Hellofresh employees' open salary initiative(hfsalary.org)
hfsalary.org
Hellofresh employees' open salary initiative
https://hfsalary.org/
157 comments
As mentioned in another comment thread: we don’t need to speculate about the effects because millions of employees already share salaries with no anonymity in thousands of groups. That is, employees of the US or state governments.
That ends up including public universities - at least here in Washington, you can look up the salary of any employee of the University of Washington: https://fiscal.wa.gov/Salaries.aspx
Go ahead and find me, Spencer Nelson, or any other Software Engineer of any level you want.
What are the consequences of this? Is there vicious infighting, and sniping over raises? Uh, no. There is just simple compensation, and way less negotiation. When some job class needs a salary adjustment because the job market has changed, everyone benefits. It’s pretty great.
That ends up including public universities - at least here in Washington, you can look up the salary of any employee of the University of Washington: https://fiscal.wa.gov/Salaries.aspx
Go ahead and find me, Spencer Nelson, or any other Software Engineer of any level you want.
What are the consequences of this? Is there vicious infighting, and sniping over raises? Uh, no. There is just simple compensation, and way less negotiation. When some job class needs a salary adjustment because the job market has changed, everyone benefits. It’s pretty great.
The root cause is an open argument but I think one of the causes is that you get a demonstrably lower quality of employee because the pay can't be negotiated, and it's pegged so far below market it's insulting. The salary you mentioned is half that of the median developer salary in the US. If you can get into FAANG as a new grad you're looking at 1.5-2x the median. I'm not super familiar with UW's scaling system but I have to go to what appears to be the top level (ES10?) to get anything approaching a reasonable salary, and it's still less than entry level FAANG.
I used to contract for state government. They used contractors for all the "real development" because the developers on state payroll making $40k/yr were wholly unqualified to write any code. So they paid a contracting firm $80/hr to get someone making $100k/yr to come in and do it while the state employees managed the project and supervised the contractors.
If the government could just negotiate individual salaries for developers, they could pay them twice as much, fire the contractors, and get the work done for roughly the same quality, and cheaper.
I used to contract for state government. They used contractors for all the "real development" because the developers on state payroll making $40k/yr were wholly unqualified to write any code. So they paid a contracting firm $80/hr to get someone making $100k/yr to come in and do it while the state employees managed the project and supervised the contractors.
If the government could just negotiate individual salaries for developers, they could pay them twice as much, fire the contractors, and get the work done for roughly the same quality, and cheaper.
So, my previous role was as a PE in AWS. I made a high multiple of my current salary, yes.
I think the quality of people around me at UW is mostly just different. Domain expertise is much deeper - the image processing experts really know their stuff! While fundamental systems and devops stuff is pretty absent from anyone’s skillsets. I don’t think you can really simply say that the talent quality is better or worse - it’s different.
I work at UW because I prefer the content of the work over my past at AWS. It turns out there are lots of people like me, who agree that $120k is plenty, and who made a very cushy pile of cash in the past at FAANG.
I think the quality of people around me at UW is mostly just different. Domain expertise is much deeper - the image processing experts really know their stuff! While fundamental systems and devops stuff is pretty absent from anyone’s skillsets. I don’t think you can really simply say that the talent quality is better or worse - it’s different.
I work at UW because I prefer the content of the work over my past at AWS. It turns out there are lots of people like me, who agree that $120k is plenty, and who made a very cushy pile of cash in the past at FAANG.
It's plenty for people who already have a pile of cash. That seems a bit problematic right?
Depends on your lifestyle but for the bulk of Americans $120k is extremely cushy, at nearly 4x the median salary of $35k
It apso puts you in the ~75th percentile for household income in the US, if your spouse also works you're doing far better than the vast majority of Americans.
> Depends on your lifestyle but for the bulk of Americans $120k is extremely cushy, at nearly 4x the median salary of $35k
True, though it is closer to 3×
True, though it is closer to 3×
lol, ok I'm not quite sure how discussing fractions of an integer would change the conversation in this case since we're already trying to compare one person's $120k to a statistical median of ~$35k.
If you're actually interested in the numbers on different groups they're here [0]. For ex $120k is ~5.77x the median for a woman without a college degree.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personal_income_in_the_United_...
If you're actually interested in the numbers on different groups they're here [0]. For ex $120k is ~5.77x the median for a woman without a college degree.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personal_income_in_the_United_...
> I'm not quite sure how discussing fractions of an integer would change the conversation in this case
It doesn't, really, hence the “True” part of “True, though...”
It doesn't, really, hence the “True” part of “True, though...”
Uh, no, it's plenty for everyone. Leave it to HN to pretend that $120k is a starvation wage.
According to Foster City (Bay area, California) affordable housing, a 4 person family is considered low income at 146,350
See the table under "What are the income limits for the program?"
https://www.fostercity.org/commdev/page/frequently-asked-que...
