6 ms·

I totally agree with your diagnosis, but I don’t see why it’s considered to be a problem. Why shouldn’t people be free to trade off salary against other desirab

I totally agree with your diagnosis, but I don’t see why it’s considered to be a problem. Why shouldn’t people be free to trade off salary against other desirable traits in a job? Even at the extremes?

madrox 3y ago
I tend to agree with you. In the end, salary reflects what the market will put up with, and if you're not willing to take a salary hit to work in games, someone else will. This is why I don't think regulation will fix this. It has to be on the individual to decide what's right for them.
- Ecstatify 3y ago
  Yeah let’s get rid of minimum wage while we’re at it.
  - madrox 3y ago
    Minimum wage does solve a certain kind of unskilled worker exploitation. I don't think passion tends to be at play for minimum wage jobs. This is a different kind of exploitation that's more difficult to regulate.
  - s1artibartfast 3y ago
    100% would agree.
    - Andrex 3y ago
      [flagged]
      - mcmoor 3y ago
        The solution for that is UBI not minimum wage
      - s1artibartfast 3y ago
        no, I just think that minimum wage is the worst possible way to address the issue, from an economic perspective. It would be far better to pay people what their work is actually worth, and then give them charity through the government, supported by taxes, if need be. Same goes for healthcare, which should absolutely not be a mandated part of employment. Pay people what they are worth, and let them buy healthcare. If we want to subsidize or provide charitable healthcare, then we can do so too.
        Ecstatify 3y ago
        Why should the taxpayer foot the bill for a business unable to pay their employees a living wage.
        s1artibartfast 3y ago
        if the work isnt worth a living wage, the difference is charity. Nobody is owed more than their work is worth. If we want to have charity to make lives easier, that's fine. There are lost of good reasons to avoid angry and starving people in the street. They can be paid by taxes. You could even tax businesses to pay for it. Pretending it isn't charity is what I object to, and the economic problems it creates.
  - swells34 3y ago
    I'd much rather implement a maximum wage, would do a huge amount of good for our society. Let's say a cap on any more than $10M a year for total wealth gain for any individual. Everything else is taxed at 100%. Suddenly, we could all have healthcare, kids would get the supplies they need for school, a UBI scheme would be doable. Basically, we could finally stop acting like a poor third world country.
    - jazzyjackson 3y ago
      This is literally how the freemasons started as a secret society btw. After the black plague there were salary caps on skilled labor but the masons decided to hell with that and colluded to demand higher wages under the table if you wanted a cathedral or a city hall built they held all the leverage
    - j7ake 3y ago
      Please explain why taxing people beyond $10M at 100% will result in better social programs? Your theory can also be countered with another theory: people making a certain amount of money will simply leave the country, leaving you with less tax revenue than the current system. Also, how does one tax unrealized stock market gains (which is what most wealthy people's wealth are)? I have not seen that policy anywhere and I imagine it would be very difficult to implement.
    - tomcam 3y ago
      Is it your thought that a 100% tax rate would increase the productivity of those being taxed at that rate? Or even leave it unchanged?
      - lacrimacida 3y ago
        Not exactly 100% but high enough to keep greed in check after a certain cap
        lotsofpulp 3y ago
        Why tax income? Wealth should be taxed. The problem is hoarding, not doing valuable work. For example, owning land that is empty or an empty building for years just so it appreciates deprives the community. Tax the shit out of it so it forces the owner to use it productively or sell it so someone else can figure out how to use it productively.
dymk 3y ago
[flagged]
- slothtrop 3y ago
  The "children" (i.e. working adults) have to go well out of their way to work on games and anime and know how much it pays. The mines (for real) in developed countries actually pay really well and are sometimes unionized.
- oatmeal1 3y ago
  When the alternative is starving, they do. The problem isn't children being allowed to work in mines. The problem is the lack of superior alternatives available to them.
  - kelnos 3y ago
    Right, and in this case, the superior alternative should be an animator who makes a decent living. Sometimes, unfortunately, we have to legislate the superior alternative into existence. I'm not certain that's a good or necessary move in this particular case (I doubt there are many if any animators where their choice is to be an animator for low wages, or starve and live on the streets), but it's an option. I always thought it weird that we have minimum wage levels for hourly workers, but once you're salaried, you work however many hours your employer wants, or you get marginalized or fired. For many HNers that's not that big a deal, as our effective hourly wage still ends up to be many hundreds of dollars. But there are salaried workers down at the low end who are required to work quite a bit more than the 40 hours a week their "nominal" hourly wage might be calculated off of, and some of those people end up well below what a minimum wage would be for hourly workers.
