#freelance workforce

[erebusvincent]

Here are 7 takeaways from the July Jobs Report and other recent data:

Unemployment for women continues to trend up, hitting 3.8%.

Women’s unemployment rose to a level not seen since the end of 2021.

Hispanic women’s unemployment spiked to 5.4% from 4.5% from the month prior.

Wage growth slowed to its weakest annual rate since May 2021.

Job openings fell in June to the second-lowest level since March 2021.

New workers seeking unemployment benefits hit the highest point in a year.

More women hold multiple jobs than men and that rate keeps climbing.

[engineeringeconomicshub]

Navigating the Gig Economy: Balancing Opportunities and Challenges

In today’s rapidly evolving economic landscape, the gig economy has emerged as a defining feature, offering both opportunities and challenges for workers and businesses alike. This article explores the pros and cons of the gig economy and examines its implications for various stakeholders. Pros of the Gig Economy: Flexibility: One of the primary advantages of the gig economy is the flexibility…

[hrmanagements]

Did you know? ❓ 💡 Research shows that organizations using HRIS solutions experience a 35% reduction in time spent on administrative tasks and a 50% increase in the accuracy of employee data. Visit : https://www.transformify.org

[maurice5320]

Work at Home Job Opportunities

Work from Home Job Opportunities: Exploring the Benefits and Challenges The concept of working from home has become increasingly popular in recent years, thanks to technological advancements that have made it possible to work remotely. The COVID-19 pandemic also accelerated this trend, with many companies adopting work-from-home policies to keep their employees safe. This has led to a surge in…

[9kmovies-biz]

How to Be a Truly Asynchronous Workplace - Everythingfair

Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own. In 2020 Dictionary.com’s word of the year was “pandemic.” Since then, a few interesting work-related trends have enjoyed honorable mentions on the annual list — like “Zoom” in 2020, “great resignation” in 2021 and “quiet quitting” in 2022. One term that has largely failed to enter the popular lexicon, despite the macro trends that…

[mostlysignssomeportents]

How unions won a 30% raise for every fast food worker in California

Tonight (September 14), I'm hosting the EFF Awards in San Francisco. On September 22, I'm (virtually) presenting at the DIG Festival in Modena, Italy.

Anything that can't go on forever will eventually stop. 40 years of declining worker power shattered the American Dream (TM), producing multiple generations whose children fared worse than their parents, cratering faith in institutions and hope for a better future.

The American neoliberal malaise – celebrated in by "centrists" who insisted that everything was fine and nothing could be changed – didn't just lead to a sense of helplessness, but also hopelessness. Denialism and nihilism are Siamese twins, and the YOLO approach to the climate emergency, covid mitigation, the housing crisis and other pressing issues can't be disentangled from the Thatcherite maxim that "There is NoA lternative." If there's no alternative, then we're doomed. Dig a hole, climb inside, pull the dirt down on top of yourself.

But anything that can't go on forever will eventually stop. For decades, leftists have taken a back seat to liberals in the progressive coalition, allowing "unionize!" to be drowned out by "learn to code!" The liberal-led coalition ceded the mantle of radical change to fake populist demagogues on the right.

This opened a space for a mirror-world politics that insisted that "conservatives" were the true defenders of women (because they were transphobes), of bodily autonomy (because they were vaccine deniers), of the environment (because they opposed wind-farms) and of workers (because they opposed immigration):

https://pluralistic.net/2023/09/05/not-that-naomi/#if-the-naomi-be-klein-youre-doing-just-fine

Anything that can't go on forever will eventually stop. A new coalition dedicated to fighting corporate power has emerged, tackling capitalism's monopoly power, and the corruption and abuse of workers it enables. That coalition is global, it's growing, and it's kicking ass.

Case in point: California just passed a law that will give every fast-food worker in the state a 30% raise. This law represents a profound improvement to the lives of the state's poorest workers – workers who spend long hours feeding their neighbors, but often can't afford to feed themselves at the end of a shift.

But just as remarkable as the substance of this new law is the path it took – a path that runs through a new sensibility, a new vibe, that is more powerful than mere political or legal procedure. The story is masterfully told in The American Prospect by veteran labor writer Harold Meyerson:

https://prospect.org/labor/2023-09-13-half-million-california-workers-get-raise/

The story starts with Governor Newsom signing a bill to create a new statewide labor-business board to mediate between workers and bosses, with the goal of elevating the working conditions of the state's large, minimum-wage workforce. The passage of this law triggered howls of outrage from the state's fast-food industry, who pledged to spend $200m to put forward a ballot initiative to permanently kill the labor-business board.

This is a familiar story. In 2019, California's state legislature passed AB-5, a bill designed to end the gig-work fiction that people whose boss is an algorithm are actually "independent businesses," rather than employees. AB5 wasn't perfect – it swept up all kinds of genuine freelancers, like writers who contributed articles to many publications – but the response wasn't aimed at fixing the bad parts. It was designed to destroy the good parts.

After AB-5, Uber and Lyft poured more than $200m into Prop 22, a ballot initiative designed to permanently bar the California legislature from passing any law to protect "gig workers." Prop 22's corporate backers flooded the state with disinformation, and procured a victory in 2020. The aftermath was swift and vicious, with Prop 22 used as cover in mass-firings of unionized workers across the state's workforce:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/01/05/manorialism-feudalism-cycle/#prop22

Workers and the politicians who defend them were supposed to be crushed by Prop 22. Its message was "there is no alternative." "Abandon hope all ye who enter here." "Resistance is futile." Prop 22 was worth spending $200m on because it wouldn't just win this fight – it would win all fights, forever.

But that's not what happened. When the fast-food barons announced that they were going to pump another $200m into a state ballot initiative to kill fair wages for food service workers, they got a hell of a surprise. SEIU – a union that has long struggled to organize fast-food workers – collaborated with progressive legislators to introduce a pair of new, even further-reaching bills.

