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> Offering equal pay for equal work [...] Pay people for their contribution and treat all humans with equal respect. Does any company actually do this? I don’t

> Offering equal pay for equal work [...] Pay people for their contribution and treat all humans with equal respect. Does any company actually do this? I don’t feel like this is economically feasible. What rate do you pay? The California rate or the Romania rate? If pay the Romania rate then no one from California will work for you. If you pay the California rate then you will be putting way more money into salaries then needed, which could drown your company in hard times. Splitting the difference doesn’t actually solve anything. I can see in the long run equal pay becoming a reality, especially within a country (same pay for California or Nebraska) because movement is so easy. But it will be long time before cost of living between the poorest matches that of the richest.

chrisseaton 4y ago
> Does any company actually do this? I think for example Igalia pay literally every person the exact same figure, no matter their experience or location.
- jfk13 4y ago
  But does everyone at Igalia do exactly equal work?
  - netizen-936824 4y ago
    Who decides what work is equal?
    - znpy 4y ago
      Same tasks, same responsibilities might be a start?
      - chrisseaton 4y ago
        That’s expectations, not output.
davidmurdoch 4y ago
If citizenship, or lack thereof, prevents someone from moving to another location in order to work from there, then equal pay across those borders doesn't make sense. But California vs Idaho (states in the US)... they should have equal pay.
silvestrov 4y ago
If you pay "Romania rate" for Romanians then those people can easily be hired by companies which are willing to pay a few dollars extra. I think we have begun to see this with people hired in India: if you pay "Indian rate" then you get the bottom of the barrel. If you want very good developers in India you need to pay above "Indian rate". The market for very good developers is no longer local.
- vlovich123 4y ago
  What you just said applies to SV too. Pay average you get an average SV engineer that likely isn’t particularly more effective than engineers abroad, the only advantage being physical locality. On the other hand, companies are quite terrible at determining and utilizing actual value. So I do think there’s a lot of really good developers that aren’t making “above average” rates for whatever reason. heck, see all the engineers that go off and start companies that they then sell back to the behemoths for several multiples more - they take a pay cut in the short term because they believe they’re being undervalued wherever they are.
- tfehring 4y ago
  Very good developers in India generally don’t make $500k+ USD/year, which is the going rate for very good developers in the Bay Area. Salaries are heterogeneous within areas, but they’re still also heterogeneous across areas even when you hold talent level constant.
bentlegen 4y ago
Other issues folks frequently skip over are legal complications and benefit differences between countries. If the salary is the same, but an employee in one country has 5 weeks vacation (legally required), but another has 2 weeks, is that equal pay for equal work? What about when one country says that, if an employee quits (not terminated), the employer must continue paying them for another 3 months anyways? Is this the same carrying cost as employment in a state with at-will employment? Another somewhat related topic is that if you employ a single employee in some states, your company may have to pay additional taxes because you now have a “presence” in that state. Do you pay them the same, even though their “carrying cost” could be prohibitive for the business? This is not an endorsement of any particular approach, just surfacing that things are not as cut-and-dry as they are presented.
- ghaff 4y ago
  At the very least, it's an easier case to make that salaries should be equalized across states within the US. There are a lot of complications to making it worldwide and, yes, it probably means at a minimum that total comp including benefits is equalized, not salary. To be sure, that means you probably don't pay especially competitively in the highest cost of living states--but frankly, that's probably already the case with many companies that don't have significant offices there.
- chrisseaton 4y ago
  Why not give everyone the same employment rights, and the same pay?
  - bentlegen 4y ago
    Nobody said you couldn’t. Go for it!
    - chrisseaton 4y ago
      Well you said 'If the salary is the same, but an employee in one country has 5 weeks vacation (legally required), but another has 2 weeks, is that equal pay for equal work?' like it was a blocker?
chrismeller 4y ago
I don’t understand that either. Even on-site jobs don’t pay the same whether you’re in the US or Europe working for the same company - IT salaries in Europe are, even in countries like Ireland and Germany, lower than their US counterparts even though the taxes and cost of living can be higher. Even in the US salaries are different based upon where you live - SFO or NYC vs. Kansas.
hamasho 4y ago
> ...especially within a country (same pay for California or Nebraska) because movement is so easy. I can't entirely agree with this. Yes, it's easier to move if your job is completely remote. But for many people, the most significant barriers are not financial problems but mental ones. Even though I'm single, I have few friends near my house and am satisfied with my current living environment. It's a bit scary to move to somewhere I don't know. And if I lived with a family, it would be much harder. That's why the house prices are skyrocketing even though more people have started working entirely remotely. The majority of remote workers are still living in a big town and don't plan to move to the countryside in the near future.
- ghaff 4y ago
  A lot of the more desirable countryside or smaller city prices have gone up as well. Not that I really disagree. Especially if you're settled in there are a lot of frictions to moving--more or less depending on circumstances. Absent a need to move for a job or whatever, you're talking at least a lot of time and at least some amount of money. So if you're "OK" where you are, the default is certainly to stay put.
- BlargMcLarg 4y ago
  >That's why the house prices are skyrocketing even though more people have started working entirely remotely. I don't disagree with the premise prior to this, but I do think a lot of people overestimate how many permanent remote workers there are, and by extension, how big their influence on the housing market is.
- aaomidi 4y ago
  Housing prices are skyrocketing in areas with no industry lol
purrcat259 4y ago
Hotjar does. Pay for the same role is the same band regardless of location.
rapind 4y ago
> If you pay the California rate then you will be putting way more money into salaries then needed, which could drown your company in hard times. This doesn't follow. You can still be profitable by hiring people who add value, and paying them a consistent percentage for that value, regardless of location. Assuming of course that everyone is working remotely regardless of location, and time zones are a non-issue. (remote vs. local could have legitimate salary impacts, as well as time zone availability, due to potential increased burden on the business). If your business's profit is based on the ability to exploit reduced living costs, then your business is at least partially focused on trading in salary differences (arbitrage?). That has it's own problems (like splitting your focus), but is probably OK as long as the margin you're making from it is lucrative. As this margin decreases you're spending more and more time trading in salaries and less time focus on your product. That's perfectly fine business wise as long as you're still making a profit, although at some point you may turn into an agency / recruiter (pivot?!?). If however, your business's profit is based purely on providing a valuable product, you still benefit from a much wider pool of talent (thus reducing overall salaries due to supply) even without exploiting living costs. You can ignore location (assuming again time zone isn't an issue) and pay based on percentage of value. Plus you can still focus primarily on your product, instead of becoming a salary trader!
- chrisseaton 4y ago
  > paying them a consistent percentage for that value Except... there's a market. People want to be paid based on a market clearing rate, not on your appraisal of value. And what is value anyway? If a company is in build mode and not generating any value is nobody paid anything?
  - rapind 4y ago
    If your value percentage does't cover market rate, then you might need to rethink your business. Market rate is derived from value percentage across all companies that seek the same talent (and also negotiating strength etc.). If a company is in build mode, there are other creative ways to compensate (stock, etc.) or you convince investors of future value so you can afford to build it (investors) by paying market rate. An investor who just gave you millions of dollars to build something, probably doesn't want to hear about how you're going to cut costs by hiring overseas talent. If the only way you can succeed is by exploiting location based salaries, then your business isn't just competing in it's product market, but also competing with every other business that is trying to exploit location based salaries (and there's a lot).
mping 4y ago
If I move from California to Romania will I get a lower salary? I call this BS.
- ykevinator2 4y ago
higeorge13 4y ago
I work remotely for a company which does this. Every role and level has a salary range, independent of location and close to german standards.
- chrisseaton 4y ago
  > close to German standards Paying everyone the floor rate is one approach, lol.

