I was, at first, very skeptical that so many people would walk out of the their jobs in a seemingly organized way, until I heard about the PTO angle of the story.
I work at a company with “unlimited PTO” (because business leaders learned that they pay less with “unlimited” than they do with accrued). But in previous jobs, it was very common to accrue PTO (up to 2 to 3 weeks worth). Most employees would find it hard to get coverage or approval for taking time off, so their PTO would accrue until it maxed out. Anytime I was going to leave a job where I had banked PTO, I would take my time off, and then resign when I came back because if you leave with accrued PTO, they would pay it out, taxed as supplemental income, which is at a higher rate.
3 weeks is a common max accrual for folks that have worked somewhere longer than a year or two, and looking at the calendar, we’re almost exactly 3 weeks from November.
These workers are getting (PTO) paid to strike, plus they’re not breaking any rules, or committing to resigning (or being terminated due to COVID policy), yet. Three weeks to take a much needed break, speak their values, and not miss a check? Now that sounds more like human behavior.
PTO usage generally needs to be approved, I can't imagine Southwest approving enough time off to shut down their operations.
If employees are using PTO by claiming they're sick (assuming there's no separate "sick days" they would normally use), Southwest might have recourse to deny paying PTO but whether or not they will is another question.
I was, at first, very skeptical that so many people would walk out of the their jobs in a seemingly organized way, until I heard about the PTO angle of the story.
I work at a company with “unlimited PTO” (because business leaders learned that they pay less with “unlimited” than they do with accrued). But in previous jobs, it was very common to accrue PTO (up to 2 to 3 weeks worth). Most employees would find it hard to get coverage or approval for taking time off, so their PTO would accrue until it maxed out. Anytime I was going to leave a job where I had banked PTO, I would take my time off, and then resign when I came back because if you leave with accrued PTO, they would pay it out, taxed as supplemental income, which is at a higher rate.
3 weeks is a common max accrual for folks that have worked somewhere longer than a year or two, and looking at the calendar, we’re almost exactly 3 weeks from November.
These workers are getting (PTO) paid to strike, plus they’re not breaking any rules, or committing to resigning (or being terminated due to COVID policy), yet. Three weeks to take a much needed break, speak their values, and not miss a check? Now that sounds more like human behavior.