    - a_t48 3y ago
      This is what salary exemption in CA is for, in my understanding. Unless you're making more than twice minimum wage overtime must be paid, even if salaried. The bar may be even higher for certain professions (like software!) (Caveat that more of the world exists than CA)
Andrex 3y ago
If unionization were endemic to the global economy, that might work. Lacking that, power dynamics are such that workers need protections enshrined in legislation. If salaries are a race-to-the-bottom, nobody benefits except the ones doing the hiring. You may have a "job," but the market salary average would be depressed while the companies enjoy a large talent pool of replaceable workers. If I didn't know history too well, I likely wouldn't hold this position. But it's clear as day if you crack open a history book.
- financypants 3y ago
  When would candidates compete to work for less? I haven’t seen that demonstrated anywhere. I have seen firms compete on pay.
  - badosu 3y ago
    When they can replace you no matter how talented you are, it only takes hiring the next bright eyed young aspiring artist.
  - Andrex 3y ago
    > When would candidates compete to work for less? The first example to jump out in my mind is gov't contractors, which isn't a direct analogue to workers but the mentality of undercutting your competition to get ahead is basic human nature IMO. Two candidates vying for the same job wouldn't consciously sabotage each other (let's assume). But if they both give a salary quote, why wouldn't the lower-priced candidate be a more appealing hire? With no protections, it would come down to whoever is willing (or able) to cut more pieces of their body off to win the job. And that behavior is not conducive to a well-functioning economy that supports a large and contented middle class, which is the preferred economic status of all state actors.
- madrox 3y ago
  Unions were on my mind when I read this. However, for some reason unions don't tend to take over in creative fields or fields of passion. SAG-AFTRA is the only exception to this that I can think of. This is why I think it's become common practice for tech companies to profit share. We take it for granted now, but it's not common...especially for artists.
Moru 3y ago
Because it's a very uneven power balance. Big company using young inexperienced workers that just want a foot in the door on a childhood dream and have no idea how much their work is worth. Most companies knows to exploit this to the full. Especially known in arts, music and game industry. Less so with (metal) industry jobs where there are old unions helping the workers to a healthier power balance. Except for Musk that seems to be a strange new coin behaving like the industry did 200 years ago.
- double0jimb0 3y ago
  Tesla as an innovation-driven company couldn’t be further from the types of metal industry jobs you refer to. Why can’t an innovative company trade its “capital” to get the young and ambitious to work for less pay?
- tomcam 3y ago
  Did people 100 years ago get stock options and similar forms of compensation along with their meager salaries?
- astrange 3y ago
  Anime doesn't really have big companies. Maybe Aniplex (Sony) at most.
ParetoOptimal 3y ago
The problem is it becomes collectively forced and the value of their labor is devalued.
GuB-42 3y ago
Because there are not many desirable traits. If people were really doing what they enjoyed, it would be fine, but the problem is that they often don't. I am thinking more about the video game industry, but I think there is a similar problem in animation and all other "fun" industry. People who get in these industries often want to get paid for what they already do for fun, being doodling or coding small games. Or maybe they see the big projects like a popular anime or a game they loved and want to be part of it. But in many cases, what they only get is a repetitive, not very creative, and high pressure job, with all the fun sucked out of it. Which would be fine if the pay was worth it, but it isn't, and the prospects are not great either, because the really interesting positions are few compared to the grunt work. Problem is that newcomers don't know that, or maybe hope they are special, and companies really play on that, schools too. What happens is that a few years later you get a bunch of guys that are completely drawn out, hopefully they find a better job elsewhere, to be replaced by a new batch of kids with a soon to be broken dream. Some are luckier and get the job they really wanted (it probably won't be you), and others are really unlucky because their skillset doesn't translate well to other industries and end up with burn out, depression and poverty.

madrox 3y ago

I tend to agree with you. In the end, salary reflects what the market will put up with, and if you're not willing to take a salary hit to work in games, someone else will. This is why I don't think regulation will fix this. It has to be on the individual to decide what's right for them.

