US Justice Dept. Sues eBay For Anti-Competitive Hiring Practices 66
McGruber writes "The Associated Press is reporting that the U.S. Justice Department is suing eBay for allegedly agreeing with Intuit not to hire each other's employees. According to the article, 'eBay's agreement with Intuit hurt employees by lowering the salaries and benefits they might have received and deprived them of better job opportunities at the other company,' said acting Assistant Attorney General Joseph Wayland, who is in charge of the Justice Department's antitrust division. The division 'has consistently taken the position that these kinds of agreements are per se (on their face) unlawful under antitrust laws.'"
Is this the same for "contractor" companies? (Score:4, Interesting)
IBM uses contract employee companies like CDI for disposable employees. CDI and IBM have agreements that limit CDI employee's ability to apply for other positions within CDI and IBM. Would these agreements be illegal as well?
Re:Is this the same for "contractor" companies? (Score:5, Interesting)
Maybe not in the case of CDI/IBM, but otherwise contractors working for the government cost 2x what it would cost them for direct hire(including benefits). They just want the freedom to increase/decrease workforce as needed. It gets around alot of red tape as well in terms of both hiring/firing. If there is a hiring/pay freeze instituted at the state level, but your agency has enough money to hire needed employees, then pay for "services" of an agency. What's ironic is the blindly broad hiring/pay freeze results in agencies wasting money in this case.
Re:Unions (Score:4, Interesting)
You mean the agreements explicitly agreed to between union management and corporations? Or the agreements explicitly agreed to between union management and employees? As far as I know, with the exception below, union employees are free to leave their union and sign up, there's nothing legally stopping them (caveat: there are some social issues).
Trying to figure out which of these is as unethical as two people agreeing not to hire a third person without his consent.
There is one place I may see your point on: the existence of "closed shops". That definitely needs to be attacked (and is illegal in many places). There should never be a closed shop, everyone should have the right to apply for a job. If the union is doing ITS job, employees will pay their dues and join. If management is doing ITS job, employees have no need of a union.
This is news? (Score:4, Interesting)
Where has the DOJ been? Oh that's right going after states who pass voter id laws all the while the AG grand stands and panders to ever special interest in the country instead of enforcing our laws. Now they can go after bigger fish and say "hey, lookie what we got right chere!" Yeah, you got two lame ducks. EBay and Intuit? Come on you may as well have gone after Hostess and Wonder Bread. Oh wait, Hostess is out of business now anyway, so they won't put up much of a fight with the DOJ.
American Airlines, IBM, HP (and the former EDS) and many others, all of them do this and now they're making a point out of EBay and Intuit? Wow, this seems like so 10 years ago when both of these entities mattered. The collusion is rampant and it's meant to keep wages low and remove options for people.
So here's how it'll play out, the DOG will go to court and lambaste these two titans of industry (I'm still laughing) They'll rail against these companies and make really good press for a couple of weeks. Then they'll reach a settlement deal and EBay and Intuit will pay a fine and say "we're sorry and won't do it again." Yeah right. As long as nobody gets caught and held truly accountable for this kind of crap, it will keep on happening
Then again you have a right to work wherever you want and they have a right to fire you whenever they want. It's the American way.