Best Buy Asking Employees To Contact Congress

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Best Buy is handing out pizza and scripts to employees before asking them to contact congress about the e-fairness bill. This kinda stuff is so uneth....pizza? Free pizza? What was I saying again? :D

The question is: is this appropriate for an employer to do? As S. describes, most people are probably apathetic, but many people would contact their legislators when they support or oppose a bill that could affect their own jobs or careers. I certainly have. Efforts like this become problematic when calling or writing in is a requirement for continued employment or favorable scheduling.
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Don't see the big deal. Union take peoples dues and drive a political agenda no matter how the member feels about issues. In 2012 a US president spent millions in ads over 6 months tempting people with easy food stamps the way drug dealers give out free crack. Pizza is nothing. Its a private biz that can do what it wants.
 
I don't see the big deal. In all honesty I would think its self serving for the employees to do also. If I worked at best buy I would most likely support it.
 
Why is it that whenever someone is giving out free food, it is always pizza.
 
I know! Get me some chateau briand, a nice glass of wine, and maybe I'll write to congress...
 
I eat pizza, but to hell with that! :D

It's also typically an easy way to feed a bunch of people. However, if you're trying to tempt me to do something with food, pizza isn't going to cut it.
 
Hmm, seems pretty innocuous. If they're so weak so as to be swayed by pizza, that's a bigger problem anyway. If anything, it's something that affects the company they work for, and their own paychecks...probably makes sense to know about it.
 
roma said:
Don't see the big deal. Union take peoples dues and drive a political agenda no matter how the member feels about issues. In 2012 a US president spent millions in ads over 6 months tempting people with easy food stamps the way drug dealers give out free crack. Pizza is nothing. Its a private biz that can do what it wants.
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Son, I think you broke something.
 
TwistedAegis said:
Hmm, seems pretty innocuous. If they're so weak so as to be swayed by pizza, that's a bigger problem anyway. If anything, it's something that affects the company they work for, and their own paychecks...probably makes sense to know about it.
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It also teaches them how to interact with congress, which I guess could be seen as a positive side-effect. On the other hand... I guess it depends on the type of people you're empowering with that side-effect.
 
Have you ever met a knowledgeable Best Buy employee?
I haven't.
Every one I've met is a retiree on pension working part time selling appliances to help make ends meet or a 16-24 year old male looking to get the employee discount on a PS4 and a big LCD TV.
 
As long as this is voluntary I don't see anything wrong with it. It's not like they're ORDERING them to do unethical stuff like write positive reviews about the company on Yelp or something. Or like Amazon did hiring a lobbyist group to try and reel and deal to halt the collection of state tax in California few years ago.
 
SGA76 said:
Have you ever met a knowledgeable Best Buy employee?
I haven't.
Every one I've met is a retiree on pension working part time selling appliances to help make ends meet or a 16-24 year old male looking to get the employee discount on a PS4 and a big LCD TV.
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Yes, I have met one. The guy was great with computers. He was selling appliances. They didn't even put him in the area where he was an expert (at the consumer sales level I would say, anyway). Best Buy has some bad management when it comes to that kind of stuff.

Free pizza? I'd take the pizza. If I wanted, I'd contact Congress. But, it'd be up to me, not my employer. If I didn't agree with it, nope.
 
Tweak42 said:
As long as this is voluntary I don't see anything wrong with it. It's not like they're ORDERING them to do unethical stuff like write positive reviews about the company on Yelp or something. Or like Amazon did hiring a lobbyist group to try and reel and deal to halt the collection of state tax in California few years ago.
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Opposing the collection of taxes is just horrible
o_O
 
SGA76 said:
Have you ever met a knowledgeable Best Buy employee?
I haven't.
Every one I've met is a retiree on pension working part time selling appliances to help make ends meet or a 16-24 year old male looking to get the employee discount on a PS4 and a big LCD TV.
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I actually have... a couple even. Also a couple of absolute idiots, so it balances out, I guess.
 
