Still paying according to location for the same work?
Incredibly naive to assume that in the knowledge industry, you can compare two people's work.
How do you measure this?
Gitlab and remote work
51–60 of 214 posts
Re: Gitlab and remote work
#52Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Why shouldn't payment for work be tied to local price ranges and cost of living? Why should it be? You pay someone enough to get them to work for you instead of someone else. That's the sole reason you pay someone anything at all. And there's no reason to pay them any more than that. How do local prices and cost of living fit into that equation?
Presumably GitLab will stop using local prices and cost of living when continuing to use them gets in the way of hiring developers they'd like to hire. As of now, it seems that it's working for them. If we enter a world where most SWEs work remotely and few other companies are paying location-based, we might see GitLab change their tune. For now, they're competing first and foremost against local jobs.
> For now, they're competing first and foremost against local jobs.
'We keep up with mediocre local jobs' is hardly 'world leader' is it?
Re: Gitlab and remote work
#53Still paying according to location for the same work?
Isn't that Capitalism 101 ? If employees are happy, company is happy, why does it matter ? Why should a company worry about pleasing everyone who is not necessarily part of them. If someone likes what Gitlab does, applies there and gets the salary they want, what's the issue ? If they don't like Gitlab's offer because someone else in a HCOL area may get more, you are essentially comparing with someone else. Not a good idea.
Re: Gitlab and remote work
#54Still paying according to location for the same work?
I saw a list of companies that paid the same regardless of location. There were even a few bay area companies that didn't cut your pay when you moved away, I wish I had that handy.
Can you name a few who will pay a Senior Software Engineer the same salary in Bay Area vs say Bangalore, India ? I am curious.
Re: Gitlab and remote work
#55Earlier quoted context omitted.
Presumably GitLab will stop using local prices and cost of living when continuing to use them gets in the way of hiring developers they'd like to hire. As of now, it seems that it's working for them. If we enter a world where most SWEs work remotely and few other companies are paying location-based, we might see GitLab change their tune. For now, they're competing first and foremost against local jobs.
Yes, but that is not a company that should be praised as world leader in remote work. How do you expect to ever raise the standard of living in poor countries if you exploit their labor for pennies on the dollar. No different from apple and other who move manufacturing to cheap labor. A real leader in remote work would try to be a part of the solution, not actively fight against it.
Just because a company may not pay salaries compared to say Bay Area, doesn't mean they are not paying great salary for your location. It is a stretch to say that they are exploiting labor for pennies if they are paying a good market rate salary for the area they are hiring in.
Re: Gitlab and remote work
#56Earlier quoted context omitted.
Who would you consider to be operationally and culturally superior in regards to remote work than Gitlab? Asking sincerely, because Gitlab is one of the first brands I think of when people mention "remote first culture".
Kraken has a few thousand employees, has been a remote first company for a decade, and pays the same no matter where you live.
Isn't Kraken part of the crypto game? Not sure they can be compared to more mature businesses. Are they paying their employees in tokens?
Re: Gitlab and remote work
#57Earlier quoted context omitted.
That doesn’t make sense? Just like universal pay doesn’t make sense unless there is a universal cost to everything.
It makes sense relative to actual world leaders in tech that do not adjust pay based on location.
Why should the definition of "World Leader in Remote" be based on how they pay. Why can't it be based on the fact that they allow fully remote and pay reasonably well for your area. Who decides the definition ?
Re: Gitlab and remote work
#58Earlier quoted context omitted.
I saw a list of companies that paid the same regardless of location. There were even a few bay area companies that didn't cut your pay when you moved away, I wish I had that handy.
Can you name a few who will pay a Senior Software Engineer the same salary in Bay Area vs say Bangalore, India ? I am curious.
Just a few months ago this[0] jobs platform for exactly that - remote, location-independent salary - was discussed on HN [1].
[0] https://remotewide.co/ [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31225138
Re: Gitlab and remote work
#59Still paying according to location for the same work?
What I don't get is: why would they pay more for someone from San Francisco? I'd expect the incentive to be to indeed pay the same for the same work, but that pay would be the lowest they can get away with. (i.e. I wouldn't expect that to lead to Silicon Valley salaries all over the world.)
Unless it's not actually the same work, and location affects work. It does at least affect gross pay in any case, I suppose.
Re: Gitlab and remote work
#60Still paying according to location for the same work?
Isn't that Capitalism 101 ? If employees are happy, company is happy, why does it matter ? Why should a company worry about pleasing everyone who is not necessarily part of them. If someone likes what Gitlab does, applies there and gets the salary they want, what's the issue ? If they don't like Gitlab's offer because someone else in a HCOL area may get more, you are essentially comparing with someone else. Not a goo…
It's because talking about your salary is so widely taboo that you may think your rate of $40k salary is good because it's comfortable in your area, but most chances are you don't realize that your co-worker who has the same skill level and workload is getting paid $80k and that's a good way to piss off your employees.
Pay for skills not for cost of living. You hire someone for what they can bring to the table not how much you can profit off them.