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Engineers Allege Hiring Collusion in Silicon Valley

nytimes.com

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Re: Engineers Allege Hiring Collusion in Silicon Valley

#91

Post by pron »

smsm42 wrote: post #80
pron wrote: post #42

This case is a beautiful demonstration of the dynamics of both "free market" and regulation. Free market dynamics demand (in this case as in all cases) that large players must never compete on prices or wages (as your competitors have the resources to fight back, so competition on price just makes everyone worse off). On the other hand, regulation was used both to stop an exploitation by the market (antitrust), as we…

If large players routinely pay top specialists low wages, they will cease to be large pretty soon, since their talent will be leaving for players paying better money and making those players large instead. Some people, of course, are impatient and want their enormous wage to be even more enormous - and now! And they want it while carrying no risk at all. That's where politicians come in - delivering other people's mo…

Bureaucracy is annoying, slow, and unjust. But the situation now is much better than when the market was unregulated and robber barons did as they pleased. The American people suffered under the tyranny of the free market, they called on the government to save them, and it did. Nothing is perfect, and everything requires constant work and improvement, but we can use a gentle reminder now and then of how things used to be.

I don't think anyone believes Silicon Valley engineers are a bunch of miserable, oppressed working-class folk, but it's good to know how even the most seemingly progressive of corporations behave.

As to "making compliance so hard that smaller players would find it very expensive to compete", I think that regulation sometimes swings this way, but it is sometimes gradually, slowly, fixed. I don't think anyone would say that all regulation is always good for the big players and bad for the small ones.

Lastly, where does the money come from?

Re: Engineers Allege Hiring Collusion in Silicon Valley

#92

Post by denzil_correa »

discardorama wrote: post #84

The sad part is that even though this behavior is illegal, no one will actually go to jail for this. Companies will pay a token fine (like Pixar and Lucasfilm did), and it'll be business as usual, but this time no emails and no documentation. Unless a few people end up in jail for this, nothing will change.

> Unless a few people end up in jail for this, nothing will change.

That's pretty much it. Does the govt come down on corporations for such acts? One rarely sees corporate honchos being jailed for such incidents. More often than not, it is a fine and then things move on to find and execute a different loophole.

Re: Engineers Allege Hiring Collusion in Silicon Valley

#93

Post by drakaal »

Zigurd wrote: post #53
drakaal wrote: post #26

This is the 99% lead charge that annoys me the most. (especially since many of the people leading it aren't 99%'ers they just think they are) The assumption is that the only places to work are the big companies. Anti-Poaching agreements are rarely about the Money and more about the "I won't steal your trade secrets if you don't steal mine" types of "we can't patent this stuff" stand offs. It is also protection agains…

If you are in a non C-level salaried position, and you don't have a few million in liquid assets, it is exceedingly unlikely you are a 1%er.

For the world is any engineer in Silicon Valley is a 1%'er.

For the US at $200k you are a 95%'er At $550k you are a 99%

That's a lot different than "C-Level" and "millions in liquid assets"

A lot of people at Google, Yahoo, Facebook, Twitter, and Microsoft are 95th percentile.

Quite a few are 98th percentile.

http://www.whatsmypercent.com/

Re: Engineers Allege Hiring Collusion in Silicon Valley

#94

Post by drakaal »

walshemj wrote: post #69
Zigurd wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you are in a non C-level salaried position, and you don't have a few million in liquid assets, it is exceedingly unlikely you are a 1%er.

exactly a BART train driver earns about the same as a developer and will have overtime and a much much better pension. Same in the UK a tube driver earns far more than the average developer does in London and has a Final Salary pension plus overtime.

A BART "train driver" is responsible for the lives of hundreds at a time. Attended school, and takes ongoing continuing education classes to maintain their license. They compete for a few hundred jobs in the US and if they don't get or keep that job there is no competition locally to transfer to.

That "SV Engineers feel entitled" thing I said. You just demonstrated it.

Re: Engineers Allege Hiring Collusion in Silicon Valley

#95

Post by smsm42 »

pron wrote: post #91
smsm42 wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If large players routinely pay top specialists low wages, they will cease to be large pretty soon, since their talent will be leaving for players paying better money and making those players large instead. Some people, of course, are impatient and want their enormous wage to be even more enormous - and now! And they want it while carrying no risk at all. That's where politicians come in - delivering other people's mo…

Bureaucracy is annoying, slow, and unjust. But the situation now is much better than when the market was unregulated and robber barons did as they pleased. The American people suffered under the tyranny of the free market, they called on the government to save them, and it did. Nothing is perfect, and everything requires constant work and improvement, but we can use a gentle reminder now and then of how things used t…

>>> I think that regulation sometimes swings this way, but it is sometimes gradually, slowly, fixed

The first sometimes is more like "almost always" and the second one is more like "almost never". Government regulation is a ratchet - easy to move one way, almost impossible to move the opposite way.

