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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

#161

Post by da_big_ghey »

kome wrote: post #129
simonebrunozzi wrote: post #112

> You should expect "equal pay for equal work" at your new remote job So naive. In an ideal, utopian world? Maybe it would work this way. Maybe. In reality, your compensation is a function of your negotiating power. Some people, in fact, manage to get the same pay even when working remote, because they're "highly employable". Others don't. And let me add: I almost agree that remote work shouldn't necessarily command…

> In reality, your compensation is a function of your negotiating power. Some people, in fact, manage to get the same pay even when working remote, because they're "highly employable". Others don't. OK, but if you go in front of the employers as individuals, 1 might gain, but everybody will lose. That's not how work relationship works. I get that on HN everybody feels like a genius and individualism is rampant. But t…

> 1 might gain, but everybody will lose.

Exactly. Based on talking with others about their salaries, I usually seem to be one who gains. So I will oppose efforts to normalize pay for a given role because I will lose and probably take a pay cut.

There's also nothing wrong with paying more or less for a job. Some people are better workers, period. This is true even if they have the same job title.

Re: "Equal pay for equal work" in remote jobs

#162

Post by NovemberWhiskey »

Dirlewanger wrote: post #127
cambalache wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, I always laugh at the naivete of many people from first world countries : "Wow down there in Mexico the dollar is worth 10X/8X/6X times as more". No, it fucking is not. Or let me rephrase, it does but just for an extremely small subset of things. Cars? No, more expensive in the third world. House? Not at all, for a similar house, same quality of construction, and neigborhood, expect to pay at the very least the…

How can local wages (in a currency other than USD) be "pitiful", but food cost "the same" for the USD? These are incongruent. Locals wouldn't be able to subsist on those food prices. The USD has greater purchasing power, that's just a fact.

Anyone who's ever done an international relocation understands this. It works like this.

Your company asks you, a SF-based tech executive, to relocate to India for a three-year assignment.

Notional cost of living in India is absurdly low. But your company will actually estimate that you'll need ~$50-100,000 more per year from a COL perspective.

This is because your existing lifestyle is now composed of what are all luxury goods in India.

A Toyota Camry is an expensive, luxury car in India with massively high rates of taxation. Even if you don't currently own a car, you will need to, because public transportation is some combination of unreliable, unsafe or unavailable. Vehicle maintenance will be much more expensive and frequent due to poor roads and the frequency of fender-benders.

Your company will tell you that they recommend in the strongest possible terms that you hire a driver from the local area, because of the track record of outcomes when an expat gets into a traffic accident.

Alcohol is incredibly expensive, particularly imported brands. Good luck if you like to eat steak. Restaurants that serve international cuisine are relatively rare, and those of good quality are actually expensive even by international standards. If you want to buy an item of technology that's near the leading edge, it's either not available, or only available via import with massive surcharges and taxes.

Very little of the housing stock will meet your expectations, and you will probably end up in one of a very-few 'expat friendly' areas. You will be buying bottled water because the domestic water is not safe to drink. If you want to be confident of 24 hour power, you will either end up needing a place with its own generator, or to be in the one of the super-elite compounds that provides its own generation capacity where you're literally paying major world city prices.

Visiting your family is now international travel involving stop-overs in Doha or London. Facilitation payments/bribes are now a budget item.

The point is: cost of living differs depending on expectation. If you go to Mexico to live like a local, it will be very cheap. If you go to Mexico to live like an American, it will not be.

EDIT: in fact, the real surprise to me was that the COL data from the big relo vendors like Cartus is nothing like symmetrical. If you look at say London/Tokyo as a city pair - there's a fairly large COL increase for moves in either direction.

Re: "Equal pay for equal work" in remote jobs

#163

Post by kome »

internet_user wrote: post #145
kome wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The Software Developers will follow the path of the Autoworkers of the 60s, once a high paid and esteemed profession which becomes a menial job with average pay. yeah... but the choice here is political, it's not the natural forces of the market (it's rarely the natural forces of the market). Working in Germany as autoworkers, you still get a more than decent wage. Sure, work is hard. But money is good. America ins…

offshoring has been happening for a long time. Why would this be an issue now all of a sudden?

Offshoring was a political decision. a decision that needed political consensus, action and supervision (to open capital markets, to set standards, to trade deals, to keep exchange rate stable, etc., etc.)

Offshoring doesn't happen in a vacuum. And in some countries, offshoring hit harder than in others. For instance, Germany and Italy are still export powerhouses. This, again, was a political decision.

In the US the decision was to privilege financial and tech industry, more than production industry. It was a strategy, and like every strategy it created some winner and some losers.

Americans have to decide if keeping this strategy or trying something else.

Re: "Equal pay for equal work" in remote jobs

#164

Post by echelon »

jasonjayr wrote: post #136
simonebrunozzi wrote: post #112

> You should expect "equal pay for equal work" at your new remote job So naive. In an ideal, utopian world? Maybe it would work this way. Maybe. In reality, your compensation is a function of your negotiating power. Some people, in fact, manage to get the same pay even when working remote, because they're "highly employable". Others don't. And let me add: I almost agree that remote work shouldn't necessarily command…

Then companies should have no problems whatsoever with Unions? I mean, if a group of employees want to get together to amplify their negotiating power, then they should not stop that?

