221–225 of 225 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I had a similar issue back in 2000. I was a new grad making the princely sum of $50k as a DBA. The woman who trained me and was incredibly capable made $27k -- literally less than she would make running a Gap. It got out, people got pissed, which they should have been.
didnt even know you could live in sf with 27k in 2000
Earlier quoted context omitted.
If that were true, these companies would have no reason to fear opening up. After all, each of their employees made conscious decisions to be underpaid, so why would they leave?
No they didn't. Most likely their employees have no clue what they could get elsewhere, or they better take that job here first than wait 2 months for another offer elsewhere, or they needed to be in city X before moving to a better company, or... Random number: 50% of employees consider their employment as a stepping stone.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> It is usually defined in terms of your last salary, that is usually disclosed as a part of your background check. This contradicts the claims of US being such a free and free market country... Sounds Kafkaesque. How does this background check really happen? Can't you deny the disclosure of your previous salary?
Some companies ask for employment confirmation from your former employer. That can include salary information.
[1] That size usually being "big enough to have a dedicated HR department"
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes. And then more data becomes available, which changes perspective. Then employees leave for better opportunity
No disagreement here; I just don't know how "companies might crash and burn because they pay their employees lower than market rate" equates to "companies that pay their employees lower than market rate should crash and burn". One doesn't follow from the other, and I don't agree that there's inherent evil just because the salary was lower than elsewhere.
The important characteristics of the companies he's talking about is that they're in an unstable equilibrium dependent on wage ignorance. Meaning that wage info itself would destabilize them rather than any of the mentioned toxicity.
I think he's excluded "companies that underpay but are stable in the presence of wage info" from the class that "should [be expected to] crash and burn".
Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's a bad move on the part of the company, because an underpaid person is a time-bomb. From what I've seen, the problem often arise not with people hired at a low pay because they didn't know better, but hired at a low pay because that was the market price at the time. They end up having less pay than people with the same experience (or even less) who were hired later when the market salary was higher.
> an underpaid person is a time-bomb I disagree. There may be some instances of this, but there are also instances of people who love their job and would not change it for more money. Money isn't the only motivator.