Companies to publish salary ranges in job adverts under new EU rules • Hacker News Board

Re: Companies to publish salary ranges in job adverts under new EU rules

#171

Post by qwytw » Thu, Mar 23, 2023, 11:10 AM UTC

piva00 wrote: post #144

ExoticPearTree wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Equality is a socialist fairytale and unions is what keeps innovation from happening. All they want is for all workers to earn the same wage because equality and other BS like this, stifle the company from firing people when they're not needed anymore and so on. As an employee you need to be able to earn as much as possible and climb the ladder as high as possible with no impediments to this. And yes, be the next tec…

"When education isn't liberating, the dream of the oppressed is to become the oppressor" fits really well with your comment. If unions keep innovation from happening how can Sweden be considered one of the most innovative countries on Earth? Or how can Germany be a powerhouse of engineering and building the machines that build machines? Your take is a regurgitation of the usual talking points that the elite class use…

High skilled workers in Sweden and Germany and severely underpaid compared to their US counterparts? So either they suddenly become much more productive after moving the US, they are subsidizing their less skilled colleagues or most of that surplus is going to their employers instead?

Probably a bit of each depending on the location/sector/etc.. However Sweden in particular has one of the highest levels of wealth inequality in the word (even a bit higher than the US)...

Re: Companies to publish salary ranges in job adverts under new EU rules

#172

Post by qwytw » Thu, Mar 23, 2023, 11:12 AM UTC

ohgodplsno wrote: post #151

ExoticPearTree wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Equality is a socialist fairytale and unions is what keeps innovation from happening. All they want is for all workers to earn the same wage because equality and other BS like this, stifle the company from firing people when they're not needed anymore and so on. As an employee you need to be able to earn as much as possible and climb the ladder as high as possible with no impediments to this. And yes, be the next tec…

Dear god what an indictement of your school system this comment is. >All they want is for all workers to earn the same wage because equality and other BS like this No, what they want is for all workers _of the same job_ to earn a fair wage, at the very least. Not a single time has a union prevented people from having a higher wage than their colleagues. >stifle the company from firing people when they're not needed a…

> people from having a higher wage than their colleagues

That's not really true though is it? I mean unless you assume companies have an infinite amount of income to distribute...

Re: Companies to publish salary ranges in job adverts under new EU rules

#173

Post by tfourb » Thu, Mar 23, 2023, 11:12 AM UTC

qwytw wrote: post #168

tfourb wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unions are the best way known to man that allows the re-distribution of profits from a small upper class (largely anointed by luck and/or heritage) to a broad segment of society. This in turn enables broad segments of society to give their children a decent education, which is the pre-requisite for society-scale innovation and (technological and social) progress. The U.S. has long profited from being able to leverage…

> Unions are the best way known to man that allows the re-distribution of profits from a small upper class Wealth inequality is still huge in Scandinavia (especially Sweden which is even worse than the US in that regard), Germany and the Benelux (especially when compared to many other European countries which might not have very strong unions..). So unions didn't really help that much with that...

I can't speak for other countries because I never looked at the data but in Germany, increasing wealth inequality correlates with decreasing union membership in recent decades while the big and broadly distributed wealth gains of the post-war era correlated with historically high levels of union memberships. Intuitively it would make sense that rising income inequality is the result of too little unionization, not too much or it being irrelevant.

Also, there is plenty of actual research that backs this up, i.e.:

- https://www.epi.org/publication/unions-help-reduce-dispariti...

Re: Companies to publish salary ranges in job adverts under new EU rules

#174

Post by Silhouette » Thu, Mar 23, 2023, 11:13 AM UTC

ExoticPearTree wrote: post #136

piva00 wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And I've seen what solidarity (without the scary quotes) did to Sweden (and other Nordics), Germany, etc. as societies for the working class. A union is not a guild, it's not about creating barriers of entry like in law or medicine, unsure why you conflate those concepts. Perhaps it's from ignorance, or perhaps from the fears that the ruling class instilled into you.

