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Zuckerberg says employees moving out of Silicon Valley may face pay cuts

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Re: Zuckerberg says employees moving out of Silicon Valley may face pay cuts

#131

Post by Klonoar »

jedberg wrote: post #46
Klonoar wrote: post #31

This feels like a "welp we need to cut some pay, let's see who takes the bait". Cost of living should not dictate your value to the company. If you're an engineer supporting x number of users worth y dollars, it literally does not change what you bring to the table whether you do the job in SF or Birmingham. Yes, they could hire cheaper in Birmingham, but they can't hire _you_. If you have a proven track record of do…

> Yes, they could hire cheaper in Birmingham, but they can't hire _you_. Unless you move to Birmingham. Now they can hire you. And if you want to live there then you'll probably take the offer because it will still be better than the local options in Birmingham. Employee pay has always been about "what does it take to get them to work here" and not value to the company. If there is something in Birmingham that you va…

_Some_ people will do that, like the aforementioned "can't be choosy" cohort I noted in my original comment.

For all the talk about abundance of engineering talent, talk to anyone who's actively had to hire in the past six months and it's a complete slog of unqualified candidates. I would find it hard to believe that engineering talent (_especially_ at FAANG level) is in a market position that doesn't afford them negotiation power. One or two people doing this is certainly nothing, but if enough do it, then it makes a potential difference.

I'll be very curious to see how FBs staff handles this come Jan 1. Probably disappointed, I'm aware... but curious nonetheless.

Re: Zuckerberg says employees moving out of Silicon Valley may face pay cuts

#133

Post by zebnyc »

j45 wrote: post #71

The thing about remote work is.. it could become a global marketplace now for talent. The big companies could get to off-shore again in a global remote-first re-jigging.

If the direction is to go full / mostly remote, I believe most companies will insist on ensure that working hours mostly overlap with US business hours. So I think the big winner here will mostly be tech workers based in South America.

At my previous job at a SF based ad-tech company, I was the lone SF based engineer. Boss was in Australia, rest of the engineering team was in South america.

Re: Zuckerberg says employees moving out of Silicon Valley may face pay cuts

#134

Post by freetanga »

Jemaclus wrote: post #2

This is one of the things that's always bothered me. Let's say you hire me for your company in San Francisco and pay me $150K. You've made a calculation: my value to the company is greater than $150K, and $150K is a price you're willing to pay to leverage that value. In other words, the company will (eventually) make more than $150K per year off my contributions to the company. But now if I decide to move to Tulsa, O…

I think the 150k is “the value you bring to the company” adjusted to “the location the company forces you to be at”.

If they demanded you to be in SF, one can guess a part of your comp was to adjust for crazy costs of living there. If you move away, that is adjusted.

Having been an expat, there are purchasing parity tables that are used in these relocations.

Imagine you were hired on Tulsa money and then forced to move to SF on the same amount...

Re: Zuckerberg says employees moving out of Silicon Valley may face pay cuts

#135

Post by TeMPOraL »

fma wrote: post #73
Jemaclus wrote: post #2

This is one of the things that's always bothered me. Let's say you hire me for your company in San Francisco and pay me $150K. You've made a calculation: my value to the company is greater than $150K, and $150K is a price you're willing to pay to leverage that value. In other words, the company will (eventually) make more than $150K per year off my contributions to the company. But now if I decide to move to Tulsa, O…

And the dev in Eastern Europe is wondering why is the dev in San Francisco getting 10x as them.

The dev in Eastern Europe may do well to be reminded that the dev in SF is losing almost all of that on costs of living, and may actually be worse off in terms of disposable income (relative to its purchasing power in the area).

Re: Zuckerberg says employees moving out of Silicon Valley may face pay cuts

#136

Post by 0max »

rconti wrote: post #110
Vysero wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the company was hemorrhaging money on employee salaries by being based in SF then why wouldn't they simply move the company somewhere else?

