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Microsoft will include pay ranges in all U.S. job postings

forbes.com

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Re: Microsoft will include pay ranges in all U.S. job postings

#231

Post by connicpu »

kriops wrote: post #215
cogman10 wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You say this as if companies don't chose where to have their offices and their attendance policies. If a company places it's headquarters in a HCOL area and requires everyone come in 5 days a week, then yes, they have a responsibility to pay a salary high enough that their employees can survive there. If employers don't like the fact that COL is too high, THEY can go ahead and march on city hall to advocate for polit…

Supply and demand. COL is a downstream price signal as far as a rational employer is concerned. While they might try to influence it to alter the supply of potential workers in their favor, it is by no means their responsibility to do so. And saying companies choose where the highest concentration of available talent resides is dishonest.

They don't have a responsibility to do so, but they shouldn't be surprised when employees are angry at them if they don't do one or the other

Re: Microsoft will include pay ranges in all U.S. job postings

#232

Post by tshaddox »

afrodc_ wrote: post #190
tshaddox wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Due to the wonders of tax law, that is equiv to 60k cash And equivalent to 0 cash for paying the rent. I suspect that’s why it doesn’t seem to be a prominent concern in discussions about tech compensation.

I don't know about you, but with tech salaries, rent is the least for my concern. I think that's true for most people that don't live in ridiculously high cost of living areas.

Perhaps, although until COVID (and we'll see what happens with remote work compensation in the long term) nearly all people with huge big tech compensation packages lived in ridiculously high cost of living areas. I suspect a very large portion still do. In the Bay Area I've heard no shortage of stories of couples/families with two big tech salaries still spending very large portions of their paychecks on rent/mortgage.

Re: Microsoft will include pay ranges in all U.S. job postings

#233

Post by rat9988 »

kccqzy wrote: post #209
Chinjut wrote: post #198

It's incredible in these comments that so many of you who work in the industry on the employee side are arguing against having more transparency for the employee, and for having more leverage in the negotiating process for the employer instead. I want all the advantage as an employee that I can get. Any secret withheld from me is not to my advantage.

I think for most people external tools like levels.fyi are already good enough in that they provide a salary range with sufficient accuracy. Of course these same people would hope that the other candidates haven't heard of levels.fyi so that companies can lowball them to have more budget for the salaries of those who have heard of levels.fyi. It's just selfishness, not collective action.

It's misguided selfishness because other people raising their price would raise yours too.

Re: Microsoft will include pay ranges in all U.S. job postings

#234

Post by deelowe »

tshaddox wrote: post #175
com2kid wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sad more companies don't up their 401k contributions, most people don't realize their employer can put in 40k a year (!!!) into an employee's 401k. Due to the wonders of tax law, that is equiv to 60k cash, and that isn't counting the earnings or the flexibility to reallocate 401k investments w/o having to pay taxes on earnings when changing where the money is invested.

> Due to the wonders of tax law, that is equiv to 60k cash And equivalent to 0 cash for paying the rent. I suspect that’s why it doesn’t seem to be a prominent concern in discussions about tech compensation.

BS. There's nothing stopping you from maxing your 401k and then pulling it back out taking the penalty. This applies to a ton of benefits people naively don't take advantage of from HSAs to employee stock purchase plans to 401k. It's almost always beneficial to maximize your tax advantaged accounts even if you're paying penalties on the back end.

Re: Microsoft will include pay ranges in all U.S. job postings

#235

Post by connicpu »

DannyBee wrote: post #47
hef19898 wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you do that only for jobs in Washington state it is only a question of time until the first discrimibation law suites are filed. Plus it is easy good press.

and then the law would get struck down because, as said, washington state isn't allowed to regulate interstate commerce.

Washington has actually successfully enforced some of its worker protection rules on a national scale in the past. As a condition of having the harsh penalties for their in-state violations dropped, they got fast food companies to agree to drop non-compete agreements from all franchise agreements nationwide[1]

Whether it happens as a direct consequence of the word of the law feels less relevant than the fact they made it happen in practice via a settlement.

[1]: https://table.skift.com/2018/07/12/some-fast-food-chains-dro...

Re: Microsoft will include pay ranges in all U.S. job postings

#236

Post by gigel82 »

ENOTTY wrote: post #6

Given that most big tech companies' base salary tends to plateau and total comp begins to be dominated by stock grants and performance bonuses, just how much real transparency is actually going to be provided?