Tweak42 said:
As long as this is voluntary I don't see anything wrong with it. It's not like they're ORDERING them to do unethical stuff like write positive reviews about the company on Yelp or something. Or like Amazon did hiring a lobbyist group to try and reel and deal to halt the collection of state tax in California few years ago.
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I agree, my company has asked a few times in my carrier, most I agreed with and went along. Thousands of potential voters saying the same thing really gets politicians listening at least.
 
How much is this different, and any better/worse than Obama, and the Democrats, refusing to Deport Illegal Aliens, and then putting them on free welfare handouts, and getting them to register as Democratic Voters, to tilt the outcome of supposededly open, and fair election results?
 
Paul Ed said:
How much is this different, and any better/worse than Obama, and the Democrats, refusing to Deport Illegal Aliens, and then putting them on free welfare handouts, and getting them to register as Democratic Voters, to tilt the outcome of supposededly open, and fair election results?
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Lol, the Obama adminstration has deported more illegals than any previous adminstration. Talk about regurgitating Faux News garbage.
 
We get regular emails about pending issues for our particular business sector.

Some I actually write about, as they are pretty important issues.

Most I don't, because I disagree.

I won't get fired for this, I'm worth more to my company than a viewpoint. :)


For a BB employee, it's coercion, imho. Mindless serfs deserve better treatment than BB...
 
Amazon started collecting tax in my state, and guess what, I still shop at amazon. Its still cheaper and a better selection, and I don't get harassed to buy stupid service plans or sign up for a bbuy card.
 
Yeah, I'm entirely fine with this, getting more average people involved in the political process can only help dilute the typical situation of extremely vocal but tiny special interest groups driving issues.

If they're writing to their congress person anyways, they might just freelance a bit and bring up issues other than those they were told to write about by BB.
 
I'm with Best Buy on this stuff, taxes make the world go round, and shitloads of e-tailers avoid them by the billions
 
roma said:
Don't see the big deal. Union take peoples dues and drive a political agenda no matter how the member feels about issues. In 2012 a US president spent millions in ads over 6 months tempting people with easy food stamps the way drug dealers give out free crack. Pizza is nothing. Its a private biz that can do what it wants.
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Exactly, this is nothing compared to what unions do everyday.

Remember when the Al Gore campaign was giving homeless people cigarettes for voting?
 
This is a stupid campaign.

You can't expect a small business operating out of a rural town in Texas to know the sales tax regime of every jurisdiction in the country.

It's burdensome and unreasonable.

Currently, most states require their citizens to voluntarily pay the sales tax on these transactions but of course, most don't.

The answer is to tell your local and state government to reduce or eliminate sales taxes and/or enforce the law against their local citizens.

Or would that be unreasonable and burdensome?

Take responsibility for the people you elect in your state or the fact that you have chosen to live where you live. Change the laws or change your location or change your outlook.

WTF happened to America?
 
I would have no problem if I still worked at BB and they did this. I actually agree with this and I don't work at BB. I don't even work for any small businesses and I still agree with this. I also didn't even know that this was a bill that was trying to get passed until it was posted on [H], and I actually completely agree with enforcing tax fairness. If you choose to sell to a particular state (online or a small business in a small town), you should be required to charge the same sales tax. Don't get me wrong, i love shopping online due to the huge selection of items, however, there is still no replacement for personally seeing, testing, using an item in a store before purchasing.

If something doesn't change regarding all of the advantages online only sellers have over brick and mortar businesses (small and large), soon we won't be able to find any store to physically test any products before purchasing. We will literally be buying products blindfolded. Sure, you're probably going to say, just read the reviews, but how many products have been reviewed between 0 stars and 5 stars (when using the 5 star system) equally. Reviews are not a fool proof system. Even review sites rarely test products in the very specific way you may want to use it, or test a specific functionality that you are interested in. Nothing will ever beat seeing and trying a product in person.

