Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Companies save billions of dollars by giving employees fake “manager” titles

cbsnews.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

121–130 of 202 posts

Re: Companies save billions of dollars by giving employees fake “manager” titles

#121

Post by MisterBastahrd »

willcipriano wrote: post #10

I worked for a restaurant that did this to me. To make sure I hit the "minimum hours" (when you start talking about hours vs tasks or responsibilities you probably aren't getting into a legitimate salary arrangement) they would have me clock in and out, and I'd get pay stubs with 40 hours (less if I worked less) and the overtime hours paid at $0. They withheld my last paycheck when I quit and stopped responding to my…

When I was an 11 year old, I got a job working for a local swim club. I'd go to the property, open the gate, and clean the grounds and take out the trash. They figured since I wasn't technically old enough to work, they could pay me $2.30 an hour when $4.25 was the minimum wage at the time. I adjusted my recorded hours versus worked hours accordingly. Given that there were no cameras on premises, the timesheets were manual, and I was always there alone, I never had an issue.

Re: Companies save billions of dollars by giving employees fake “manager” titles

#122

Post by lcnPylGDnU4H9OF »

qualudeheart wrote: post #101
lcnPylGDnU4H9OF wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I work on internal web applications at a company who sells a physical product (read: not a tech company). I started the job when I was in my late 20s and my title was "Senior Something-or-other". Around the time I started, I told that to someone who works outside IT and their immediate response was, "You don't look very senior." Yeah, tell me about it.

What do those apps do?

Nothing special; they’re just interfaces for managing internal data.

Re: Companies save billions of dollars by giving employees fake “manager” titles

#123

Post by ElfinTrousers »

lotsofpulp wrote: post #45
sigzero wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is even a trope on sitcoms and has been forever. lol

Every teenager who has ever had a job at a convenient store/fast food/restaurant/hotel/etc knows this. Enough of the population simply likes it because it keeps prices low for them, and maybe some of them justify it themselves by having been already subjected to it.

Not to mention that calling a 19-year-old "manager" and maybe giving them a different color uniform shirt is a good way to get that 19-year-old more engaged in the job, that doesn't involve any extra expense on the employer's part.

Re: Companies save billions of dollars by giving employees fake “manager” titles

#124

Post by MisterBastahrd »

fHr wrote: post #72
pxue wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a small government advocate, i have no issue with labor boards. the alternative is violence or unionization, neither of which are optimal in resolving disputes like these in a civilized and efficient manner.

Unionization is amazing. I do not know why especially people in US are so against this. Did they just gave up and are okay with the big corps fucking them over withouth having any leverage?

Living in America is expensive, wages are relatively low, and long labor fights result in financial devastation that might take years to recover from despite some of the gains being virtually negligible in terms of real impact on the wallets of employees. There are many people, especially of boomer age, who are still haunted by long-term strikes. Strikes have more of an effect when they're against smaller companies. Huge conglomerates like Shell and Exxon don't care. They can afford to wait them out.

Re: Companies save billions of dollars by giving employees fake “manager” titles

#125

Post by toomanyrichies »

jcadam wrote: post #70

Was once a senior engineer at a small-ish office of a fairly large company. We had a particularly high-strung junior engineer that was prone to throwing fits if he didn't get his way. Apparently, one day, he threatened to quit for another offer. He was placated with some trivial pay increase and promotion to lead engineer (essentially leap-frogging the other seniors in the office in title - but not in pay). Except no…

> “I know, I know... we kinda have to humor him on this."

I’m sorry… what? Why did they feel the need to placate a junior at all, let alone with a leap-frog promotion? In what way was a junior engineer not replaceable? Was he someone’s cousin or something?

Re: Companies save billions of dollars by giving employees fake “manager” titles

#126

Post by hardolaf »

atomicnumber3 wrote: post #61
nouveaux wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's probably not a path you want to go down. Do we start putting employees in jail for wage theft?

Yes, at appropriate levels. I worked in several regulated financial institutions. Every year it was part of compliance training to be reminded that if you notice, for instance, money laundering or financial fraud, you can be personally liable and go to jail. This isn't a new concept at all. Professional engineers have similar levels of risk if they breach ethics, though I don't know if it's criminal or just self regu…

Yup. When I worked in the defense industry, even as an unlicensed engineer, I was bound by threat of prosecution to report a wide category of violations. Per our agreement with the US DoD, even workplace injuries which could impact our readiness fell under this definition. Now that I'm over in the finance space, if I ever notice anything suggesting a financial crime, I am required by law to report it.