Not for Microsoft though; their stock grants are :peanut_emoji: compared with other top tier companies (Source: levels.fyi); so this probably a good thing overall...

EDIT: just found out HackerNews is stripping out unicode emoji characters from comments.

Re: Microsoft will include pay ranges in all U.S. job postings

#237

Post by JamesSwift »

Solstinox wrote: post #96
JamesSwift wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure it is. If more start to do it, it becomes an arms race. If a company is loading the compensation in other ways and coming in light on salary then their job posting becomes much less compelling for job seekers. So they have a choice: disclose the other compensation (in order to compete with the salary numbers of the other companies) or adjust their compensation to be heavier on salary so their numbers are in line…

Arms race (which will lead to bigger salaries) or price collusion (salaries stay the same)?

I think its more likely to be an arms race now that the "remote work" dam has broken and work location is not as important as during the time of the previous well-known collusions.

Re: Microsoft will include pay ranges in all U.S. job postings

#238

Post by throwaway09223 »

vlovich123 wrote: post #221
throwaway09223 wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Board retainers aren't significant expense anywhere as far as I'm aware. Often their stipends are less than an employee's pay. For example, Google's board stipend is $100k, which is about half the median total comp of an average employee (less, counting benefits). Walmart I think pays their board $60k. You may be thinking of executive comp, but even then it is generally not significant amount. You could completely el…

That's not accurate. The board meets maybe 4 times a year. Let's be generous and say they work one full calendar month of the year. That means their pro-rated stipend is actually 1.2 M/year. Google employees who only choose to work one month of the year can do so, but the median salary would be 16k dollars. AFAIK board members don't put in a month's worth of work so that 1.2 M/year is an underestimate. They also can…

We're discussing whether redistributing the board stipends would change individual salaries and the clear answer is it will not, even in the most extreme situations.

But, to your point regarding prorated comp: I've been a salaried employee at a company like Google. I've also been a board member.

First, like many senior tech employees my total comp market rate is in the seven figures. A pro-rated 1.2M stipend would be appropriate to compensate me for my time. The average board retainer for less profitable companies is closer to $30k/yr. These are not entry level positions and the retainers are shockingly low in the vast majority of cases. (In my case, I'm on the board of a non-profit and I actually pay them)

Second, I think you are underestimating how little some salaried workers actually work. I think if you try you can find more than a few Google employees who only work one month a year ;) Conversely: I work far harder in my role as a board member than I used to in my salaried role. It's different for everyone of course, but I assure you no one is seeking out board seat retainers as a way to get rich. It's just not worth it.

Re: Microsoft will include pay ranges in all U.S. job postings

#239

Post by phpisthebest »

jonas21 wrote: post #222
cogman10 wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You say this as if companies don't chose where to have their offices and their attendance policies. If a company places it's headquarters in a HCOL area and requires everyone come in 5 days a week, then yes, they have a responsibility to pay a salary high enough that their employees can survive there. If employers don't like the fact that COL is too high, THEY can go ahead and march on city hall to advocate for polit…

Companies may have more sway than an individual employee, but that sway is still close to zero. Why? Because everyone knows that once enough key employees live nearby, they can't just pick up and move the company somewhere else. Google, for example, has been trying for over a decade to build some medium-density housing near its campus. This goes beyond just advocating for political action (which they're also doing) -…

>>Because everyone knows that once enough key employees live nearby

It is almost like, in any context, centralization is bad. I am not sure why we has a civilization have to keep learning this lesson, over and over and over again

Anytime you centralize anything it results in bad outcomes.

Diversity, Diversification, Distributed Models, etc are ALWAYS preferable, I dont care if you are talking about Stocks, People, Housing, Power, Government, you name, Consolidation and centralization is always bad

Re: Microsoft will include pay ranges in all U.S. job postings

#240

Post by donthellbanme »

jonas21 wrote: post #222
cogman10 wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You say this as if companies don't chose where to have their offices and their attendance policies. If a company places it's headquarters in a HCOL area and requires everyone come in 5 days a week, then yes, they have a responsibility to pay a salary high enough that their employees can survive there. If employers don't like the fact that COL is too high, THEY can go ahead and march on city hall to advocate for polit…

Companies may have more sway than an individual employee, but that sway is still close to zero. Why? Because everyone knows that once enough key employees live nearby, they can't just pick up and move the company somewhere else. Google, for example, has been trying for over a decade to build some medium-density housing near its campus. This goes beyond just advocating for political action (which they're also doing) -…

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