Servitude question for you all

No, I'm not selling myself - rather the reverse, possibly, which is what brings me to seek other viewpoints, since it's got me in something of a pickle, as Skylar inexplicably termed it.

Alright. As some of you know, I'm CEO (by which I mean, I generate publicity, while Ana and others do most of the actual work of running things; in my defence, I'm good at generating publicity) of a company, Envirometrics - we develop and manufacture environmental control technology, mostly for medical applications and quarian clean-rooms, as well as various niche markets like drell humidity regulators, hanar hydroprocessors, a few odds and ends for the volus market - the big transstellars have that one sewn up pretty tight, we mostly do boutique tech add-ons... anyway.

We're looking at adding a new specialist to our little R&D lab, and what has me pondering is that one of the top qualified applicants is an indentured servant. This applicant has the particular expertise we need (and various secondary skill sets that we think will come in very handy as well), but there's no way to just buy out the contract and put the applicant on payroll as a regular employee - even if we did have the credits to be making that sort of lump sum payment (we don't), they'd still be indentured, just to us, and in that hypothetical event in any case if we bought the contract out and dissolved it, without a negotiated guarantee in its place (which would kind of defeat the point of dissolving it in the first place), we'd be putting other employees at risk from the financial hit we'd take if that 'investment' walked out the door.

So this is the choice we have - lease an indentured servant from their contract holder, or reject the applicant simply because they're an indentured servant. The latter would be quite unfair, but... well, I've never 'owned' anyone. I'm not pretending I'm some kind of anti-servitude crusader - I disapprove of the practice, but I guess the fact that I still live here has to be seen as some sort of tacit endorsement, or at least permission via lack of opposition - and yes, I'd agree with the advocates who point out that a servant here is in a much better position than a slave in many other places in the Terminus. It's still a kind of slavery, though. I'm having trouble making up my mind about this.

So, here I am, asking the extranet, because that always goes swimmingly. Obviously talking this over with Ana (she's in a meeting at the moment) and Eafina and everyone will likely prove much more influential than random forum discussion... especially if Dwick or the like somehow gets involved... but you never know who'll say the thing that crystallises your thoughts, you know? Worth a shot. So, thoughts?

Do you have reason to believe they were co-erced into their contract?

Do you have reason to believe you will be forcing them to do something they do not wish due to their contract? Are their stipulations in the contract that would make it possible for one of your employees to take advantage of them without legal recourse?

Do you have reason to believe the contract is horribly unfair for any reason?

Beyond 'It's an Indentured Servitude Contract' is there anything morally wrong with the subject of the contract or what it would allow you or the employee's supervisors to take advantage of them?

If not, I fail to see much of a reason not to hire them, save for the Public Relations hit or a moral opposition to the institution of Indentured Servitude. If you believe the public relations hit or moral opposition to the idea are strong enough to outway the (considerable) qualifications this candidate seems to possess, reject them and cite your reason for rejecting the application. Otherwise, I see no particular reason not to employ them.

Interesting. I always was admiring how Envirometrics got along without indentured servants.

If it is unavoidable to go this way, did you interview the person directly? That's what I would do first. If she is comfortable with the work you offer and with the conditions she gets out of her contract then I'd say, she better works for you than some other company which may be less thoughtful.

On general terms, that is one of the things you have to accept when living on Illium. Contracted regulations are still much better than forceful slavery but still a form of exploiting other people's necessities. It transfers more responsibility on the employer of a servant and you can only try to live up to your own morale standards here.
Personally I resent any form of contracting that binds the free will of the contracted, but as an individual you have to come to terms with the larger rules of the places you live.

In my experience, most willful slaves are people who have to get their life back in order after past mistakes. By buying their contract and treating her fairly during them servant time you would allow them to do their time and get their life back in order through hard work. I think it would be commendable.

I would love to talk to one of your slaves.

System exists for a reason, if they're what you need you might as well take advantage of it.

Seems simple enough to me.

What he said. I was one once upon a time. I used them at Trask. Being an indent is hardly different from being forced into boot, especially these days where you don't even have the public service project opt-out anymore.

