Google’s Refusal To Negotiate With YouTube Music Contract Workers Is Illegal, New Ruling Proves
Search engine giant Google is not having the best start to the new year after a recent ruling from the National Labor Relations Board called the company out for illegal behavior.
The ruling
further shed light on how the tech giant refused to carry out
negotiations with a group of contractors of YouTube Music based in
Austin. Moreover, the panel featuring three members says that the
company owns YouTube Music and Cognizant, the latter being a
subcontractor.
The duo in question is a combination of joint employers for the
contractors’ group that are responsible for carrying out data-based
tasks such as highlighting errors across its algorithm.
Despite
having such a significant role, more should have been done on this
front, the ruling added. Moreover, the material highlighted some real
terms and conditions for the employment of the workers present at the
facility who are working as joint employers, the board added.
The
problems that Google is facing with contractors linked to YouTube Music
are not something new. We saw the matter arising after 40 workers were
hired by the organization Cognizant. They voted to enter the Alphabet
Workers Union.
The major issue on this front had to do with the
app’s demand for workers working remotely to get back into their
respective Austin offices. But the workers argued as they were paid just
$19 each hour, most of them being hired remotely.
They were
seen arguing about how little expenses for childcare and transport were
being covered so to go back into the workspace physically was just not
something they were keen on.
This scenario appeared to be
familiar as it reminded many of how the company behaved last year in
November when a shocking ruling that was similar to this one was made
against the search engine giant.
This was related to contractors
from Bard and Search that voted to unite, classifying Google’s
relationship with Accenture as a joint employer one. But during that
time, the Alphabet-owned firm appealed the ruling by the NLRB ruling,
and from the looks of it, they have plans to do the same in this
particular case too.
The news was first reported by media outlet
Bloomberg who mentioned how the firm would make the appeal in the
federal court of law. It’s a repeat of behavior seen in the past.
The
latest NLRB ruling that came into effect in December made it so much
harder for firms such as Google to make arguments about how they’re not
responsible for dealing with such kinds of unionization offers entailing
third-party contractors.
This replaced a rule from the Trump
era that had to do with joint employers so that unions would find it
simpler to keep both franchises as well as contract employees more
organized. That was at the expense of tech giants that were not a fan of
the idea as they rely heavily on such unions to carry out many of their
laborious tasks.
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