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Comment by pluralmonad | Hacker News Reader

I've worked places that refuse to fire low performers and its hard for it to not be toxic. I'm not saying this outcome is a forgone conclusion of unions, but my union experience is that poor performers take even longer to get rid of and I'm not sure I would be interested in that sort of environment again. This is more of an implementation problem than philosophical, but theoretically good and practically bad is still just bad.

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Until healthcare and housing aren't tied to employment, making it easier to fire people will always be the monstrous position. If you want firing people with abandon to be socially acceptable then you need a public safety net. Until that's in place, I'm always going to be on the side of labor organizations demanding dignity than the people destroying lives.

How do you feel about consensual relationships? I don't impose myself on my employer, we have a mutual and consensual relationship. I don't understand, what do you want peoples material resources tied to if not their own assets?

My relationship with my employer is coercive, not consensual. They have something I need in order to survive. If I leave it will have deleterious effects on the quality of my life. You could make the argument that they are not the ones coercing me, society is or something, but I do not associate with them freely.

This was even more apparent before the ACA passed, when insurance providers were not prevented from denying or charging more for customers with pre-existing conditions. Hate your job but have cancer? Better not leave, you might not even be able to get insured at your next job.

You don't have to fire "low performers" you just have to be realistic about their skillsets and use them that way.

If you see an engineer is out of his depth then change his position, no need to fire them since like others have pointed out, that can have severe consequences in their personal lives and most of the time they can still be useful if they get more adequate work.

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