Imagine being hired as a strike buster
Big corporations show their true colors in a lot of ways, but as soon as employees express a desire to be treated even halfway decently, corporations really let their scumbag colors fly. If the rumblings out of Las Vegas are true, then MGM is about to show the world how little it thinks of the people that make the company run.
Local insider Twitter account Las Vegas Locally posted on Monday that MGM is “actively preparing for a Culinary Union strike in the next 2 weeks,” citing “multiple sources.” One of its sources added that the company is set to pay “politically connected ‘strike busting’ experts” to try to put the squeeze to striking or potentially striking union members.
That anyone would want to be a “strike buster” is nuts, but I suppose they get paid enough to allow themselves to sleep well at night. They are commonly contracted by large companies to either convince employees not to strike (and not through honest conversation) or to engage in tactics to make a strike as uncomfortable as possible for the workers, beyond the loss of income.
None of that should come as a surprise. Happens all the time. The television and film studios pulled all sort of tricks on the Writers Guild and Screen Actors Guild during their recent strikes, but both unions held firm. The Writers finally got what they wanted and are back to work, while the Screen Actors are still on strike.
Corporate employees being pressured
What is more disturbing, though, if true, is the second thing that one of Las Vegas Locally’s sources said. According to this insider, MGM corporate HR has been “demanding” that those working in the corporate office give them times that they are willing to step in and work in the place of striking workers. If they refuse, they could be fired before Christmas.
And the corporate office employees are not expected to do both their jobs and the striking workers’ jobs, which in a sense is good. But the bad part is that they would not do their own corporate jobs, which could “cause cascading effects for technical systems as no one will be there to monitor them.”
A risky game for a company that just lost millions upon millions of dollars because of a systems hack.
Again, we do not know for sure if these reports are true, but Las Vegas Locally is a reputable source, so for now, we’ll go with it. So not only would MGM pull all sorts of tactics to not negotiate in good faith with the Culinary Union at a time the Las Vegas Strip is raking in record profits, but it would also threaten the livelihood of employees who aren’t on strike.
If you’re an MGM corporate employee who wants to show solidarity with your Culinary Union colleagues by not stepping in and doing their jobs, you could find yourself unemployed. If you’re an MGM corporate employee who doesn’t want to do someone else’s job because you don’t know how and don’t want to abandon your own post, tough shit, wish the unemployment office a Merry Christmas.