Re: Companies save billions of dollars by giving employees fake “manager” titles

#127

Post by shepardrtc »

ornornor wrote: post #87
shepardrtc wrote: post #23

I worked at a university in Florida that did this to me. I was being made to work overtime on a few software projects and making a nice little amount of extra money. Then one day I found out that I was being "promoted" to a manager title. No raise or any extra benefits, but I was no longer allowed to get overtime. It was part of a campus-wide initiative to cut costs. And now that I was a manager I was expected to wor…

Just curious: are you able to refuse a promotion. Especially this kind of “promotion”? What happens then? Do you get fired because… reasons or do you just keep your current job title etc?

No. My boss rewrote my job description to fit the new type of position and then my position was changed. He convinced me it was my path to promotion. I suppose that was true - I was promoted again. This time I was given a 1k raise, but I was taking on the additional duties of a manager that quit. So double the work for another 1k a year.

Re: Companies save billions of dollars by giving employees fake “manager” titles

#128

Post by bawolff »

kennend3 wrote: post #105
bmitc wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of unions directly block solving disputes, choosing instead to deny all disputes. I know one union that was perfectly happy letting government workers make sox figures while "working" from home, while they produced objectively zero work over a period of months. These were the type of workers that would keep government equipment after retiring, quitting, or rarely being fired, requiring the government to send of…

You can simply step back and watch what is taking place in Canada right now. https://nationalpost.com/news/politics/federal-union-wants-4... Because it is not going anywhere, they had an independent body get involved, their commentary says it all: "The union’s proposals “do not appear realistic for what should be a fairly advanced stage of negotiations. The numerous proposals are not focused and they would result in…

> would result in an increase to compensation far beyond what is reasonable

Its a negotiation. The union asking for the highest number it can get is what its supposed to do.

Re: Companies save billions of dollars by giving employees fake “manager” titles

#129

Post by JamesBarney »

hourago wrote: post #43
bmitc wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of unions directly block solving disputes, choosing instead to deny all disputes. I know one union that was perfectly happy letting government workers make sox figures while "working" from home, while they produced objectively zero work over a period of months. These were the type of workers that would keep government equipment after retiring, quitting, or rarely being fired, requiring the government to send of…

> I know one union that was perfectly happy letting government workers make sox figures while "working" from home, while they produced objectively zero work over a period of months. "Companies save billions of dollars by giving employees fake “manager” titles" is fraud. If you do not like unions because ONE did something that you do not like , how much do you hate companies were you have thousands of examples of bad…

On hackernews most of the complaints I see about unions are people who've had direct experience with unions.

My experience with unions was they were shady, jobs were given out based on nepotism, work was given out solely based on seniority and most work you did for them involved kickbacks.

Re: Companies save billions of dollars by giving employees fake “manager” titles

#130

Post by hardolaf »

alar44 wrote: post #78
dopylitty wrote: post #44

I’ve said it before but I’ll keep pounding the drum that the FLSA needs to be completely rewritten. Any work more than 8 hours in a day should result in overtime pay regardless of type of work or base salary. It’s ridiculous that companies can force people to work 24/7 with no extra pay just because those people happen to work with computers or in "knowledge" work. And even developers/IT folks are largely not making…

It's not that simple though. I'm an IT Director. A good chunk of my time is just thinking and not doing. It's impossible to measure the amount of work I do in a day because I'm thinking about stuff when I shower, or am walking the dog etc. Do I sit at my laptop 8 hours a day? Fuck no. Do I work 8 hours a day? Probably, but it's hard to say. I can't say "I worked for 9.5 hours today" because it's impossible to measure…

I'm a design engineer. A lot of my time is also thinking. I can be "working" but actually just reading articles or clearing my mind. And I can be in the middle of a gaming session later that same day and suddenly come up with a solution to a problem. How many hours I work is very subjective based on your definition of "work".

But to make up for this I am also compensated several times the median household income. And the threshold for paying people like me should definitely be set to at least 2x the median household income for the region in which you work or 2x the federal average whichever is more. Currently, that'd be a minimum of $141K/yr. I feel that's a reasonable cutoff for no more overtime pay.

Post reply on HN