Navigating Employnomics: Unpacking Employee Rights and Corporate Exploitation in Today's Work Culture

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Have you ever felt like your corporate job is a game rigged against you? Welcome to the world of employnomics, where the scales of power are tilted heavily in favor of employers, often at the expense of hardworking employees. In this eye-opening episode of the Employee Survival Guide®, host Mark Carey takes a deep dive into the troubling dynamics of the workplace called employnomics, exposing practices like non-compete agreements, forced arbitration, and wage theft that leave employees vulnerable and exploited. 

As we navigate the complexities of employment law and employnomics, Carey sheds light on the systemic issues of discrimination—including race discrimination, gender discrimination, and age discrimination—that persist in our workplaces. He discusses how the at-will employment rule creates a hostile environment, allowing employers to terminate employees without just cause. This episode emphasizes the urgent need for a paradigm shift towards termination for cause, a concept already being embraced in states like Montana. Such changes could foster trust and significantly improve employee engagement, which has hit an all-time low. 

Listeners will gain invaluable insights into the realities of employee rights and the importance of advocating for a fair workplace culture. Carey urges you to recognize the pervasive nature of employnomics and its implications on your career, job security, and overall well-being. With practical advice on navigating employment contracts and understanding your rights, this episode serves as a powerful resource for anyone facing workplace challenges, from sexual harassment to work disputes. 

Whether you're negotiating a severance package, dealing with a hostile work environment, or simply trying to understand your rights as an employee, the Employee Survival Guide® is here to empower you. Tune in for insider tips on career development, employee advocacy, and how to effectively navigate the murky waters of employment law. Don’t let your voice be silenced; join us in the fight for better workplace conditions and ensure your rights as an employee are respected. 

Remember, knowledge is power, and understanding employnomics is your first step toward reclaiming your workplace rights. Listen to this episode now and arm yourself with the tools to survive and thrive in your career! 

If you enjoyed this episode of the Employee Survival Guide please like us on Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn. We would really appreciate if you could leave a review of this podcast on your favorite podcast player such as Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Leaving a review will inform other listeners you found the content on this podcast is important in the area of employment law in the United States.

For more information, please contact our employment attorneys at Carey & Associates, P.C. at 203-255-4150, www.capclaw.com.

Disclaimer: For educational use only, not intended to be legal advice.

Episode Transcript

SPEAKER_00 (00:18):
Hey, it's Mark and welcome back to the next edition
of the Employee Survival Guide,where I tell you, as always,
what your employer does not wantyou to know about and a lot
more.
Today we're talking aboutemployonomics, the thing that
employers do to employees everyday.
Employnomics is a term coveringliterally every aspect of
working and the dysfunctionalrelationship between corporate
management and all employees.
The term is synonymous withcorporate power and money to the

(00:41):
immediate disadvantage ofemployees.
Employnomics is the intentionand often willful behavioral
force, the imbalance of power orleverage, and the dehumanization
of employees, all with asingular goal of making money
for employers at any cost.
Discrimination pays in thesystem of employnomics, whether
at the individual manager orcoworker level, discrimination

(01:02):
can be used to increase theeconomic, political clout of
each offender.
At the systemic level, theorganization benefits
financially.
Our anti-discrimination laws aredesigned to deter economic gains
resulting from overt andsubversive discriminatory
employment practices, yet thesystem is imperfect.
The term employment helpsexplain why employees never get

(01:23):
a benefit from entering into anon competition agreement.
Employees never ask for theagreement, and they cannot
negotiate the terms of theone-sided adhesion contract.
Employers use noncompeteagreements as corporate chess
pieces to fend off competition,stifle third party development,
and ruin careers in the process.
The term employonomics explainswhy employers push employees

(01:46):
into forced arbitrationagreements to hide their
discriminatory and previouslydistorted sexual harassment
cases, which is now illegal.
It is the greatest corporatedamage control instrument ever
created to benefit employerreputations, especially in the
era in the internet age.
Arbitration saves money foremployers who will have to pay
for discrimination and corporateabuse of whistleblowers.

(02:07):
Arbitrators are known to splitthe baby regarding judgments,
some for employees, and here'ssome for employers.
Employees never agreed to orcould negotiate these one-sided
agreements.
Courts and Congress have all buteternally sanctioned arbitration
under the Federal ArbitrationAct.
Arbitration pays and benefitsonly employers.
The term Employmics alsoexplains how employers

(02:29):
deliberately engage in wagetheft under state and federal
law.
Billions of dollars are savedeach year through the trickery
of 1099 employment in full viewof regulators with a lack of
resources to combat them all.
The term Employnomics helpsexplain why Amazon factory
workers cannot take a urinationbreak on the floor.
Employnomics also includes thepervasive performance

(02:51):
improvement plans used to builddefense cases, not better
employee performance.
The term employnomics is alsosynonymous with current
management efforts to forceproductive remote workers back
to the office because theemployers need to utilize office
rents.
The term employment can alsohelp explain why employers are
shifting away from providingperformance reviews and feedback

(03:13):
to something even more vague andconfusing, HR language, to make
employees feel less anxiousabout getting performance
feedback from their managers.
And here's my favoriteemployment's concept of all
time, the at-will rule, a legalterm to conceal a vast majority
of discriminatory and regulatorybehavioral without legal
consequence.

(03:34):
Billions are saved each yearunder the guise of the at-will
termination.
As courts routinely uphold thisprerogative of employers,
employees face an enormousfinancial and emotional burden
to demonstrate such terminationswere illegal, which is
exponentially more complicatedwhen the termination is labeled
as a reduction in force, masslayoff, and headcount reduction.
Yet employers still cannotunderstand why employees just

(03:57):
don't trust their employers, andcorporate culture is always
nonexistent.
Employee engagement is at anall-time low in 2025.
Employers would financiallybenefit from hiring employees
with four-cause terminationbasis, which promotes a
foundational trust betweenemployees and private government
they work for.
Montana is the only state in thecountry that has successfully

(04:17):
legalized forecast terminationsand done away with the outwill
employment rule.
The list of situations coveredby the term employment is
endless.
Now we have a term or word ofart to describe how employers
adversely benefit from theimbalance of power over
employees.