the jobs they have now so…
Is it easy to be cavalier with someone else’s job? It comes down to the scenario’s Fact (they’d have no job at Tesla) Versus the Speculation (They could find another job… somewhere).
Who would get them those jobs?
In the CBA that IF Metall is trying to have Tesla sign there is a part about support if you lose your job (omställningsstöd). It’s an extra safetynet that, and while it doesn’t promise to lead to a new job, it helps you on the way.
At the moment workers at Tesla doesn’t have this, and that is one of the reasons for the strike.
Your seem to be inferring the workers could find jobs elsewhere which is not… insightful. Who would get them those jobs? The union?
Well at the very least, the income insurance from the union would cover them for the next few years while they look for a job. All they need to do is to submit a monthly report that they in fact still don’t have a job. They don’t need to speculate about them finding a new job when they have them covered regardless. But keep fearmongering.
Also the union can very well find them new jobs. It’s not like the demand for mechanics who can repair Teslas would disappear. One of the many workshops that already have a CBA would pick up the demand, and they would then hire those mechanics.
It’s not the employers that create jobs. It’s the demand for goods and services.
If Tesla kicks them out then union will pay them and support them until they find new job. Unions do offer support to members when finding new job especially if previously mentioned event would occur. It would probably be pretty high priority for unions to help those people to get new job.
Nice. Can’t wait for the reactions of those that support a corporation over basic rights.
Hyperbole.
It still baffles me that the employees themselves at Tesla aren’t interested in unionizing, but the union can affect Teslas partners and use that to extort Tesla. This is insane, how is Swedens unions NOT a mafia??
The people at Tesla Sweden aren’t interested in unionizing, that really should be the end of the story. But instead the swedish unions are pulling these mafia moves.
IF Metall is acting on behalf of their members who are Tesla employees.
They cannot act without having members at Tesla.
The union needs to just let the employees vote and stop with the pressure.
Let the employees decide.
they are sick of being used this way. Over 90% of them want nothing to do with this union.
I’d love to see you provide anything resembling a source for this.
It’s from Tesla Swedens PR department and if you read it you’ll realize they’re refferring to the whole company, managers, techs, HR department etc. Tesla officially has 289 employees in sweden (probably a bit more today). So we’re talking about around 30 people. The union (IF Metall) took out 130 mechanics to be available for the strike but I have no way to tell if that is actually how many mechanics that work there but at least it sets an upper limit. That leaves us with 20-25% of the mechanics on strike.
Sauce
[289 employees](https://www.allabolag.se/5569314098/tm-sweden-ab)
No you wouldn’t. I did so yesterday and people here were still in total denial.
You would have to be an idiot to prefer to pay a union than to get Tesla stock privileges and all the benefits Tesla offers.
Do so right now.
Over 90% of them want nothing to do with this union.
What is your source for this absurd claim?
Is there a source for the inverse either. People just seem to be running both narratives without facts to back this up.
Well, the union claims they put 130 mechanics who are part of their union on strike. I don’t know exactly how it works in Sweden, but I can’t imagine they can call for non-members to strike. I would also say that being a union member means they want a union.
The union members at Tesla HAVE voted.
What is your source for that 90% number? If it’s from Tesla, I wouldn’t put too much faith in it.
What’s the source for any number. As far as I know there isn’t any.
If there isn’t any in favor or against, maybe one should refrain from using the number from an unreliable source as an argument?
Tesla is claiming 90% are still working, IF Metal is claiming something like 150 people are part of the strike and that tesla is using strikebreakers. I don’t trust IF Metals numbers either.