Equality is a socialist fairytale and unions is what keeps innovation from happening. All they want is for all workers to earn the same wage because equality and other BS like this, stifle the company from firing people when they're not needed anymore and so on. As an employee you need to be able to earn as much as possible and climb the ladder as high as possible with no impediments to this. And yes, be the next tec…

That's why technology leapfrogged all other domains, because it was free to innovate at a crazy pace.

The most financially successful innovations in US tech this century have arguably been business models based on venture capital and barely regulated corporations achieving monopoly/oligopoly levels of control and engaging in exploitative behaviours at a larger scale than ever before. Is that really the kind of free market, light regulation economics to be proud of?

Re: Companies to publish salary ranges in job adverts under new EU rules

#175

Post by pasquinelli » Thu, Mar 23, 2023, 11:23 AM UTC

ExoticPearTree wrote: post #136

piva00 wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And I've seen what solidarity (without the scary quotes) did to Sweden (and other Nordics), Germany, etc. as societies for the working class. A union is not a guild, it's not about creating barriers of entry like in law or medicine, unsure why you conflate those concepts. Perhaps it's from ignorance, or perhaps from the fears that the ruling class instilled into you.

Equality is a socialist fairytale and unions is what keeps innovation from happening. All they want is for all workers to earn the same wage because equality and other BS like this, stifle the company from firing people when they're not needed anymore and so on. As an employee you need to be able to earn as much as possible and climb the ladder as high as possible with no impediments to this. And yes, be the next tec…

> That's why technology leapfrogged all other domains, because it was free to innovate at a crazy pace.

i have a lot of questions. what do you mean by technology and what are the other domains? when did technology leapfrog those other domains? what are technology's innovations with respect to those other domains? why was technology free to innovate so fast? why were other domains not?

at a very basic level, the tech sector advancing must corrispond to advances in other sectors because tech only advances by advancing other sectors. if it doesn't advance other sectors of the economy, then it's just a waste of time and energy, which is a fair characterization of the tech sector for the last couple decades. in contrast, the advancement of tech happening now is nothing compared to the 1920s to the 1940s, when unions were a lot bigger in the united states.

not that that has anything to do with it. in truth technological breakthroughs happen every once in a while, take several decades to be fully exploited, after which point there's no real development for who knows how long until the next breakthrough happens, and it doesn't really make a difference (for technological development) how work is organized.

Re: Companies to publish salary ranges in job adverts under new EU rules

#176

Post by thomascarney » Thu, Mar 23, 2023, 11:24 AM UTC

tfourb wrote: post #154

roenxi wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If we're going to copy the Nordics, someone is going to have to start by translating their laws into English so we know what it is they are actually doing. I don't like arguing based on what they are hypothetically doing and I don't think many of the people pointing at them as an example know either. They're tiny, homogeneous and Norway has obscene oil wealth. It isn't obvious we can copy them piecemeal, even if it d…

Salaries in Germany (and other European countries) are lower than in the US because German citizens receive a lot of benefits through government budgets that US citizens can only dream of. healthcare, essentially free higher education on a level easily comparable to most U.S. universities, better quality primary and secondary education, free or low cost (depending on the state) childcare from age 2-3, comparatively d…

We have get healthcare, disability pensions, pensions and care via insurance in Germany. They aren't provided via government budgets.

If you earn enough or you are self employed, you can in some case opt out of the public insurances, and get private insurance.

Re: Companies to publish salary ranges in job adverts under new EU rules

#177

Post by qwytw » Thu, Mar 23, 2023, 11:25 AM UTC

ktosobcy wrote: post #165

th13row wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unelected bureaucrats who think they are above the citizens, too much reach, too much influence, insistence in regulating every industry and every activity. This can only end in a can a cashless mass-surveillance social credit system dystopia even worse than China. Give it a few years.

Give me a break. Parlimant is elected directly, commission is made of PMs of the member states government, that were also elected. If feels like hearing Brits touting those 'unelected bureaucrats' while at the same time having unelected PM and house of Lords... no voting system is perfect nor the EU is perfect but this is one of the dumbest arguments there. As for policies - they are quite often very pro-citizen and…

I definitely agree that in balance the EU has been greatly beneficial but let's not get overoptimistic...