One bill would have made the corporate overseers of franchise businesses jointly liable for lawbreaking by franchisees – so if a McDonald's restaurant owner stole their employees' wages, McDonalds corporate would also be on the hook for the offense. The second bill would restore funding and power to the state Industrial Welfare Commission, which once routinely intervened to set wages and working standards in many state industries:

https://www.gtlaw-laborandemployment.com/2023/08/the-california-iwc-whats-old-is-new-again/

Fast-food bosses fucked around, and boy did they find out. Funding for the IWC passed the state budget, and the franchisee joint liability is set to pass the legislature this week. The fast-food bosses cried uncle and begged Newsom's office for a deal. In exchange for defunding the IWC and canceling the vote on the liability bill, the industry has agreed to an hourly wage increase for the state's 550,000 fast-food workers, from $15.50 to $20, taking effect in April.

The deal also includes annual raises of either 3.5% or the real rise in cost of living. It keeps the labor-management council that the original bill created (the referendum on killing that council has been cancelled). The council will include two franchisees, two fast food corporate reps, two union reps, two front-line fast-food workers and a member of the public. It will have the power to direct the state Department of Labor to directly regulate working conditions in fast-food restaurants, from health and safety to workplace violence.

It's been nearly a century since business/government/labor boards like this were commonplace. The revival is a step on the way to bringing back the practice of sectoral bargaining, where workers set contracts for all employers in an industry. Sectoral bargaining was largely abolished through the dismantling of the New Deal, though elements of it remain. Entertainment industry unions are called "guilds" because they bargain with all the employers in their sector – which is why all of the Hollywood studios are being struck by SAG-AFTRA and the WGA.

So what changed between 2020 – when rideshare bosses destroyed democratic protections for workers by flooding the zone with disinformation to pass Prop 22 – and 2023, when the fast food bosses folded like a cheap suit? It wasn't changes to the laws governing ballot initiatives, nor was it a lack of ready capital for demolishing worker rights. Fast food executives weren't visited by three ghosts in the night who convinced them to care for their workers. Their hearts didn't grow by three sizes.

What changed was the vibe. The Hot Labor Summer was a rager, and it's not showing any signs of slowing. Obviously that's true in California, where nurses and hotel workers are also striking, and where strikebreaking companies like Instawork ("Uber for #scabs") attract swift regulatory sanction, rather than demoralized capitulation:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/07/30/computer-says-scab/#instawork

The hot labor summer wasn't a season – it was a turning point. Everyone's forming unions. Think of Equity Strip NoHo, the first strippers' union in a generation, which won recognition from their scumbag bosses at North Hollywood's Star Garden Club, who used every dirty trick to kill workplace democracy.

The story of the Equity Strippers is amazing. Two organizers, Charlie and Lilith, appeared on Adam Conover's Factually podcast to describe the incredible creativity and solidarity they used to win recognition, and the continuing struggle to get a contract out of their bosses, who are still fucking around and assuming they will not find out:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_fgXihmHIZk

Like the fast-food bosses, the Star Garden's owners are in for a surprise. One of the most powerful elements of the Equity Strippers' story is the solidarity of their customers. Star Garden's owners assumed that their clientele were indiscriminate, horny assholes who didn't care about the wellbeing of the workers they patronized, and would therefore cross a picket-line because parts is parts.

Instead, the bar's clientele sided with the workers. People everywhere are siding with workers. A decade ago, when video game actors voted on a strike, the tech workers who coded the games were incredibly hostile to them. "Why should you get residuals for your contribution to this game when we don't?"

But SAG-AFTRA members who provide voice acting for games just overwhelmingly voted to authorize a strike, and this time the story is very different. This time, tech workers are ride-or-die for their comrades in the sound booths:

https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/business/story/2023-09-13/video-game-voice-actor-sag-strike-interactive-agreement-actors-strike

What explains the change in tech workers' animal sentiments? Well, on the one hand, labor rights are in the air. The decades of cartoonish, lazy dismissals of labor struggles have ended. And on the other hand, tech workers have been proletarianized, with 260,000 layoffs in the sector, including 12,000 layoffs at Google that came immediately after a stock buyback that would have paid those 12,000 salaries for the next 27 years:

https://doctorow.medium.com/the-proletarianization-of-tech-workers-ad0a6b09f7e6

Larry Lessig once laid out a theory of change that holds that our society is governed by four forces: law (what's legal), norms (what's socially acceptable), markets (what's profitable) and code (what's technologically possible):

https://cs.stanford.edu/people/eroberts/cs181/projects/2010-11/CodeAndRegulation/about.html

These four forces interact. When queer relationships were normalized, it made it easier to legalize them, too – and then the businesses that marriage equality became both a force for more normalization and legal defense.

When Lessig formulated this argument, much of the focus was on technology – how file-sharing changed norms, which changed law. But as the decades passed, I've come to appreciate what the argument says about norms, the conversations we have with one another.

Neoliberalism wants you to think that you're an individual, not a member of a polity. Neoliberalism wants you to bargain with your boss as a "free agent," not a union member. It wants you to address the climate emergency by recycling more carefully – not by demanding laws banning single-use plastics. It wants you to fight monopolies by shopping harder – not by busting trusts.

But that's not what we're doing – not anymore. We're forming unions. We're demanding a Green New Deal. And we're busting some trusts. The DoJ Antitrust Division case against Google is the (first) trial of the century, reviving the ancient and noble practice of fighting monopolies with courts, not empty platitudes.

The trial is incredible, and Yosef Weitzman's reporting on Big Tech On Trial is required reading. I'm following it closely (thankfully, there's a fulltext RSS feed):

https://www.bigtechontrial.com/p/what-makes-google-great

The neoliberal project of instilling learned helplessness about corporate power has hit the wall, and it's wrecked. The same norms that made us furious enough to put Google on trial are the norms that made us angry – not cynical – about Clarence Thomas's bribery scandals:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/04/06/clarence-thomas/#harlan-crow

And they're the same norms that made us support our striking comrades, from hotel housekeepers to Hollywood actors, from strippers to Starbucks baristas:

https://thetyee.ca/News/2023/09/13/Starbucks-Workers-Back-At-Strike/

Yes, Starbucks baristas. The Starbucks unions that won hard-fought recognition drives are now fighting the next phase of corporate fuckery: Starbucks corporate's refusal to bargain for a contract. Starbucks is betting that if they just stall long enough, the workers who support the union will move on and they'll be able to go back to abusing their workers without worrying about a union.

