I don't understand why we aren't pushing back on WFH-related salary cuts. Why does it matter to a FAANG company where I live? The value of labor is the value of labor. If you're producing at the same rate in Boise as you would in SF, why is that suddenly worth less? People have lived in Bay Area suburbs forever to decrease cost of living, but we wouldn't expect or accept lower salaries for them because of it. Companies are already reducing overhead by letting employees WFH. We should be recouping that as workers rather than taking a discount. The level of cuts seem arbitrary and the calculations are not transparent. We should not tolerate this. We should band together to reject this collectively.
Monopsony
I agree ppl in contries outside US should be paid equally.
Nope definitely not
I agree. OP should agree to take the wage levels demanded by people in rural India.
The real question is if we are about equality, shouldn’t Apple rebalance if just for a year and pay everyone the median salary regardless of role? Imagine the lives that would be changed
By the same token, companies now have a larger labor pool to choose from and this naturally puts downward pressure on the price of labor. You are free to say no, and they are free to fire you and hire someone from Boise who will work for 1/2 the cost.
Do they really? Labor market statistics say otherwise
Candidates also have a larger pool of companies to choose from. It balances out.
What salary cuts are you talking about? But I kind of agree - I personally think they have to compensate me for having to WFH - housing and office costs. And the worst part - I cannot even deduct home office expenses!
I think the mistake you’re making is assuming your pay is in any way related to your ‘output.’ It’s not. You’re paid based on how much other employers would pay you for the same position. Intuitively, this is why between two equal candidates, the one with the counteroffer gets paid more. When you move to Boise, you’re no longer in a competitive market. Amazon knows you don’t have better paying options, so they can pay you less.
You get a salary that’s more than me because you moved to the HCOL area. Now you’re not there. So you don’t get to have that benefit anymore. Your salary drops to somewhere around mind in a normalized scenario. I just realized. You sound like the union people. My answer to collective bargaining is: No.
There's nothing inherently wrong about unions and historically unions have done some really good things for providing benefits and livable wages. But I agree with your first part about HCOL.
Cisco: what is your problem with collective bargaining? United we bargain divided we beg
That’s why I’m about to quit my job. They want to pay me 20-25% less to do the same thing because I want to go back to where I grew up. But they let people live in the suburbs of Seattle and WFH for their original amount.
Your pay is relative to cost of living in the area you are at. Why should someone in Boise be paid as much as the Bay Area when they can buy a house at 25% of the cost ? If anything, I’d vote for deeper cuts.
Nope. These are still talented coworkers we'd want to keep, right?
No, your pay is relative to the competitive market for labor in which you live, ASSUMING everyone does not have virtual work opportunities. It's not a coincidence that low competition areas are also lower cost of living though there are exceptions (ie London, people are not paid great in tech but they are paid well in say finance, but it's very expensive for other reasons.)
You have a choice: say no
Exactly. If collectively we start saying no, compensations will react accordingly. We are the one in demand and its a tough market to hire
Is this really true? I don't feel like I'm in demand. I even get offers, but they're never willing to negotiate. If there was real demand Id imagine they'd be more flexible.