Back on topic about providing flyers and a script to call a politician. To me, it sounds like they are attempting to educate their employees and provide them with the information needed to take action if they so choose. This is completely fair and shouldn't be seen as bad. It is literally educating them to try and protect their own jobs. Especially since if their Best Buy store was closed due to this, chances are that the employees will try to get other jobs in the retail industry, but will again be susceptible to the same problems they were trying to be educated about.

As someone else said before, unions do this same thing, but they have the "collective bargaining rights" to act on the behalf of all their members in situations like this and would contact the politicians for the employees. Best Buy employees are not in a union, therefore, they must individually act for their own interests and protect their own jobs as best they can. Therefore, Best Buy was providing the means and opportunity for them to do so.

Think what you will, but I think that Best Buy is acting in the best interest of themselves as well as their employees in this case. Just because they don't always do so, does not mean they are in the wrong. In this situation, I believe they are doing what is right.
 
@ Teenk9
(Lol, the Obama adminstration has deported more illegals than any previous adminstration. Talk about regurgitating Faux News garbage.)

Since, among other things, I AM A RETIRED, EX-BORDER PATROL AGENT (IPI), WHO STILL CONTACTS OLD FRIENDS STILL WORKING, I CAN TELL YOU, FOR A FACT, THAT OUR COUNTRY IS FLOODED WITH MORE ILLEGAL ALIENS THAN EVER BEFORE, AND THE CURRENT BPAs ARE NOT ALLOWED TO OBEY THEIR SWORN OATHS OF OFFICE, BY THE HIGER UPS IN THE OBAMA ADMINISTRATION, BECAUSE HE WANTS THEM IN THE US, AS REGISTERED DEMOCRATIC VOTERS, WHO WILL OWE, AND VOTE DEMOCRATIC, IN FUTURE EXECTIONS, ALTHOUGH I DON'T EXPECT THAT YOU WILL BELIEVE IT!

PS: BTW, NONE OF THAT IS COVERED BY THE MAIN STREAM MEDIA, SO YOU ARE EVEN WRONG THERE TOO!
 
Paul Ed said:
@ Teenk9
(Lol, the Obama adminstration has deported more illegals than any previous adminstration. Talk about regurgitating Faux News garbage.)

Since, among other things, I AM A RETIRED, EX-BORDER PATROL AGENT (IPI), WHO STILL CONTACTS OLD FRIENDS STILL WORKING, I CAN TELL YOU, FOR A FACT, THAT OUR COUNTRY IS FLOODED WITH MORE ILLEGAL ALIENS THAN EVER BEFORE, AND THE CURRENT BPAs ARE NOT ALLOWED TO OBEY THEIR SWORN OATHS OF OFFICE, BY THE HIGER UPS IN THE OBAMA ADMINISTRATION, BECAUSE HE WANTS THEM IN THE US, AS REGISTERED DEMOCRATIC VOTERS, WHO WILL OWE, AND VOTE DEMOCRATIC, IN FUTURE EXECTIONS, ALTHOUGH I DON'T EXPECT THAT YOU WILL BELIEVE IT!

PS: BTW, NONE OF THAT IS COVERED BY THE MAIN STREAM MEDIA, SO YOU ARE EVEN WRONG THERE TOO!
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OBVIOUSLY YOU BECOME MORE CREDIBLE AND ACCURATE WHEN TYPING IN BOLD TEXT.
 
Is this really any different than when any sort of business that tells it's workers "If that law/bill passes or person is elected we'll have to downsize"?? Personally I'd rather see this kind of corporate involvement ... i.e. from actual individuals... rather than the interpretation that corporations are made up of individuals so if they "donate" it's just the people donating.
 
E-Fairness act wouldn't make a difference in my life :(. As a Californian, we already get taxed by newegg, amazon, a few ebay retailers and a few other online e-tailers so it wouldn't make a difference :rolleyes:.
 
Paul Ed said:
@ Teenk9
(Lol, the Obama adminstration has deported more illegals than any previous adminstration. Talk about regurgitating Faux News garbage.)

