Tesla lays off 'more than 10%' of its global workforce
Tesla lays off 'more than 10%' of its global workforce
The layoffs were announced in a company-wide email, after rumors they could reach as high as 20% of Tesla's ~140,000 global headcount.
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While we don’t have an exact percentage, “more than 10%” means at least 14,000 employees will be laid off
Surprisingly I thought it would be a bigger number.
Rumors are 20% actually.
There are numerous topics over on Reddit talking about "laid off this morning". There was no warning, they just got fired over the weekend.
What looks bad is the absolute urgency and callousness of this event. In fact, there are various laws at the state level (ex: California's WARN laws: https://edd.ca.gov/en/jobs_and_training/layoff_services_warn), that require 60-days notice before a mass firing. So this "weekend layoff" is straight up illegal in some areas of the country.
Business have a ton of precedent these last few years that following laws isn't cost effective. The fine is far cheaper.
The "fine" is backpay for all the employees for months.
Its cheaper to not pay lawyers and just do the right thing, rather than fight it and backpay all of the laid off workers anyway. WARN laws are serious, and have serious precedent. You ain't gonna win vs them in court.
Collect interest on the pay they withhold, pay out eventually and probably still come out ahead. If the fine is just paying what's owed, that's not a fine that's simply restitution. I don't know anything about WARN but i have seen week of layoffs, no notice layoffs, no notice furloughs and a plethora of other, probably illegal shit in upstate NY in a lot of mfg facilities.
Maybe the layoffs aren't in California?
That's never deterred Musk
Usually you just tell them they are employed for 60 more days but are not required to come to work or do any work. Are the people on Reddit saying they are getting no more pay?
I don't think that law means what you think it means. They can just give you 60 days severance, they are not required to have you keep working.
Also, I would not be surprised if they extensively use contractors, which don't have the same protections.
Then again, this is Musk, who reneged on his Twitter severance plans and got sued. So he very well could be trying to pull some bullshit again.
I don’t think that law means what you think it means. They can just give you 60 days severance, they are not required to have you keep working.
These aren't programmers where severance is better (you don't want a toxic programmer messing up your codebase). These are factory workers who would have been productive if they kept working.
IE: This is a stealth factory idle. Likely because of how much the sales have dropped for Tesla. This is IMO very bad news for what Tesla expects in the near future for their sales / revenues / profits.
Cutting contractors doesn't count as a "layoff". So in addition to cutting FTEs, there could be a massive number of contractors being cut loose additionally.