They're fucking around, and they're finding out. Starbucks workers at two shops in British Columbia – Clayton Crossing in Surrey and Valley Centre in Langley – have authorized strikes with a 91% majority:

https://thetyee.ca/News/2023/09/13/Starbucks-Workers-Back-At-Strike/

Where did the guts to do this come from? Not from labor law, which remains disgustingly hostile to workers (though that's changing, as we'll see below). It came from norms. It came from getting pissed off and talking about it. Shouting about it. Arguing about it.

Laws, markets and code matter, but they're nothing without norms. That's why Uber and Lyft were willing to spend $200m to fight fair labor practices. They didn't just want to keep their costs low – they wanted to snuff out the vibe, the idea that workers deserve a fair deal.

They failed. The idea didn't die. It thrived. It merged with the idea that corporations and the wealthy corrupt our society. It was joined by the idea that monopolies harm us all. They're losing. We're winning.

The BC Starbucks workers secured 91% majorities in their strike votes. This is what worker power looks like. As Jane McAlevey writes in her Collective Bargain, these supermajorities – ultramajorities – are how we win.

https://doctorow.medium.com/a-collective-bargain-a48925f944fe

The neoliberal wing of the Democratic party hires high-priced consultants who advise them to seek 50.1% margins of victory – and then insist that nothing can be done because we live in the Manchin-Synematic Universe, where razor-thin majorities mean that there is no alternative. Labor organizers fight for 91% majorities – in the face of bosses' gerrymandering, disinformation and voter suppression – and get shit done.

Shifting the norms – having the conversations – is the tactic, but getting shit done is the goal. The Biden administration – a decidedly mixed bag – has some incredible, technically skilled, principled fighters who know how to get shit done. Take Lina Khan, who revived the long-dormant Section 5 of the Federal Trade Act, which gives her broad powers to ban "unfair and deceptive" practices:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/01/10/the-courage-to-govern/#whos-in-charge

Khan's wielding this broad power in all kinds of exciting ways. For example, she's seeking a ban on noncompetes, a form of bondage that shackles workers to shitty bosses by making it illegal to work for anyone else in the same industry:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/02/02/its-the-economy-stupid/#neofeudal

Noncompete apologists argue that these merely protect employers' investment in training and willingness to share sensitive trade secrets with employees. But the majority of noncompetes are applied to fast food workers – yes, the same workers who just won a 30%, across-the-board raise – in order to prevent Burger King cashiers from seeking $0.25/hour more at a local Wendy's.

Meanwhile, the most trade-secret intensive, high-training industry in the world – tech – has no noncompetes. That's not because tech bosses are good eggs who want to do right by their employees – it's because noncompetes are banned in California, where tech is headquartered.

But in other states, where noncompetes are still allowed, bosses have figured out how to use them as a slippery slope to a form of bondage that beggars the imagination. I'm speaking of the Training Repayment Agreement Provision (AKA, the TRAP), a contractual term that forces workers who quit or get fired to pay their ex-bosses tens of thousands of dollars, supposedly to recoup the cost of training them:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/08/04/its-a-trap/#a-little-on-the-nose

Now, TRAPs aren't just evil, they're also bullshit. Bosses show pet-groomers or cannabis budtenders a few videos, throw them a three-ring binder, and declare that they've received a five-figure education that they must repay if they part ways with their employers. This gives bosses broad latitude to abuse their workers and even order them to break the law, on penalty of massive fines for quitting.

If this sounds like an Unfair Labor Practice to you, you're not alone. NLRB General Counsel Jennifer Abruzzo agrees with you. She's another one of those Biden appointees with a principled commitment to making life better for American workers, and the technical chops to turn that principle into muscular action.

In a case against Juvly Aesthetics – an Ohio-based chain of "alternative medicine" and "aesthetic services" – Abruzzo argues that noncompetes and TRAPs are Unfair Labor Practices that violate the National Labor Relations Act and cannot be enforced:

https://www.nlrb.gov/case/09-CA-300239

Two ex-Juvly employees have been hit with $50-60k "repayment" bills for quitting – one after refusing to violate Ohio law by performing "microneedling," another for quitting after having their wages stolen and then refusing to sign an "exit agreement":

https://prospect.org/labor/2023-09-14-nlrb-complaint-calls-noncompete-agreement-unfair-labor-practice/

If the NLRB wins, the noncompete and TRAP clauses in the workers' contracts will be voided, and the workers will get fees, missed wages, and other penalties. More to the point, the case will set the precedent that noncompetes are generally unenforceable nationwide, delivering labor protection to every worker in every sector in America.

Abruzzo has been killing it lately: just a couple weeks ago, she set a precedent that any boss that breaks labor law during a union drive automatically loses, with instant recognition for the union as a penalty (rather than a small fine, as was customary):

https://pluralistic.net/2023/09/06/goons-ginks-and-company-finks/#if-blood-be-the-price-of-your-cursed-wealth

Abruzzo is amazing – as are her colleagues at the NLRB, FTC, DOJ, and other agencies. But the law they're making is downstream of the norms we set. From the California lawmakers who responded to fast food industry threats by introducing more regulations to the strip-bar patrons who refused to cross the picket-line to the legions of fans dragging Drew Barrymore for scabbing, the public mood is providing the political will for real action:

https://www.motherjones.com/media/2023/09/drew-barrymores-newest-role-scab/

The issues of corruption, worker rights and market concentration can't – and shouldn't – be teased apart. They're three facets of the same fight – the fight against oligarchy. Rarely do those issues come together more clearly than in the delicious petard-hoisting of Dave Clark, formerly the archvillain of Amazon, and now the victim of its bullying.