Ecstatify 3y ago
Yeah let’s get rid of minimum wage while we’re at it.
- madrox 3y ago
  Minimum wage does solve a certain kind of unskilled worker exploitation. I don't think passion tends to be at play for minimum wage jobs. This is a different kind of exploitation that's more difficult to regulate.
- s1artibartfast 3y ago
  100% would agree.
  - Andrex 3y ago
    [flagged]
    - mcmoor 3y ago
      The solution for that is UBI not minimum wage
    - s1artibartfast 3y ago
      no, I just think that minimum wage is the worst possible way to address the issue, from an economic perspective. It would be far better to pay people what their work is actually worth, and then give them charity through the government, supported by taxes, if need be. Same goes for healthcare, which should absolutely not be a mandated part of employment. Pay people what they are worth, and let them buy healthcare. If we want to subsidize or provide charitable healthcare, then we can do so too.
      - Ecstatify 3y ago
        Why should the taxpayer foot the bill for a business unable to pay their employees a living wage.
        s1artibartfast 3y ago
        if the work isnt worth a living wage, the difference is charity. Nobody is owed more than their work is worth. If we want to have charity to make lives easier, that's fine. There are lost of good reasons to avoid angry and starving people in the street. They can be paid by taxes. You could even tax businesses to pay for it. Pretending it isn't charity is what I object to, and the economic problems it creates.
- swells34 3y ago
  I'd much rather implement a maximum wage, would do a huge amount of good for our society. Let's say a cap on any more than $10M a year for total wealth gain for any individual. Everything else is taxed at 100%. Suddenly, we could all have healthcare, kids would get the supplies they need for school, a UBI scheme would be doable. Basically, we could finally stop acting like a poor third world country.
  - jazzyjackson 3y ago
    This is literally how the freemasons started as a secret society btw. After the black plague there were salary caps on skilled labor but the masons decided to hell with that and colluded to demand higher wages under the table if you wanted a cathedral or a city hall built they held all the leverage
  - j7ake 3y ago
    Please explain why taxing people beyond $10M at 100% will result in better social programs? Your theory can also be countered with another theory: people making a certain amount of money will simply leave the country, leaving you with less tax revenue than the current system. Also, how does one tax unrealized stock market gains (which is what most wealthy people's wealth are)? I have not seen that policy anywhere and I imagine it would be very difficult to implement.
  - tomcam 3y ago
    Is it your thought that a 100% tax rate would increase the productivity of those being taxed at that rate? Or even leave it unchanged?
    - lacrimacida 3y ago
      Not exactly 100% but high enough to keep greed in check after a certain cap
      - lotsofpulp 3y ago
        Why tax income? Wealth should be taxed. The problem is hoarding, not doing valuable work. For example, owning land that is empty or an empty building for years just so it appreciates deprives the community. Tax the shit out of it so it forces the owner to use it productively or sell it so someone else can figure out how to use it productively.

dymk 3y ago

[flagged]

slothtrop 3y ago
The "children" (i.e. working adults) have to go well out of their way to work on games and anime and know how much it pays. The mines (for real) in developed countries actually pay really well and are sometimes unionized.
oatmeal1 3y ago
When the alternative is starving, they do. The problem isn't children being allowed to work in mines. The problem is the lack of superior alternatives available to them.
- kelnos 3y ago
  Right, and in this case, the superior alternative should be an animator who makes a decent living. Sometimes, unfortunately, we have to legislate the superior alternative into existence. I'm not certain that's a good or necessary move in this particular case (I doubt there are many if any animators where their choice is to be an animator for low wages, or starve and live on the streets), but it's an option. I always thought it weird that we have minimum wage levels for hourly workers, but once you're salaried, you work however many hours your employer wants, or you get marginalized or fired. For many HNers that's not that big a deal, as our effective hourly wage still ends up to be many hundreds of dollars. But there are salaried workers down at the low end who are required to work quite a bit more than the 40 hours a week their "nominal" hourly wage might be calculated off of, and some of those people end up well below what a minimum wage would be for hourly workers.
  - a_t48 3y ago
    This is what salary exemption in CA is for, in my understanding. Unless you're making more than twice minimum wage overtime must be paid, even if salaried. The bar may be even higher for certain professions (like software!) (Caveat that more of the world exists than CA)