chrisseaton 4y ago

> Does any company actually do this? I think for example Igalia pay literally every person the exact same figure, no matter their experience or location.

jfk13 4y ago
But does everyone at Igalia do exactly equal work?
- netizen-936824 4y ago
  Who decides what work is equal?
  - znpy 4y ago
    Same tasks, same responsibilities might be a start?
    - chrisseaton 4y ago
      That’s expectations, not output.

davidmurdoch 4y ago

If citizenship, or lack thereof, prevents someone from moving to another location in order to work from there, then equal pay across those borders doesn't make sense. But California vs Idaho (states in the US)... they should have equal pay.

silvestrov 4y ago

If you pay "Romania rate" for Romanians then those people can easily be hired by companies which are willing to pay a few dollars extra. I think we have begun to see this with people hired in India: if you pay "Indian rate" then you get the bottom of the barrel. If you want very good developers in India you need to pay above "Indian rate". The market for very good developers is no longer local.

vlovich123 4y ago
What you just said applies to SV too. Pay average you get an average SV engineer that likely isn’t particularly more effective than engineers abroad, the only advantage being physical locality. On the other hand, companies are quite terrible at determining and utilizing actual value. So I do think there’s a lot of really good developers that aren’t making “above average” rates for whatever reason. heck, see all the engineers that go off and start companies that they then sell back to the behemoths for several multiples more - they take a pay cut in the short term because they believe they’re being undervalued wherever they are.
tfehring 4y ago
Very good developers in India generally don’t make $500k+ USD/year, which is the going rate for very good developers in the Bay Area. Salaries are heterogeneous within areas, but they’re still also heterogeneous across areas even when you hold talent level constant.

bentlegen 4y ago

Other issues folks frequently skip over are legal complications and benefit differences between countries. If the salary is the same, but an employee in one country has 5 weeks vacation (legally required), but another has 2 weeks, is that equal pay for equal work? What about when one country says that, if an employee quits (not terminated), the employer must continue paying them for another 3 months anyways? Is this the same carrying cost as employment in a state with at-will employment? Another somewhat related topic is that if you employ a single employee in some states, your company may have to pay additional taxes because you now have a “presence” in that state. Do you pay them the same, even though their “carrying cost” could be prohibitive for the business? This is not an endorsement of any particular approach, just surfacing that things are not as cut-and-dry as they are presented.