As Maureen Tkacik writes for The American Prospect, Clark had a long and storied career as Amazon's most vicious and unassuming ghoul, a sweatervested, Diet-Coke-swilling normie whose mild manner disguised a vicious streak a mile wide:

https://prospect.org/power/2023-09-14-catch-us-if-you-can-dave-clark-amazon/

Clark earned his nickname, "The Sniper," as a Kentucky warehouse supervisor; the name came from his habit of "lurking in the shadows [and] scoping out slackers he could fire." Clark created Amazon Flex, the "gig work" version of Amazon delivery drivers where randos in private vehicles were sent out to delivery parcels. Clark also oversaw tens of millions of dollars in wage-theft from those workers.

We have Clark to thank for the Amazon drivers who had to shit in bags and piss in bottles to make quota. Clark was behind the illegal union-busting tactics used against employees in the Bessamer, Alabama warehouse. We have Clark to thank for the Amazon chat app that banned users from posting the words "restroom," "slave labor," "plantation," and "union":

https://pluralistic.net/2022/04/05/doubleplusrelentless/#quackspeak

But Clark doesn't work for Amazon anymore. After losing a power-struggle to succeed Jeff Bezos – the job went to "longtime rival" Andy Jassy – he quit and went to work for Flexport, a logistics company that promised to provide sellers that used non-Amazon services with shipping. Flexport did a deal with Shopify, becoming its "sole official logistics partner."

But then Shopify did another logistics deal – with Amazon. Clark was ordered to tender his resignation or face immediate dismissal.

How did all this happen? Well, there are two theories. The first is that Shopify teamed up with Amazon to stab Flexport in the back, then purged all the ex-Amazonians from the Flexport upper ranks. The other is that Clark was a double-agent, who worked with Amazon to sabotage Flexport, and was caught and fired.

But either way, this is a huge win for Amazon, a monopolist who is in the FTC's crosshairs thanks to the anti-corporate vibe-shift that has consumed the nation and the world. As the sole major employer for this kind of logistics, Amazon is a de facto labor regulator, deciding who can work in the sector. The FTC's enforcement action isn't just about monopoly – it's about labor.

Now, Clark is a rich, powerful white dude, not the sort of person who needs a lot of federal help to protect his labor rights. When liberals called the shot in the progressive coalition, they scolded leftists not to speak of class, but rather to focus on identity – to be intersectionalists.

That was a trick. There's no incompatibility between caring about class and caring about gender, race and sexual orientation. Those fast food workers who are about to get a 30% wage-hike in California? Overwhelmingly Black or brown, overwhelmingly female.

The liberal version of intersectionalism observes a world run by 150 rich white men and resolves to replace half of them with women, queers and people of color. The leftist version seeks to abolish the system altogether. The leftist version of intersectionalism cares about bias and discrimination not just because of how it makes people feel, but because of how it makes them live. It cares about wages, housing, vacations, child care – the things you can't get because of your identity.

The fight for social justice is a fight for worker justice. Eminently guillotineable monsters like Tim "Avocado Toast" Gurner advocate for increasing unemployment by "40-50%" – but Gurner is just saying what other bosses are thinking:

https://jacobin.com/2023/09/tim-gurner-capitalists-neoliberalism-unemployment-precarity

Garner is 100% right when he says: "There’s been a systematic change where employees feel the employer is extremely lucky to have them, as opposed to the other way around."

And then he says this: "So it’s a dynamic that has to change. We’ve got to kill that attitude, and that has to come through hurt in the economy."

Garner knows that the vibes are upstream of the change. The capitalist dream starts with killing our imagination, to make us believe that "there is no alternative." If we can dream bigger than "better representation among oligarchs" when we might someday dream of no oligarchs. That's what he fears the most.

Watch the video of Garner. Look past the dollar-store Gordon Gecko styling. That piece of shit is terrified.

And he should be.

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/09/14/prop-22-never-again/#norms-code-laws-markets

EFF Awards, San Francisco, September 14

[tailschannel]

Significant cuts hits IDW's parent company in a self-described "reset"

IDW Media Holdings, the parent of IDW Publishing (the company behind the Sonic the Hedgehog comics), announced major cuts in an effort to unlock financial stability.

The company terminated their New York Stock Exchange listing, shook up senior management, and slashed entire promotional and editorial departments - around 39% of its workforce.

The newly-appointed CEO characterized the axe drop a "reset."

Background

There's no other way to describe it, the cuts at IDW are significant.

The axe drop was in direct response to a poor balance sheet in a tough economic environment. IDW suffered greatly during the COVID-19 pandemic, and non-publishing segments (like direct-to-consumer games) continued to illustrate repeated quarterly losses.

It's no secret that IDW experienced cash flow issues and various others financial challenges, even though the comic books in particular (like IDW Sonic and TMNT) are significant revenue generators.

The company hopes that these cost-cutting measures will provide $4.4 million USD in estimated annual savings.

The impacted

Marketing, public relations, and editorial at IDW were impacted by today's announced cuts.

Comicsbeat reported that the entire marketing and PR departments, and half of the editorial team, got the axe, with more specific details yet to come. That's 39% of the total workforce.

At press time, @idwsonicnews told us that Shawn Lee, a "designer and letterer on many IDW titles", were among the laid off. He tweeted, "whelp, I'm officially a freelancer now."

---

Meanwhile, senior management got a shakeup. Former chairman Davidi Jonas replaced Allan Grafman as Chief Economic Officer. Chief Financial Officer Brooke Feinstein was ousted, and Amber Huerta was promoted to Chief Operating Officer.

IDW also voluntarily delisted their Class B common stock from the New York Stock Exchange, the largest trading venue in the world; and suspended their reporting status to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The company hoped that this will "reduce pressure on limited resources and the Company’s current inability to realize many of the benefits."

Okay, what about IDW Sonic?

Deep breaths.

At press time, there's nothing we know that flags an immediate concern for the IDW Sonic comics. However, as this is a developing situation, and the long-term outlook is uncertain, the forecast can change.

Even though it, and other comic book franchises (TMNT, etc.) continues to generate significant revenue to the publishing unit, IDW will have to enact more critical decisions to remain financially sound.

