Thread regarding ViacomCBS layoffs

I did some research on the terms of PBE employment, and what I found was that they weren't really doing anything illegal for the most part. None of the benefits outside of sick leave are mandated by law, and they were paying everyone on W-2s as far as I know, so there was probably no misclassification there. What WAS illegal was their health insurance offer – the law in NYS dictates that any employer with more than 50 employees is obligated to offer an affordable health insurance option, which means it needs to cost less than a certain percentage of the employees salary (something around 9%, I believe).
They did have an option, probably for an appearance of compliance, but it wasn't actually compliant, because it didn't meet the State's definition of "affordable" – it cost something like $700 a month, for some folks almost 1/4 of their pay. They probably used the subsidiaries like Cast and Crew to limit payroll numbers to less than 50 and not have to actually pay anything. I'm not a lawyer, so I don't know if any of this is actually correct, but to me as a layperson it seems like they cheat their employees out of health insurance money, and in many cases cheated the State of New York out of taxpayer money, because many people had to recur to subsidized health coverage through New York State of Health. That's corporate welfare for you. For the folks staying, I highly recommend looking into unionizing. They will always do whatever they can get away with.

The relief fund isn’t “finalized” according to HR so I’m sure the PBEs who were just treated like absolute trash won’t even see a penny.

Arturo, THANK YOU! Well said, but also sad. Keep paying people big money for sh– ideas. The ViacomCBS way.

On the topic of this 100 million dollar covid19 relief fund, can anyone explain where exactly this money is supposed to go?? These corrupt disgusting scum are letting go tons of people, many with ZERO SEVERANCE... but yet this steaming pile company wants to fellate itself over how GENEROUS THEY ARE? How can the executives of this company CONTINUE to show how absurdly tone deaf they are after all these months? How can they be so detached and f—ing obtuse?

Oh but we should be kissing their gold rings for giving us free access to a bunch of sh–ty content most sane people wouldn't even pay people to watch? We haven't had job security in MONTHS and we are supposed to jump for joy over free SHOWTIME? Blob Bakish, I hope you read this and know you are a garbage subhuman.

I’m interested to see if there will be layoffs next week.

Oh, staff layoffs are coming. Rest assured. Count me in on the class-action lawsuit too! I will be a staff witness!

Why do I feel like no one is going to see anything of this “100M relief fund”? And is any staff going to be laid off? Or just going to lay off more PBEs. They can kick rocks

I would LOVE to see a major class action lawsuit against this deplorable company for misclassifying so many workers, especially the workers who were employed for YEARS without benefits. This permalancing nonsense is a cancer and needs to be severely punished.

Does anyone know if the PBEs were actually given anything from the $100M COVID relief fund?

ViacomCBS Lays Off Several Contract Workers Across Multiple Divisions
MTV, VH1, CMT, Logo, Comedy Central, TV Land, Showtime and Paramount Pictures all see cuts

Key insights:

• Among the hardest hit divisions are two LGBTQ+ brands.
• While several of those laid off hold high-level jobs, they are not considered permanent staff and do not receive benefits.

ViacomCBS, created in December when Viacom and CBS merged, laid off contract workers across a number of its divisions today, a move the company said was due to the COVID-19 pandemic, which has shut down most Hollywood productions.
According to sources, “almost all” of the company’s contract workers are being let go across multiple divisions.

One of the hardest hit seemed to be two LGBTQ+ brands, Logo and NewNowNext, which had essentially merged in recent years as Logo’s original programming ground to a halt after its hit show RuPaul’s Drag Race moved to VH1. According to sources who spoke anonymously for fear of retribution, ViacomCBS laid off seven members of the NewNowNext and Logo teams, leaving only four people to operate the LGBTQ+ brands’ editorial, video, social and payroll needs.
In total, over 60% of the Logo team was cut. Only two of the remaining team are permanent staff.
Four laid-off team members from different ViacomCBS brands said they were not offered any severance pay and do not believe that anyone else was offered severance packages of any kind. Adweek was able to directly confirm layoffs among people who had worked for MTV, VH1, CMT, Logo, Comedy Central, TV Land, Showtime and Paramount Pictures.
Update: On Thursday morning, Adweek was able to confirm additional contract worker layoffs in Viacom Velocity, the company’s in-house branded content studio.
ViacomCBS brands also include CBS, BET, Nickelodeon, Pop and Smithsonian Channel, along with non-TV divisions such as the Simon & Schuster publishing house.
The company confirmed that the layoffs took place companywide, but did not comment on how many people were affected.
“Like many businesses, COVID-19 has had an unprecedented effect on our industry. With so many of our productions on hold for the past month and into the foreseeable future, we made the difficult decision to release a number of freelance and project-based employees, particularly in production while the shutdown is in place,” a ViacomCBS representative told Adweek in a statement Wednesday evening.
The representative pointed to a $100 million COVID-19 relief fund that ViacomCBS launched on April 9 to help support laid-off entertainment and production workers.
ViacomCBS did not comment on whether these layoffs were exclusively due to COVID-19 shutdowns or whether they were also connected to the larger companywide layoffs that have occurred since December’s merger across several divisions, including ad sales.
The company had hinted on March 27 that COVID-19 cuts could soon be on the way, saying in a statement, “Global concerns about the coronavirus disease 2019 have impacted the macroeconomic environment as well as ViacomCBS Inc.’s business.” At the time, the company said it was “also working proactively to offset a portion of anticipated revenue losses through cost-savings initiatives,” but did not specify what form the cost-saving initiatives would take.
A ViacomCBS worker laid off on Wednesday told Adweek that the company had already long employed tricky workarounds to keep costs low, contracting most of its workers through a third-party company called Cast & Crew to limit payroll numbers. At ViacomCBS, those workers are called PBEs, or Project-Based Employees, according to the laid-off worker.

While they often hold high-level jobs including management and payroll positions, they are not considered permanent staff, do not receive benefits and are even assigned a different work email address: @viacommix instead of @viacom.
“It’s ridiculous. We are asked to be at meetings at certain times of the day, we work specified hours. … There’s no world in which this is a contract job,” said one laid-off contractor who asked to remain anonymous, citing fears that their final paycheck could be withheld if they spoke publicly.

Another laid-off worker told Adweek that “almost all” PBEs were being fired by ViacomCBS, at least under the MTV, VH1, CMT and Logo divisions. It’s unclear how many people that is, but one source said they had been employed at ViacomCBS as a PBE for over six years and another said they had worked for more than three years at their job without ever being moved from PBE status to permanent staff.
The payroll company that ViacomCBS contracts with, Cast & Crew, itself laid off a “significant percentage” of its own staff last week, announcing on April 9 that executives would also take a 50% pay cut.
On Wednesday afternoon, workers said, Chris McCarthy, president of entertainment and youth brands, ViacomCBS domestic media networks—including Paramount Network, Comedy Central, MTV, VH1, CMT and Logo Media—addressed workers during a weekly Zoom call to review projects and goals.
But this week’s call took a somber tone, said one laid-off staffer, as McCarthy announced that layoffs would continue through April 27. According to a laid-off worker who provided Adweek with notes from the call, the announcement was over in six minutes.

Need an account to read the article- would someone be so kind as to copy paste the contents of the article?