ghaff 4y ago
At the very least, it's an easier case to make that salaries should be equalized across states within the US. There are a lot of complications to making it worldwide and, yes, it probably means at a minimum that total comp including benefits is equalized, not salary. To be sure, that means you probably don't pay especially competitively in the highest cost of living states--but frankly, that's probably already the case with many companies that don't have significant offices there.
chrisseaton 4y ago
Why not give everyone the same employment rights, and the same pay?
- bentlegen 4y ago
  Nobody said you couldn’t. Go for it!
  - chrisseaton 4y ago
    Well you said 'If the salary is the same, but an employee in one country has 5 weeks vacation (legally required), but another has 2 weeks, is that equal pay for equal work?' like it was a blocker?

chrismeller 4y ago

I don’t understand that either. Even on-site jobs don’t pay the same whether you’re in the US or Europe working for the same company - IT salaries in Europe are, even in countries like Ireland and Germany, lower than their US counterparts even though the taxes and cost of living can be higher. Even in the US salaries are different based upon where you live - SFO or NYC vs. Kansas.

hamasho 4y ago

> ...especially within a country (same pay for California or Nebraska) because movement is so easy. I can't entirely agree with this. Yes, it's easier to move if your job is completely remote. But for many people, the most significant barriers are not financial problems but mental ones. Even though I'm single, I have few friends near my house and am satisfied with my current living environment. It's a bit scary to move to somewhere I don't know. And if I lived with a family, it would be much harder. That's why the house prices are skyrocketing even though more people have started working entirely remotely. The majority of remote workers are still living in a big town and don't plan to move to the countryside in the near future.

ghaff 4y ago
A lot of the more desirable countryside or smaller city prices have gone up as well. Not that I really disagree. Especially if you're settled in there are a lot of frictions to moving--more or less depending on circumstances. Absent a need to move for a job or whatever, you're talking at least a lot of time and at least some amount of money. So if you're "OK" where you are, the default is certainly to stay put.
BlargMcLarg 4y ago
>That's why the house prices are skyrocketing even though more people have started working entirely remotely. I don't disagree with the premise prior to this, but I do think a lot of people overestimate how many permanent remote workers there are, and by extension, how big their influence on the housing market is.
aaomidi 4y ago
Housing prices are skyrocketing in areas with no industry lol

purrcat259 4y ago

Hotjar does. Pay for the same role is the same band regardless of location.

rapind 4y ago

> If you pay the California rate then you will be putting way more money into salaries then needed, which could drown your company in hard times. This doesn't follow. You can still be profitable by hiring people who add value, and paying them a consistent percentage for that value, regardless of location. Assuming of course that everyone is working remotely regardless of location, and time zones are a non-issue. (remote vs. local could have legitimate salary impacts, as well as time zone availability, due to potential increased burden on the business). If your business's profit is based on the ability to exploit reduced living costs, then your business is at least partially focused on trading in salary differences (arbitrage?). That has it's own problems (like splitting your focus), but is probably OK as long as the margin you're making from it is lucrative. As this margin decreases you're spending more and more time trading in salaries and less time focus on your product. That's perfectly fine business wise as long as you're still making a profit, although at some point you may turn into an agency / recruiter (pivot?!?). If however, your business's profit is based purely on providing a valuable product, you still benefit from a much wider pool of talent (thus reducing overall salaries due to supply) even without exploiting living costs. You can ignore location (assuming again time zone isn't an issue) and pay based on percentage of value. Plus you can still focus primarily on your product, instead of becoming a salary trader!

chrisseaton 4y ago
> paying them a consistent percentage for that value Except... there's a market. People want to be paid based on a market clearing rate, not on your appraisal of value. And what is value anyway? If a company is in build mode and not generating any value is nobody paid anything?
- rapind 4y ago
  If your value percentage does't cover market rate, then you might need to rethink your business. Market rate is derived from value percentage across all companies that seek the same talent (and also negotiating strength etc.). If a company is in build mode, there are other creative ways to compensate (stock, etc.) or you convince investors of future value so you can afford to build it (investors) by paying market rate. An investor who just gave you millions of dollars to build something, probably doesn't want to hear about how you're going to cut costs by hiring overseas talent. If the only way you can succeed is by exploiting location based salaries, then your business isn't just competing in it's product market, but also competing with every other business that is trying to exploit location based salaries (and there's a lot).

mping 4y ago

If I move from California to Romania will I get a lower salary? I call this BS.

ykevinator2 4y ago

higeorge13 4y ago

I work remotely for a company which does this. Every role and level has a salary range, independent of location and close to german standards.

chrisseaton 4y ago
> close to German standards Paying everyone the floor rate is one approach, lol.