IDW Sonic editors David Mariotte and Riley Farmer have yet to officially acknowledge the parent company's announcement, but both "retweeted posts related to the layoffs," @idwsonicnews told us.

We have reached out to IDW Publishing for further comment.

(Updated Friday 11:00 pm ET)

[roebeanstalk]

i owe my landlord $1,270 and my roommate $405

i'm asking for help - even just a few dollars. i hate doing this, but i am trying to get a lot of other stuff together and it still just hasn't happened.

i have been unable to get past the interview phase of pretty much every job i've applied to, even ones that i seem to be perfectly qualified for. idk if it's because i've been out of the "workforce" as a freelancer, trans things, corporate bullshit, or some shortcomings i'm not recognizing. so much of my energy nowadays goes into not feeling like shit, and i've at least been mostly successful at that so...yay?

please donate or share to help a trans girl at her wits end. ily and also i'm sorry x_x

[nenelonomh]

human resource management pt.2

i've begun posting my notes in tumblr post format to revise for my exam tomorrow (this was written on 27-05-24, i'm probably going to schedule though to avoid spamming). here's the second hrm topics post!

part 1 | part 3 | part 4

in the last post, we looked at demographic change, employee welfare, and flexi-time. this time we will focus on the gig economy and immigration.

the gig economy is characterised by the prevalence of short-term contracts or freelance work as opposed to permanent jobs. for example, freelance, delivery drivers, taxi services, contract services, and other flexible work opportunities. a huge example of this is uber - which is an app that offers various 'rides' to assist people to reach their destinations.

businesses can use gig workers by hiring them as independent contractors, in the place of full-time employees. this is a cheaper alternative for the business, as it saves on employee benefits and rids the need for training employees.

however, gig work limits workers' potential for career development, lacks job security and secure income, and the worker misses out on employee benefits.

compliance with labour laws and regulations can be complex when managing gig workers. companies must understand legal requirements and adapt their hrm policies to address gig workforce management.

immigration refers to the action of moving to live in a different location with intentions to stay in the area. this is not the same as labour mobility, since immigration is the movement of people for non-work-related reasons.

one advantage of immigration on businesses includes the filling of job positions that domestic workers cannot be placed in. also, the company may benefit from new points of view - and gain a niche marketing opportunity.

negatives of this topic are that migrant workers may be unfamiliar with federal laws and regulations, and the workers may be more unproductive than the local employees. therefore, a business may need to invest more time into the foreign employee.

///

again, hope this post was fun to read! it's definitely more fun to post than read over my notes.

❤️ nene

image source: pinterest

[illusionremember]

Trying to find work after college has been one of the most humiliating experiences of my life. Not in the sense of being embarrassed to work. Not in the sense of work is beneath me. I want to work. I really enjoy editing. I want the satisfaction and the productivity and being able to do something useful. Paycheck would be nice too. But job hunting is, by design, exposing yourself and being vulnerable and proving your worth to complete strangers who Do Not Care About You. It is, straight up, a humiliating experience and I feel like people talk about how frustrating and defeating it can feel, but I've never heard anyone mention the humiliation. Here I am, looking for entry level work in my field. I do in fact have previous work experience that I feel like should be more than enough to prove myself, but for "entry level" jobs they ask for qualifications better suited to.... you know... NONentry level work. So I scrape together my degree and my experience with freelancing and literary journals and tutoring college students and working as an instructional assistant, and put it all on paper and hand it off. I take my time answering all their additional questions, which ask for the same things I just put on my resume. I take their little proof-of-knowledge tests, I write my short essay responses, I write cover letter after cover letter that describes the ways I can be an asset to them and how this job will help me to learn new skills and develop professionally and that's why it's the current My Dream Job(tm). And everything I put forth I do so with the earnestness of a third grader bringing home his straight-As & Bs report card for mom and dad to sign off on. Or like I'm presenting a piece of child art that I can see is messy and Not Right and at least hoping for acknowledgement. I'm a whole-ass adult with actual years of experience, I'm not aiming high at all, and this process still makes me feel so juvenile. Here's my work! How'd I do? Can I have a sticker for my efforts? I literally have that same feeling - like I'm a child who can only do so much with what has been available to me, but I'm doing my absolute best, and I'm even doing well for someone in my position.

And we get ghosted. I put hours and hours of labor into job hunting and applications, and most of them cannot even be bothered to send me a message confirming they got my resume. It is literally humiliating. I once had someone message me on LinkedIn (a mass message, I realized later) inviting me to apply to a freelancer's agency. Great! I made an account, filled out the paperwork, I ticked all the boxes, until the last one, which asked me to list out at least seven (7) bestsellers that I had worked on, with links to their listings. It would not let me proceed or submit my application for consideration without these. That's when it finally clicks - this agency is exclusively for years-of-experience editors, ones that are sick of working for the Big Five, that want to quit their jobs and go private. I am still in the entry-level zone. I don't have that yet. So I deleted my account. That was over a year ago and to this day they still send me emails about seminars and classes as if I were a client rather than an employee applicant.

I don't understand how they keep a workforce going without hiring people. Without hiring new people passionate about the work and offering training. If they only want to hire people with experience, you first need.... people who've worked entry level to gain experience. How does this make any sense???

[offshoreoilrig]

if only i could open the grad school application website without wanting to throw up then i could check the requirements, sign up for prerequisites at the local community college, apply in early march, get in, spend 2 years there while working full time, apply to FAANG companies, get hired and make 180k salary, pay off the loans, save and invest 75% of my income, and retire early while working freelance or on something creative just in case something happens and i need to return to the workforce. it's actually so easy to live a good life in america, that's only what, like 7 steps

[hrmanagements]

Prompt Payments: How Automated Billing Software Benefits Freelancers

As the gig economy thrives, freelancers play a crucial role in various industries. However, one common challenge they face is ensuring timely service payments. Late or delayed payments can significantly impact freelancers' cash flow and hinder their business sustainability. Payments must consistently maintain cash flow, avoid financial stress, and hamper freelance businesses. Automated billing software has emerged as a powerful tool for freelancers to address this issue.

