Talk:At-will employment
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[edit] Covenant of Good Faith & Fair Dealing
I edited the rather optomistic comment recognizing ICGFFD as supporting causes of action for wrongful termination based upon a breach of the covenant. Not true in all States recognizing this quasi-implied contract claim, and the trend line of the cases has been heading the other way.
Alltone
Alltone 04:32, 19 April 2007 (UTC) Hi all! Even is prohibited, At Will Employment is used to discriminate against minorities in United States. This American Law is a dangerous weapon that must be abolished.
Martín R. Rodríguez Oct. 9, 2006.
What a lie!
by Martin R. Rodriguez
All Rigths Reserved
What a lie! Twist your tongue!,
Open your mouth to declare,
This state has a marvelous labor law!,
This is a great right to work state. Oh Yeah!
What a lie! Twist your tongue!,
take their job,once again,without care,
it doesn't matter! fire them all!,
No concern! Cause dispair!
What a lie! Twist your tongue!,
Put your knife in their throat! who will care?,
Fire them all! none will ask: Is it fair?
This is a great right to fire state. Oh Yeah!
Dictionary definition at the moment. Does it stand a chance of being expanded.. the current content could be in-lined into homemaker which is the only place that links to it? Or is the term more general than a homemaking role? I ask partly because this term doesn't not exist in the UK? Pete/Pcb21 (talk) 14:24, 6 Mar 2004 (UTC)
- I don't think it has anything to do with homemaking. An 'at-will' employee just doesn't have the right to any sort of 'due-process' before they can be fired (or sacked for you Brits). Once the boss says 'you're fired', that's it, time to clean out your desk.
-
- We have such jobs in Britain... but much more likely to be manual work than a desk job. The phrase we don't have. Pete/Pcb21 (talk) 16:47, 11 Mar 2004 (UTC)
- "An 'at-will' employee just doesn't have the right to any sort of 'due-process' before they can be fired" - and likewise for the employee - the employee can quit at any time, for any reason (though like the article says, this is overwhelmingly to the benefit of the employer). Let's face it - our labor is a commodity just like everything else businesses purchase to produce their products. :) If they want to stop purchasing from a particular supplier, that's their prerogative. --Cheese Sandwich 19:58, 18 August 2005 (UTC)
Labor is not a commodity. First of all, it's not tangible, it's a service, which by many definitions would exclude it. Anyway, in the USA at least it's legally not a commodity. It's a little disheartening every time someone calls it a commodity. There is a significant difference between money in compensation and money derived through commerce. The most obvious being that workers do not incorporate themselves as businesses :-|
http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode15/usc_sec_15_00000017----000-.html
Labor is indeed considered an expendable commodity in much of the United States. The majority of states follow at-will employment, and even if discrimination has taken place, it is very difficult to prove, as lawyers in hardline at-will states are often reluctant to take on these cases. This is not likely to change anytime soon, with the decline of organized labor and the ascendancy of pro-management Republican policies since the 1980s.--MarshallStack 05:18, 2 November 2005 (UTC)
I changed the heading on the common law exceptions to eliminate the phrase about "swallowing the rule." I would argue that the common law exceptions are nowhere near the point of "swallowing the rule" in the United States. The vast majority of employment situations may be described by the general rule of employment at will (employer may discharge the employee "for good cause, for no cause, or even for bad cause"), subject to the very limited case law exceptions and of course the statutory exceptions as explained in the article. Famspear 19:44, 21 January 2006 (UTC)
- I concur. I have no idea which state that contributor must have been from, but it must be a small, weird outlier state (like Alabama or Maine). At-will is still the overwhelmingly dominant rule in most states. --Coolcaesar 23:44, 21 January 2006 (UTC)
- We might want to do a cross-reference with Just Cause to see what union contracts include to negotiate at-will. --Chrispounds 02:34, 13 September 2006 (UTC)
[edit] Merge
I suggest a speedy merger. —Markles 01:01, 11 March 2006 (UTC)
At will employment.....all employment is at will. There are ways to fire anyone regardless of any law that could be created. Any job worth the cost of fighting for already has a legal team who could keep litagation going much longer than any common person has money to contest it in court. Less taxpayer money should be spent, in this country, for issues like this. As far as screaming minority..... good luck ..... First you would have to cure all the components associated with fraud, lies, and dirty dealing. Any headway made to "right the wrongs" would be constantly knocked back to "beginning steps" by any number of people along the way. Besides who would be running the government then? Considering all the steps necessary to change any misjustice, we will still be screaming minority and misjustice in another 100 years. In answer to merging the topics....it would make the information easier to find for people on both sides of the equation. Cracks like the one about Alabama would help keep responces shorter. My SOAP BOX answer was necessitated by that glib comment. Radiologyinstructor 00:46, 30 November 2006 (UTC)Drenda Benn
Your wrong, dude. Several people in the US have successfully sued former employers for illegal firing. While being fired for being a protected class is difficult to prove, it can be done, and it has been done. When it is proven, plaintiffs can collect millions - yes, millions, of dollars in punitive damages. Besides, if you do it right, it costs you absolutely nothing to sue a company if you loose. How, you ask? It's called contingency-based attorneys. Cotingency-based attorneys operate on a "no recovery, no fee" basis, so if you loose, and thus get no recovery, you don't owe the lawyer a dime.