Since, among other things, I AM A RETIRED, EX-BORDER PATROL AGENT (IPI), WHO STILL CONTACTS OLD FRIENDS STILL WORKING, I CAN TELL YOU, FOR A FACT, THAT OUR COUNTRY IS FLOODED WITH MORE ILLEGAL ALIENS THAN EVER BEFORE, AND THE CURRENT BPAs ARE NOT ALLOWED TO OBEY THEIR SWORN OATHS OF OFFICE, BY THE HIGER UPS IN THE OBAMA ADMINISTRATION, BECAUSE HE WANTS THEM IN THE US, AS REGISTERED DEMOCRATIC VOTERS, WHO WILL OWE, AND VOTE DEMOCRATIC, IN FUTURE EXECTIONS, ALTHOUGH I DON'T EXPECT THAT YOU WILL BELIEVE IT!

PS: BTW, NONE OF THAT IS COVERED BY THE MAIN STREAM MEDIA, SO YOU ARE EVEN WRONG THERE TOO!
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Go to a farm in deep red Southern state around harvest time and look at who’s in the fields of these farm owners, who tend to be a very solid Republican block. The minute you start talking about deporting all of those field hands the first the farmer is going to say is "Do you want you food prices to go up?" To sit there and say that all of these people are crossing the border so that Obama can give them welfare and turn them into Democratic voters is complete bullshit.

These people wouldn't be coming here if there were not a LOT of demand for their labor. And there's plenty of upstanding right leaning farmers all over that are more than happy to use that labor, among other industries. And quite honestly Democrats don't really need to lift a finger when it comes to galvanizing minority voters because of the CONSTANT insults coming from the right.
 
Well that is pretty much how lobbying works, but the pizza is money...lot's of money. If it works for lobbyists and senators, then it works for minimum wage sheep minus the actual cash in hand bribery.
 
Let me guess. If S declined the pizza, S wouldn't be seeing a raise for x amount of years or worse, he's shown the door after he's charged with a BS employee infraction.
 
Teenk9 said:
Lol, the Obama adminstration has deported more illegals than any previous adminstration. Talk about regurgitating Faux News garbage.
Click to expand...

They've changed the way they count deportations to include people caught before they jump the fence now. When DREAM advocates got all huffy about the deportations number the White House even admitted it was inflated. Wouldn't want to alienate a possible future voting pool if they can manage to sneak another round of amnesty through. ;)
 
Paul Ed said:
@ Teenk9
(Lol, the Obama adminstration has deported more illegals than any previous adminstration. Talk about regurgitating Faux News garbage.)

Since, among other things, I AM A RETIRED, EX-BORDER PATROL AGENT (IPI), WHO STILL CONTACTS OLD FRIENDS STILL WORKING, I CAN TELL YOU, FOR A FACT, THAT OUR COUNTRY IS FLOODED WITH MORE ILLEGAL ALIENS THAN EVER BEFORE, AND THE CURRENT BPAs ARE NOT ALLOWED TO OBEY THEIR SWORN OATHS OF OFFICE, BY THE HIGER UPS IN THE OBAMA ADMINISTRATION, BECAUSE HE WANTS THEM IN THE US, AS REGISTERED DEMOCRATIC VOTERS, WHO WILL OWE, AND VOTE DEMOCRATIC, IN FUTURE EXECTIONS, ALTHOUGH I DON'T EXPECT THAT YOU WILL BELIEVE IT!

PS: BTW, NONE OF THAT IS COVERED BY THE MAIN STREAM MEDIA, SO YOU ARE EVEN WRONG THERE TOO!
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You're a retired ex-border patrol agent. Right, sure. :rolleyes: . Well I'm Batman, and I say you're wrong.
 
roma said:
Don't see the big deal. Union take peoples dues and drive a political agenda no matter how the member feels about issues. In 2012 a US president spent millions in ads over 6 months tempting people with easy food stamps the way drug dealers give out free crack. Pizza is nothing. Its a private biz that can do what it wants.
Click to expand...
Quoting for truth and justice.
 