Greater supply of employees, and potentially greater attraction TO employees. Sure, they have to "import" employees, but importing 10% of the workforce in the Bay Area at X cost is apparently more appealing than importing 98% of employees to Tulsa at Y cost. (Relatedly; Tulsa's not exactly a small place, but if you think the influence of "big tech" is bad in a larger metro like the Bay Area, I'd HATE to see what it w…

I hear DC/VA/MD with the contractor industrial complex is a good example

Re: Zuckerberg says employees moving out of Silicon Valley may face pay cuts

#137

Post by rconti »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #127
jpeg_hero wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I always see comments like this from individual contributors. I'll give you the managers perspective. You may be worth $150k, any one individual engineer could be worth multiples of that! Look at your entire engineering team, from best to worst. Is not there some inflation of salaries in the SF Bay area? The bootcamper that is making $110k out of bootcamp? Are they really 73% as effective as you? The marketing person…

> I always see comments like this from individual contributors. Tangent, but did I miss some trend here? Over the recent months, I've started to see the phrase "individual contributor" being used pejoratively, at times almost like a swear word. Is it now a label that's assigned to bad employees or something?

As an IC, I didn't read it that way. It seemed like a pretty clear case of "you are presenting an IC's perspective, allow me to present a manager's perspective". Two views of the same issue. It didn't seem to assign more value to one than the other.

Re: Zuckerberg says employees moving out of Silicon Valley may face pay cuts

#138

Post by jedberg »

Klonoar wrote: post #131
jedberg wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Yes, they could hire cheaper in Birmingham, but they can't hire _you_. Unless you move to Birmingham. Now they can hire you. And if you want to live there then you'll probably take the offer because it will still be better than the local options in Birmingham. Employee pay has always been about "what does it take to get them to work here" and not value to the company. If there is something in Birmingham that you va…

_Some_ people will do that, like the aforementioned "can't be choosy" cohort I noted in my original comment. For all the talk about abundance of engineering talent, talk to anyone who's actively had to hire in the past six months and it's a complete slog of unqualified candidates. I would find it hard to believe that engineering talent (_especially_ at FAANG level) is in a market position that doesn't afford them neg…

> talk to anyone who's actively had to hire in the past six months and it's a complete slog of unqualified candidates.

That's always been the case. When I did interviews at Netflix, people who had resumes that said "Senior Engineer" for five years couldn't do fizzbuzz in their favorite language.

Yes, if enough really talented people all get together and demand higher wages, they might stay high. And some stellar performers will demand high wages regardless of where they are.

But the truth of it is that most people are not stellar performers. They're good engineers who can get work done. And they will demand median salaries.

Median salaries will probably shift towards an equilibrium below SF salaries and above {pick your favorite small town in middle America}.

Re: Zuckerberg says employees moving out of Silicon Valley may face pay cuts

#139

Post by nojito »

somebrody wrote: post #29
nostromo wrote: post #7

People should be warned that working remotely has been career suicide for as long as I've been in tech. Being "out of sight, out of mind" from management generally means you're passed over for promotions, and often the first to get cut during layoffs. It's just human nature. It's easier to layoff the person that's been working from across the country (or another country) than it is to layoff the person at the desk ne…

It is only suicide for in-company promotion tracks. It has no effect on your career if you learn to not depend on in-company tracks for your success.

WFH only works in theory when the economy is booming. In a recession WFH employees are going to the be first ones on the chopping block.

Re: Zuckerberg says employees moving out of Silicon Valley may face pay cuts

#140

Post by TeMPOraL »

umeshunni wrote: post #81
somebrody wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> good subset of people who dont really care that much about their careers Caring too much is a bad bargain. The companies don't care too much about you and me

I think OP is talking about people caring about their own careers (i.e. growth, promotions etc).

Again, not everyone wants to progress all the way to the top in their careers. The higher you go, the more your job changes into helping people help people help people do the actual work, which isn't all that appealing if you chosen a particular career because of the lower-level work being done.

It's like in Star Trek, with this common advice to given to captains on the show by their friends/colleagues: never let yourself be promoted to admiral, because you'll be taken off the starship and put behind a desk to push paperwork, and that is just boring.

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