"Equal pay for equal work" in remote jobs
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"Equal pay for equal work" in remote jobs
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Re: "Equal pay for equal work" in remote jobs
#2If you’re going to pay people differentially based on where they choose to live, why not pay them differentially based on whether they have kids, too?
This opens a whole can of worms. If a person moves to a lower COL location but then has kids would they break even?
Re: "Equal pay for equal work" in remote jobs
#3If you’re going to pay people differentially based on where they choose to live, why not pay them differentially based on whether they have kids, too? This opens a whole can of worms. If a person moves to a lower COL location but then has kids would they break even?
The pay difference is nothing new, global companies with offices in different countries already pay employees different salary based on where they live. This is not caused by working remote.
Why do you think so many software companies have offices in india? Because it allows them to pay less based on cost of living.
Re: "Equal pay for equal work" in remote jobs
#4If you’re going to pay people differentially based on where they choose to live, why not pay them differentially based on whether they have kids, too? This opens a whole can of worms. If a person moves to a lower COL location but then has kids would they break even?
The pay difference is nothing new, global companies with offices in different countries already pay employees different salary based on where they live. This is not caused by working remote. Why do you think so many software companies have offices in india? Because it allows them to pay less based on cost of living.
Yep this. Let's equalise SF salaries with Europe and India first. What's that? You don't want to? Yeah I didn't think so.
I guess this is what Marx was thinking about when he wanted the workers of the world to unite. Without unity it's super easy for capital to flow to the cheapest labour possible. So far software engineers in the U.S didn't really feel it, but things can change.
Re: "Equal pay for equal work" in remote jobs
#5This, and similar moans, really misses the point.
Employment is a social contract, looking for a compromise between two positions:
* Employers want to essentially acquire a good (productive employee) for the best quality / price ratio. If a trained monkey could do the job for peanuts, employers would be happy.
* Employees, and the society made up of employees, want stability, employment rights etc. as salary work is a backbone of societal stability.
Employers will happily pay the lowest amount of salary that will convince someone to work for them - COL being a key consideration. Employees will negotiate on the basis of the value they bring, but in principle, there is no moral obligation for employers to pay a wage that's fair, based on the value of the employee work, perhaps above ~subsistence levels.
How it works out, we'll see. Perhaps societies agree that strong-arming employers to pay equal salaries, regardless of location, will work - that's how unions, weekends and paid holidays came to be in the developed world (sorry Americans). But neither is a fundamental human right, and rather a societal contract, negotiated between labour takes and makers.
For a different take, should it also be unfair for someone qualified, living in a lower cost-of-living location, to offer their employment to the same company for less? This seems like normal salary negotiation to me.
Re: "Equal pay for equal work" in remote jobs
#6If you’re going to pay people differentially based on where they choose to live, why not pay them differentially based on whether they have kids, too? This opens a whole can of worms. If a person moves to a lower COL location but then has kids would they break even?
The pay difference is nothing new, global companies with offices in different countries already pay employees different salary based on where they live. This is not caused by working remote. Why do you think so many software companies have offices in india? Because it allows them to pay less based on cost of living.
It's nothing new, but it doesn't make the sense it once did.
Those adjusted costs were based on the local job market. They needed to be competitive with the other options you might have had. Once you are working remote, you are not likely comparing "I can go down the street and work THERE for x" any more. You are instead "I can go online and work THERE instead for Y". Your physical location is not a variable in that comparison except for companies that hire based on some data security or legal requirement that work be done within the borders of some certain country.
Re: "Equal pay for equal work" in remote jobs
#7Supporting remote work can come at a cost to an employer so it does make some sense to me to offer less money in those cases and inversely, more money if you move to their town to work there. Other than that equal pay is more fair indeed. I think things have mostly gotten crazy along with some housing markets. Perhaps this will slowly disperse the extreme concentrations of wealth throughout countries with employers opening up more offices at cheaper locations. Or they will have to prove that those extreme concentrations result in equally large productivity/quality improvements.
Re: "Equal pay for equal work" in remote jobs
#8How long before an enterprising startup starts selling virtual apartment addresses in the heart of SF?
Re: "Equal pay for equal work" in remote jobs
#9Earlier quoted context omitted.
The pay difference is nothing new, global companies with offices in different countries already pay employees different salary based on where they live. This is not caused by working remote. Why do you think so many software companies have offices in india? Because it allows them to pay less based on cost of living.
Yep this. Let's equalise SF salaries with Europe and India first. What's that? You don't want to? Yeah I didn't think so. I guess this is what Marx was thinking about when he wanted the workers of the world to unite. Without unity it's super easy for capital to flow to the cheapest labour possible. So far software engineers in the U.S didn't really feel it, but things can change.
All the turmoil we are starting to see in the first world countries is due to this. With the rise in productivity in third world countries the wages will keep moving towards a median.
Re: "Equal pay for equal work" in remote jobs
#10If you’re going to pay people differentially based on where they choose to live, why not pay them differentially based on whether they have kids, too? This opens a whole can of worms. If a person moves to a lower COL location but then has kids would they break even?
The pay difference is nothing new, global companies with offices in different countries already pay employees different salary based on where they live. This is not caused by working remote. Why do you think so many software companies have offices in india? Because it allows them to pay less based on cost of living.
Yes. But economics is different for local and remote work:
Like it is natural to pay the same price for something we both order from China, and in the same time it is also completely normal that we will pay different prices for potatoes at our local market.