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Layoffs Don't Work

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Re: Layoffs Don't Work

#721

Post by screye »

modo_mario wrote: post #686
screye wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Has to do with H1b visas. Post layoff, a person on H1B has 2 months to sign a new job offer or they must leave the country. Majority of Indian and Chinese H1bs do not have green cards, and are the main group that suffers. Some of these folks are well into their 30s, with kids and houses in the US.

I'm kind of curious how they have houses in the US. I'm from Europe but I would have kind of assumed that banks aren't willing to lend to someone without residency pinned down or would only do so at extortionate rates. I also kind of assume most wouldn't be able to pay for a house outright.

In the US, it's common for folks to sell a house with a partially paid loan. Makes real-estate a liquid asset and that reduces risk. Further, it's low risk for the bank because they can always repossess the house if something goes wrong. A resident who falls on hard times can missa lot of payments before repossession can be forced. An H1b on hard times has 2 months to leave the country. This means at worst, they'll miss 1 payment before they're forced to sell the house. Much lower risk for the bank.

If you pay your monthly installments and have solid financial health (good credit score, high income, paid your taxes) then you'll get a standard deal. H1b Indians are on 30-50 yr queues for green card. Buying houses without residency is the norm, not the exception.

Re: Layoffs Don't Work

#722

Post by rincebrain »

int_19h wrote: post #517
giantg2 wrote: post #493

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yep. The subliminal message I'm getting from my current managers is that I should just be a good little disabled person and work as a Walmart greeter. It's turning into harassment at this point. Just all sorts of BS. Like telling me they are doing so much for me, when my ADA accommodation is weekly 1-on-1s with the manager and my tech lead. Is that really a lot? There are people without disabilities getting weekly 1-…

A weekly or bi-weekly 1:1 with your manager has been the standard arrangement in my last two jobs.

I suspect that the difference is a lot of managers end up so overcommitted that they can't handle 1:1s with all their direct reports.

Of course, that's its own problem, but particularly in places where it's hard to get headcount, the management structures get wider and wider...

Re: Layoffs Don't Work

#723

Post by Dylan16807 »

grandempire wrote: post #698
Dylan16807 wrote: post #650

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And the people that built your car and house had a say in how that process went. A rather big say.

Some did. Assembly line workers didn’t. Framers didn’t.

At that point we're begging the question by going too deep into the analogy and finding the original situation again. The point has still been made that working on something without ownership can be enough to justify a say.

And the framers might have a say, it depends on the company.

Re: Layoffs Don't Work

#724

Post by ike2792 »

Workaccount2 wrote: post #150

Real talk here, and I'm sorry for being "that guy" Why do tech workers get so wrapped around the axle of layoffs when most people are in a chronic state of tech job hopping? I know multiple people who have worked their entire career thus far without ever staying at a place for more than 3 or 4 years. Some no more than two. Tech job culture is practically a mono culture with "hop jobs" being a hallmark. From an employ…

I think job hopping happens for the same reasons layoffs do: short-term thinking on management's part. I've been an engineering manager for 8 years now and have observed that a) giving an external candidate a $10-15K bump during negotiations is fairly easy while b) giving that same bump to an existing employee is practically impossible. Engineers learn that moving every 2-4 years is the way to keep their salary growing, while the same companies that claim to not be able to pay them more happily dish out even more money to hire their replacements.

Re: Layoffs Don't Work

#725

Post by SR2Z »

gknoy wrote: post #714
SR2Z wrote: post #708

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> A livable wage in the geographic jurisdiction they are in. This is called the Iron Law of Wages. As its name implies, it's neither prescriptive nor pleasant - but it is guaranteed to be liveable. > Including stuff like transportation, healthcare, food, heat, housing, and insurance. The thing that trips people up is that the word "liveable" is a synonym for "subsistence," not "fullfilling." A wage that's only liveab…

The intention of "minimum wage" in the US is not merely subsistence level. FDR said, "by living wages, I mean more than a bare subsistence level-I mean the wages of decent living." [0] The "iron law of wages" is instead an economic principle that wages tend to trend downwards until people are paid the minimum possible for subsistence. It's not meant to be a goal. 0: http://docs.fdrlibrary.marist.edu/odnirast.html

There are ten million stated reasons for the minimum wage! Pretty much the only one that economists can agree on is that it's helpful to prevent abuses of monopsony power in small towns.

