Elon Musk has decried a wave of “insane” strikes focused on Tesla workshops in Sweden, as workers target the US electric car manufacturer in a strike calling for collective bargaining rights.

In what has been portrayed as the largest fight in decades to save Sweden’s union model from global labour practices, the powerful trade union IF Metall has been leading a strike across eight Tesla workplaces in Sweden for five weeks.

It is the first time workers for the US carmaker have gone on strike and on Thursday, Musk, the tech billionaire and chief executive of Tesla, made his feelings clear, writing on X, formerly Twitter: “This is insane.”

  • Dra@lemmy.zip
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    1 year ago

    I would love to see the number of people upvoting this who are genuinely working class.(remember, every downvote on my reply is a middle class person who does not practice what they preach)

    • zuch0698o@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      Middle class is the working class and I support our unions. When I worked for one I got a fair wage and just because I’m not in one currently doesn’t mean you cant support them.

    • bamboo@lemm.ee
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      1 year ago

      The middle class is a made up idea designed to divide the working class. You either have to work for a living or you don’t, and slightly higher income and a bit of savings doesn’t make your function in society entirely different even if it allows you more comfort.

      • Dra@lemmy.zip
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        1 year ago

        Nope. Totally different universes. Middle class people in the west like to roleplay as downtrodden but none of them have worked actual working class jobs and all enjoy at least some security of education

        • bamboo@lemm.ee
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          1 year ago

          So you’re trying to tell me that because I have a degree, work in an office job, and have some savings, that I’m not working class? If I lost my job I’d have a few months in savings before I’d be digging into retirement funds, and even then I’d probably be completely broke within a year or two. That’s certainly a lot more comfort than someone who would miss rent next month, but ultimately I still am dependent on an employer and selling my labor, I do not have anywhere near enough money to live on dividends or interest payments. I see much more in common with someone making minimum wage than I do with the owner class who lives on rent, interest, and dividends without working.

          • Dra@lemmy.zip
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            1 year ago

            You dont think that’s middle class? Because you have to work to not run out of money?

            So do most of the upper classes. What you have the luxury of an education that allows them some freedom to work, and the comforts of knowledge work that allow them to not have to sacrifice their physical health and, most likely an income bracket that at least affords you some choice in where you live.

            The point is that high levels of migration, effectively forces your own countries working classes to compete with and deal with tons of cheap foreign labour coming in, with little or no conformity to the parent culture because it hasn’t been facilitated. The middle classes traditionally laugh at the working classes and claim they are being “racist”, “stupid” and “lazy” for complaining about this arrangement, while mostly avoiding it’s effects themselves.

            This voting is a result of the left wing, middle classes being unable to grasp the obvious effects of their voting record, instead pretending to each other in echo chambers that they are the real working classes and how shocking all this right wing-tilt is. Throwing the incumbent working class culture under a bus.

            • barsoap@lemm.ee
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              1 year ago

              You can call it middle class if you want. But it’s also working class. Even most petite bourgeois are working class as they cannot live off capital interest.

            • CancerMancer@sh.itjust.works
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              1 year ago

              You either live off wealth or you live off income. If you live off income you are a worker and workers need to stand together.

              • Dra@lemmy.zip
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                1 year ago

                This is, as I have described above, all well and good to say…

                …Apart from when you repeatedly support policies that further squeeze extant working classes, then have the gall to do this vague virtue signalling of “standing together”. It’s hypocritical.

                You are doing local workers in the country a disservice and the owning classes a great help to price them out of existence.

    • bigFab@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      Ofc every upvote is working class. There is no other reason I would upvote that comment

    • Roflmasterbigpimp@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      Ah yes. I might have missed the memo where you became the Judge of who is working class or not.

      (And remember if you answer my comment you admit that you have no Idea what you are talking about and are just here to troll 🥸)

    • prole@sh.itjust.works
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      1 year ago

      .(remember, every downvote on my reply is a middle class person who does not practice what they preach)

      Yeah no, that’s not how this works. You’re being downvoted for posting a stupid comment.

      • Dra@lemmy.zip
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        1 year ago

        It’s an accurate observation, and it’s not so much that I consider myself smart, it’s more that I note most negative replies generally refuse to acknowledge the underlying issue (read: dumb).

    • cro_magnon_gilf
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      1 year ago

      The reason they have so many downvotes is because they buy them cheap on Amazon.com

      OnT: I’m Swedish and it’s good to see a proper strike, but the real thing motivating the unions on this isn’t workers rights or anything. The unions are subservient to the national labour union organisation, LO, who’ll do the shadiest shit to get more power for themselves, and don’t care about working conditions in the slightest. The only thing that’s a red line for them, is when corporations refuse to take part in the charade, by not signing a collective agreement.

      You have to pay some lip-service, even if it costs you. If you do, the unions will be on your side against the workers.