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Antiwork

I don’t often see it mentioned, but IMHO, in the US / CANADA you’re getting royally screwed with the Hourly VS Salaried distinction.

Where I live in Europe work is handled sort of like a subscription service: Employer gets your availability for X hours, from eg. 9 to 5, Monday to Friday for a fixed salary every month. Employer doesn't need you for the day and sends you home? Their loss. They'll still have to pay you. Employer wants you to work overtime? Okay, but each hour is paid extra. Employer wants you to work outside of regular hours? I can refuse and if I accept I get paid overtime. Employer alleges structural changes that requires them to have employees work a different schedule from now on (needs to give 30 days notice)? I can refuse and if I get fired because the Employer alleges that it's impossible to keep the old schedule, I'll get severance pay. It's sort of like a cellphone data plan where if you buy X GB of data…


Where I live in Europe work is handled sort of like a subscription service:

  • Employer gets your availability for X hours, from eg. 9 to 5, Monday to Friday for a fixed salary every month.

  • Employer doesn't need you for the day and sends you home? Their loss. They'll still have to pay you.

  • Employer wants you to work overtime? Okay, but each hour is paid extra.

  • Employer wants you to work outside of regular hours? I can refuse and if I accept I get paid overtime.

  • Employer alleges structural changes that requires them to have employees work a different schedule from now on (needs to give 30 days notice)? I can refuse and if I get fired because the Employer alleges that it's impossible to keep the old schedule, I'll get severance pay.

It's sort of like a cellphone data plan where if you buy X GB of data for $10 Month, if you don't use it you lose it, but if you go over the allotted amount you'll pay a fee for every extra consumed GB.

Now, BIG CAVEAT: there's tons of nuances, exceptions and different jurisdictions in Europe. I'm sure there might be exceptions for jobs with naturally weird schedules like Doctors and Nurses, or in some places certain 0-hour contracts for very temporary summer jobs can be more akin to the US' hourly, but it's not the norm at all.

What I'm mentioning however is the norm where I like and also in all other places that I know of in Europe for every average job, whether blue collar or white collar, retail or office based.

The structure you have in the US and Canada is really weird and I never see anyone complain in this sub. I wonder why that is because IMHO you're getting royally screwed over there.

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