Last Task After Layoff at Disney: Train Foreign Replacements

[IDemo]

ORLANDO, Fla. — The employees who kept the data systems humming in the vast Walt Disney fantasy fief did not suspect trouble when they were suddenly summoned to meetings with their boss.

While families rode the Seven Dwarfs Mine Train and searched for Nemo on clamobiles in the theme parks, these workers monitored computers in industrial buildings nearby, making sure millions of Walt Disney World ticket sales, store purchases and hotel reservations went through without a hitch. Some were performing so well that they thought they had been called in for bonuses.

Instead, about 250 Disney employees were told in late October that they would be laid off. Many of their jobs were transferred to immigrants on temporary visas for highly skilled technical workers, who were brought in by an outsourcing firm based in India. Over the next three months, some Disney employees were required to train their replacements to do the jobs they had lost.

“I just couldn’t believe they could fly people in to sit at our desks and take over our jobs exactly,” said one former worker, an American in his 40s who remains unemployed since his last day at Disney on Jan. 30. “It was so humiliating to train somebody else to take over your job. I still can’t grasp it.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/04/us/last-task-after-layoff-at-disney-train-foreign-replacements.html

[rurallib]

1. It's A Small World After All

[phantom power]

6. btw, thread winner ^^^

[phantom power]

2. It surprises me more people don't just tell them to fuck off when they do this.

I mean, what are they going to do, fire you?

[IDemo]

7. Yes, they will fire you

It's unemployment benefits or not, depending on the circumstance.

[phantom power]

8. ah right, 'laid off' versus 'fired', is that it?

[thesquanderer]

16. No... "laid off" and "fired" are the same.

For unemployment, what you can't do is "Quit."

That is, you collect unemployment if you stop working at your employer's discretion, not your own.

[fasttense]

20. And you can't be laid off for cause either

If they fire you and say we fired him because he wouldn't do his job, then no unemployment benefits for you.

[Person 2713]

10. Fire you and have grounds to deny unemployment benefits and any layoff payout due . Yes

[lostnfound]

42. Ordinary folks are too decent and loyal to sabotage the training, which would be easier

It's surprising that people don't train them the newcomers in the wrong way to do things. Would take a while to,catch on if you did it right.
But ordinary folks recognize the new worker is a person too, and feel no malice toward them.

[djean111]

3. Just remember which politicians want even MORE H-1B visas issued.

I am sure that the ousted workers will find nice jobs at Amazon or McDonald's. And those new jobs will count for see! increased job numbers! I would love to see a breakdown of those numbers by wage and hours. And how many people work two jobs just to get by.

[kath]

11. yes. isn't Hillary a big fan of more H-1B visas??

[Fuddnik]

17. Oh yeah,

Back in 2008, Tata of India, a major outsourcer was a big donor to Hillary. One woman, a manager at Nielsen, the TV rating company, was a huge Hillary supporter, and as a member of our local party, really pushed it.

Tata bought Nielsen and took a bunch of local tax incentives to "create jobs" . After they got them, they laid everyone off and brought in H1B's to replace them.

I remember a councilman, at a meeting afterward, screaming "I know a thief when I see one"! Same guy who staunchly supported a strong guest worker program when he tried to run for congress.

[peacebird]

18. Yes, she is. H1B workers will take jobs for a fraction of what American workers make, driving wages

Down across the board. In my field when I was a manager, I was shown the average wages for my position in our area. They went down over instead of up because we now have so many H1B workers.

[metalbot]

31. The solution here is to auction the H1-B's, rather than to grant by lottery

In the current state, congress sets limits on the number of H1-B's that can be accepted. There are typically ten times as many applicants as visa slots. Applicants are accepted via a lottery process. Since there's huge variance in skill level, the average salary levels are driven down.

If we were to change that so that the visas were awarded from highest salary to lowest, it would go a long way towards mitigating the use of H1B to drive down wages, but would still allow companies that feel they need top talent from overseas to bring them here (at what might actually be above market wages).