In this blog post, we will explore the benefits of automated billing software to ensure prompt payments. We will also discuss how it streamlines freelancers' invoicing processes.

Benefits of Payment Automation Software

Streamlined Invoicing Process

Manual invoicing can be time-consuming and error-prone. Payment automation software simplifies invoicing by generating professional-looking invoices quickly and accurately. Freelancers can customize templates with their branding, add project details, and set payment terms, ensuring clear communication with clients. By automating this administrative task, freelancers can save valuable time and focus more on their core work.

Invoice Tracking and Reminders

Late payments often occur due to oversight or forgetfulness by the client and the freelancer. Automated billing software keeps track of sent invoices and reminds us of pending or overdue payments. These reminders can be scheduled to be sent automatically, reducing manual follow-ups. By automating invoice tracking and reminders, freelancers can maintain better control over their payment schedules and improve cash flow.

Recurring invoices

Automatic billing is crucial for freelancers who work on long-term projects or offer subscription-based services. Billing automation software enables freelancers to set up recurring invoices that are automatically generated and sent at specified intervals. It ensures a steady stream of invoices and payments, eliminating repeated manual invoicing. With recurring payments, freelancers can create predictable revenue streams and focus on delivering quality work.

Online Payment Options

Many clients prefer online payment methods like credit cards, debit cards, or digital wallets. Automated billing software integrates with various payment gateways, allowing freelancers to offer multiple online payment options to their clients. By providing a seamless online payment experience, freelancers can expedite the payment process and reduce barriers that hinder prompt payments.

Expense Tracking and Reporting

Freelancers often incur business-related expenses that must be tracked for accurate billing and taxation purposes. Automated billing software can help track expenses by allowing freelancers to categories and record business expenses. Payments to Freelancers are made easier, and the accounting process is simplified by this feature, as is maintaining organized financial records and generating comprehensive tax reports.

Financial Insights and Analytics

Financial management is essential for freelancers to understand their business's fiscal health and make informed decisions. Automated billing software offers financial insights and analytics, giving freelancers an overview of their invoicing, payments received, outstanding payments, and revenue trends. By accessing such data, freelancers can identify potential issues, optimize invoicing strategies, and plan for future growth.

Reliable Payment Automation Software Provider Timely payments are vital to freelance businesses' success and sustainability. TFY's automated billing software offers freelancers a range of benefits, including streamlined invoicing processes, invoice tracking and reminders, recurring invoicing, online payment options, expense tracking and reporting, and financial insights. By leveraging these features, freelancers can reduce administrative burdens, enhance cash flow, and ensure prompt client payments. Embracing automation through billing software empowers freelancers to focus on their work. The software handles invoicing and payment, fostering a more efficient and prosperous freelancing journey. To know more about it, contact the TFY solution provider.

[sapphichymns]

I’ll admit, I’ve been thinking about Kerblam a lot due to the rise of AI and how it’s used as a gotcha about the politics of 13′s era being actually conservative and not ‘woke’. So basically, Kerblam is a really annoying fungi in the fandom wank.

Here’s the thing, I know what the problem with the episode. It’s the word System. System is only ever used to describe the AI. Never was used to describe the way Kerblam uses the capitalist system to operate in Kandoka. Of course, it wouldn’t really raise eyebrows for a script editor, it really isn’t contradicting anything that came before. But when the Doctor says:

DOCTOR: The systems aren't the problem. How people use and exploit the system, that's the problem. People like you.

It somehow automatically became about the capitalist system Kerblam operates on. If it had been:

DOCTOR: The AI isn’t the problem. How people use and exploit the AI, that's the problem. People like you.

the fandom wank about it wouldn’t have ever reached this level of political jerk off (I swear I didn’t want to reach this level of the metaphor but I did).

The episode is not about capitalism in space(!), it’s about automation anxiety. How Kerblam is using an AI to replace jobs from people to maximize profit and it does cause an issue to the people of Kandoka.

KIRA: I was terrible too, my first week. I'm amazed the System kept me on. But now I just take a deep breath at the beginning of every shift and tell myself, Kira Arlo, you can do this. Sometimes I almost believe myself. DOCTOR: What I don't understand is, why does Kerblam need people as a workforce? These are automated and repetitive tasks. Why not get the robots to do it? KIRA: Do you not watch the news? DOCTOR: We travel a lot. RYAN: A lot. KIRA: Kandokan labour laws. Ever since the People Power protests, companies have to make sure a minimum ten percent of the workforce are actual people, at all levels. Like the slogan says, real people need real jobs. Work gives us purpose, right?

The people of Kandoka were indeed holding Kerblam accountable for the push of automation, even the way the episode ends is a continuation of that.

SLADE: We're suspending all operations for a month, pending review and while the TeamMates are rebuilding Dispatch. JUDY: All our workers have been given two weeks' paid leave, free return shuttle transport. And I'm going to propose that Kerblam becomes a People-Led Company in future. Majority organics. People, I mean. We're always looking for good workers to join our management team. DOCTOR: Er, thanks. We're strictly freelance.

(Note: Charlie did not  care about the people who worked at Kerblam. He only cared about Kira and only because, it affected him directly.)

I understand Oxygen is more popular because the Doctor says capitalism sucks and it’s basically abolished by the end of it but not every story needs the Doctor to just show up and somehow solve a systematic issue. Some times, talking about the importance of fighting little by little to make things better is just as important. It’s a recurring theme in 13′s era.

I don’t even think Kerblam needs a medal for effort or its issue is somehow some big moral failure. It just happened. It’s common for this show (or many others) to have its moment where it trips on itself. It’s just the conversation around it is so fucking dumb.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

A link-clump demands a linkdump

Cometh the weekend, cometh the linkdump. My daily-ish newsletter includes a section called "Hey look at this," with three short links per day, but sometimes those links get backed up and I need to clean house. Here's the eight previous installments:

https://pluralistic.net/tag/linkdump/

The country code top level domain (ccTLD) for the Caribbean island nation of Anguilla is .ai, and that's turned into millions of dollars worth of royalties as "entrepreneurs" scramble to sprinkle some buzzword-compliant AI stuff on their businesses in the most superficial way possible:

https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2023/08/ai-fever-turns-anguillas-ai-domain-into-a-digital-gold-mine/

All told, .ai domain royalties will account for about ten percent of the country's GDP.