I'm certainly not pro-union in tech, but this is something that could hasten its arrival.

Just because I'm in Atlanta doesn't make me inherently worth less than my peers in SF.

Re: "Equal pay for equal work" in remote jobs

#165

Post by inquirerofsorts »

simonebrunozzi wrote: post #112

> You should expect "equal pay for equal work" at your new remote job So naive. In an ideal, utopian world? Maybe it would work this way. Maybe. In reality, your compensation is a function of your negotiating power. Some people, in fact, manage to get the same pay even when working remote, because they're "highly employable". Others don't. And let me add: I almost agree that remote work shouldn't necessarily command…

Why does this feel like one of these numerous HN posts that will not stand the test of time a few years later.

I can do a better job than many in SF for half the price. Have already spent close to a decade waking up early for US west coast meetings.

Get the feeling that a day of reckoning is coming for those clinging so dearly to their location based earnings. I've been saying it for years about Australia being so constrained with cities like Sydney and Melbourne which magically have some of the most expensive land prices on Earth. Getting away from these places and making your own digital way is truly a freedom to behold.

Re: "Equal pay for equal work" in remote jobs

#166

Post by leothecool »

eloisant wrote: post #88

The reality behind "cost of living" is actually "market price". Companies having this policy don't actually try to figure out how much it costs to live in a city in an other, they just look how much people are paid for a similar job in the area. In other words, companies with this policy pay you as low as the market allows them, without you being poached by a local competitor.

To me this looks like the practices that led to the High-Tech Employee Antitrust Litigation of 2013 are still going on. The market is still broken. Companies that have this policy are only free to pay "cost of living" based salaries because the companies that are offering remote work aren't competing with each other. Like you said, they are only competing with the local startups in the cities where remote workers live.

Re: "Equal pay for equal work" in remote jobs

#167

Post by username90 »

Dirlewanger wrote: post #109
bumby wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a pervasive misconception that you are paid for how much value you bring. In a market economy, you are paid commensurate to how much you can negotiate. The value you bring (real or imagined) is part of that negotiation, but so are other factors. It pains me to see people get frustrated by this fact.

If a company is going to use the lazy COL argument, they're going to do so no matter what. Take 2 people of equal skill, experience, and negotiating prowess. One lives in SF, another in Kansas City. Both apply to the same remote position for a SF-based company. The company will always take the one in KC. I don't see how negotiation skill has a role in this. Unless there are people out there who have successfully nego…

High end companies doesn't work like that. For example Google first decides that they want you, then they pay you their market rate no matter where you live. You can choose to work in SF for a high pay or in India for a low pay, up to you, they still want you. In fact the high pay in SF is actually the easiest position to get, the lower wage positions in other areas are more competitive since they have fewer spots.

Re: "Equal pay for equal work" in remote jobs

#168

Post by x87678r »

klodolph wrote: post #91

Often overlooked in the discussions about privilege and equality is the discussion about how citizens of different countries are given different levels of access to the same jobs. Like, I’m a US citizen and have basic programming skills. Not long after college I landed a software engineering job and I immediately have access to markets like SF or NYC, all I have to do is pack up and move (and it turns out I don’t eve…

Forget Syria, Canada is a better example. Canadians earn a fraction of US salaries despite some expensive COL in Vancouver and Toronto.

Re: "Equal pay for equal work" in remote jobs

#169

Post by thinkharderdev »

0x445442 wrote: post #96

Sadly I expect Big Tech is looking at remote work for the wrong reason, mainly labor cost arbitrage. I say sadly because I think Big Tech could do a lot of social good in an ever increasing divided America by making a concerted effort to employ remote workers from diverse geographic regions within America.

But those two seem equivalent to me. A software engineer in Toledo has a competitive advantage over an equally skilled software engineer the Bay Area because they are able to work at a lower wage without materially sacrificing their quality of life. So by looking to reduce labor costs by hiring more remote engineers in Toledo, Bay Area companies are effectively working to reduce income polarization and spreading the economic benefits of the US tech sector to more Americans.

Re: "Equal pay for equal work" in remote jobs

#170

Post by missedthecue »

jasonjayr wrote: post #136
simonebrunozzi wrote: post #112

> You should expect "equal pay for equal work" at your new remote job So naive. In an ideal, utopian world? Maybe it would work this way. Maybe. In reality, your compensation is a function of your negotiating power. Some people, in fact, manage to get the same pay even when working remote, because they're "highly employable". Others don't. And let me add: I almost agree that remote work shouldn't necessarily command…

Then companies should have no problems whatsoever with Unions? I mean, if a group of employees want to get together to amplify their negotiating power, then they should not stop that?

Yes, generally speaking, buyers of any commodity don't like it when sellers cartelize themselves. Whether it's in oil like OPEC, chicken meat, or labour.
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