401–410 of 624 posts
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I've been at startups where we experienced 90% engineering turnover over 12 mo. due to M&A or change of leadership. We got by. I'm sure Fb could cope.
I've been involved in these and it's a nightmare.
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Kids today are being taught to program in elementary school.
Mmmm, not all kids, and not all 'kinds' of programming. Yes, they're being made more aware that programming exists and is necessary, but that's not the same as "being taught to program".
Say you have a startup in California and are thinking about hiring me remotely. It's completely ridiculous that you say "Okay I'll give you $100k if you live in NYC, but only $60k for the same work if you live in the Rust Belt." If it makes economic sense for you to pay me $100k, making that conditional on where I live is just a jerk move. As someone who actually does live in the Rust Belt, it feels like these tech c…
If society deems this undesirable, the government can create polices to try to achieve a different outcome. This would be a complex undertaking. But I imagine there are beneficial options that exist, especially if the goal is to merely reduce or mitigate the harshest aspects of the labor markets. We already do this in many cases. Employment law is a big area of law.
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> not a marketplace failure. Remove the subsidies and the market would quickly find the higher price at which dairy farmers could produce milk profitably and consumers would purchase it. If it is in our societal interest to produce more milk so people can eat, and the market doesn't do so, requiring subsidy, then that is a failure of the market to meet society's need. You're conflating the failure of a marketplace to…
for certain people, the point of a market is not to meet people's needs, it is to "function efficiently," so they'll never think a failure to meet society's need is a market failure, that's just "the way things are, money doesn't grow on trees commie!"
Failing to meet people's needs is definitely a problem, but not a uniquely market-driven one. If there is a specific phenomenon which causes markets to fail in the delivery of socially desirable goods, it would be good to come up with a specific description and corresponding term of art.
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> the marketplace failed to provide both affordable milk and the ability for dairy farmers to make a living. So the price is both two low and too high? This is not a failure of the marketplace (aka price discovery), this is the U.S. deciding that cheap milk and overproduction is in the nation's best interest and we should socialize some of the production costs. There are logical (milk as a staple product and avoidanc…
> not a marketplace failure. Remove the subsidies and the market would quickly find the higher price at which dairy farmers could produce milk profitably and consumers would purchase it. If it is in our societal interest to produce more milk so people can eat, and the market doesn't do so, requiring subsidy, then that is a failure of the market to meet society's need. You're conflating the failure of a marketplace to…
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Aren't there cases where the market fails when considered in broader context? E.g., the market decides to off-shore manufacturing. This is good short-term as it leads to lower prices for consumers. But it's also potentially a failure at a national long-term level as it has reduced our manufacturing capacity. The short-term bias of the market can adversely affect long lead-time strategic interests. See: the inability…
> But it's also potentially a failure at a national long-term level as it has reduced our manufacturing capacity. That isn't a market failure. It's just a recognition that the economy is global, not national. The market doesn't optimize for the benefit of one nation against others. As for "short-term bias", the market just reflects the biases of the people making the decisions—the same as any other system. If people…
True, and good point.
>just reflects the biases of the people making the decisions...The market's only real "failure" is that it's too democratic
This is a failure if you can agree that people are less than optimal at making decisions, i.e. that humans have biases that work against their own rational self-interest at times. Meaning the market can exacerbate faulty decision heuristics. Behavioral economics is full of examples of this that classical economics simply labels as "anomalies". I tend to think the socialization aspect is an admonition that markets don't always work best when humans are at their most emotional/least rational.
Most people excluding the most ardent anarcho-capitalists recognize there are times when a completely free market doesn't serve the best interest of society (e.g., healthcare, monopolies). Sometimes I think people get it inverted and think society serves the market and not the other way around.
Say you have a startup in California and are thinking about hiring me remotely. It's completely ridiculous that you say "Okay I'll give you $100k if you live in NYC, but only $60k for the same work if you live in the Rust Belt." If it makes economic sense for you to pay me $100k, making that conditional on where I live is just a jerk move. As someone who actually does live in the Rust Belt, it feels like these tech c…
Using PHP presumably... there's your salary rate problem.
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> not a marketplace failure. Remove the subsidies and the market would quickly find the higher price at which dairy farmers could produce milk profitably and consumers would purchase it. If it is in our societal interest to produce more milk so people can eat, and the market doesn't do so, requiring subsidy, then that is a failure of the market to meet society's need. You're conflating the failure of a marketplace to…
I think there is another angle here too which is whether or not milk should be a staple. The market could function properly. It would mean people drink less cows milk and more other milk substitutes which could be good for everyone in the long run.
Say you have a startup in California and are thinking about hiring me remotely. It's completely ridiculous that you say "Okay I'll give you $100k if you live in NYC, but only $60k for the same work if you live in the Rust Belt." If it makes economic sense for you to pay me $100k, making that conditional on where I live is just a jerk move. As someone who actually does live in the Rust Belt, it feels like these tech c…
For one thing, if you give your employer a wildly wrong address (i.e. different state), your taxes will end up pretty screwed up. Your example could possibly work for NYC vs. upstate, middle-of-nowhere NY, though.
But you'll file in your real state of residence, and the other state will then insist you owe them taxes because your employer reported you were working there.
That could be an awkward conversation since a W-4 has this above your signature: "Under penalties of perjury, I declare that this certificate, to the best of my knowledge and belief, is true, correct, and complete."
Definitely consult a tax attorney before you try anything like this.
> 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…
So, what exactly are you saying then? Should there be checks in place to ensure salary negotiations between an employer and employee be treated differently than two big companies hashing out milk prices or not?
If not that would certainly be a very naive position which gets increasingly problematic, quickly, the more lopsided negotiation power and money is distributed between the two parties. A human centric society has to provide checks for that. An understanding of what we want can for example be driven by articles such as the one linked and is instrumental to the process.