Posted by metsmax on 8/29/2015 1:23:00 AM (view original):
I believe we have reached a result. If someone believes that workers do not have a right to join a union (most workers) and that taking personal calls is at the SOLE DISCRETION of the employer, he is simply wrong. The workplace in modern times is not a unilateral domain of the employer. That may some version of the workplace you imagine. It isnt the world in which we live.
by the way - how a phone connection works is only relevant if workers have a right (in the absence of special circumstances like security or safety that make it reasonable to forbid it) to make some amount of personal calls. Shawn has assrted that there is no right to use computer equipment of the employer. if phones work via computer equipment and there is a right to use phonesm then that is a right to use computer rquipment where that is the means of phone connection. In most workplaces, an employer would not as a matter of law be able to sustain a total ban on personal calls.
Most workers can't join a union. That's a fact.
Look around America for a moment and you know its true. Right now fast food workers are fighting for the right to unionize - why? Because they don't have that right, and neither do most employees at most companies.
If you are working, you are to be doing actual work. That's the nature of employment. Anything else you do while you are supposed to be working is always at the sole discretion of your employer, lest you risk being reprimanded and consequences, including the potential loss of employment. That's how it works, plain and simple.
Let's an employee decides to take as much personal phone call time as they want during working hours despite being told several times this is not permitted. They will eventually lose their job. They can whine that it was "wrong" all they want - they have only themselves to blame. They could have simply waited to take or make personal calls on break or before or after working hours.
Don't like the policy of not being able to take personal phone calls during work hours? Find a job where they are okay with it, if it's that big of a deal to you. Simple solution.
How a phone connection works is never relevant to this argument. If it's property of an employer, it is at their discretion, regardless.
I never said there is no right to use computer equipment. I said there is no right to do so without permission. The same extends to the phone. This is precisely what makes it irrelevant how the connection works - employer property is controlled by the employer, whether it is a phone or computer.
This is because the owner of a phone/line has the right to dictate who can use it and in what manner. If you'd care to argue against this, I hope some bum on the street rips your cell phone out of your hand and starts using it however they please. If that happens, remember, by your own argument you have no right to stop them, since you don't have the right to control others use of your own phone.
In any workplace an employer can ban personal phone calls if they so choose. It's the same as any other workplace rule. Without workplace rules, there would be workplace anarchy, and no law is going to support that. If you don't like the rules at your workplace, find another job. Again, simple solution.