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

Netflix has job with almost $1M listed salary range, to comply with new CA law

jobs.netflix.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

21–30 of 117 posts

Re: Netflix has job with almost $1M listed salary range, to comply with new CA law

#21

Post by butlerm »

tony_cannistra wrote: post #4
ablatt89 wrote: post #2

Good for the engineer who is an expert in those audio and video testing and can get hired for the role. We should be thankful engineering has provided many folk who were previously poor, an opportunity to rise to the middle class simply by studying and being smart.

You're right but I think you're missing the point. Offering a range that broad in the job listing is just an effort to flaunt a law. That law was put into place to help the people you're talking about.

The minimum salary paid for a position is useful information. The median or estimated median may be as well. Legislated disclosure of a maximum is useless. It implies that employees are interchangeable widgets with a cap on their market value that isn't more than some reasonable percentage of the minimum.

There are true superstars out there that some companies can afford to compensate properly, but they are generally remarkably atypical and their salary is irrelevant to what a person of ordinary talent and experience can expect. I think it is great that some of them are worth and can be paid nearly $1M / year, but I wouldn't expect that to be relevant to the salary negotiation of most engineers taking a job with similar duties.

Re: Netflix has job with almost $1M listed salary range, to comply with new CA law

#22

Post by subharmonicon »

I wonder what follow-through the law has to fix/avoid this kind of behavior?

I know some companies are now working to ensure that they no longer have a single listing for a job into which you could hire people at different levels, so that they can better honor the spirit of the law. It would be nice if the law itself ensured had a way to enforce or ensure that sort of behavior, but I don’t know what that would look like.

Re: Netflix has job with almost $1M listed salary range, to comply with new CA law

#23

Post by binarymax »

remote_phone wrote: post #19
phailhaus wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is likely no engineer at that level, instead they're gaming the law. They're required to report their salary range for transparency, and they're basically replying with "our salaries are between between 0 and $1M".

I know a couple of Netflix employees making over 700k cash. I also have a friend who was a recruiter at Netflix that handled an offer to an engineer for $1M cash. These are real numbers.

That’s fine but, there are probably multiple levels that have been glommed into one req…which makes it look not great. There should be jr, sr, principal, staff, etc.

Re: Netflix has job with almost $1M listed salary range, to comply with new CA law

#24

Post by dsfyu404ed »

tony_cannistra wrote: post #4
ablatt89 wrote: post #2

Good for the engineer who is an expert in those audio and video testing and can get hired for the role. We should be thankful engineering has provided many folk who were previously poor, an opportunity to rise to the middle class simply by studying and being smart.

You're right but I think you're missing the point. Offering a range that broad in the job listing is just an effort to flaunt a law. That law was put into place to help the people you're talking about.

Or they're complying in good faith. They may very well be flexible and not really care if they hire a fresh out of school grad or a seasoned expert with a rockstar resume. They'll hire either and pay accordingly.

Re: Netflix has job with almost $1M listed salary range, to comply with new CA law

#25

Post by [deleted] »

phailhaus wrote: post #11
ablatt89 wrote: post #2

Good for the engineer who is an expert in those audio and video testing and can get hired for the role. We should be thankful engineering has provided many folk who were previously poor, an opportunity to rise to the middle class simply by studying and being smart.

There is likely no engineer at that level, instead they're gaming the law. They're required to report their salary range for transparency, and they're basically replying with "our salaries are between between 0 and $1M".

[deleted]

Re: Netflix has job with almost $1M listed salary range, to comply with new CA law

#26

Post by TheRealPomax »

tony_cannistra wrote: post #14

Colorado has a similar law, but I've never observed this kind of "range-hacking." Why would this happen in CA but not CO?

Probably because of selection bias: most of the huge tech companies are headquartered in CA, not CO, and of those, the ones that are just batshit insane when it comes to hiring are also found more in CA than in CO.

And then because Netflix considered themselves a "dream team" snowflake, they even have a "we may decide to fire you if you're not the absolute best each week every week". But because of how they implement that, it really means "we'll fire you if you and your manager don't click". From https://jobs.netflix.com/culture:

"To strengthen our dream team, our managers use a “keeper test” for each of their people: if a team member was leaving for a similar role at another company, would the manager try to keep them? Those who do not pass the keeper test (i.e. their manager would not fight to keep them) are given a generous severance package so we can find someone even better for that position—making an even better dream team. Being on a dream team is the thrill of a professional lifetime, and team members are incredibly supportive of each other. This is why "You make time to help colleagues across Netflix succeed" is a valued behavior."

This is not a good company to work for, even if the people working there are amazing people to work with.

Re: Netflix has job with almost $1M listed salary range, to comply with new CA law

#27

Post by highwaylights »

remote_phone wrote: post #19
phailhaus wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is likely no engineer at that level, instead they're gaming the law. They're required to report their salary range for transparency, and they're basically replying with "our salaries are between between 0 and $1M".

I know a couple of Netflix employees making over 700k cash. I also have a friend who was a recruiter at Netflix that handled an offer to an engineer for $1M cash. These are real numbers.

Tell your friend I’m willing to slum it for $999k.

Don’t expect more than 40 hours per week though. It’s not like you’re paying me the big bucks that Mike is getting.

EDIT: On a serious note, I’d be all over this if they offered remote, but if they did they’d not offer nearly as much.

Re: Netflix has job with almost $1M listed salary range, to comply with new CA law

#29

Post by butlerm »

CodeWriter23 wrote: post #20
tony_cannistra wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're right but I think you're missing the point. Offering a range that broad in the job listing is just an effort to flaunt a law. That law was put into place to help the people you're talking about.

It’s not flaunting a law. It’s a typical built in Sacramento law written by dilettantes who can’t think through the simplest of problems. Just like the “can’t charge extra for using a credit card” law. Prices went up and gas stations give a cash discount.

"Can't charge extra for using a credit card" is a contractual condition imposed by the credit card companies. If anything there should be a law voiding such conditions as contrary to sound public policy. Why should cash or debit card users in a competitive market be charged extra to subsidize rewards for credit card users, for example?

Re: Netflix has job with almost $1M listed salary range, to comply with new CA law

#30

Post by [deleted] »

binarymax wrote: post #23
remote_phone wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know a couple of Netflix employees making over 700k cash. I also have a friend who was a recruiter at Netflix that handled an offer to an engineer for $1M cash. These are real numbers.

That’s fine but, there are probably multiple levels that have been glommed into one req…which makes it look not great. There should be jr, sr, principal, staff, etc.

[deleted]
Post reply on HN