Hire yourself a compliance attorney and make sure everything looks legit on the contract. Sit down in a private one-on-one interview with the indenture. Make sure you're going to mutually benefit each other. If the contracting agency won't grant you a one-on-one and/or insists that one of their brokers be present in the room during the interview, you immediately know they're full of shit and either a black market ring or con men. Same thing applies if they pocket any gratuities or bonuses earned by the indent; good agencies let them keep those.

If the indent does a good job, hire them on as waged at end-of-term or at least give them good references and some sort of severance package.

As others have mentioned, I would verify the conditions and initiation of their servitude contract. If it was entered willingly and the individual in question does not appear to have been treated poorly since signing, there should not be any moral obligation against it.

I'm waiting for The Sarcastic Salarian's take on this. Didn't he work in a contract years back?

This is a tricksy one :/

I've worked with indents before, and they were... well, not like really happy but glad to be able to work off whatever legal or moneyish thingies they had - you just need to treat them nicely (not that that'd be a problem for you, Daia :D). And it's not like they'll be in that situation for ever and ever and ever, once contract's up they'll be free as one as those feathery things!
I have completely forgotten that word, what is it? :S

On the other hand... you're still not paying them. Which is legal, yeah, but not nice.
Aaaaaaaarg.

Wings.

Given your options...just remember to interview the person in question. While all this morality vs practicality is riveting for discussion, I'm sure, if I were in your place, I'd try to make sure that whomever this specialist is, they at least had some kind of saying on what happened them.

After that, you're still the one has to make the decision.

I'd honestly say that if they're the most qualified for the position, they should get it. You may not be able to pay them directly now, but if you keep them on after their contract expires, they have the experience that you can pay them what they deserve at that time.

It's unfortunate that they're in the situation they're in, but contracts have a limited amount of time.

I’m taking a while to answer because I’m trying not to see green at the moment.

There is no way I can look at this objectively. As much as Illium likes to trumpet about how it’s “fair” and “not slavery” and “bound by standards within the Illium Indentured Service Bureau,” that doesn’t change the fact that I was coerced into my contract. It does not change that I signed under significant mental and legal duress, and that I could see no other option because I had next to no legal representation at the time.

Is that anecdotal? Sure, but if you’re going to dispute it you can go take an FTL spacewalk for all I care.

Indentured service on Illium is a crock. It is a farce, a means of playing nice with slavers in the Terminus in exchange for a piece of the pie, at the expense of those coerced into joining the system.

It will also never stop being a Thing on Illium, because basic ordinances take years to pass in asari democracy, let alone something so plainly, obviously wrong, yet politically incendiary as slavery. The shrelling heat death of the universe is more likely to change before Indentured Slavery is abolished there. So, unless the unfortunate schmuck in question is a krogan or an asari, they’re completely screwed for life, and your choice won’t matter to them or any other such being who is stuck in the system.

So yeah. Go ahead. Join in the fun that’s the Illium Indentured Service Bureau. Read through the contract about eight times, and hire a lawyer from the Protectorate to go over the terms. If the schmuck is some honest guy who got thrown into the shuffle, hire him and treat him well. Shrell, maybe with a little help from your company’s Legal Department, you could find a way to squeeze him out of the system a little faster, like I happily managed to do by accident.

And if he’s scum, do what sounds “right” to you.

Just know that you’re mucking about in the same scum that helped create me.

You have stated that you run a technology concern which practices the art of maintaining and enhancing quality of life.

You have formerly operated in a business wherein most of your compatriots are expected to give over the very act of procreation as a means of entertainment, and most of them are obliged to do so involuntarily, under duress or socioeconomically contrived and slanted circumstances, and you did so whilst safely from such circumstances by your accounts.

It seems fairly apparent you should already be aware of the context and circumstances proposed, and the logical answer thereafter.

That Illium exists at all and you have chosen to occupy space thereof is the only evidence or criteria actually needed.

I have forgotten one more thing. Is this person the only option to go for your problem?
Are there other, not indentured people available that may be a tad less qaulified? Would their lack of experience or whatever endanger the project or could it outweigh the moral problems that come with an indentured servant?