[HughBeaumont]

4. (Finger wags) HEY! Job offshoring/inshoring is an overall win-win for America!

It's NOT zero-sum! These workers will find other jobs! These lefty sob-stories serve no purpose other than to sully the free market's grand plan for ALL workers.

Remember, a rising tsunami upends all buildings . . . or
. . . some ham-fisted metaphor that says I'm right.

as if it needs to be said.

[IDemo]

9. "This land is my land, this land ain't your land..." n/t

[MisterP]

15. "growing pains," that's the ticket! for 40 years now ...

[HughBeaumont]

19. Funny thing about those "pains" . . . .

. . . . they're never usually never suffered by the people that say "change is good".

[Baitball Blogger]

5. Because Orlando isn't already a pressure-cooker when it comes to

finding a job that can provide you a decent living.

[onehandle]

12. Disney World has dormitories full of temporary foreign workers.

They have done this for decades.

Guess they are stepping up the corporate dream to fire all Americans, except executives of course.

[GoneOffShore]

33. And who's a big supporter of those visas?

Hmmmmm...

[mrmpa]

13. H1-B visas are for workers to fill.....

jobs that there are no US citizens to perform them. I honestly think that some law was broken here.

[jeff47]

28. Awww, you still think the law matters.

The way you pull off this scam is by deliberately making it so that no US citizen will apply for the job.

Disney hires the contracting company to do the work. Part of the contract is for the contracting company to hire workers, since Disney will no longer be doing the work itself.

The contracting company dutifully attempts to find US workers. They trundle on over to Dice and Monster and look for workers. Who do not live in Orlando. And have not expressed interest in moving to FL. Even better if the resume is marked as not looking for work. Then they contact these people and ask them, "Hey, wanna come work in Orlando for below market rate? We don't even offer any relocation assistance!". And so the US citizens turn them down. If any are foolish enough to accept, they are required to pay to travel to their own in-person interview where they will be rejected on fuzzy grounds that are easily defendable in court.

Do this for a couple dozen workers in each position, and then they say "Well, we can't find US workers! To the H1B pile!!".

Disney gets away with it because they are laying off their workers to be replaced by the contracting firm's workers. The contracting firm gets away with it because they "couldn't find any workers", despite deliberately sabotaging their own efforts to find workers.

I get lots of emails a week pulling this scam. It happens all the time. The politicians who continue it are either woefully ignorant or are lying.

[cascadiance]

30. These contracting firms are called "body shops", and have been in action since the 90's...

i remember managers joking how they would hire a "service" from these body shops, so that what they paid the contacted workers wouldn't be compared as "employee salaries" to those permanent employees they might otherwise hire at the company that is getting this "service". These managers were laughing at how they were saving money with this scam.

And for those who try to say this helps those that are hired in to these jobs, watch this interview to see how they are exploited as "indentured servants", when it is H-1B programs that they are directed to be hired in to if they want a job here. Becoming citizens takes a lot longer and is harder for them to get through.

http://www.nbcbayarea.com/investigations/Silicon-Valleys-Body-Shop-Secret-280567322.html

H-1B IS a SCAM! And we really should be focused on streamlining regular immigration for those who want to move here, become citizens and have they and their families INVEST on becoming part of our system, not just temporarily work here as "indentured servants" for lower salaries that they send back to their families overseas (and not in to our economy which has their work here not stimulate OUR economy here). They do this because their family expenses are a lot less than someone who works here and has to support a family HERE on U.S. cost of living expenses.

And ultimately when the term of their job is up, they go back to their own country and the technology investment we made in training these individuals pays off more in more experienced workers in other countries rather than our own.

That is why Bangalore, India is now the high tech capitol of the world instead of Silicon Valley in terms of volume of tech workers working there.

