We’ve seen this story more and more recently:
Wisconsin lawnmower factory says it will FIRE all 53 of its Muslim employees if they take unscheduled prayer breaks
In short: a bunch of the employees on an assembly line walk away from their jobs twice a day, apart from the scheduled break times. The business has a problem with this… not really surprising, as having people step away from an assembly line can mean the whole process grinds to a halt. The article does not say how many employees the company has as a whole, but if the prayer-walkoffs do cause the whole company to lock up, then I can see why this would be a major problem.
So, I have a solution which everyone should appreciate.
Some groundrules for my solution:
- Those who want to wander off and pray are allowed to do so.
- Those who don’t should not be made to pay for it. This means not only the company, but other employees… they shouldn’t have to put in extra time because their co-workers weren’t on the job.
So… my solution is simple. If shutting down the production line twice a day for, say, ten minutes at a time without extending the work day to make up for it costs the company (handwave) $5000 a day in lost productivity… those employees who want to leave to go pray get to make up the difference. Fifty employees cough up the $5K/day difference, or $100 per day per employee.
Seems simple enough. The company doesn’t suffer economic losses, the other employees don’t have to stay late, and those who want to go pray get to go pray. Simple! Fair! Equitable!
Also noted in the story is that the company has a dedicated “prayer room.” One wonders… if during Prayer Shutdown someone wanted to use the “prayer room” to sacrifice a pig to Odin or Pele, or even just have a ham sammich, swig some mead, and sing sagas about That One Time Ragnar Went A’Whorin’ In Cairo, would the other inhabitants of said prayer room complain? Well, if history is any guide, Odinists are not really welcome in generic “Multicultural Rooms.” Which is exactly why if there are any pagans working at this manufacturing facility, they should make full use of the “prayer room.”