Would you rather have 'the best of the best there is' or 'not going that way' by settling for the second best?

Don't hire them.

Slave/Indentured/Compacted labour competes with free labour. That idea, that you can keep certain kinds of employees from 'walking out the door'? It puts pressure on the whole system, discouraging investment in free people and yeah, let's get back to the idea that indentured labour competes with free labour.

You don't have to wave signs about every shitty thing your society does-nobody would ever have time to sleep, but support what you want.

Thanks for all your comments, folks. Having had these points of view (and those of the people close to me here, of course) to take into consideration has made the decision... well, I don't know if 'easier' is the word, but I feel like I won't be second-guessing myself as much as I might've otherwise, so that's a plus.

So getting right to the point, this from Capice:
...turned out to be the angle I found critical in deciding that we won't be, in so many words, using indentured labour. While this thread was running I got in touch with Cesali T'Ra, with Advocacy for a Free Illium - some of you may remember we had her on From Illium pre-war, she's moved up in the organisation now - and talking it over with her, and Ana, and Charisma (who came to Illium herself under a four year contract), cemented that this was really the main objection that was rattling around in my subconscious, and having put it into clear words, I really can't in good faith dismiss it. My problem with servitude was and is with the institution, not the individuals within it, and I've always tended to give priority to individuals over the 'big picture' (hence why, aside from letting my voice be heard as any citizen ought to, I don't make much of an effort to get involved in politics). The indentured labour/free labour argument, though, that puts it in clearer terms for me, makes it grounded on both sides.

Anyway, while I'm here, may as well answer/elaborate on some of the queries raised. The contract holder, in this case, is reliable, I'd say it's very unlikely there's any impropriety with regards to the servitude contract on their end - that's our legal advisor's opinion, not just me being optimistic as always. All I can say about the specific contract is that it's a Type 3, which is to say the contractee is an immigrant who will be granted permanent resident status on completion of contract - there's been a bit of a boom in Threes since the relays reopened, what with a lot of the smaller Terminus nations in recession or worse, and the Board here can be pretty stingy when it comes to approving immigration without any local backing; the doors aren't closed, exactly, but you all know well enough how Illium bureaucracy can be. I haven't interviewed the applicant - the application was made by the contract holder, a personal interview would only come as part of the lease negotiation process, if we'd chosen to pursue that. That's a standard procedure, not an indication of unusual secretiveness on the part of the contract holder, so I wouldn't read too much into it.

And there are other, non-contracted, applicants - we're not the kind of company that can command the services of the best techs on Illium, so it's not the kind of position where there's only a handful of people on the planet with the perfect qualifications required, whoever we got it was always going to be a matter of finding someone with the right grounding and interests and bringing them up to 'ideal skill set' on the job. I've got a few dossiers on my desk, so I think in a week or so we'll be having interviews.

Is it? I've got an idea it's the whole animal. Ducks? Free as a duck. Does that sound better when you've grown up with English? To my aurals it's just off somehow, perhaps it is wings after all.

Still do! (And besides, the average salarian excepted, it's always been a means of entertainment.)

Underground/criminal trade is naturally difficult to account for (especially now, with the war having thrown everything out of whack), but the SA (Sapphire Alliance, not the other one) is still cautiously projecting a majority of sex workers in Citadel space having acceptable working conditions, which obviously includes it being voluntary; not sure what the breakdown is by government, but by all accounts illegal prostitution is still being fairly handily suppressed in the Republics, so that's heartening. Not sure about extra-Cit stas (well, Illium, obviously, but that's just a case of the Sisterhood doing the best it can, the planet being what it is), but if you're thinking 'most' are forced by one means or another, I'm guessing your cat basket's in the Terminus or similar. Or you have really poor taste in nightclubs.

I got here late, but I'm going to say the same as Kayana. If you use indentured labour, you're condoning it. As long as there's a market for indentured labour, it will exist. Sometimes the most effective option isn't the most moral option.

I think you made the right choice.

Hooray, Daia.
I am glad you didn't have to do it.