>>> Lastly, where does the money come from?

That, as I said, the question that is never asked. Because everybody feels entitled to have the money, nobody ever asks who's paying the money. Consumers? Shareholders? Taxpayers? Who cares.

Re: Engineers Allege Hiring Collusion in Silicon Valley

#96

Post by hga »

walshemj wrote: post #69
Zigurd wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you are in a non C-level salaried position, and you don't have a few million in liquid assets, it is exceedingly unlikely you are a 1%er.

exactly a BART train driver earns about the same as a developer and will have overtime and a much much better pension. Same in the UK a tube driver earns far more than the average developer does in London and has a Final Salary pension plus overtime.

And won't become unemployable as a regular salaried employee around age 35-40.

Re: Engineers Allege Hiring Collusion in Silicon Valley

#97

Post by sliverstorm »

smsm42 wrote: post #88
sliverstorm wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You say they will cease to be large, and "pretty soon" at that. You accuse employees of being impatient. But this collusion lasted for nearly five years. Besides, how can their talent leave for players paying better money when nobody except for the large players can afford top wages? Just because Google can extract $150k+ of yearly value out of an engineer doesn't mean another company can. You need a large, successfu…

Five years is not a very long time for a company, and it assumes this collusion actually suppressed wages in a meaningful way, compared to the rest of the industry, which is yet to be proven. >>> Besides, how can their talent leave for players paying better money when nobody except for the large players can afford top wages? If their wages are so high already as to be unaffordable for most of the industry, it signifi…

Five years is not a very long time for a company, but for an individual? Especially in an industry that exhibits ageism and by some accounts is "done with you" when you turn 40? Given that, five years is more than 25% of the time in which you are hot on the market. So, no, I don't really think someone who has been shafted for five years is being "impatient". Just how long do you expect them to wait?

Re: Engineers Allege Hiring Collusion in Silicon Valley

#98

Post by lostlogin »

sliverstorm wrote: post #82
smsm42 wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If large players routinely pay top specialists low wages, they will cease to be large pretty soon, since their talent will be leaving for players paying better money and making those players large instead. Some people, of course, are impatient and want their enormous wage to be even more enormous - and now! And they want it while carrying no risk at all. That's where politicians come in - delivering other people's mo…

You say they will cease to be large, and "pretty soon" at that. You accuse employees of being impatient. But this collusion lasted for nearly five years. Besides, how can their talent leave for players paying better money when nobody except for the large players can afford top wages? Just because Google can extract $150k+ of yearly value out of an engineer doesn't mean another company can. You need a large, successfu…

This doesn't directly correlate, however Apples profit per FTE was over $2 million in 2013. http://tech.fortune.cnn.com/2013/10/31/apple-revenue-per-hea...

Re: Engineers Allege Hiring Collusion in Silicon Valley

#99

Post by lostlogin »

dhoulb wrote: post #3
nerfhammer wrote: post #2

> It also offers a portrait of Silicon Valley engineers that differs sharply from their current caricature as well-paid villains who are driving up the price of real estate in San Francisco and making the city unbearable for others. What? "unbearable"? That seems a little out of place. Would most NYTimes readers have any idea what he's talking about? From the author's recent articles list: -- In little more than a de…

Wow, did Eric Schmidt run over his dog or something? Guy's got a serious bias!

Some people, myself included, find fault often (too often) and look for the flaws. Assuming the worst leads to pleasant surprises. Assuming the best rarely does. My 2c.

Re: Engineers Allege Hiring Collusion in Silicon Valley

#100

Post by ahomescu1 »

hanswesterbeek wrote: post #57
bowlofpetunias wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We could use a bit more self-reflection and a little less shooting the messenger around here. If you only want to read happy happy joy, disruption yeah, cheerleader stories about how awesome the tech industry is, I suggest TechCrunch. Our industry has a pervading attitude of treating anybody who is not "us" as roadkill on the highway to progress. That's going to turn against us a lot harder then these few relatively…

Exactly. The tech-industry is horribly naive. It operates based on the idea that the general public perceives them as those friendly shy nerdy guys from school. Wake up, guys. People have had tech giants invade their life way too much and they've all seen in The Social Network what kind of person a poster boy like Mark Zuckerberg really is.

> Wake up, guys. People have had tech giants invade their life way too much and they've all seen in The Social Network what kind of person a poster boy like Mark Zuckerberg really is.

The Social Network is heavily dramatized, and not really realistic. You shouldn't take a Hollywood movie as reference for real-life. IMHO, the way they depicted MZ in the movie is completely off (spoiled arrogant ass-hole), that's not what he is like in real life.

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