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The boss who put everyone on 70K

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Re: The boss who put everyone on 70K

#111

Oh, that story. I remember it. A lot of the high-performers left shortly after that. It was all triggered by some lawsuit in the first place anyway. The "give everyone the same salary" was like a compromise to weaken the lawsuit while at the same time to make a positive impact on media.

Alfred Nobel started the prize because his obituary was accidentally published, putting him in a bad light and he wanted to be remembered differently - we benefit from this prize today, in spite of his destructive business activities. I think it's fair to mention the fact that it was due to Price being accused of overpaying himself that the situation got turned around to be something valuable for his company and staff. However, I don't think it's fair to vilify him in the present day and discredit the results.

Re: The boss who put everyone on 70K

#112
post #87
post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure where you’re going with the can’t buy crappy stuff anymore argument, from another perspective, most things built today are crappy Chinese junk compared to things built 70 years ago, if they existed 70 years ago. Mending and the art of repair has been forgotten by most - if your TV has an issue, you’re more likely to buy a new one than fix it, even if it’s possibly repairable for less than a couple hundred bu…

> [...] built today are crappy Chinese junk compared to things built 70 years ago, if they existed 70 years ago [...] Ignoring the big 'if': most goods today are better than what we had in 1950. Especially if you compare the quality of goods that required the median worker to work the same amount of hours. The 'junk' you talk about takes minutes of work to earn enough to buy. And most of the time, that's good enough.…

I mostly agree.

>cars need much less maintenance these days.

And, especially if you lived somewhere with snow and salt on the roads, they mostly lasted about 50K miles before they rusted out. Growing up, it was an unusual car that made it to 100K.

That said, minor repairs of otherwise functional gear can make sense. I'm generally in agreement on electronics. But I fairly commonly repair or have repaired hiking or camping gear for example that just needs some stitching to get back in working condition.

Re: The boss who put everyone on 70K

#114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't find any mention of technical staff having their salary slashed. The only mention of pay cuts is the one the CEO took. Would you mind sharing a source where this is stated?

> Would you mind sharing a source where this is stated? It’s in the title. ‘Everyone on 70k’ is a pay cut if you were in more than 70k, as any professional would be. It’s clearly wrong as it doesn’t make any sense, but that’s the source they were referring to.

> as any professional would be

Would call center staff, receptionists etc not be professionals (I.e. is there a use of the term I'm not aware of?). Is it people doing work requiring degrees?

Re: The boss who put everyone on 70K

#115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Would you mind sharing a source where this is stated? It’s in the title. ‘Everyone on 70k’ is a pay cut if you were in more than 70k, as any professional would be. It’s clearly wrong as it doesn’t make any sense, but that’s the source they were referring to.

> as any professional would be Would call center staff, receptionists etc not be professionals (I.e. is there a use of the term I'm not aware of?). Is it people doing work requiring degrees?

> Would call center staff, receptionists etc not be professionals

Are you just asking what a 'professional' is? As in you're not a native speaker?

The etymology is from 'someone who has professed vows' and traditionally means someone who's part of some kind of learned society. In the past it was classes like doctors, lawyers, religious ministers. Over the industrial revolution it began to include engineers. Engineers used to be part of learned societies (I am, as a software engineer), but now it's more relaxed in many places, with software engineering being at the extreme end of relaxed.

So not call centre staff, because that's not part of any learned society and are not part of a career that would traditionally have been so but has become more relaxed.

Wikipedia explains well https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Professional.

Are you confusing the term with just 'anyone who works for a living'? That's not what 'professional' means.

Re: The boss who put everyone on 70K

#116

Oh, that story. I remember it. A lot of the high-performers left shortly after that. It was all triggered by some lawsuit in the first place anyway. The "give everyone the same salary" was like a compromise to weaken the lawsuit while at the same time to make a positive impact on media.

Alfred Nobel started the prize because his obituary was accidentally published, putting him in a bad light and he wanted to be remembered differently - we benefit from this prize today, in spite of his destructive business activities. I think it's fair to mention the fact that it was due to Price being accused of overpaying himself that the situation got turned around to be something valuable for his company and staf…

[deleted]

Re: The boss who put everyone on 70K

#117
And what about that one employee that tend to work more than the others(every company have one of those, maybe it's you), do you find it fair for him to get the same salary as everybody ? why would you better yourself and be more productive only to get paid the same as everybody.

Re: The boss who put everyone on 70K

#119

I think it's important to mention some other sides of this story, namely that the raise came right around the time his brother filed a lawsuit for him overpaying himself and domestic abuse allegations. I don't remember the articles exactly but there were some rumors that this change was a PR stunt and shield for him Some articles that talk about the other side: https://www.bloomberg.com/features/2015-gravity-ceo-dan-…

Some of my favorites from the first article: “Gravity’s 2014 profit was $2.2 million, Price adds. At private companies with sales like Gravity’s total revenue, salary and bonus for the top quartile of CEOs is $710,000, according to Chief Executive magazine’s annual compensation survey. At companies with sales like Gravity’s net revenue, the top quartile pay falls to about $373,000. At companies with a similar number…

If you’ve gone from earning 40k and struggling, to earning 70k, do you care what the CEO’s motives are?

It’s been 5 years, or $150k each, and there’s been no apparent bad news. What more do you need?

Have you changed in the last 5 years?

Re: The boss who put everyone on 70K

#120

And what about that one employee that tend to work more than the others(every company have one of those, maybe it's you), do you find it fair for him to get the same salary as everybody ? why would you better yourself and be more productive only to get paid the same as everybody.

Yes, it's fair. If you don't like the conditions, go work somewhere else: it's not a company town where your choice is work for BigCo or move.
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