Quote:
Originally Posted by HarryT
Yes, I know, but again my personal view (and I know that there will be some who will feel otherwise) is that, as long as it's clearly stated that it's a condition of employment, with that employer, there's no problem. Nobody's forcing anyone to apply for a job where the employer will make such checks. It's all about openness.
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The problem with that is, for most jobs it's information that shouldn't be needed, yet it wouldn't be long before every employer does it as a matter of course.
Once every employer does it, you can't just not apply for jobs at the companies who invade privacy without good reason. Some companies are not only asking you to login, but to turn over you passwords so they can monitor future usage too (will they extend it to email too? or other websites?)
For some jobs, yes I agree, facebook, email, even home/computer searches would be warranted, but they're not your average job. For most jobs, that information is private and should not be accessible to any employer. If they search your public facebook pages/google your name, fair game.
Still, I partly agree with what you're saying, I also subscribe to the, if you don't like the terms, don't apply for the job line of thought (with the exception of health and safety, which is one of the few reasons I think strikes are important). However, in this case, I can see all companies implementing it as a general policy and really disagree with that.
edit: In response to the free market, yes that's usually the case, but it doesn't always work that way. Those who are "skilled" may be able to pick and choose and companies implementing that policy might lose out and dump it. However, for the majority of workers, there's 1000's more that would take the job in your place, so those companies can get away with it because the 1000's of other applicants are desperate for work.
In a way it's like minimum wage. For skilled workers, the law isn't needed, you just pick/choose your work. For many though, companies could drive wages down to almost nothing and get away with it because there's so many applicants that would take anything they can, they're desperate for work.