17 ms·

Wow, this feels like a middle finger on the way out the door: > Severance for most will likely involve a payout of two months wages plus a week per year served

Wow, this feels like a middle finger on the way out the door: > Severance for most will likely involve a payout of two months wages plus a week per year served up to a max of 26 weeks A week per year of service?

wawayanda 2y ago
Fair or not, a week per year is an extremely common formula for calculating severance at a large company
- alkonaut 2y ago
  This varies a lot between cultures and jurisdictions obviously. But not even half of Dells emplyees are in the US, so presumably a large chunk of these layoffs will be elsewhere.
gruez 2y ago
That's on top of "two months wages" base, which is already pretty generous. I'm not sure what you're expecting here? 2 months base + 1 month per year?
- jatins 2y ago
  don't think 2 months is generous
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
  - gruez 2y ago
    What's your baseline and where are you getting it? At least compared to the statutorily mandated amount of 0 days, and what companies typically give out (eg. 1-2 months), it's pretty good.
    - FireBeyond 2y ago
      > At least compared to the statutorily mandated amount of 0 days For a mass layoff, the statutorily mandated minimum amount is actually 2 months.
bombcar 2y ago
That's .... pretty damn good, actually. 2 months is already way above "average" and adding weeks per year is ... nice.
- laborundrstandr 2y ago
  Grading exit packages on a curve instead of what workers deserve only carries water for Dell and sets an ever lower bar for every subsequent round of layoffs.
  - gruez 2y ago
    Okay, how should it be graded? What's preventing me for arbitrarily choosing a number like 100 months? Averages might not be perfect, but at least everyone can agree on it.
    - laborundrstandr 2y ago
      You can choose 100 months then advocate your position on its merits, if you like. This is a political question, a contest of power and resources, not a math problem. Scaling severance to be proportionate to the average period of unemployment at the time of firing would ensure the company doing the layoff would bear their share of the societal burden of unemployment they are helping to create.
      - gruez 2y ago
        >You can choose 100 months then advocate your position on its merits, if you like You certainly didn't bother to do that, and "2 months is generous because it's above average" might be a lazy argument and perpetuates the status quo, but it's certainly orders of magnitude better than no argument.
        laborundrstandr 2y ago
        Your system of averaging employer input means that exclusively employers comprise a virtual senate for all matters severance and the corresponding employment they create. Any proposal that considers opinion and interests beyond businesses’ is already more even handed than your proposal.
kingTug 2y ago
Meanwhile, the CEO is estimated to be worth 90B.
nolok 2y ago
That's actually pretty good and how it's calculated in France when you're fired (beside the "notice" period, which would more or less match the two months here in Dell annoncement): https://www.service-public.fr/particuliers/vosdroits/F987 https://www.service-public.fr/particuliers/vosdroits/F987 , and similar to what other countries here are doing. 1/4 of a month per year served up to 10 years, and 1/3 of a month per year served after the first 10 years I'm of course ignoring the whole cause of layoff, which in France is very different and can lead to majoration or to straight up remove the severance, and also here unless you're someone with years on the job the paid holidays severance is usually the largest part of the amount you get and I don't think the US has an equivalent.
uqual 2y ago
Although, look at it like a retroactive inflation adjusted 2% raise for every year up to 26 that you worked at Dell. Dell doesn't _have_ to offer much of anything although in my experience the 1 week per year of tenure on top of a fixed payout is fairly common. For a 26 year employee, that's a total of 8 months of pay which is plenty of time to find a new job - assuming you have valuable skills to contribute and haven't just been coasting for years and not keeping your industry skills up to date. If one can't find a job in six months that is similar to their now defunct job, they probably won't and likely need to adjust their expectations.
grecy 2y ago
Welcome to America. As you can see from all the replies here, employee exploitation is not just the norm, it's expected. As you can see people are even thankful for it!
- nickpp 2y ago
  Welcome to America, where companies know they can fire easily so they hire easily. Strong competition between employers benefits employees. That is why salaries in the USA are so much higher than those in Europe. But hey, at least we’re not “exploited” here in the old EU. We're just being paid peanuts…
gred 2y ago
Seriously curious, what is your point of reference that makes this look bad?
bdcravens 2y ago
Even the two months sounds pretty good to me.
lostemptations5 2y ago
Wow what were you expecting? A year per year of service?
mywacaday 2y ago
That's poor, when I was in financial services there were three rounds of layoffs in 10 years. The payout was notice period and 6 weeks per year capped at two years salary. Some people I know were on three months notice and had 15 years service.

