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Is this satire? Talking about salaries have always resulted in better or equal pay for everyone involved (except the higher ups, like you) in my experience, an

Is this satire? Talking about salaries have always resulted in better or equal pay for everyone involved (except the higher ups, like you) in my experience, and the experience of everyone I know. Your post sounds like companies claiming that unions would actually hurt you. If you're underpaying people in order to get to an IPO, people deserve to be aware of that and know the risks involved.

usui 5y ago
I'm not sure why you are interpreting the parent's comment as similar to "claiming that unions would actually hurt you". It's just a post talking about how management in companies works around the illegality of telling employees not to talk to about pay. It's in the first sentence. It's not like the parent comment is defending the practice, just how it's done in practice to discourage employees. Yes, groups of employees that don't band together believe that it will hurt their own bottom line if they talk about pay.
- yupper32 5y ago
  Are you saying that the poster is saying that they lie to their employees? I'm honestly not sure what you're saying.
mfogikds 5y ago
"Talking about salaries have always resulted in better or equal pay for everyone involved" What is the exact source on this? I highly doubt every company in existence has the budget to pay everyone "better or equal"
- yupper32 5y ago
  I address that in the second half of the sentence: "in my experience, and the experience of everyone I know." I'm not claiming a universal truth. I do think that the original post is much farther away from the truth than my claim, though.
  - mfogikds 5y ago
    Have you done an actual survey? I doubt you know the inner workings of every workplace of everyone you know.
- makeitdouble 5y ago
  You’ll need pretty solid justifications to lower salaries. In a case where a bunch of employees realize they’re underpaid, there’s only three natural outcomes: - lower paid employees don’t get anything, and start looking for a better paying job - lower paid employees get compensatory raises - lower paid employees get nothing and the higher paid members are expected to get lower pays. They proceed to leave for greener pastures (and they only need to find at least equal paying jobs to make it worth it) The scenario where salaries go down and employees don’t do anything is unrealistic.
kube-system 5y ago
I think the person you're responding to is referring to the social (not economic) outcomes that result when people realize they're paid differently than their peers. Depending on how diverse a team is (in terms of ability, experience, performance) this can open up discussions about what "equal pay" really means. If ability, experience, and performance are part of how you pay your employees, then a discussion about comparative pay of employees inherently means you are opening up a discussion about the comparative ability, experience, and performance of employees. I'm not saying that's a bad thing -- but -- some feelings might get hurt in the process.
- b3morales 5y ago
  Mostly agree, but I think there's a companion reason for the triggering of discomfort. The idea that pay is completely merit-based -- as you say "in terms of ability, experience, performance" -- is a comforting lie that we tell ourselves, in my experience. No company has truly objective decisions for salary. There is always a large handful of historical accident and personal relationships stirred in. (If nothing else, in tech a person's salary is partly determined by their previous salary at other companies!) Discussing the raw numbers of pay exposes that fact as well.
  - kube-system 5y ago
    For sure, pay is much more driven by immediate staffing needs for retention or hiring. This has more to do with the labor markets and work pipeline than anything about an individual employee. But people say they should be paid based on ability, performance, and experience. So this is what the conversation will be centered around, whether it is the complete reality for the considerations made by the employer or not. Alice won’t care that Bob was hired for $10K more because there was a labor shortage and the company was going to lose a contract if they couldn’t hire another person. She just wants her $10K. So, the marginal cost of hiring an additional employee is not only the cost of that employee, but the additional wage demand that would result from the rest of your workforce. This is likely why we see many companies giving bonuses in this labor crunch rather than higher base wages.

usui 5y ago

I'm not sure why you are interpreting the parent's comment as similar to "claiming that unions would actually hurt you". It's just a post talking about how management in companies works around the illegality of telling employees not to talk to about pay. It's in the first sentence. It's not like the parent comment is defending the practice, just how it's done in practice to discourage employees. Yes, groups of employees that don't band together believe that it will hurt their own bottom line if they talk about pay.

yupper32 5y ago
Are you saying that the poster is saying that they lie to their employees? I'm honestly not sure what you're saying.

mfogikds 5y ago

"Talking about salaries have always resulted in better or equal pay for everyone involved" What is the exact source on this? I highly doubt every company in existence has the budget to pay everyone "better or equal"

yupper32 5y ago
I address that in the second half of the sentence: "in my experience, and the experience of everyone I know." I'm not claiming a universal truth. I do think that the original post is much farther away from the truth than my claim, though.
- mfogikds 5y ago
  Have you done an actual survey? I doubt you know the inner workings of every workplace of everyone you know.
makeitdouble 5y ago
You’ll need pretty solid justifications to lower salaries. In a case where a bunch of employees realize they’re underpaid, there’s only three natural outcomes: - lower paid employees don’t get anything, and start looking for a better paying job - lower paid employees get compensatory raises - lower paid employees get nothing and the higher paid members are expected to get lower pays. They proceed to leave for greener pastures (and they only need to find at least equal paying jobs to make it worth it) The scenario where salaries go down and employees don’t do anything is unrealistic.

kube-system 5y ago

I think the person you're responding to is referring to the social (not economic) outcomes that result when people realize they're paid differently than their peers. Depending on how diverse a team is (in terms of ability, experience, performance) this can open up discussions about what "equal pay" really means. If ability, experience, and performance are part of how you pay your employees, then a discussion about comparative pay of employees inherently means you are opening up a discussion about the comparative ability, experience, and performance of employees. I'm not saying that's a bad thing -- but -- some feelings might get hurt in the process.

b3morales 5y ago
Mostly agree, but I think there's a companion reason for the triggering of discomfort. The idea that pay is completely merit-based -- as you say "in terms of ability, experience, performance" -- is a comforting lie that we tell ourselves, in my experience. No company has truly objective decisions for salary. There is always a large handful of historical accident and personal relationships stirred in. (If nothing else, in tech a person's salary is partly determined by their previous salary at other companies!) Discussing the raw numbers of pay exposes that fact as well.
- kube-system 5y ago
  For sure, pay is much more driven by immediate staffing needs for retention or hiring. This has more to do with the labor markets and work pipeline than anything about an individual employee. But people say they should be paid based on ability, performance, and experience. So this is what the conversation will be centered around, whether it is the complete reality for the considerations made by the employer or not. Alice won’t care that Bob was hired for $10K more because there was a labor shortage and the company was going to lose a contract if they couldn’t hire another person. She just wants her $10K. So, the marginal cost of hiring an additional employee is not only the cost of that employee, but the additional wage demand that would result from the rest of your workforce. This is likely why we see many companies giving bonuses in this labor crunch rather than higher base wages.