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Why is remote work seen as a gift?

cdoyle.me

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Re: Why is remote work seen as a gift?

#301

Post by vladvasiliu »

ejb999 wrote: post #254
CalRobert wrote: post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know if it matters but I have a limited company and am an employee of said company, which means I deal with taxes on my own and can perform work for (almost) any company in the world - I just invoice them like any supplier. Maybe this is the future? Though some companies would rather you were their employee I suppose.

I think an awful lot of employers would prefer you were a contractor; in the USA at least, it is the IRS/government that prevents this from happening more by putting the fear into said employers that they will be fined and forced to pay back taxes for anyone improperly classifying people as contractors when they are in fact employees.

Are contractors taxed less than companies in the US?

In France, companies also like to contract out a lot, either to "freelance" or regular outsourcing shops.

The reason I put freelance in quotes is that there's no such thing here, legally. You have to have some form of company, through which you invoice the client.

But then, whenever you want to get the money out of the company to pay rent and eat, you'll be hit by, more or less, the same taxes the employer would pay. For a given unit of work, it's not cheaper to contract out, there's no real tax loophole.

As far as I know, the state doesn't really care. It may even prefer it, since contractor rates are usually higher than salaries, so they get to get more tax.

The only situation where it would crack down on this is if the would-be employee complained. Since this is considered a "precarious" arrangement, if the contractor can prove that they're basically an outsourced employee, they can ask to be converted to an actual employee and the state will back them up.

Re: Why is remote work seen as a gift?

#302

Post by jen20 »

newaccount74 wrote: post #148

When you are in the office, the company has almost all your attention. There is almost nothing to distract you from work. When you are at home, there are a million things to distract you. There's laundry that needs to be done, the kitchen cleaned, kids that want to play, there's a full fridge with stuff to make a sandwich, a TV that you can turn on, etc. When you are forced to go to the office, you are forced to take…

> There is almost nothing to distract you from work.

Have you ever actually… seen an office?

Re: Why is remote work seen as a gift?

#306

Post by antisthenes »

senttoschool wrote: post #150
tluyben2 wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Many managers are not very good and mostly believe managing means flogging the herd to work harder; that’s not really possible remotely.

Many individual contributors are not very good and mostly overrate their own ability to be productive while working from home.

True, but the last 4 words of your statement are irrelevant.

Re: Why is remote work seen as a gift?

#307

Post by monkeynotes »

PragmaticPulp wrote: post #284
MrGilbert wrote: post #25

I find it kind of amusing (and annoying) that employers like to play the salaray game as it fits their needs. I got interviewed a few times, and some stated that they cannot pay the salary I was asking, because i don't live in a high-density, high-cost-for-living area, while others argued that they have to respect their local salaries, which are below what I would expect in my area. I'm yet to meet the employer that…

> What annoys me the most is that there are still companies out there stating that remote is "complicated". It's different, and you need to adjust your processes, but it's not "complicated". I’ve worked remote and managed remote teams for a long time. I would say it is indeed more complicated. You may not struggle with remote work and may do fine interacting remotely, but that’s not true for a lot of people. It’s ver…

It isn't more complicated, it is just different. Here, let me hire for an office instead...

"You may not struggle with office work and may do fine interacting in person, but that’s not true for a lot of people."

I have people who do far better at home than in the office, and some on the other end of the spectrum. People come in all sorts of shapes and sizes and finding the right people is the same challenge regardless.

What is hard is tooling and setting up processes that work for remote people. The world is at the start of figuring that out at scale and there is lots to learn. But hiring is always going to be the same game, finding the right people for the role and its requirements.

If I were hiring for an oil rigger it would not be more complex than hiring for a great developer. It will definitely be different, but all recruitment is different and sees different challenges. But it's always going to be about knowing what to ask, knowing your industry, and doing your very best to find a process that selects fairly and efficiently. Remote work hiring is just a different challenge that we are all just getting used to. People are hard problems to solve.

Re: Why is remote work seen as a gift?

#308

Post by elteto »

ericmay wrote: post #220
franciscop wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While it is true, the best you can do is vote with your feet. I have had the situation where I was offered "locally competitive salaries" (not in the USA though), and every time I've rejected it I had a 50%-100% better offer within few weeks . There ARE companies that will pay better and independently of your location, you do need to be good though (as in companies are proactively seeking you out) and keep searching.…

I’m really surprised that nobody has set up address as a service yet so that you can claim for example to live in New York by virtue of an address auto command “a New York salary”.

And then pay New York taxes? And possibly NYC too?

Re: Why is remote work seen as a gift?

#309

Post by kitsunesoba »

lbriner wrote: post #163

I wish people would stop posting articles that imply that remote working is somehow objectively better when it has already been made more than clear that it doesn't work well for everyone. I really miss the contact from the office but since most people don't go in any more, it is not worth much of my time to travel there. Yes, we employ some people fully remotely, which is fine because that's what we knew at the time…

After having worked remotely since the beginning of the pandemic, I’d say that I’m not totally against working in the office but I am going to avoid it if there’s any significant commute whatsoever. If I could arrive with a mere 10-20 minute walk, it wouldn’t be so bad and I could maybe even see opting into being there at least part time. My patience for commuting is gone though.

Re: Why is remote work seen as a gift?

#310

Post by claudiawerner »

mejutoco wrote: post #157
dontlaugh wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you actually read Marx? If you haven't, I recommend you start with https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1865/value-price... . It'll clarify much of your confusion on basic economics.

IMO OP is right on the money with the labor theory of value. If the value is what offer and demand agree on, exploitation disappears, in Marx's theoretical model. While I am not an expert, I remember reading about it on "The Classical School: The Turbulent Birth of Economics in Twenty Extraordinary Lives", by Callum Williams. It made sense to me. https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/49374783 While linking to the so…

>If the value is what offer and demand agree on, exploitation disappears, in Marx's theoretical model.

This is not true; Marx's model of exploitation (known to modern economists as the Profit-Exploitation Correspondence Model (PECP)) does not concern itself with what demand and offer agree on within a labor negotiation. Marx says that workers do not sell their labor, they sell their labor-time (e.g. X units of time/goods) during which they exercise their labor-power. The discrepancy between the value of the time and the value produced during that time is where this 'exploitation' comes in.

The idea that exploitation is a matter of opinion or agreement adds a moral or justicial spin to what Marx considered to be a fact of the capitalist economy. Whether the people involved are happy with the situation or agree to it does not change this discrepancy of value or its representation in money.

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