Please do your research before you come here and start running your big, fat, annoying, cocky, arrogant mouth. Pretty please! —Preceding unsigned comment added by Dstebbin (talk • contribs) 02:39, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
[edit] Retaliatory discharge exception
I removed the following statement:
"All U.S. states recognize retaliatory discharge as an exception to the at-will rule."
Since I could find no basis for it. IANAL, but the reference that I found specifically refuted retaliation as a cause of action unless it violated public policy or some statute. Feel free to re-add with citation. --b4hand 16:12, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
-No, you're 100% correct. An employer can fire you as punishment for anything that is not against public policy, such as turning in the company for a crime. And when I say "anything," I mean anything, as in they could fire you for, say, criticising one of their favorite politicians (freedom of speech does not extend to the private sector). —Preceding unsigned comment added by Dstebbin (talk • contribs) 02:29, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
[edit] Citing the Wagner Act
I put in the Wagner Act of 1935, and just because I know somebody has never heard of it and will want citation, I put it in there automatically. It was based on an academic journal called Managerial Law, but apparently, I got the HTML wrong, even though I copied and pasted the formula from the cite journal template. If someone could correct the HTML, I'd appreciate it.
[edit] This page is good! - and a question
I have to say I'm very impressed with this little page. And looking at the history it seems a really good example of a gradual build up, with a few different contributors. I wanted to ask, in the UK we have the requirement to give reasonable notice before a dismissal under s.86 of the Employment Rights Act 1996, or payment in lieu of notice. Everyone has a minimum of 1 week after 1 month, 2 weeks after 2 years, 3 weeks after 3 years, and so on till you get to 12. Anyone who is an "employee" is covered. And of course the contract itself can offer greater notice period. Am I right, this does not exist in the US (excluding the WARN Act)? Wikidea 09:53, 16 April 2008 (UTC)
- At-will employment is what it sounds like it is. It's like that show The Apprentice (U.S. TV series) where Donald Trump says "You're fired!" and the contestant has to leave the premises RIGHT AWAY. Except for people who have executed personal service contracts (a relatively small number of elite executives, athletes, entertainers, etc.), most people are under at-will.
- However, because of all the exceptions noted in this article, employers in most states are careful about firing people willy-nilly because of the high risk of getting hit with wrongful termination lawsuits. Usually most rational employers will quietly develop a paper record of an employee's misconduct or incompetence and try to provide constructive feedback several times. Then when they have developed a sufficient record demonstrating "good cause" (as a defense against wrongful termination) they will pick a suitable day and fire the employee. At that very moment, an employee can demand immediate payment of any pending wages, but then must clean out any personal belongings out of their workspace, return any of the employer's property like keys, and depart the premises immediately. --Coolcaesar (talk) 11:58, 17 April 2008 (UTC)
- Haha, yes I know Trump - and there's even a version of the Apprentice in the UK. It's interesting how you put it though, because this "good cause" firing idea is something we do not have. Let's say there is nothing about dismissal in the contract. You can fire somebody for any economic reason - in other words it can be as little as "we don't want to pay you any more". But you cannot fire somebody on discriminatory grounds, you have to give reasonable notice (the idea of this is to keep some responsibility for unemployment on the employer, and some burden off the state for paying benefits) and in some cases you have to pay redundancy. If there was a real instance of incompetence then of course that's a good reason to sack someone, because of course, they will have breached the terms of their contract to do a job.
- What you say is interesting because here an employer would not need to go into whether the employee was a good or bad person. It seems to me a bit perverse that employers would compile instances of incompetence in order to be able sack down the line, when that might just be constructing an excuse to get rid of someone for perfectly legitimate business reasons. Why shouldn't the law just allow people to say, "sorry we can't afford to pay you anymore"? What do you think? Wikidea 18:28, 17 April 2008 (UTC)
