Blizzard workers share salaries in revolt over wage disparities • Hacker News Board

Re: Blizzard workers share salaries in revolt over wage disparities

#121

Post by DubiousPusher » Tue, Aug 04, 2020, 5:07 AM UTC

rosywoozlechan wrote: post #43

axaxs wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why all the hoops? Companies have shamed us into thinking sharing salaries is bad. It's not. People should share freely, in my opinion it benefits all parties except the company.

It doesn't benefit top earners to share salary information. If I'm making more money than everyone else and the consequences of sharing salaries is equity than it is in my rational self-interest to keep my salary hidden because I'm unlikely to get any kind of raise until equity is achieved whereas I may continue to get raises otherwise. You know what those top earners are going to do then? Quit. And then you end up w…

> doesn't benefit top earners to share salary information.

I think this discussion is by and large irrelevant to any so called "top earner". If a person is highly paid and then considers any subsequent conversation about pay in a "cost-benefit" mindset they are pretty much not going to be a useful voice for equality.

I'm not condemning them mind you. To say one view or the other is better is a question of personal conviction. But if they're regarding their superior pay as strictly a matter of their personal benefit then I find it very unlikely any ethical argument would sway them to act in their coworkers benefit.

Re: Blizzard workers share salaries in revolt over wage disparities

#122

Post by xenihn » Tue, Aug 04, 2020, 5:09 AM UTC

daenz wrote: post #73

>Several former Blizzard employees said they only received significant pay increases after leaving for other companies That's the key quote in the article for me. If you feel that your compensation is below market rate, switch jobs and prove it.

Riot is the only videogame industry employer I can think of that tries to pay fairly. My friends' Riot SWE offers are the only ones that I've seen come anywhere near FAANG compensation. Sadly they still fall short due to no RSUs, but at least they try. Riot offers are ~75% of FAANG TC, and on par with SF/Bay Area base salaries, while Blizzard offers are more typical for the industry and approach 40% of FAANG TC at best.

Re: Blizzard workers share salaries in revolt over wage disparities

#123

Post by irrational » Tue, Aug 04, 2020, 5:09 AM UTC

intended wrote: post #51

rosywoozlechan wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It doesn't benefit top earners to share salary information. If I'm making more money than everyone else and the consequences of sharing salaries is equity than it is in my rational self-interest to keep my salary hidden because I'm unlikely to get any kind of raise until equity is achieved whereas I may continue to get raises otherwise. You know what those top earners are going to do then? Quit. And then you end up w…

Sadly your pay has little to do with merit, and more to do with perception, connections, face time and ability to handle office issues better than your cohort. It may well be, if not more likely to be, the other way round - you could be a GOOD performer, but since you can't or don't gork office politics, you are underpaid or even not at the level of challenge and seniority you should be.

Eh, anecdotal, but that hasn’t been true in my experience. I’m fairly certain I’m perceived negatively. I show up, do my work, but do not seek any sort of human communication beyond the bare minimum required. I certainly don’t create connections, seek face time, etc.

I’ve been with my company for nearly 2 decades and only know about 10 people, and only 2 of those well. I worked with one person for five years on a daily basis before they learned I was married with a bunch of kids.

My salary has gone up 84% in those 18+ years. I make way more money than I feel I deserve (though I’m not complaining). I’ve never asked for a raise or anything like that. They just keep giving me raises on their own. Just recently in the middle of the pandemic they gave me a 16% raise out of the blue.

I don’t know for sure how much others make, but I’m fairly certain I’m one of the top earners. It frankly baffles me.

Re: Blizzard workers share salaries in revolt over wage disparities

#124

Post by xenihn » Tue, Aug 04, 2020, 5:11 AM UTC

dyslexit wrote: post #47

john-shaffer wrote: post #9

I boycotted Blizzard after their censorship regarding Hong Kong. It was a great decision since it saved me from the dumpster fire to end all dumpster fires that was Warcraft III Reforged [1]. I would strongly suggest that if anything about Blizzard pisses you off, just be done with them entirely. The people who created the great games of the past don't work there. Blizzard is no longer capable of producing good produ…

I feel like their entire mission changed around the time of their merger with Activision. I remember reading a long time ago the original devs saying they made games they would want to play, and I believe it showed. The most obvious example of that to me were the game stories. Back then the stories and background lore had depth and were fascinatingly interesting. Characters felt like they had real motivations and rea…

What changed is that all of the people who made the pre-WoW games so great did not work on them, because they were no longer at Blizzard.

