United bringing gambling to paychecks

[bilateralrope]

United Replaces Small Worker Bonuses With Chance to Win $100,000

By
March 3, 2018, 2:22 PM GMT+13
United Continental Holdings Inc. is overhauling an incentive program to give employees a chance to win $100,000, a luxury car or a swanky vacation. One union leader says his membership would rather have a shot at bonuses that are far, far smaller -- but also a much surer thing.

Under the new approach, one lucky winner will take home the six-figure cash prize every quarter, with as many as 10 people getting Mercedes-Benz C-Class sedans or $40,000 each, President Scott Kirby said in a memo to employees Friday. The program includes smaller awards as well. Workers need perfect attendance to participate. And the airline has to hit its performance targets.

“We believe that this new program will build excitement and a sense of accomplishment as we continue to set all-time operational records that result in an experience that our customers value,” Erin Benson, a spokeswoman for the Chicago-based carrier, said in an email.

The prize drawings are a sharp break from the past, when the airline would pay broad-based employee bonuses of as much as $300 a quarter if it hit certain on-time operational measurements, said Craig Symons, president of United’s flight dispatchers union. For some employees, he said, a chance at a new Mercedes apparently isn’t as nice as a small-but-steady stream of cold, hard cash.

“I think everybody really likes Scott Kirby’s ‘If you’re not first, you’re last’ competitiveness,” Symons said. “We all want to win, but this program doesn’t encourage a team approach to winning. No team-oriented reward should be dictated by lottery.”

Them trying to defend it with " a sense of accomplishment" makes me think of when EA tried to defend lootboxes in BF2 and earned themselves the most downvoted reddit post of all time. Which makes me think that United saw that EA got away with gambling microtransactions and decided to save money by bringing gambling to how they pay workers. Because you know that the total payout from their lottery scheme is going to be far less than the total payout from the small bonuses they paid to all staff previously.

[The Romulan Republic]

Fuck them.

And one more argument for why we need a massive minimum wage hike, followed by Basic Income.

[mr friendly guy]

When I started work there was a lottery as well, but it was optional and we took out money from our paycheck to enter the lottery. Needless to say I never bothered with it.

Back to the article, which worker would prefer this to a raise in wages? I mean you are foregoing a near 100% guarantee of getting a little bit more (unless the company hits hard times) for a low chance to get a large amount. I certainly wouldn't.