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Twitter Layoff Started Today

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Re: Twitter Layoff Started Today

#221

Post by _puk »

jmathai wrote: post #67
schnebbau wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess they'll have to lower their cost of living like the rest of us?

I don't understand the hate towards high cost of living areas. Making a few $100k in a HCOL area is similar to making $100k in a LCOL area. You don't live like a king if both your income AND expenses are higher. Both people in this example have a lot more in common than I'm reading into from your comments.

Having lived in both, the thing that got me is that if you're left with 20% after you've paid for everything that month.. that's an awful lot more left over in a HCOL area.

But then everything seems geared towards parting you from that remaining 20% wherever you live :)

I do feel for those laid off, not everyone being laid off will have managed to maneuver themselves into the ideal position over their time at Twitter.

Re: Twitter Layoff Started Today

#222

Post by throwaway5959 »

leetrout wrote: post #165
throwaway5959 wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seriously. I wouldn’t be surprised if the lowest total comp was in excess of $200k/year. If you can’t have 6 months in cash sitting in a high yield savings account on that, there’s no amount of severance that will help you.

What "high yield savings accounts"?? I dont know of any over 2%

Those are high yield relative to most savings accounts at the big banks.

Re: Twitter Layoff Started Today

#223

Post by abeppu »

janstenpickle wrote: post #89
stocknoob wrote: post #2

“ many of these folks won’t be able to sell the shares they earned. The money they need pay bills and keep them afloat if and until they get new employment. When severance ends, that’s it.” It’s Twitter’s responsibility to not only offer severance, but make sure employees keep an emergency fund?

> It’s Twitter’s responsibility to not only offer severance, but make sure employees keep an emergency fund? Where's Twitter's emergency fund?

Well, founded in 2006, they went public in 2013 when they weren't yet profitable, and finally had their first profitable year in 2018. Musk is paying a meaningful premium. So it seems like they've actually had a pretty good run of getting everyone else to be their emergency fund.

Re: Twitter Layoff Started Today

#224

Post by thrown321 »

sokoloff wrote: post #149
notch656a wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would think someone would be happy to lend you the number of shares you have blacked out for a large fee, with a contract you release that to the lender afterwards. Something like "we lend you 75% face of your blackout shares now, in return we get all your blackout shares when they're released." Edit: Per below comment, don't do this :)

Most of these anti-insider trading policies prevent all of the obvious "one clever tricks" by prohibiting entering into options contracts, lending, borrowing, shorting, executing futures transactions, etc. If you could find someone to lend you cash (based on the totality of your financial situation and personal credit), that's fine. It's not fine to borrow someone else's shares and short them during a blackout.

Regular folks are not insiders. You can certainly pledge collateral for a loan.

Re: Twitter Layoff Started Today

#225

Post by least »

ProfessorLayton wrote: post #211
least wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are highly educated, highly compensated, and highly privileged folk considered working class now? Financial literacy is something that desperately needs to be part of the curriculum in high school and I can empathize with people that will struggle as a result of their layoffs even if it's due to their own money mismanagement, but software engineers being laid off from a tech giant are definitely not working class in…

If someone needs to work to make ends meet, then yes they're working class. The capitalist class are those that make their income from the labor of others (The working class).

A person developing software definitionally isn't part of the proletariat or working class, they'd be defined as petite bourgeoisie. Your definition does not make sense in the archaic marxist sense nor does it represent the connotative definition of working class that is more representative of class structure in the world we're currently living in.

Re: Twitter Layoff Started Today

#226

Post by thrown321 »

stocknoob wrote: post #113
falcolas wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let's pretend some of these SF twitter employees have families. $4k in rent monthly, 4k in general living expenses (these are based off median figures available publicly) A bit over $96k in living costs. Assuming that $200k in total comp includes about 25% in stock (based off publicly reported comp packages for twitter employees), and a combined state/federal 35% tax rate... They have no spare money to save without a…

Yes, because income tax brackets aren’t progressive (all the income is taxed at 35%, and no standard deduction). People should definitely live a lifestyle with no slack for savings. It’s fault I couldn’t save anything with 3.5x the median household income.

You should look at it the SF Bay Area affordable housing income requirements. You’d be surprised how many tech families qualify.

Re: Twitter Layoff Started Today

#227

Post by thrown321 »

projectazorian wrote: post #162
falcolas wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let's pretend some of these SF twitter employees have families. $4k in rent monthly, 4k in general living expenses (these are based off median figures available publicly) A bit over $96k in living costs. Assuming that $200k in total comp includes about 25% in stock (based off publicly reported comp packages for twitter employees), and a combined state/federal 35% tax rate... They have no spare money to save without a…

It's a sad commentary that when the prospect of someone facing economic hardship comes up, many peoples' first thought is "but did they deserve it?"

No post body was provided.

Re: Twitter Layoff Started Today

#228

Post by twblalock »

jrockway wrote: post #148
jpollock wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Many people are extended enough that their stock is considered part of their compensation for buying a house. I know many people that sell all of their stock every month to make sure they have enough to live in the Bay Area. What's the mortgage on a USD$2m 1300sqft house? Looks to be $11k/mo? So, total comp should be at least US$400k to be considered affordable. Using South Bay, I don't know where a Twitter engineer…

I used to get paid in stock. I had a plan on file to auto-sell it every month, and then I reinvested the proceeds so I had less financial exposure to my employer. The exact scenario is if the company stops doing well, then your job is going to go away at the same time the stock becomes worth $0. The other side of the coin is that you pay significantly less taxes if you hold on to the vested shares. They increase in v…

> The other side of the coin is that you pay significantly less taxes if you hold on to the vested shares. They increase in value after vesting, and you structure your sales such that you take a long term capital gain. A lot of my coworkers did that, and have a lot more money than me. But it's a gamble, and you should always weigh your gambles by how badly you can afford to do.

This depends on how the stock plan is structured.

For example, with RSUs, you pay income tax on the value of the RSUs whether you sell them or not and some companies do that tax withholding for you. The value of the RSUs on the vesting date becomes your basis. When you sell the shares is when capital gains taxes come in -- on gains above the amount they vested at.

So, there is not a tax penalty to selling RSUs the day they vest and reinvesting them -- you have to pay the income tax whether you sell them or not. If you decide not to sell them, then you do benefit from holding them long enough to make the capital gains long term gains -- but with the risk of having a lot of your eggs in one basket.

With options it can be very different based on the type of options.

Re: Twitter Layoff Started Today

#229

Post by thrown321 »

abeppu wrote: post #208
throwaway5959 wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seriously. I wouldn’t be surprised if the lowest total comp was in excess of $200k/year. If you can’t have 6 months in cash sitting in a high yield savings account on that, there’s no amount of severance that will help you.

You and a bunch of others in the thread are starting from the presumption that these people were very well compensated. But we don't have to make _only_ assumptions, you can look up some perhaps stale and perhaps biased self-reported numbers. The most convenient of these to access for recruiters at twitter (who seem to be the ones impacted) guess a median compensation of 137K, with around 94k of that as base. I think…

h1binfo will capture prevailing wages.

Re: Twitter Layoff Started Today

#230

Post by kuramitropolis »

notch656a wrote: post #119
actually_a_dog wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course it is, if you're not taking anything with you. I moved thousands of miles for $0 once, because everything I was taking fit in a suitcase that I already owned, and my flight was paid for by the company I was moving to work for. I'm talking about people who have to move apartments, and possibly families. You aren't doing that for $20.

Only 16% of SF is families with children, so that's not really representative of someone living there.

What % of Twitter? (not being facetious, honest question)
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