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How Apple, Google, and other tech companies conspired against their own workers

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Re: How Apple, Google, and other tech companies conspired against their own workers

#231

Post by matwood »

darkpuma wrote: post #159
rightbyte wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Power Point? What have PPT ever done to you?

Difference what powerpoint allows you to do and what you can do with a static PDF on the projector. The extra that powerpoint offers you is virtually useless; a bunch of flash with little substance. Hardly any justification for its existence. This becomes more stark when you compare powerpoint with another part of Microsoft Office: Excel. Excel is actually amazing software. Innumerable small businesses are basically…

Excel is amazing software. It can do so many things.

The problem with PP is not PP, but that most people do not know how to give a presentation.

Re: How Apple, Google, and other tech companies conspired against their own workers

#232

Post by [deleted] »

turc1656 wrote: post #11

Notice the difference: " Top executives of leading tech companies secretly agreed among themselves not to hire each other’s employees" "...brought charges against the companies " They should have been indicting both, or just the executives for their explicit role in this criminal behavior. I really detest the lack of individual accountability in all these cases when we deal with large companies. If this was a couple…

[deleted]

Re: How Apple, Google, and other tech companies conspired against their own workers

#233

Post by JDiculous »

nostrademons wrote: post #122

So I was at one of these companies when the scandal broke. I didn't get screwed quite so much as my coworkers, since I'd only been working there for a year or so. The settlement was a joke - I got about $1100, but my compensation increased by roughly $100K/year the year after the cartel broke, and kept rising. Can't say I'm terribly pleased about either the wage-fixing or the settlement, but... My wife works in phila…

> if they did hire remote workers, the same thing would happen in their communities.

That's nonsense. There's a severe shortage of housing in Silicon Valley despite the fact that there's an abundance of housing in most of the country. Hiring remote workers means that you're hiring all around the country/world and people can move, not hiring in any one community. Also, hiring remotely means you can pay much less than Silicon Valley compensation because landlords aren't leeching an enormous bulk of it.

Silicon Valley could solve its housing problem tomorrow if it fixed its ultra-restrictive zoning laws, ended Prop 13, and built a ton of apartments. It won't do that because the people in power place the interest of wealthy landlords above that of the average people who live there.

Re: How Apple, Google, and other tech companies conspired against their own workers

#234

Post by zzzzzzzza »

nostrademons wrote: post #122

So I was at one of these companies when the scandal broke. I didn't get screwed quite so much as my coworkers, since I'd only been working there for a year or so. The settlement was a joke - I got about $1100, but my compensation increased by roughly $100K/year the year after the cartel broke, and kept rising. Can't say I'm terribly pleased about either the wage-fixing or the settlement, but... My wife works in phila…

how much do you pay for coca cola? If the price has gone up, it's probably not nearly as much as real estate has (probably more in line with what real inflation has been). And that's because real estate is a natural monopoly... luckily there's a solution, read Henry George: land value taxes.

Re: How Apple, Google, and other tech companies conspired against their own workers

#235

Post by arvinsim »

josho wrote: post #220
JDulin wrote: post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is an important point, and I couldn't agree more. This idea overwhelms me when I read the newest filings and indictments of pharmaceutical companies in the opioid crisis. A corporation, fundamentally, cannot "learn lessons" like people do. It is a collection of incentives, with men inside directed or manipulated by those incentives. If gently nudging 47,000 people a year to kill themselves with overdoses would c…

While I agree, in our current political climate it’s not going to happen. In the interim I would be willing to settle on significant punitive damages. Eg. Make getting caught very expensive and those corporate nudges will start nudging in the directions of protecting employees, consumers, etc.

It should also be down to the individual level so that people down the the chain of command won't have the incentive to protect the executive in fear of losing their jobs.

Re: How Apple, Google, and other tech companies conspired against their own workers

#236

Post by masonic »

thereare5lights wrote: post #193
munk-a wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree, there is far too much ability to transfer liability in the modern world which lets this sort of stuff get abstract and easier to dismiss. Companies should be held accountable to the extent their growth has encouraged bad behavior, but individuals at that company committed the behavior and, if they were instructed to do so and blindly followed then... 1. "Just following orders" isn't now and has never been a…

> 1. "Just following orders" isn't now and has never been a valid excuse That's not true. Just look at Lt. William Calley.

"following orders" was specifically not an excuse, hence him being convicted.

He didn't serve additional time due to other technical issues in his prosecution.

Re: How Apple, Google, and other tech companies conspired against their own workers

#237

Post by jhanschoo »

turc1656 wrote: post #11

Notice the difference: " Top executives of leading tech companies secretly agreed among themselves not to hire each other’s employees" "...brought charges against the companies " They should have been indicting both, or just the executives for their explicit role in this criminal behavior. I really detest the lack of individual accountability in all these cases when we deal with large companies. If this was a couple…

Depending on their position and the law, it is possible that liability is limited so that they cannot be sued by external entities. That is, external entities can sue the companies, but only the company and shareholders and possibly the state can sue the execs.

Re: How Apple, Google, and other tech companies conspired against their own workers

#238

Post by shard972 »

pathseeker wrote: post #153
nostrademons wrote: post #122

So I was at one of these companies when the scandal broke. I didn't get screwed quite so much as my coworkers, since I'd only been working there for a year or so. The settlement was a joke - I got about $1100, but my compensation increased by roughly $100K/year the year after the cartel broke, and kept rising. Can't say I'm terribly pleased about either the wage-fixing or the settlement, but... My wife works in phila…

>So now house prices in Mountain View and Sunnyvale go from $800K -> $2.4M, This just proves that the housing crises was the same before. A regular middle-class income cannot afford an $800k home. The problem is the same before and after: there isn't enough supply for people who want homes. Until you look at sales numbers and supply, your analysis is meaningless. Increased wages don't make housing prices increase. >n…

I don't think they would open an office in Detroit, might affect their diversity numbers too much /s

Re: How Apple, Google, and other tech companies conspired against their own workers

#239

Post by heavyset_go »

nostrademons wrote: post #122

So I was at one of these companies when the scandal broke. I didn't get screwed quite so much as my coworkers, since I'd only been working there for a year or so. The settlement was a joke - I got about $1100, but my compensation increased by roughly $100K/year the year after the cartel broke, and kept rising. Can't say I'm terribly pleased about either the wage-fixing or the settlement, but... My wife works in phila…

> So now house prices in Mountain View and Sunnyvale go from $800K -> $2.4M, and you must be a dual-tech-income family to afford a house.

Weird that this is a problem in Vancouver, Toronto, etc. The larger trend that you're ignoring is that global capital finds real estate in these areas to be good investments compared to their domestic options for storing value.

Instead of competing locally or domestically for real estate, people in the US, Canada, etc are competing with the richest people on the planet for a slice of the pie.

Re: How Apple, Google, and other tech companies conspired against their own workers

#240

Post by darkpuma »

matwood wrote: post #231
darkpuma wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Difference what powerpoint allows you to do and what you can do with a static PDF on the projector. The extra that powerpoint offers you is virtually useless; a bunch of flash with little substance. Hardly any justification for its existence. This becomes more stark when you compare powerpoint with another part of Microsoft Office: Excel. Excel is actually amazing software. Innumerable small businesses are basically…

Excel is amazing software. It can do so many things. The problem with PP is not PP, but that most people do not know how to give a presentation.

The problem with powerpoint is it doesn't give people leverage, which is to say it doesn't make poor presenters better at presenting. I've never even seen evidence of it making good presenters better at presenting.
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