As rise of Chinese e-commerce platforms adds to pressure, having Sundays off remains protected under Germany’s Basic Law
The Chinese Communist Party wants to manifest its rules everywhere, this is part of its propaganda that pops up once in while in Europe and beyond.
Last year, British media outlet The Independent warned asking, The 996: Is this dystopian work trend coming to the UK next?, warning that the toxic practice has already made the leap from China to America’s Silicon Valley.
Some Silicon Valley AI startups are asking employees to adopt China’s outlawed ‘996’ work model, as reported by outlets like Forune.
Techcrunch reported, As China’s 996 culture spreads, South Korea’s tech sector grapples with 52-hour limit.
The ironic bit in my opinion here is that Chinese propagandists frequently criticizes Western labour standards and workers’ rights, but thennot only defend Chinese labour politics where worker protections (and social welfare) lag very far behind any Western norms but also support the export of this ‘996 culture’ into Western economies.
If you ever wondered, how western propaganda on social media works, here‘s an example.
The South China Morning Post is a media outlet under the direct control of the Chinese Communist Party’s censorship regime. All they want and to is conveying Chinese government propaganda, sowing division and hatred in Western communities.
The Tardigrade is a very right wing account similar to @randomname@scribe.disroot.org and @Hotznplotzn@lemmy.sdf.org with the clear, but very questionable agenda to spam specific European communities with posts and „informative“ commentary, which incidentally almost exclusively targets China and Russia as enemy nations, and the occasional other stuff, that goes against European capital‘s interests, as for example, currently by posting against the left-wing government of Spain, as Spain‘s government has been working against the grain recently. All they want and do is manufacture consent and sow division and hatred in Western communities.
Gut so! As it should be, we don’t need to exploit the worker more to become a strong economy we need to tax the fucking rich and stop the far right from blaming everyone. I hate this pro-capitalist sentiment that the worker is working too little. MERZ LECK EIER
How does shopping on Sundays exploit workers?
The exploitation happens mostly passively:
- While technically nobody is forced to accept jobs that require working on Sundays most people are not in a position to negotiate such hard requirements.
- Having a common mandatory day off is a quality of life improvement. Want to schedule a party with friends? The vast majority of people have Sunday off.
While technically nobody is forced to accept jobs that require working on Sundays most people are not in a position to negotiate such hard requirements.Maybe, but as far as I know, Sundays are paid more. And normally is not every Sunday, you alternate with your coworkers.
Having a common mandatory day off is a quality of life improvement. Want to schedule a party with friends? The vast majority of people have Sunday off.There already are people who work on Sundays/Holidays: they are paid more (the double in Italy, for example) and then they have a day off some other day in the week.
And for the party with your friend you only need a little more planning, it is not impossible.Maybe, but as far as I know, Sundays are paid more
Do you think this stays the same as it now if Sunday becomes just a regular working day? I highly doubt it.
There already are people who work on Sundays/Holidays
Indeed there are. That’s why I wrote “the vast majority” and not “everyone”. Just because there are exceptions to the rule we shouldn’t simply abandon the rule, though.
Do you think this stays the same as it now if Sunday becomes just a regular working day? I highly doubt it.
If it is a normal working day you somehow should be given a day off some other day (Monday for example).
In this case I agree that probably you would not be paid more but on the other hand you still have your day off (and sometime it can be usefull to have the day off in the middle of the week). If they simply want to let places to be open also on Sunday then it is overtime and you can be paid more or earn an additional day of PTO.Indeed there are. That’s why I wrote “the vast majority” and not “everyone”. Just because there are exceptions to the rule we shouldn’t simply abandon the rule, though.
Sure, but it not impossible to discusse about a rule change.
On top of that only bigger stores will be able to hire people to work Sundays, while the local smaller shops would have to compete with paying more wages while the total amount of money spent in a month stays the same. People don’t get to spend more money on stuff just because the stores open more frequently.
That’s a very good point!
Who operates the stores when you go shopping?
I send my personal shopper, so I’d don’t really know!
Okay, so, the workers cannot choose which day to work on? Don’t they usually earn more on Sundays? What about the workers at restaurants and cafés - does your concern not extend to them?
Yeah that’s exactly what they want to get rid of, making Sunday a normal work day, no extra pay (if you even get some), just work work work
They precisely earn more on a Sunday and on Saturday because it is normally a free day.
By eliminating the work protection on those days, they also will take away those bonuses.
