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this post was submitted on 15 Sep 2023
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At-will employment makes no sense to me. You go to work every day knowing you could be fired without any possibility of taking the time to find another job. It would drive me crazy.
Oh it's terrifying.
You should not compare that to employment as it is known in other countries.
Rather compare it to slavery. Doesn't it look better now? ;-)
The flip side is we can quit at anytime.
Yeah, that really doesn't make up for it.
So like mid-shift or are there any limits to this?
I quit by showing up 3 hours early and sent an eff you I’m out email. Dropped my badge on my desk and walked out without talking to anyone.
No. You just tell someone above you that you quit, and then leave.
You could walk out without telling anyone, but that's rare. Depends on how shitty the job is.
Nope. I literally walked into work, dropped off my badge, said I quit and never looked back. HR called and I let it go to voicemail. They wanted to confirm my mailing address. A few weeks later I got my last paycheck. I left that company to change fields and it has never come up as an issue in subsequent roles. Quitting without notice is a fantastic perk that almost no one will be able to use. The key is to burn out early so looking for the next job is just around the corner.
I’m sorry I don’t get why this is a perk.
In here we have mandatory notice up to three months depending on tenure. It’s perfectly normal for new employers to have to wait the notice period when hiring a new person. Mind you, that’s 3 more guaranteed pay checks after you quit.
If you want to leave early you can negotiate a shorter notice, which i personally have never seen refused - normally people don’t want to keep leavers around so they’ll agree to a couple of weeks for handovers and then happily send you away with your (mandatory, tenure based) severance bonus.
If your old employer is petty and wants to keep you around for the whole notice you can just stop caring and carry on with the bare minimum. What are they going to do, fire you? Unless you’re causing them serious damage in that time they can’t do anything about it. That is also why employers tend to be very happy when you try to negotiate a short notice period.
I can understand how satisfying it must be to show up, slam your badge on somebody’s desk and say “fuck you I quit” - but other than those two seconds of joy I don’t see any other benefits.
There's no negotiating anything with at will employment. You just leave if you want to leave.
You can negotiate if you want to. Or you can say fuck off and just get another job somewhere else. That's the freedom of it. You're not locked into any type of contact.
Yeah but I don’t understand how that’s better. Your employer has to agree to keep you around longer rather than the other way around, feels much worse for financial well-being. But even if it was the same, there’s no way that’s worth having zero notice firing without just cause.
It feels a bit like cope ngl- like yeah I’m doing chemo I can’t eat anything but flavourless meal replacements but look I’ve never been slimmer! That’s a remarkable perk!
I don't get it either. Ignoring the inherent power imbalance between a single worker and an employer, good luck getting Gardening Leave in an at-will workplace.
https://www.gov.uk/handing-in-your-notice/gardening-leave
That’s interesting. Why is it called gardening leave?
From a euphemism for being suspended on full pay pending an investigation. You aren't working, and you can't work for a competitor, so there's not much to do but potter about in the garden.
(The term originated when the paid white-collar workforce was still overwhelmingly comprised of men who weren't responsible for housework or child rearing.)
Oh that is interesting. Thanks for the info!
Depending on your contract, you can absolutely just leave mid shift with no repercussions. Even if you breach your contract, the company will have to pursue legal action to claim any damages, which is costly.
I mean, I don’t live in an at-will state and I can quit at any time too.
So you live in Montana?
... because that's the only one.
I guess that also makes it somewhat easier to get hired though? You can give your employees a chance without thinking too much about it, and if they suck just fire them.
We have this in Germany - for the first six months of employment. Ok, it's still two weeks notice because that's the right thing to do, but still, it's less than the 1/2/3/4/5/6/7 months of notice required after working at a place for 0.5/5/8/10/12/15/20 years. (BGB §622 for the curious)
There is no reason to keep the possibility for such a short notice indefinitely.
For the most part, in my experience, don't be a fuck up and you won't get fired. Every company I've ever worked for has had very strict rules about firing people, It can take months for someone to get fired for anything short of violence, theft, or sexual harassment.
Thanks for the answer. It’s clearer now.
Some companies having strict rules isn't a stand-in for decent workers protections.
Employers don't have protections from employees flaking out either. It goes both ways.
Yeah, there's quite a power imbalance there ...
Only if you're easily replaceable.
No, then there's still a power imbalance, only slightly less egregious.
This is true. No idea why you're being downvoted. There are tons of protections in place for workers in at-will states.
Nope. You can just get laid off for "no reason."
No you can't.
Labor laws are a very real thing.
Yes, that's the entire point of "at-will" employment.
There are protected classes, but "for no reason" is quite legal in most states, which is the terrible reality. US labor laws suck.
https://www.findlaw.com/legalblogs/law-and-life/what-are-your-legal-rights-if-you-are-laid-off/#:~:text=Federal%20Protections&text=Nearly%20all%20jobs%20are%20considered,long%20as%20it's%20not%20discriminatory.
That depends on where you're working. If you're working for a company in an industry that tends to lay people off at certain times, then yeah you're probably to be laid off in the future. Most companies aren't like that though.