NoLegs said:
I would have no problem if I still worked at BB and they did this. I actually agree with this and I don't work at BB. I don't even work for any small businesses and I still agree with this. I also didn't even know that this was a bill that was trying to get passed until it was posted on [H], and I actually completely agree with enforcing tax fairness. If you choose to sell to a particular state (online or a small business in a small town), you should be required to charge the same sales tax. Don't get me wrong, i love shopping online due to the huge selection of items, however, there is still no replacement for personally seeing, testing, using an item in a store before purchasing.

If something doesn't change regarding all of the advantages online only sellers have over brick and mortar businesses (small and large), soon we won't be able to find any store to physically test any products before purchasing. We will literally be buying products blindfolded. Sure, you're probably going to say, just read the reviews, but how many products have been reviewed between 0 stars and 5 stars (when using the 5 star system) equally. Reviews are not a fool proof system. Even review sites rarely test products in the very specific way you may want to use it, or test a specific functionality that you are interested in. Nothing will ever beat seeing and trying a product in person.

Back on topic about providing flyers and a script to call a politician. To me, it sounds like they are attempting to educate their employees and provide them with the information needed to take action if they so choose. This is completely fair and shouldn't be seen as bad. It is literally educating them to try and protect their own jobs. Especially since if their Best Buy store was closed due to this, chances are that the employees will try to get other jobs in the retail industry, but will again be susceptible to the same problems they were trying to be educated about.

As someone else said before, unions do this same thing, but they have the "collective bargaining rights" to act on the behalf of all their members in situations like this and would contact the politicians for the employees. Best Buy employees are not in a union, therefore, they must individually act for their own interests and protect their own jobs as best they can. Therefore, Best Buy was providing the means and opportunity for them to do so.

Think what you will, but I think that Best Buy is acting in the best interest of themselves as well as their employees in this case. Just because they don't always do so, does not mean they are in the wrong. In this situation, I believe they are doing what is right.
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What he said.

It's just a matter of time before all online businesses have to deal with collecting taxes for states. The online businesses say its an "unfair burden" but really in this computerized age, I find it hard to believe that there would be some huge roadblock to creating a point of sale system for online commerce that couldn't do all this automatically. Sure, sending money to 50 different states for sales tax sounds like a pain, but even this could all be done electronically.

As soon as there is a demand for a system like that, they will pop up everywhere.
 
NoLegs said:
I would have no problem if I still worked at BB and they did this. I actually agree with this and I don't work at BB. I don't even work for any small businesses and I still agree with this. I also didn't even know that this was a bill that was trying to get passed until it was posted on [H], and I actually completely agree with enforcing tax fairness. If you choose to sell to a particular state (online or a small business in a small town), you should be required to charge the same sales tax. Don't get me wrong, i love shopping online due to the huge selection of items, however, there is still no replacement for personally seeing, testing, using an item in a store before purchasing.
[snip]
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Except that you would not have to collect sales tax for 49 other states which is bad enough but literally thousands of tiny county and municipal taxing regimes.

You don't "choose to sell to a particular state", you sell to everyone and you obey your local laws. You want people to have to obey the local laws of every city, county and state in the USA. That is absolute madness and counter to the idea of federalism.

Look, It's not my fault that your welfare hell hole can't manage it's money and charges state, county and municipal sales tax - I don't live there and I'm not subject to those taxing authorities. Read the Constitution.

Calling it "Tax Fairness" is a just dishonest. It's tax burden redistribution.

If I run a Computer store in Oregon, 5 miles from the California border, would you try to make me charge the California customers California sales tax?

I'm assuming you would say no because it would be unenforceable. Just how would that work anyway? California needs to worry about their own damn taxes, not place burdensome mandates on citizens of other sovereign states which they have absolutely no authority over.

Has anyone even thought about foreign sellers? If I sell mechanical keyboards from Hong Kong, how do you propose to bring me under your "tax fairness" regime?

When did people fall so in love the the flavor of boot?
 
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