Silicon Valley layoffs aren’t a cost-cutting measure. They’re a culture reset

>The Facebook/Google crazy level of perks with 3 meals provided very day, dry cleaning, massages, etc

I worked for Google at the campus on Crittenden for a short stint in 2015. We had a few folks keep the kegerator stocked with their home brews and a wall of liquor one could sample as needed. I kept the kitchenette stocked with hot sauce on my own accord b/c I wanted to have some handy.

I'm also in my (late) 40s and all of these little perks were very new to me. I quickly grew accustomed to them, but to be honest I didn't miss a single one of them after I left. I don't know that they really moved the needle for me at all.

Except for the shuttle. I *loved* having the shuttle. It greatly simplified the ability to not have a car for the first time in my adult life and it was awesome.

Some of the criticism doesn't make sense: Providing food, amenities, even accommodation has been a method with which private and state organizations around the world used to cut their costs and better the life standards of their members since the dawn of the modern economy after the industrial revolution.

Especially for organizations that have thousands of employees in one location, providing a cafeteria can be much cheaper for both the employees and the organization than thousands of employees going out to eat in private establishments at lunch time. The organization providing housing to employees to work around the bloated real estate sector can also be beneficial to the employeees and the organization. Similarly, Apple mulling its own health services is a good idea - they can reduce their costs and increase quality of life.

Its economies of scale after all. If you have tens of thousands of organization members in a location, it becomes an economy of scale that can reduce every member's and organization's costs directly.

If you do not provide such services to your members using economies of scale inside your organization and instead leave it to the free market by giving monetary compensation instead, you can bet that the free market will do everything in its power to suck all of that monetary compensation out of the hands of the employees by providing the minimum service in return to maximize profit.

> Why are we assuming it would go to salaries?

Because companies generally budget for total compensation and then divide between salary and perks, and because employees generally compare offers using total compensation rather than just salary.

> This line of reasoning makes any workplace perk into an act of infantilisation

Of course it can, but it exists on a spectrum. Things like 401(k) matching and healthcare and toilet paper aren't infantilizing because they're cheaper or have tax benefits when provided through the company, and most people use them. So they're simply a win-win. On the other hand, if a company provides a lower salary but free housing, that can be extremely infantilizing since a big part of adult autonomy is balancing a lot of factors in choosing where to live.

Things like free meals, rec rooms, laundry, and haircuts are generally more on the infantilizing side of things, since a lot of employees would just prefer cash instead. Lunches provided at-cost can make a lot of sense though when restaurants are far away though -- it's not infantilizing because you still pay for lunch, but it's win-win because the company isn't making a profit off of you like restaurants do.

This used to be handled by having a non-free cafeteria.

The cafeteria will still be cheaper for employees than going out to restaurants, and it will be cheaper than the company picking up the tab for everyone.

It used to be common to make a lunch and bring it to work too.

This recent stuff that tech workers are entitled to a free meal at work or to go spend an hour+ to go to a restaurant for lunch every day is a very new thing.

The most challenging thing I found at a large tech company was building and maintaining relationships. Grabbing food with coworkers on campus is a cheat code for this. Similarly if I visited a new office, I was guaranteed to be able to do the same thing with partner teams.