And choosing which day to work? Good way of showing that you don’t really know how minimum wage workers are treated. No, you cannot really choose which day to work in a workweek setting. You might be able to talk to your colleagues and try to arrange things in that way, but good luck telling your boss “Nah I dont like your work schedule, I only work when I want to.” And again, this is exactly about removing the special protection of the weekend and trying to make it a normal part of the work week.
but good luck telling your boss “Nah I dont like your work schedule, I only work when I want to.”
Then you have a shitty boss anyway.
While I think that the premiums for weekends would remain even if shopping on Sundays becomes legal, I fully agree with you on the fact that low wage workers don’t have the power as individuals to decide freely when they will work.
Also try to avoid scmp. it’s owned in part by CCP.
Totally agree! We prefer only not state-owned and therefore unbiased outlets like BBC, Euronews, Deutsche Welle and the Kyiv Independent here. Every media piece originating from China or Russia is evil propaganda, beware! Not ours, though!
I repeat: Do not consume Chinese or Russian media, it will fry your freedom-brain and transform you into Putin trolls, dictatorship lovers and genocide excusers! Also, we think you’re unable to critically consume outsider-media by your own consideration, probably because you’re too feeble-minded. Just don‘t, we‘ll be real mad at you, if you do!
Also, don‘t share media sanctioned by our democratic supranational institution EU, not because you‘ll get jailed for up to 5 years for it, like in some evil authoritarian regime, but because it‘s evil propaganda, as our leaders said it is!
No need to be so toxic just for not agreeing with someone’s view, is there?
Look at their instance friend and you’ll see your words fall on an automated metalic scanner
Got an argument? I‘d post the same shit from any other instance and it‘d still be a valid opinion.
No need to play the victim card so early in the day.
Also, you, if it’s media you approve:
Your behaviour is stalking posts in this community for político. linking your post about its petition. But your petition got a balanced and nunaced response with pro and contras.Abolishing newssources is.just too weird.Its something autocrats might do. Stop this weird behavior already. A
No need to be so toxic just for not agreeing with someone’s view, is there?
Your behaviour in this community explicitely nurtures division and hate towards other ethnicities by constantly reinforcing enemy stereotypes.
Germany’s drive to compete with Chinese imports is colliding with its long-standing tradition of Sunday rest
Isn’t having Sundays off protected by law in all of EU?
Saturday too for that matter, except of course it doesn’t have to be those 2 days, but we generally have 2 days off per week, and working Sundays pays extra.This seems like a very ignorant understanding of working conditions by a Chinese person.
EU will not make conditions worse, more likely China will improve conditions for workers, so the insane work weeks of 60 hours will become outside the norm in China just as in most of the rest of the world.
There are already movement among Chinese people to strive for a better work/life balance.The article however does have a point that shops not being allowed to open on Sundays seems a bit antiquated. The headline however and the start of the article is way way off. Opening shops on Sundays will not increase German international competitiveness significantly.
Isn’t having Sundays off protected by law in all of EU?
I think it does not cite specifically Sunday but that you need to have a day off a week
Saturday too for that matter, except of course it doesn’t have to be those 2 days, but we generally have 2 days off per week, and working Sundays pays extra.
Or you make up for the working Saturday on some other day.
For example in Italy shops are closed half a day on Monday (groceries shops open only in the morning while other open only in the afternoon) exactly because they work on Saturday. Some kind of shops still close on Monday to balance the Saturday opening (barber shops for example).And yes, normally here Saturday is paid 50% more and Sunday 100% more. Sometimes you can choose to have the day not paid but to earn an extra day of PTO to use when you want. I know more than few persons that work on Sundays to have some more days for the holidays (even though there are a limit imposed by law to the number of Sundays you can work in a year)
I’m pretty sure you’re already allowed to keep your business open 24 hours a day, 6 days a week + some Sundays per year. But for some reason, nobody does it. Truly a mystery 🧐.
Does this include big supermarkets?
First of all I’d like to say that I haven’t studied German law and what I’m telling you is secondhand knowledge I got from someone who actually studied German law and had to deal with the issue of working on Sundays.
As far as I know there’s nothing special about supermarkets in this case. But I’ve also never seen a supermarket that’s open 24 hours a day or one that’s open on those special Sundays (at least in recent years).
I also don’t think they would open on Sundays, even if they were allowed to (the same goes for the post office and pharmacies), because you have to go there anyway. So staying open longer just means higher costs. Vending machines and lockers probably offer everyone a greater benefit than being open on Sundays, because as far as I know, they’re allowed to be “open” 24/7.
