I'm so sick of US corporate culture. They don't give a shit about the people who work for them.
Tldr; Since just a few months into this job, my partner's company has tried to find any excuse to fire him. I'm just so sick of how much of our lives we have to sacrifice to these companies just to maintain employment.
In more detail, my partner started working for a high stress tech company doing software. Then, they abruptly moved him to mechanical engineering which he has limited training on. Once again, shocked Pikachu face, he couldn't do the things he wasn't trained in or hired to do. They knew what his skills were and what he needed training on when they hired him, and everyone mutually agreed on it. Now it's a damned if you do damned if you don't – either he teaches himself to be an engineer or he's fired.
Because he's not a good enough self taught mechanical engineer, he won't even get a cost of living raise this year even though inflation in our city is 7%. He pulls 50 hours weeks for a company that is essentially giving him a pay cut. Now he's going to start working 60+ hour, 6 day weeks just to keep his job.
The real kicker is this week, a minority outreach program that my partner started in his free time FOR this company got axed. The head of communications said it was because “indigenous people are afraid of new technology” which is just so absurdly racist. My partner told them that this statement made him uncomfortable and went to HR. He's now being told that taking this to HR (instead of his engineer boss) was “unprofessional.” He's now being threatened with termination over this. I know HR isn't on your side, but I never knew it was so bad that they'd fire someone for reporting a racist email. I guess that's a learning experience.
It's just so insane that we have no protections against overworking employees, that basically anyone can be fired for any reason at any time, and that salaries still aren't indexed to inflation.
We should have 4 day work weeks, not 6. We should have universal health care. We shouldn't have to be the best at our jobs to be given basic needs.
My partner and I are privileged in that I know he'll be able to find another job, but between student debt and rent and heath insurance, he can't just quit this toxic work environment. As soon as I'm done with school, I'm moving us out of the US.