Regardless of what FDR said, a living wage is guaranteed because people will not accept anything lower.

The problem with a "decent" living is that reasonable people can disagree about what that looks like. Roommates? Children? An unemployed spouse? Vacations and retirement?

It's not the government's job to guarantee all of that stuff and I would rather we focus on stopping wage and tip theft and protecting the rights of workers (banning noncompetes, decoupling health insurance, etc.) instead of increasing the minimum wage towards some poorly-defined goal.

There's also the other side of the minimum wage debate, which is that most of the specific numbers people list as "liveable" do actually result in some folks losing their jobs and becoming unemployable. There was even a recent BERKELEY study that showed this!

Re: Layoffs Don't Work

#726

Post by eikenberry »

wilg wrote: post #536
eikenberry wrote: post #403

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If a company is bleeding revenue, it cannot sustain the overhead of employees. They have to go. No, they don't. During the dotcom bubble my company gave us 2 choices, layoffs or 20% pay cut. We took the latter. Everyone stayed and we had our pay back to previous levels in a couple years and the company remained profitable. You can, in fact, treat people as people and still run a company. > Employees feelings don't…

Surely there are some situations where a pay cut is insufficient because you would like to reorganize the company, for example to wind down an unprofitable initiative or division and there's not a reasonable way to maintain the same headcount?

I wasn't saying that there are never needs for layoffs, but these aren't the sorts of layoffs being discussed. Where that line is drawn can be a bit fuzzy in a few cases, but the for majority it is clear cut.

Re: Layoffs Don't Work

#727

Post by disgruntledphd2 »

mistercheph wrote: post #256
gruez wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Market makers make fractions of a percent per trade. How will your "penalty for higher frequency" deter traders that prey on "ignorance of other participants" or whatever, but don't put market makers out of business?

Easy, bye market makers! It's like a layoff, some good will end up getting culled with the bad.

Unfortunately, if you don't have people to make a market, it's not going to be a very good market for a bunch of important values of good.

Re: Layoffs Don't Work

#728

Post by grandempire »

Dylan16807 wrote: post #723
grandempire wrote: post #698

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some did. Assembly line workers didn’t. Framers didn’t.

At that point we're begging the question by going too deep into the analogy and finding the original situation again. The point has still been made that working on something without ownership can be enough to justify a say. And the framers might have a say, it depends on the company.

True, let’s simplify. The people who have a say are higher up managers who have been granted that power by the owners.

Re: Layoffs Don't Work

#729

Post by Dylan16807 »

grandempire wrote: post #728
Dylan16807 wrote: post #723

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At that point we're begging the question by going too deep into the analogy and finding the original situation again. The point has still been made that working on something without ownership can be enough to justify a say. And the framers might have a say, it depends on the company.

True, let’s simplify. The people who have a say are higher up managers who have been granted that power by the owners.

Are we discarding the analogy then? Okay.

The owner has a bunch of space and equipment they can grant power over, but that's only half a company. They don't naturally start with power over the employees.

Re: Layoffs Don't Work

#730

Post by milesrout »

kelnos wrote: post #711
milesrout wrote: post #672

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is no such thing as what minimum wage should be "fairly". What is the minimum amount you should be able to pay someone an hour? Surely it is the amount where if you didn't, someone else would pay them more. There are many people who do jobs worth much less than $32/hour. That min wage would just make them illegal to employ. >You can't go off mcdonalds sandwiches, and you can't use the economic indicators that i…

> There is no such thing as what minimum wage should be "fairly". Sure there is. It's the amount you have to pay someone such that they can work a reasonable amount of hours (40/week), such that they can afford all of life's essentials while having a little extra to save for a rainy day, as well as have a little fun. But certainly some people's poilitics ignore the human aspects of the world we live in, and think tha…

What are life's essentials? Do you have the right to a car? To one bedroom per child or should they share? Do you have the right to central heating so you can wear a tshirt indoors or should you be expected to wear a jersey in winter?

The minimum wage doesn't make anyone be paid more. It only causes anyone paid less than it to instead be paid $0, and instead be paid an unemployment benefit. How is that reasonable?

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