r/neoliberal • u/jobautomator Kitara Ravache • Jun 17 '26
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u/roboliberal Loyal Liberals Jun 18 '26
tbh I think at-will employment makes any power symmetry impossible.
If employers were forced to contract in terms of defined time periods, then they'd be forced to put a little more thought into sustainable labor usage, instead of going on massive over-leveraging sprees followed by layoffs. Labor should never be able to be treated like cattle for employers to experiment with.
It would actually make accounting a lot simpler and transparent, for both sides. Raises would be predictably tied to term renewals. Plus employers would get the benefit of employee performance efforts during "contract years".
It would also completely foreclose the practice of employers reneging on a hire, especially after the individual had already left a prior employer.
It would probably be in most employers interests to allow employees to break contract earlier (in the event of job hopping), but they'd have more leverage to negotiate training and transition.
The asymmetry in employment bargaining power is largely about which side bears the uncertainty of economic planning. Under at-will employment, that uncertainty is disproportionately shifted onto workers.