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> This is a Bernie Madoff-sized crime. Really? Equivalent to a $50 billion ponzi scheme in which thousands of people lost their pensions and become destitute?
by thinkpad20 13y ago
> This is a Bernie Madoff-sized crime.
Really? Equivalent to a $50 billion ponzi scheme in which thousands of people lost their pensions and become destitute? That's the same as denying a few thousand dollars to already very highly compensated engineers? I'm not excusing what they're doing but the Madoff comparison seems off.
- Zigurd 13y agoIs it a smaller crime if you take smaller amounts from more people? Had these been outright unpaid wages, the answer would be clear. The dollar value here is probably similar.
- thinkpad20 13y agoThey're not poaching each other's workers, so let's say that Tom works for Apple and makes $90,000 per year. Google could attempt to recruit Tom and offer him $100,000 per year, but they don't. So Tom loses $10,000 per year. This is probably the worst-case scenario for an individual engineer. Of course, Tom is still earning a very nice salary over that time, and who knows, maybe he actually ends up making more, but let's envision a worst-case scenario in which an engineer loses $100 grand over ten years, because of this policy. In order for the dollar value to be similar to what Madoff stole from people, that scenario, or a higher wage loss, would have had to happen to five hundred thousand engineers. All working at a handful of companies. Does that still sound plausible to you?
- Zigurd 13y agoOr to 100k employees for 5 years. Or if it's not just cash but ISOs and bonuses that are also depressed, maybe just 50k employees. Multiple large tech employers are involved, over a span of perhps longer than 5 years. It adds up quickly.