[Exilednight]

37. Hillary's vote for visas at work.

[SoapBox]

14. Despicable.

[Ed Suspicious]

21. But we have a skills shortage?!!???!!!!!??!!!!!???

Maybe we can put that line of shit to bed for good now. We have a lack of willingness by highly profitable companies to pay 1st world wages while there are third world employees who will do it for a fraction of the cost. (sorry about the 1st world 3rd world terminology, but I can't think of a less shitty way to communicate the idea)

[peacebird]

35. No apologies needed. You described it perfectly.

[Fred Sanders]

22. Highly skilled technical workers were replacing not very skilled workers who should have got some.

There is more to every tale than the speculative/outrage bait headlines.

[Baitball Blogger]

23. Then, why don't you provide a link to a source to help

enlighten us?

[HughBeaumont]

24. Yet, the outgoing "not-so-skilled" had to train the, er, "highly-skilled" . . . .

Things that don't make you go

[HughBeaumont]

25. Yes, it really DOES help to read beyond the headlines. SHEEEEESH.

The former Disney employee who is 57 worked in project management and software development. His résumé lists a top-level skill certification and command of seven operating systems, 15 program languages and more than two dozen other applications and media.

“I was forced into early retirement,” he said. The timing was “horrible,” he said, because his wife recently had a medical emergency with expensive bills. Shut out of Disney, he is looking for a new job elsewhere.

Former employees said many immigrants who arrived were younger technicians with limited data skills who did not speak English fluently and had to be instructed in the basics of the work.

[Ed Suspicious]

36. Good luck finding a job in IT at 57.

[HughBeaumont]

45. Good look finding a JOB at 57.

Corporations are such bastards.

"Hey, let's toss needed experience to the curb to save a buck. The whole shithouse is going up in flames anyway, so who cares?? WE GOT OURS!"

[jeff47]

29. Yes, keep the delusion going.

Here's a thought....why did those highly skilled workers have to be trained by those not-very-skilled workers?

Keep throwing the bullshit out there. I'm sure it will become true one of these days.

Now, if you'll excuse me I have to go respond to an email where an H1B contracting company is asking me to relocate to Cleveland for a below-market-rate job. That way they can use my rejection to "prove" that no US worker will do the job. And no, I have not expressed any desire to relocate to anywhere near OH, and my resume is marked "Not looking for work". Golly, so weird that this company decided to try and recruit me anyway. Almost like they aren't really looking for US workers...

[Elwood P Dowd]

34. I knew one or more of the TPP cheerleaders would jump on this.

They all support fake free trade deals along with the importing of cheap foreign labor to replace American labor. Who do these people work for? Why do they ALWAYS come on here to support corporate scams to kill American jobs and drive down wages? Why are they so rabid about it?

[cali]

47. it's digusting

I only wish I could really say what I think of heartless sycophant s.

[magical thyme]

38. I guess that's why they needed the not very skilled workers to train the

supposed highly skilled workers, right?

[Fred Sanders]

39. Management 101: new tech workers have to be made familiar with equipment, policy and procedure.

[magical thyme]

41. and yet the not very skilled workers had been excelling so much they thought they were

being called in to get bonuses.

[cali]

46. more bullshit clams from you without a bit of substantiation

You do this constantly. It certainly reveals what you are and what you believe

[raouldukelives]

26. Somewhere a shareholder got their wings. nt

[KamaAina]

27. The tech industry has been doing this for years

Not good to see it going mainstream.

[Liberal_in_LA]

32. kick

[PowerToThePeople]

40. Well, no more Disney purchases from me.

One more to add to my blacklist.

[onethatcares]

43. fuck disney and michael eisner

it's been a blight on the landscape from the git go and it hasn't gotten any better.

This is from a Florida resident who's wife made him take 4 kids and two other parents to disney for 5 days living in the park.

they will never get a cent from me.

now to tell them that.

[lonestarnot]

49. Ditto

[lpbk2713]

44. WDW is a Mickey Mouse operation.

[nsd]

48. Disney's response was strange.

The spokesperson skirted the issue -- talked about other jobs, but not these ones.

I hope the NY Times and other media outlets in the next few days hold Disney's feet to the fire -- force them to explain themselves.