One of my coworkers was crying. She sits in Indiana. I am in Illinois. I'll call her "Donna." All of us work from our homes, including each of our managers.
I got another message..this time from "Golda" (in North Carolina). She was panicking. She said that our employer, a super sized IT services provider, has made a decision to cut everyone's pay by 15%.
I said this is probably a rumor -- and you shouldn't worry.
Then I got the presentation describing the pay cut and the reasons why we were getting it.
I read in shock I was dragged into a "virtual" meeting along with 200 people in our department. Our manager's manager told us that this was happening to us because a former employee had sued the company for not paying overtime (I chose not to join even though I have worked as much as 30 hours of over time week after week).
Managements solution? Cut everyone's pay by 15% and make them "non-exempt" (eligible for overtime).
We found this out 3 weeks after Christmas. Many of my coworkers had taken on a little debt, so they were worried.
I am worried as well. We are a single income family. We usually can only save 3-400 per month. Since we have three young kids, mommy4mak had decided to put her career on hold.
Many of my team members are staunch republicans (specially the ones living in the south). They grumbled about how they hadn't joined the lawsuit out of a sense of loyalty.
Almost more than the pay cut, or the two week notice, the thing that stung us the most of us was that 80% of us chose not to join the lawsuit, we were being punished. The presentation said our company was trying to "eliminate the risk" of future lawsuits. But it was doing this at our expense.
I think it is clear to my colleagues that our large public company doesn't give a hoot about us. While our CEO makes tens of millions annually, our company is willing to cause major hardship to many of its employees, during the toughest economic time in about 2 decades.
This is why I am fighting for John Laesch (CD IL-14) who is replacing Dennis Hastert. The primary is on Feb 5th, and the Special Elections is on March 8th.
Jon Laesch is going to fight to bring better and more affordable healthcare to all Americans.
John will fight to make corporate America more accountable to its shareholders and employees
He is in the fight of his life against millinoaire candidates who are closer to the Rahm Emmanuel wing of Chicago Area politics.
John Laesch needs your support TODAY. Please donate a little bit wherever you are: http://www.john08.com/...
You can make phone calls to likely Democratic Primary voters and ask them to vote twice for John Laesch on February 5th. Call the office 630.801.8900 or write info@john08.com
If you a are closer to Chicago, he needs help in canvassing and distributing signs as well.
Let's bring real progressive representation to Chicago.
p.s. the headline is catchy but I never really had any faith in Corporate America (The part about losing 800 dollars/month is true)