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Striking auto workers want a 40% pay increase–the same rate their CEOs’ pay grew

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441–450 of 611 posts

Re: Striking auto workers want a 40% pay increase–the same rate their CEOs’ pay grew

#441

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Supply and demand does not account for ... Yes, it does, in each scenario you presented. > We are free to change the perceived value of workers through the power of worker solidarity It's more like using the power of government to ensure the company has no alternative to the union. Company leaders have no actual power over the workers. They cannot force anyone to come to work. They cannot have you arrested. They ca…

Having control of money is power. A kind of power that everyone needs, and many workers (who are typically poorer than company leaders) don’t have secure access to.

Having skills someone with money needs is power, too.

Re: Striking auto workers want a 40% pay increase–the same rate their CEOs’ pay grew

#442
post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you're the CEO of a company and you increased profits by 92% Did you ? Attributing all the success a company achieves to the CEO feels shortsighted. Aside from anything else: if all these companies saw their profits grow by so much surely there’s an external commonality there? “The CEO did it all” would be slightly more plausible if only one company experienced that success.

Maybe. It could well just be the market and luck, but it could be the CEOs decision. On the other hand, it's never because the line workers just started working harder. Think about being an early engineer at Amazon vs the same at another startup that never went anywhere. Those engineers did the same amount of work, but the difference is that Jeff Bezos was telling the Amazon engineers what to build. BTW I'm not makin…

> Those engineers did the same amount of work, but the difference is that Jeff Bezos was telling the Amazon engineers what to build

Particularly at early stage startups engineers are often responsible for a ton of innovation. It’s rarely exclusively top down instruction. Same goes for pretty much every company I’ve ever worked at. The CEO is not making every decision and coming up with every idea.

Re: Striking auto workers want a 40% pay increase–the same rate their CEOs’ pay grew

#443

Whereabouts should we purchase land in Mexico? Needs to be near the new factories that'll go in next year.

Companies and individuals do not make decisions based on posturing or their pet peeves. If a company has not outsourced a plant already for cost savings there are reasons for still keeping that operation in the US.

If labor costs go up 40%, but only in the US factories, I don't see how that doesn't lead to more parts & assembly in Mexico, Canada, China, etc.

Re: Striking auto workers want a 40% pay increase–the same rate their CEOs’ pay grew

#444
post #26

There is an equation with an equilibrium: CEO's pay rate = (some multiplier) * median salaried worker's pay rate OR CEO's pay rate = (some multiplier) * minimum salaried worker's pay rate We've been conditioned to think it's not fair somehow, but the discrepancy is just....engorgingly terrible. I'm not arguing for how this metric would be enforced, only that it would be a good one to have. Especially in a time when g…

It's also been suggested that Congressional salaries be a fixed multiple of minimum wage, and for similar reasons. Honestly I think that would probably fix things a lot faster.

100% agree.

Serving in public choice should for duty, not a career.

Make a fixed salary. If you dont like it, get a job elsewhere just like everyone else.

And oh, you wont get qualified candidates - nonsense. We had a movie actor, a silver spoon heir, a community organizer, a real estate broker and a lifelong politician as presidents.

There's nothing in technical expertise that they have in common. They were just good orators with some charistma and a penchant to lie with a smile...on their face.

Oh, you are worried of a bribe? Good thing we have FEC disclosure forms etc. Make them audited every year. Have more bite. Increase sentences. Put bounties on whistleblowing. Then sit back and relax

Re: Striking auto workers want a 40% pay increase–the same rate their CEOs’ pay grew

#445

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There is no training to be a good CEO. They are not easily replaceable. If Steve Jobs—who first created and then basically rescued Apple and started it on the path to where it is today—can be 'replaced' then any other leader can be replaced. Similarly there are plenty of CEOs that are paid oodles of money that were or are absolute garbage: see Boeing for the last 15+ years as Exhibit A.

Steve was replaced with one of the greatest minds in Operations that history has ever known, and much of Apple's success under Steve was thanks to Tim. So Apple is not the best example if you're trying to show "CEOs don't matter."

> So Apple is not the best example if you're trying to show "CEOs don't matter."

I wasn't try to show that they don't matter, but that they are replaceable. And few companies need to have "the greatest mind in Operations that history has ever known" to function well.

Does Eli Lilly, Unitedheath, Johnson & Johnson, Procter & Gamble, Home Depot, Pepsico, Walmart, Coca Cola, Accenture, Intuit, Caterpillar, Lowes, Nike?

* https://www.slickcharts.com/sp500

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_S%26P_500_companies

Heaven knows that the last few CEOs of Boeing mattered as they have completely screwed the pooch and basically wrecked that company—all the while making a whole lot of money.

