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Ask HN: Remote Employees Double-Dipping?

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31–40 of 104 posts

Re: Ask HN: Remote Employees Double-Dipping?

#31
post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

...yes? Cost of living between Mexico to San Francisco probably in the neighborhood of 4x, depending on which part of Mexico. 500000 MXN rounds to $25k, which is 1/4 of $100k.

Cost of surviving(food, shelter, boose) - yes. What about cost of having trip around the world for vacation, building your retirement fund, price of the iphone, car?

Well, the retirement fund might be more CoL adjusted, if you intend to retire to the same region you currently reside.

Re: Ask HN: Remote Employees Double-Dipping?

#32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's messed up. Unless there's a separate component like local-cost-of-living-adjustment where you get extra for living in a high-rent area.

it's not messed up. Otherwise you're overpaying by 4x compared to local positions. Which means the person will probably never leave if they're unhappy etc.

If it's more than just a cost-of-living bonus for high-rent areas, then yes it is. You're saying "Hey engineer A, you're just as good as B, but we're going to pay you less because people that live near you aren't getting paid as much. If you'd like a raise, move somewhere where engineers get more money."

Again, if it's just the cost-of-living bonus (like, all our engineers get $80K, plus $X/month where X is average rent and groceries, plus Y% for taxes) then it's fine. Otherwise it's valuing someone less purely on their geographical location.

Edit: Also, really, overpaying so they might be unhappy? "We're giving you less money for your own good!" Presumably if they're a world-class engineer and can work remotely at one place, they can find another remote job, too...

Re: Ask HN: Remote Employees Double-Dipping?

#33
post #26

I'd like to land one (1) FT remote job, and here we've got folks talking about working two at the same time :)

Ditto. I had a remote job once, but the hours I got out of it were so abysmal that I had to leave it for a regular office job after just 2 months.

Re: Ask HN: Remote Employees Double-Dipping?

#34
post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cost of surviving(food, shelter, boose) - yes. What about cost of having trip around the world for vacation, building your retirement fund, price of the iphone, car?

Well, the retirement fund might be more CoL adjusted, if you intend to retire to the same region you currently reside.

You shouldn't have to decide that up front. Plus someone living in a high-rent area then gets a huge retirement bonus and allows them the option to move somewhere else. Someone in a low-rent area doesn't get that option at all.

Re: Ask HN: Remote Employees Double-Dipping?

#35
post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel like it's kinda impressive that he managed to keep that up for 8 months. What were the two jobs exactly?

Software developer!

:o. That was... not what I expected. I read your original post and thought that maybe he was a security guard exploiting proximity of the two buildings to do a somewhat ok job on both simultaneously, or something.

Re: Ask HN: Remote Employees Double-Dipping?

#36
post #9

No! I'll feel bad to cheat someone else - and I don't like to feel bad:)

I don't want to be "that guy," but... If it's a salaried position, you're presumably not filling in an hours sheet dishonestly. Is it truly cheating if both companies are happy with your work and you're not breaking either company's rules? Even if you don't explicitly tell them you're doing it?

Most salaried positions require you don't have any other paying jobs.

Re: Ask HN: Remote Employees Double-Dipping?

#38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lol I had to negotiate to get about a quarter of that salary. I know Travis CI limits your pay to your region. GitLab as well. Difference from Mexico to San Francisco is about 4x.

That's messed up. Unless there's a separate component like local-cost-of-living-adjustment where you get extra for living in a high-rent area.

It's not messed up, it's supply and demand.

Someone living in SF will have many high-paid opportunities so they have to match that.

On the other hand they know someone not willing to relocate won't have the same opportunities locally or with remote jobs, so they can afford to pay them less.

Re: Ask HN: Remote Employees Double-Dipping?

#39
I'd love to have just one full-time remote job. Anyone managing to do two at once more than makes up for any points lost on ethical grounds with the bonus points for technical chops and sheer moxie.

If ever were in such an enviable position, these are the potential pitfalls I might see.

  - The companies schedule mandatory meetings at the same time.
  - The companies schedule on-site days that make travel arrangements impossible.
  - Conflict of interest between companies.
  - The companies don't actually care, but you hide it anyway, and they care about that.
  - The companies do care, but you tell them, and they retaliate for the embarrassment.
  - Tax withholding comes out wrong, and you are fined for it.
  - Someone you met through both companies outs you.
  - One of your companies is acquired by or merged into the other.
  - Your life is converted to an 80s-style sitcom script, and you aren't even credited.

Re: Ask HN: Remote Employees Double-Dipping?

#40

Since when is working two jobs a bad thing? Plenty of people work two or three jobs to make ends meet. If you can make both work, and you aren't violating any contracts or NDAs, I don't see why you should feel bad about that.

It is ok when you don't lie in the process. It is not ok when you pretend to work full time while actually working only equivalent of part time in each workplace (does not matter all that much whether drop in productivity is due to burnout or cheating on time spent by working). The productivity of programmers is often hard to measure, if you don't take advantage of it then it is fine. There are jobs that dont require full time, it is cool to combine them.

Workaday without overtime (and working that much is too little I was told by people here) is 8 hours. Assuming you work it twice plus take 2 hours a day for shopping, food and shower, you have only 6 hours sleep remaining. With such persistent sleep deprivation, you wont be able to produce all that much for each employer - your productivity will go down. Then it is just a question of whether either management finds out.

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