> Parliament is elected directly

The institution is a joke with no real power compared to national parliaments. They don't get to appoint the government, can't propose legislation etc. basically they just rubber-stamp anything which is brought by the commission by them. Barely any anywhere takes the EU elections seriously.

> made of PMs of the member states government

PMs? National governments can appoint anyone they want and often use it as a way to reward their buddies with a very cushy job (with close to zero political accountability) for a few years. Or to get someone influential/popular/etc. but whom the government finds dangerous from the country for a few years.

The process for picking ("electing") a commission president is a bit different but perfectly illustrates my point. They just appointed the most incompetent high ranking politician they could find in Germany...

> unelected PM

Just like the head of government in every single non-presidential country in Europe (Germany, Netherlands, Italy, Sweden, Spain, Austria etc... (the only excpetion is France). Anyway be any objective metric this is more democratic than the EU government.

> and house of Lords.

I agree. But it's an anachronistic and a powerless institution. Basically a retirement program for retired influential politicians...

Re: Companies to publish salary ranges in job adverts under new EU rules

#178

Post by qwytw » Thu, Mar 23, 2023, 11:27 AM UTC

elric wrote: post #143

adrianN wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Health insurance" is not a benefit in any EU country that I know of. Are there any EU countries where health insurance is as messed up as in the US?

Literally every EU country has health insurance as a benefit. This is on top of the default healthcare provided by the country in question. Depending on the insurance, it can get you things such as private hospital rooms, dental plans, better eyecare, payment plans, or even extra income guarantees if you're unable to work.

> Literally every EU country has health insurance as a benefit

Well while private insurance is obviously available everywhere in some/many(?) countries employers only provide it for a very small proportion of workers.

Re: Companies to publish salary ranges in job adverts under new EU rules

#179

Post by ivanovb » Thu, Mar 23, 2023, 11:29 AM UTC

compmanager1234 wrote: post #70

Having worked at just-below-FAANG companies with a surely above average oversight on how compensation strategy works, let me summarize my experience: We, as a company already know how much our competitors pay for a given role as everyone in the industry is buying and selling statistical data on their compensation structure through 3rd party agencies. Therefore, we can and do intentionally target, which salary band ou…

> You have absolutely no way to negotiate your base salary above the band which was already known when we created the position

I don't actually want to negotiate the base salary, but I want to know before hand if all the time invested in interviews and the risk taken when switching jobs is worth it for me.

> You should care about your total compensation anyway and neither cash bonus, nor equity is covered in the disclosure, although especially for senior positions, those are very substantial part of your compensation.

No, because equity and all the other benefits besides the base salary are most of the time at the company's whim - I might or not receive them and I'll have only the freedom to choose between options offered by the company, not real freedom.

Re: Companies to publish salary ranges in job adverts under new EU rules

#180

Post by PeterisP » Thu, Mar 23, 2023, 11:35 AM UTC

elric wrote: post #81

kalnins wrote: post #68

There is an interesting side effect here. Salaries throughout EU vary a lot. This will give people chance to better understand the salary differences between countries.

I doubt it. It'll be apples and oranges. Can't even compare salaries between companies in many countries because a salary isn't expressed as a single amount. It's a combination of some gross periodic amount, a random collection of benefits which differs from employer to employer, and even "the same" benefits can have radically different values (e.g. health insurance from provider A instead of provider B). There's no…

While that's technically true also in EU, the salaries are quite directly comparable, because these benefits are a much smaller portion of total compensation than in USA, as the difference between e.g. no employer-provided health insurance and very good extra health insurance is simply not that much money in EU, and also because similar job roles offer a roughly similar level of benefits.

Like, if I'm comparing two offers, the difference in money value of the benefits provided by the best offer and the worst offer (let's assume that apart from some fancy words they're really providing the bare minimum required by EU law) is going to be at most something like 10% of the compensation - but the difference in offered salary may easily be much, much more than that.

Sure, things like performance-determined pay/bonuses may be a big part of the total compensation in some areas (e.g. sales) but not as much as in USA, and benefits even less so; in EU market generally the contracted amount is not that far from the total compensation.