Andrex 3y ago

If unionization were endemic to the global economy, that might work. Lacking that, power dynamics are such that workers need protections enshrined in legislation. If salaries are a race-to-the-bottom, nobody benefits except the ones doing the hiring. You may have a "job," but the market salary average would be depressed while the companies enjoy a large talent pool of replaceable workers. If I didn't know history too well, I likely wouldn't hold this position. But it's clear as day if you crack open a history book.

financypants 3y ago
When would candidates compete to work for less? I haven’t seen that demonstrated anywhere. I have seen firms compete on pay.
- badosu 3y ago
  When they can replace you no matter how talented you are, it only takes hiring the next bright eyed young aspiring artist.
- Andrex 3y ago
  > When would candidates compete to work for less? The first example to jump out in my mind is gov't contractors, which isn't a direct analogue to workers but the mentality of undercutting your competition to get ahead is basic human nature IMO. Two candidates vying for the same job wouldn't consciously sabotage each other (let's assume). But if they both give a salary quote, why wouldn't the lower-priced candidate be a more appealing hire? With no protections, it would come down to whoever is willing (or able) to cut more pieces of their body off to win the job. And that behavior is not conducive to a well-functioning economy that supports a large and contented middle class, which is the preferred economic status of all state actors.
madrox 3y ago
Unions were on my mind when I read this. However, for some reason unions don't tend to take over in creative fields or fields of passion. SAG-AFTRA is the only exception to this that I can think of. This is why I think it's become common practice for tech companies to profit share. We take it for granted now, but it's not common...especially for artists.

Moru 3y ago

Because it's a very uneven power balance. Big company using young inexperienced workers that just want a foot in the door on a childhood dream and have no idea how much their work is worth. Most companies knows to exploit this to the full. Especially known in arts, music and game industry. Less so with (metal) industry jobs where there are old unions helping the workers to a healthier power balance. Except for Musk that seems to be a strange new coin behaving like the industry did 200 years ago.

double0jimb0 3y ago
Tesla as an innovation-driven company couldn’t be further from the types of metal industry jobs you refer to. Why can’t an innovative company trade its “capital” to get the young and ambitious to work for less pay?
tomcam 3y ago
Did people 100 years ago get stock options and similar forms of compensation along with their meager salaries?
astrange 3y ago
Anime doesn't really have big companies. Maybe Aniplex (Sony) at most.

ParetoOptimal 3y ago

The problem is it becomes collectively forced and the value of their labor is devalued.

GuB-42 3y ago

Because there are not many desirable traits. If people were really doing what they enjoyed, it would be fine, but the problem is that they often don't. I am thinking more about the video game industry, but I think there is a similar problem in animation and all other "fun" industry. People who get in these industries often want to get paid for what they already do for fun, being doodling or coding small games. Or maybe they see the big projects like a popular anime or a game they loved and want to be part of it. But in many cases, what they only get is a repetitive, not very creative, and high pressure job, with all the fun sucked out of it. Which would be fine if the pay was worth it, but it isn't, and the prospects are not great either, because the really interesting positions are few compared to the grunt work. Problem is that newcomers don't know that, or maybe hope they are special, and companies really play on that, schools too. What happens is that a few years later you get a bunch of guys that are completely drawn out, hopefully they find a better job elsewhere, to be replaced by a new batch of kids with a soon to be broken dream. Some are luckier and get the job they really wanted (it probably won't be you), and others are really unlucky because their skillset doesn't translate well to other industries and end up with burn out, depression and poverty.