See the table under "What are the income limits for the program?"
https://www.fostercity.org/commdev/page/frequently-asked-que...
You’re getting unfairly teased for this; I do think its a bit weird. But it’s mostly a problem for FAANG. My advice to everyone who can get a job at FAANG is to put in 5 or 6 years there, raking in a few million dollars (!!). Pay off student debts and secure your future, and then work for ~100k on something you care about or good for the world.
FAANG has to pay so much that they can actually have trouble retaining people. This pattern I have described seems to be becoming more common.
FAANG has to pay so much that they can actually have trouble retaining people. This pattern I have described seems to be becoming more common.
What you're saying is that if you're not motivated by money, and not worried about money, because you already have tons of money, then disclosing how much money you're making and knowing how much money your peers are making won't make much difference. Well, yes, probably. But I don't think this is the common case - especially when we're talking about academia, which attracts people with different set of motivations, usually.
That's all we needed to know - your primary motivation is not the max salary you can get. On that note, more power to you, I truly believe you're more likely to lead a happy life than most people.
But you're really not in a good position to advocate for open salaries - you're an outlier. Most people deeply, deeply, deeply care about their salaries. It's what gets them out of the bed in the morning, it's what makes their partners respect them, it's what might perhaps provide for private schooling for their kids, etc. Most importantly, it's what makes them feel good about themselves. Yes, those are all wrong reasons, and yes, that's how most people are wired [1].
You'll notice that people who work in academia, military, government jobs, etc all have one thing in common - they are ok with not being able to make more than their peers. They get their happiness from other things in life. But the majority of people out there will happily go the extra mile to get an extra bump in their salary. Open salaries don't allow that - everyone is treated the same, everyone works the same, everyone's output is the same, everyone makes the same salary.
If it sounds familiar to communism, it is - where I was born, everyone's salary was also the same and there was nothing you could do about it. It worked great for people in academia and military (and, coincidentally or not, those are generally the strengths of a communist regime), and it demoralized most people working in other parts of economy where there was supposed to be some competition in the market (which again, coincidentally or not, are the weaknesses of a communist regime). Notably, you won't find a lot of salary transparency in more evolved communist regimes like China, and that perfectly correlated with their economic growth.
[1] Side note: I might sound like I am wired the same way, but I actually took a 6x reduction in salary about 10 years ago and have stayed much below my previous level ever since. Life was incredibly comfortable back then, but I am happier now.
But you're really not in a good position to advocate for open salaries - you're an outlier. Most people deeply, deeply, deeply care about their salaries. It's what gets them out of the bed in the morning, it's what makes their partners respect them, it's what might perhaps provide for private schooling for their kids, etc. Most importantly, it's what makes them feel good about themselves. Yes, those are all wrong reasons, and yes, that's how most people are wired [1].
You'll notice that people who work in academia, military, government jobs, etc all have one thing in common - they are ok with not being able to make more than their peers. They get their happiness from other things in life. But the majority of people out there will happily go the extra mile to get an extra bump in their salary. Open salaries don't allow that - everyone is treated the same, everyone works the same, everyone's output is the same, everyone makes the same salary.
If it sounds familiar to communism, it is - where I was born, everyone's salary was also the same and there was nothing you could do about it. It worked great for people in academia and military (and, coincidentally or not, those are generally the strengths of a communist regime), and it demoralized most people working in other parts of economy where there was supposed to be some competition in the market (which again, coincidentally or not, are the weaknesses of a communist regime). Notably, you won't find a lot of salary transparency in more evolved communist regimes like China, and that perfectly correlated with their economic growth.
[1] Side note: I might sound like I am wired the same way, but I actually took a 6x reduction in salary about 10 years ago and have stayed much below my previous level ever since. Life was incredibly comfortable back then, but I am happier now.
> Most people deeply, deeply, deeply care about their salaries. It's what gets them out of the bed in the morning...
This seems to be kind of a problem though? Both to be this person, and to have to work with them, and to have society composed of them. Billionaires are a drain on society and the economy, but the core issue is not the wealth inequality itself but the larger attitude in which "most people deeply care about money, first and foremost".
This seems to be kind of a problem though? Both to be this person, and to have to work with them, and to have society composed of them. Billionaires are a drain on society and the economy, but the core issue is not the wealth inequality itself but the larger attitude in which "most people deeply care about money, first and foremost".
When you’re trying to save enough money to have 25x your annual expenses saved by retirement (to support a 4% safe-withdrawal-rate), buy a house in a good school district, and save for their kids’ college, people are naturally concerned about their income. This is single-digit barely-millionaire territory, not billionaire level of income inequality.