Re: Blizzard workers share salaries in revolt over wage disparities

#125

Post by NineStarPoint » Tue, Aug 04, 2020, 5:12 AM UTC

tonitosou wrote: post #65

Pxtl wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I work in healthcare where this is handled by job titles and it seems a lot healthier. Job title makes it clear that it's about greater responsibilities. "Why is Jeff paid more than me" "Because Jeff is senior dev and you're junior dev" is a much easier conversation to have, and everybody's job title is very visible.

im not sure. in a perfect society if the junior dev is better and works harder and bring more value to the company he should be better paid than his senior. it is capitalism and if a company is judget by its output an employee should too

If the other dev can’t perform better than a junior dev, they shouldn’t be a senior dev. There’s no reason that you have to go up in the titles over time if you can’t improve your capabilities. Titles should reflect skill, not just be handed out due to age.

Re: Blizzard workers share salaries in revolt over wage disparities

#126

Post by cheerlessbog » Tue, Aug 04, 2020, 5:12 AM UTC

im3w1l wrote: post #23

IgorPartola wrote: post #5

Whenever the topic of sharing salary information comes up I always bring up the algorithm for figuring out the average salary for a group of people without anyone learning anyone else’s exact salary: Say you have 10 people sitting at a round table. Person 1 picks up a piece of paper and on it writes a sum of their salary + randInt(100_000, 10_000_000) remembering what the initial random number was. We can call this n…

Everyone writes their salary on a piece of paper and puts it into a hat. Then you can get a the full distribution.

Or use modified randomized response technique [1]

Roll a die and multiply (salary - 100k) by the spots on the die. Share that value publicly. Sum all such values and average them then divide by 21/6 and add 100k. Choose the 100k value to be closest to but not greater then your guess at the lowest salary.

[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Randomized_response

Re: Blizzard workers share salaries in revolt over wage disparities

#127

Post by MaximumYComb » Tue, Aug 04, 2020, 5:12 AM UTC

TeaDrunk wrote: post #108

scottLobster wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd argue your first example is actually fair. Someone who has trouble negotiating in professional circles is going to have issues far beyond the workplace, if nothing else they're going to get repeatably screwed buying a car, and they should work on that. Why shouldn't the more aggressive, more strategic people earn more on average? I'd argue they give more of a damn by definition. The ability to project social forc…

Statistically women ask for raises just as much and as aggressively as men, but they’re less likely to be granted. The idea that aggression is a skill recurved the same between men and women is very much false...

A quick search revealed only one study that said this, and a ton of studies that said the complete opposite. Oh, and articles showing faults in that one study. i.e. for masters students entering new jobs, men were 8x more likely to negotiate on salary.

Re: Blizzard workers share salaries in revolt over wage disparities

#128

Post by Mandatum » Tue, Aug 04, 2020, 5:13 AM UTC

masayune wrote: post #116

Back when I worked there, they had something called "Blizzard Bucks" to "supplement" your salary. Basically "Blizzard Bucks" was Monopoly money we could use to buy their microtransactions and WoW game-time. In reality, you made approx. $30-40k sans OT, but they would always calculate your "salary" at $50-60k because of all the "Blizzard Bucks" and claim your salary was industry best. The best part was, and they would…

That is possibly the most exploitative form of compensation I've heard of in the Western world.

Re: Blizzard workers share salaries in revolt over wage disparities

#129

Post by 9935c101ab17a66 » Tue, Aug 04, 2020, 5:13 AM UTC

woodruffw wrote: post #92

scottLobster wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd argue your first example is actually fair. Someone who has trouble negotiating in professional circles is going to have issues far beyond the workplace, if nothing else they're going to get repeatably screwed buying a car, and they should work on that. Why shouldn't the more aggressive, more strategic people earn more on average? I'd argue they give more of a damn by definition. The ability to project social forc…

> Why shouldn't the more aggressive, more strategic people earn more on average? I'd argue they give more of a damn by definition. The ability to project social force is a positive trait if used well, and can directly benefit the work if turned in that direction. One potential reason: being aggressive and strategic, as qualities, are orthogonal to one's skills. They're just as good signals for being an abusive manage…

This is an incredibly well-written and well-written response.

Re: Blizzard workers share salaries in revolt over wage disparities

#130

Post by nitrogen » Tue, Aug 04, 2020, 5:14 AM UTC

jessaustin wrote: post #113

verma7 wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How would you get the distribution from the sum of numbers individually?

You don't count the slips of paper in the hat. Instead you count the number of people who put in slips of paper.

That will give an average, but it won't give the distribution (min/max/etc)