It's actually kind of nice to see Anguilla finding some internet money at long last. Back in the 1990s, when I was a freelance web developer, I got hired to work on the investor website for a publicly traded internet casino based in Anguilla that was a scammy disaster in every conceivable way. The company had been conceived of by people who inherited a modestly successful chain of print-shops and decided to diversify by buying a dormant penny mining stock and relaunching it as an online casino.

But of course, online casinos were illegal nearly everywhere. Not in Anguilla – or at least, that's what the founders told us – which is why they located their servers there, despite the lack of broadband or, indeed, reliable electricity at their data-center. At a certain point, the whole thing started to whiff of a stock swindle, a pump-and-dump where they'd sell off shares in that ex-mining stock to people who knew even less about the internet than they did and skedaddle. I got out, and lost track of them, and a search for their names and business today turns up nothing so I assume that it flamed out before it could ruin any retail investors' lives.

Anguilla is a British Overseas Territory, one of those former British colonies that was drained and then given "independence" by paternalistic imperial administrators half a world away. The country's main industries are tourism and "finance" – which is to say, it's a pearl in the globe-spanning necklace of tax- and corporate-crime-havens the UK established around the world so its most vicious criminals – the hereditary aristocracy – can continue to use Britain's roads and exploit its educated workforce without paying any taxes.

This is the "finance curse," and there are tiny, struggling nations all around the world that live under it. Nick Shaxson dubbed them "Treasure Islands" in his outstanding book of the same name:

https://us.macmillan.com/books/9780230341722/treasureislands

I can't imagine that the AI bubble will last forever – anything that can't go on forever eventually stops – and when it does, those .ai domain royalties will dry up. But until then, I salute Anguilla, which has at last found the internet riches that I played a small part in bringing to it in the previous century.

The AI bubble is indeed overdue for a popping, but while the market remains gripped by irrational exuberance, there's lots of weird stuff happening around the edges. Take Inject My PDF, which embeds repeating blocks of invisible text into your resume:

https://kai-greshake.de/posts/inject-my-pdf/

The text is tuned to make resume-sorting Large Language Models identify you as the ideal candidate for the job. It'll even trick the summarizer function into spitting out text that does not appear in any human-readable form on your CV.

Embedding weird stuff into resumes is a hacker tradition. I first encountered it at the Chaos Communications Congress in 2012, when Ang Cui used it as an example in his stellar "Print Me If You Dare" talk:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=njVv7J2azY8

Cui figured out that one way to update the software of a printer was to embed an invisible Postscript instruction in a document that basically said, "everything after this is a firmware update." Then he came up with 100 lines of perl that he hid in documents with names like cv.pdf that would flash the printer when they ran, causing it to probe your LAN for vulnerable PCs and take them over, opening a reverse-shell to his command-and-control server in the cloud. Compromised printers would then refuse to apply future updates from their owners, but would pretend to install them and even update their version numbers to give verisimilitude to the ruse. The only way to exorcise these haunted printers was to send 'em to the landfill. Good times!

Printers are still a dumpster fire, and it's not solely about the intrinsic difficulty of computer security. After all, printer manufacturers have devoted enormous resources to hardening their products against their owners, making it progressively harder to use third-party ink. They're super perverse about it, too – they send "security updates" to your printer that update the printer's security against you – run these updates and your printer downgrades itself by refusing to use the ink you chose for it:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2020/11/ink-stained-wretches-battle-soul-digital-freedom-taking-place-inside-your-printer

It's a reminder that what a monopolist thinks of as "security" isn't what you think of as security. Oftentimes, their security is antithetical to your security. That was the case with Web Environment Integrity, a plan by Google to make your phone rat you out to advertisers' servers, revealing any adblocking modifications you might have installed so that ad-serving companies could refuse to talk to you:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/08/02/self-incrimination/#wei-bai-bai

WEI is now dead, thanks to a lot of hueing and crying by people like us:

https://www.theregister.com/2023/11/02/google_abandons_web_environment_integrity/

But the dream of securing Google against its own users lives on. Youtube has embarked on an aggressive campaign of refusing to show videos to people running ad-blockers, triggering an arms-race of ad-blocker-blockers and ad-blocker-blocker-blockers:

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/where-will-the-ad-versus-ad-blocker-arms-race-end/

The folks behind Ublock Origin are racing to keep up with Google's engineers' countermeasures, and there's a single-serving website called "Is uBlock Origin updated to the last Anti-Adblocker YouTube script?" that will give you a realtime, one-word status update:

https://drhyperion451.github.io/does-uBO-bypass-yt/

One in four web users has an ad-blocker, a stat that Doc Searls pithily summarizes as "the biggest boycott in world history":

https://doc.searls.com/2015/09/28/beyond-ad-blocking-the-biggest-boycott-in-human-history/

Zero app users have ad-blockers. That's not because ad-blocking an app is harder than ad-blocking the web – it's because reverse-engineering an app triggers liability under IP laws like Section 1201 of the Digital Millenium Copyright Act, which can put you away for 5 years for a first offense. That's what I mean when I say that "IP is anything that lets a company control its customers, critics or competitors:

https://locusmag.com/2020/09/cory-doctorow-ip/

I predicted that apps would open up all kinds of opportunities for abusive, monopolistic conduct back in 2010, and I'm experiencing a mix of sadness and smugness (I assume there's a German word for this emotion) at being so thoroughly vindicated by history:

https://memex.craphound.com/2010/04/01/why-i-wont-buy-an-ipad-and-think-you-shouldnt-either/

The more control a company can exert over its customers, the worse it will be tempted to treat them. These systems of control shift the balance of power within companies, making it harder for internal factions that defend product quality and customer interests to win against the enshittifiers:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/07/28/microincentives-and-enshittification/

The result has been a Great Enshittening, with platforms of all description shifting value from their customers and users to their shareholders, making everything palpably worse. The only bright side is that this has created the political will to do something about it, sparking a wave of bold, muscular antitrust action all over the world.

