Eron Musk was surprised last fall to report a high absence at a factory in Teslin near Berlin.
“This sounds crazy. Investigating it, the company’s Workholic, the company’s highest executive, wrote in X, a social media platform he owned last September.
The number of workers calling for illness has long been a flash point of the facility, and the manager maintains the spirit of a free wheels of an American high -tech company in the pressure of a union that approaches more workers -friendly European practices. I’m fighting to do.
Cultural collision provides more and more frequent contexts of European politics, including recent approval of the German Party’s extreme right alternative.
“From Maga to Mega: Make Europe again wonderful!” The mask tweeted on January 18 and riff the slogan of the campaign to take Donald Trump to the White House. You need to be confused.
The tension between Tesla’s labor culture and local norms is set to reach the German court in a global resistance test on the company’s union.
At the end of last year, IG Metall Union filed a lawsuit in seeking the removal of the leader of the Tesla’s work council to “repeatedly neglected the law to hinder our commitment to the interests of labor.”
Tesla told local media that the suit was desperate. The company and the mask have not responded to the comments in this article.
Ring doorbell
When the ratio of illness in Gigafactory in Tesla last August jumped up, the local Deputy Director Andre Tierig, the mask, dispatched a manager and sounded an absent worker. Tierig told local media at the time, suggesting that the rise in Friday’s illness was abusive for German social models.
Despite his hard work reputation, Germans had more illness than other European citizens in 2022, according to a survey by World Health Organization, on average, due to illness and injury per employee. There is a 25 -day absence a year.
Economist returns a high rate to a generous system for German employee fees. Workers are legally given the right to receive the full amount from the employer during the absence of up to six weeks throughout the year.
Ig Metall states that Tesla’s absence is far higher than his fellow fees due to the “very high work load”. In October, 83 % of workers conducted a survey that felt that they were “frequently or very frequently overloaded.”
Musk, who is leading other companies such as Rocket Maker SpaceX and undertaking the role of the Trump administration, is famous for his harsh schedules and high expectations for staff. After obtaining X, MUSK told employees that they were “very hardcore” and needed to work “high -strength and long hours.”
In Germany, dissatisfaction with working conditions is usually processed by the so -called work council of a company, a group of elected employees.
However, the Tesla council has been divided. Following the March voting, IG METALL has 16 seats, but the unions have 23 seats in small groups that are close to management.
In October, Tesla blamed for threatening physical violence and fired a production worker who had one of the IG metal seats. The union has denied the claim from the debate after the workers have notified the night shift late at night. Workers are appealing for his dismissal.
“Tesla’s management will repeat the work of the union in Brandenburg repeatedly,” said Dark Schulze, the union regional leader, Dark Schulze.
Opposition to the union
Iron Mask did not keep his opposition to the union accused of creating a hierarchy and negative in the workplace.
Tesla is the only car manufacturer in Germany and has not concluded collective negotiations with workers. IG Metall has not yet gathered enough support in the factory to fight the company for the right to negotiate wages.
When Tesla increased the payment of German factory workers by 4 % in November, Tierig made it possible to act quickly and flexibly, according to a statement on local media at the time. I praised the company’s independence. The wage is “no labor dispute or strike.”
Comments were brought in because the local huge Volkswagen was trapped in a noisy negotiations with IG Metal for wages, investment, and potential closure.
After about three months of consultation, VW signed a contract with the union in late December, assuming that the company’s production capacity is reduced without forced redundancy. Analysts welcomed the reconciliation, but some criticized the lack of urgency, given the unpredictable and expensive transition to the European automotive market and electric vehicles.
Last year, European EV sales decreased after Germany, the largest market in the region, reduced subsidies. According to the ACEA of the Industrial Trade Organization, Tesla was almost struck more fierce and registration decreased by 11 %.
This year, carbon oxide emission rules have been set to strengthen in the European Union, and most automakers need to sell more EVs, otherwise they need to pay a huge fine. Without the gas engine business, Tesla is a potential beneficiary of these rules, agreeing to be in charge of excessive emissions of conventional automakers for a fee, and helps avoid penalties.
Despite the other EU measures that support EVS, MUSK called for Europe to take it. This is a position where he consistent with the former Fringe Afd party in Germany.
“Only AFD can save Germany,” said a recent German newspaper editorial. The party’s approach to deregulation said, “Reflects the principles of Tesla and SPACEX,” said the mask.
On January 9th, in a one -hour conversation with AFD co -leader Alice Weidel, MUSK complained about the track loads of paper needed to open the Berlin Plant in Tesla.
Musk said, “I need something like a collection of rules,” Musk said. “If (rules” and regulations’) are doubtful that they are net income, otherwise, everything will reach this point, so it is necessary to eliminate them. “
Please write on Stephen Wilmot on stephen.wilmot@wsj.com