Re: Striking auto workers want a 40% pay increase–the same rate their CEOs’ pay grew

#446

40% over 4 years isn't as crazy (especially when you consider that they had some concessions back in '08). typical clickbait when you consider this is a high value for negotiation and they're likely looking for anywhere between 20-30% over 4 years when it's all said and done. barely above inflation YoY.

It’s not entirely on the media for using these headline numbers. The Unions like these numbers being used. It sounds better to their members that they’re getting a 40% pay rise.

> It sounds better to their members that they’re getting a 40% pay rise.

When they get it - right now every reports that they are asking for 40%

Re: Striking auto workers want a 40% pay increase–the same rate their CEOs’ pay grew

#447

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you underpay elected officials then 1. they just start taking bribes 2. only rich people will run in the election. This is why Singapore pays them even more than we do. Anyway, minimum wages (despite being ok policies) aren't what people are actually paid, and of course aren't especially what non-working people are paid. And remember that non-working people, namely children and the elderly, are poorer than workers…

America's GDP allocated per congressperson is like $50 billion each. Salaries wont fix bribes for someone with that much to command and even the already rich can make a lot of money getting into politics. Their salary means nothing to them.

You need to pay congressmen enough money so they can have upper middle class lifestyle - without that pressure to take bribes is dramatically higher. You have nice 5bdrm house in good school district and enough money for nice vacation + savings? Refusing bribes is easy - you are comfortable. Kids are taken care of. Wife does not have to work. This lifestyle requires 300-600k in DC.

You live in shitty 2bdrm apartment with wife and two kids in poor school district? With no savings and vacation? Your life is hell and you are that much more likely to take bribes.

It’s all about incentives.

Re: Striking auto workers want a 40% pay increase–the same rate their CEOs’ pay grew

#448
post #376

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For a fun thought experiment: If the CEO go on strike and don't come to work for a month, how many cars will not be built, and how money will the company lose? If the union factory workers go on strike and don't come to work for a month, how many cars will not be built, and how much money will the company lose? Therefore, who is actually more important to the earnings and success of the company?

That's not an interesting thought experiment at all. The workers in aggregate are clearly more valuable than the CEO alone. That's why their cumulative salary is way higher than the CEO's.

But why did the CEO's salary increase more than the workers?

To keep the equation in check, surely they need to increase at the same rate

Re: Striking auto workers want a 40% pay increase–the same rate their CEOs’ pay grew

#449
post #385

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There is no training to be a good CEO. They are not easily replaceable. If Steve Jobs—who first created and then basically rescued Apple and started it on the path to where it is today—can be 'replaced' then any other leader can be replaced. Similarly there are plenty of CEOs that are paid oodles of money that were or are absolute garbage: see Boeing for the last 15+ years as Exhibit A.

Steve Jobs is practically an example of WHY top CEOs get paid so much. Apple was basically in its death throes when he came back. A few years later they had the iPod. A few years after that the iPhone. When he died in 2011 they were well on their way to being the worlds most valuable publicly listed company. I do think a lot of CEOs are way overpaid. That said, if a couple hundred million package means the difference…

> Steve Jobs is practically an example of WHY top CEOs get paid so much.

Yes, I explicitly mentioned that: without Jobs AAPL would not be where it was today. But he was replaced.

If someone as instrumental as Jobs can be replaced then so can any CEO that is/was less instrumental.

And what other CEOs are / were as instrumental as Jobs? What other major companies need to have someone of that calibre?

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_S%26P_500_companies

> That said, if a couple hundred million package means the difference between a company folding and firing everyone, or being a multi-billion dollar business with thousands of employees, the math works out.

Now do the example of packages that cost millions of dollars and the CEOs wrecked the companies, like Boeing, or Enron, or WorldCom. Or Jack Welch's financial shenanigans at GE.

Re: Striking auto workers want a 40% pay increase–the same rate their CEOs’ pay grew

#450
post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Settle in for a wild propaganda-filled fall season > There is no reality where line workers screwing in the same 3 door bolts all day long are getting what amounts to an effective ~70% pay increase in one year. Please align your own comments. They are looking for a 40% hourly pay increase over 4 years, and a reduction to a 32 hour work week. These combined work out to an increase of 12% in annual pay, over four yea…

Ah, so the propaganda has already started. In four year's time, will their pay be 70% higher than it is today if all demands are met? Yes. Are you hopeful about a 70% pay increase in four years? I sure am not...

In one post you say 70% in a year, now you say 70% in 4, with respect to the first quoted post, this looks like walking back a failed attempt at propaganda.
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