The Google antitrust case is certainly the most important corporate lawsuit of the century (so far), but Judge Amit Mehta's deference to Google's demands for secrecy has kept the case out of the headlines. I mean, Sam Bankman-Fried is a psychopathic thief, but even so, his trial does not deserve its vastly greater prominence, though, if you haven't heard yet, he's been convicted and will face decades in prison after he exhausts his appeals:

https://newsletter.mollywhite.net/p/sam-bankman-fried-guilty-on-all-charges

The secrecy around Google's trial has relaxed somewhat, and the trickle of revelations emerging from the cracks in the courthouse are fascinating. For the first time, we're able to get a concrete sense of which queries are the most lucrative for Google:

https://www.theverge.com/2023/11/1/23941766/google-antitrust-trial-search-queries-ad-money

The list comes from 2018, but it's still wild. As David Pierce writes in The Verge, the top twenty includes three iPhone-related terms, five insurance queries, and the rest are overshadowed by searches for customer service info for monopolistic services like Xfinity, Uber and Hulu.

All-in-all, we're living through a hell of a moment for piercing the corporate veil. Maybe it's the problem of maintaining secrecy within large companies, or maybe the the rampant mistreatment of even senior executives has led to more leaks and whistleblowing. Either way, we all owe a debt of gratitude to the anonymous leaker who revealed the unbelievable pettiness of former HBO president of programming Casey Bloys, who ordered his underlings to create an army of sock-puppet Twitter accounts to harass TV and movie critics who panned HBO's shows:

https://www.rollingstone.com/tv-movies/tv-movie-features/hbo-casey-bloys-secret-twitter-trolls-tv-critics-leaked-texts-lawsuit-the-idol-1234867722/

These trolling attempts were pathetic, even by the standards of thick-fingered corporate execs. Like, accusing critics who panned the shitty-ass Perry Mason reboot of disrespecting veterans because the fictional Mason's back-story had him storming the beach on D-Day.

The pushback against corporate bullying is everywhere, and of course, the vanguard is the labor movement. Did you hear that the UAW won their strike against the auto-makers, scoring raises for all workers based on the increases in the companies' CEO pay? The UAW isn't done, either! Their incredible new leader, Shawn Fain, has called for a general strike in 2028:

https://www.404media.co/uaw-calls-on-workers-to-line-up-massive-general-strike-for-2028-to-defeat-billionaire-class/

The massive victory for unionized auto-workers has thrown a spotlight on the terrible working conditions and pay for workers at Tesla, a criminal company that has no compunctions about violating labor law to prevent its workers from exercising their legal rights. Over in Sweden, union workers are teaching Tesla a lesson. After the company tried its illegal union-busting playbook on Tesla service centers, the unionized dock-workers issued an ultimatum: respect your workers or face a blockade at Sweden's ports that would block any Tesla from being unloaded into the EU's fifth largest Tesla market:

https://www.wired.com/story/tesla-sweden-strike/

Of course, the real solution to Teslas – and every other kind of car – is to redesign our cities for public transit, walking and cycling, making cars the exception for deliveries, accessibility and other necessities. Transitioning to EVs will make a big dent in the climate emergency, but it won't make our streets any safer – and they keep getting deadlier.

Last summer, my dear old pal Ted Kulczycky got in touch with me to tell me that Talking Heads were going to be all present in public for the first time since the band's breakup, as part of the debut of the newly remastered print of Stop Making Sense, the greatest concert movie of all time. Even better, the show would be in Toronto, my hometown, where Ted and I went to high-school together, at TIFF.

Ted is the only person I know who is more obsessed with Talking Heads than I am, and he started working on tickets for the show while I starting pricing plane tickets. And then, the unthinkable happened: Ted's wife, Serah, got in touch to say that Ted had been run over by a car while getting off of a streetcar, that he was severely injured, and would require multiple surgeries.

But this was Ted, so of course he was still planning to see the show. And he did, getting a day-pass from the hospital and showing up looking like someone from a Kids In The Hall sketch who'd been made up to look like someone who'd been run over by a car:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/doctorow/53182440282/

In his Globe and Mail article about Ted's experience, Brad Wheeler describes how the whole hospital rallied around Ted to make it possible for him to get to the movie:

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/arts/music/article-how-a-talking-heads-superfan-found-healing-with-the-concert-film-stop/

He also mentions that Ted is working on a book and podcast about Stop Making Sense. I visited Ted in the hospital the day after the gig and we talked about the book and it sounds amazing. Also? The movie was incredible. See it in Imax.

That heartwarming tale of healing through big suits is a pretty good place to wrap up this linkdump, but I want to call your attention to just one more thing before I go: Robin Sloan's Snarkmarket piece about blogging and "stock and flow":

https://snarkmarket.com/2010/4890/

Sloan makes the excellent case that for writers, having a "flow" of short, quick posts builds the audience for a "stock" of longer, more synthetic pieces like books. This has certainly been my experience, but I think it's only part of the story – there are good, non-mercenary reasons for writers to do a lot of "flow." As I wrote in my 2021 essay, "The Memex Method," turning your commonplace book into a database – AKA "blogging" – makes you write better notes to yourself because you know others will see them:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/05/09/the-memex-method/

This, in turn, creates a supersaturated, subconscious solution of fragments that are just waiting to nucleate and crystallize into full-blown novels and nonfiction books and other "stock." That's how I came out of lockdown with nine new books. The next one is The Lost Cause, a hopepunk science fiction novel about the climate whose early fans include Naomi Klein, Rebecca Solnit, Bill McKibben and Kim Stanley Robinson. It's out on November 14:

https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250865939/the-lost-cause

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/11/05/variegated/#nein