wawayanda 2y ago

Fair or not, a week per year is an extremely common formula for calculating severance at a large company

alkonaut 2y ago
This varies a lot between cultures and jurisdictions obviously. But not even half of Dells emplyees are in the US, so presumably a large chunk of these layoffs will be elsewhere.

gruez 2y ago

That's on top of "two months wages" base, which is already pretty generous. I'm not sure what you're expecting here? 2 months base + 1 month per year?

jatins 2y ago
don't think 2 months is generous
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- gruez 2y ago
  What's your baseline and where are you getting it? At least compared to the statutorily mandated amount of 0 days, and what companies typically give out (eg. 1-2 months), it's pretty good.
  - FireBeyond 2y ago
    > At least compared to the statutorily mandated amount of 0 days For a mass layoff, the statutorily mandated minimum amount is actually 2 months.

bombcar 2y ago

That's .... pretty damn good, actually. 2 months is already way above "average" and adding weeks per year is ... nice.

laborundrstandr 2y ago
Grading exit packages on a curve instead of what workers deserve only carries water for Dell and sets an ever lower bar for every subsequent round of layoffs.
- gruez 2y ago
  Okay, how should it be graded? What's preventing me for arbitrarily choosing a number like 100 months? Averages might not be perfect, but at least everyone can agree on it.
  - laborundrstandr 2y ago
    You can choose 100 months then advocate your position on its merits, if you like. This is a political question, a contest of power and resources, not a math problem. Scaling severance to be proportionate to the average period of unemployment at the time of firing would ensure the company doing the layoff would bear their share of the societal burden of unemployment they are helping to create.
    - gruez 2y ago
      >You can choose 100 months then advocate your position on its merits, if you like You certainly didn't bother to do that, and "2 months is generous because it's above average" might be a lazy argument and perpetuates the status quo, but it's certainly orders of magnitude better than no argument.
      - laborundrstandr 2y ago
        Your system of averaging employer input means that exclusively employers comprise a virtual senate for all matters severance and the corresponding employment they create. Any proposal that considers opinion and interests beyond businesses’ is already more even handed than your proposal.

kingTug 2y ago

Meanwhile, the CEO is estimated to be worth 90B.

nolok 2y ago

That's actually pretty good and how it's calculated in France when you're fired (beside the "notice" period, which would more or less match the two months here in Dell annoncement): https://www.service-public.fr/particuliers/vosdroits/F987 https://www.service-public.fr/particuliers/vosdroits/F987 , and similar to what other countries here are doing. 1/4 of a month per year served up to 10 years, and 1/3 of a month per year served after the first 10 years I'm of course ignoring the whole cause of layoff, which in France is very different and can lead to majoration or to straight up remove the severance, and also here unless you're someone with years on the job the paid holidays severance is usually the largest part of the amount you get and I don't think the US has an equivalent.

uqual 2y ago

Although, look at it like a retroactive inflation adjusted 2% raise for every year up to 26 that you worked at Dell. Dell doesn't _have_ to offer much of anything although in my experience the 1 week per year of tenure on top of a fixed payout is fairly common. For a 26 year employee, that's a total of 8 months of pay which is plenty of time to find a new job - assuming you have valuable skills to contribute and haven't just been coasting for years and not keeping your industry skills up to date. If one can't find a job in six months that is similar to their now defunct job, they probably won't and likely need to adjust their expectations.

grecy 2y ago

Welcome to America. As you can see from all the replies here, employee exploitation is not just the norm, it's expected. As you can see people are even thankful for it!

nickpp 2y ago
Welcome to America, where companies know they can fire easily so they hire easily. Strong competition between employers benefits employees. That is why salaries in the USA are so much higher than those in Europe. But hey, at least we’re not “exploited” here in the old EU. We're just being paid peanuts…

gred 2y ago

Seriously curious, what is your point of reference that makes this look bad?

bdcravens 2y ago

Even the two months sounds pretty good to me.

lostemptations5 2y ago

Wow what were you expecting? A year per year of service?

mywacaday 2y ago

That's poor, when I was in financial services there were three rounds of layoffs in 10 years. The payout was notice period and 6 weeks per year capped at two years salary. Some people I know were on three months notice and had 15 years service.