What do you do at UW? I left academic research in an unrelated discipline (cognitive neuroscience) to become a software engineer. I really enjoy my work, but I also miss the deep expertise and intellectual stimulation of the academe. I might interested in this career path - $120k is plenty.
I write software and basic infrastructure for astronomy. I spend most of my time on the upcoming Rubin Observatory, which is actively hiring software people: https://www.lsst.org/hiring/
Academia has pluses and minuses. Less pay, but the overall mission is more interesting. Really really smart coworkers, but not a lot of structure for growth, since almost everyone just thinks in terms of tenure. Laid back pace, but sometimes too laid back; I wish expectations were a bit higher. Overall I certainly like it more than my time at AWS, but recognize its not for everyone.
Academia has pluses and minuses. Less pay, but the overall mission is more interesting. Really really smart coworkers, but not a lot of structure for growth, since almost everyone just thinks in terms of tenure. Laid back pace, but sometimes too laid back; I wish expectations were a bit higher. Overall I certainly like it more than my time at AWS, but recognize its not for everyone.
Any advice for making the switch? In particular, which parts of your AWS experience did UWA find most relevant?
> If the government could just negotiate individual salaries for developers, they could pay them twice as much, fire the contractors, and get the work done for roughly the same quality, and cheaper.
This isn't a bug, it's a feature intended to funnel taxpayer money into private companies. And I know this is usually a statement laced with malice, but it's not really - it makes sense (on paper) that if competent private companies exist the government should contract them instead of scaffolding its own development company inside of the existing bureaucracy.
In practice we know it would probably be cheaper to just hire 10-ish good developers per county for $1m/yr each and get them to do all the digital work for the state. But that's a harder sell that none of the existing private firms (read: campaign donors who stand to gain no money and lose talented employees) would spring for.
This isn't a bug, it's a feature intended to funnel taxpayer money into private companies. And I know this is usually a statement laced with malice, but it's not really - it makes sense (on paper) that if competent private companies exist the government should contract them instead of scaffolding its own development company inside of the existing bureaucracy.
In practice we know it would probably be cheaper to just hire 10-ish good developers per county for $1m/yr each and get them to do all the digital work for the state. But that's a harder sell that none of the existing private firms (read: campaign donors who stand to gain no money and lose talented employees) would spring for.
> because the pay can't be negotiated, and it's pegged so far below market it's insulting.
This has nothing to do with transparency. Just because one seller sells something at a certain price does not mean another has to, and same for the buyer.
The pay not being able to be negotiated is a combination of it being a political decision and lack of demand relative to supply.
When the government really wants someone, they start negotiating too.
Edit: one notable example of how it is politically impossible to pay appropriate to get the job done right the first time is the rollout of healthcare.gov and various health insurance websites by state governments. They could have paid enough to attract competent programmers, but the government decided to cheap out. Then it was a political fiasco when the project failed, and they had to open the government wallet to pay for competent programmers. But if they had advertised market pricing for programmers in the first place, and transparently, the the job would have been done right the first time.
This has nothing to do with transparency. Just because one seller sells something at a certain price does not mean another has to, and same for the buyer.
The pay not being able to be negotiated is a combination of it being a political decision and lack of demand relative to supply.
When the government really wants someone, they start negotiating too.
Edit: one notable example of how it is politically impossible to pay appropriate to get the job done right the first time is the rollout of healthcare.gov and various health insurance websites by state governments. They could have paid enough to attract competent programmers, but the government decided to cheap out. Then it was a political fiasco when the project failed, and they had to open the government wallet to pay for competent programmers. But if they had advertised market pricing for programmers in the first place, and transparently, the the job would have been done right the first time.
Many (most?) states have a Constitutional prohibition against anyone in the government making more than the Governor. It's literally illegal.
I just looked up the Governor's salary for the state I contracted for, and it's less than a first-year FAANG salary. So in this case, no, they can't really negotiate anything under the current structure.
I just looked up the Governor's salary for the state I contracted for, and it's less than a first-year FAANG salary. So in this case, no, they can't really negotiate anything under the current structure.
That is incorrect, there isn't a single state in the United States where the highest paid state employee is the governor. They are mostly coaches at state universities, and where they aren't they are upper tier member's of the state university system.
https://worldscholarshipforum.com/wealth/highest-paid-state-...
https://worldscholarshipforum.com/wealth/highest-paid-state-...
Could you name a couple of these states that have such a Constitutional prohibition (or even a statute) on any state employee making more than the governor?
This implies that a "job class" has relatively similar value output across job titles. That may be the case in universities (or rather, the high performers are more differentiated on directorships/board memberships in private companies, not disclosed on that web page) but in tech two people with the same job title can contribute wildly different value to a company.
You can just invent a billion different job titles, but you could also just figure out what each person is happy to accept a job for and bump their salaries by the saving you make on not employing people to create and maintain and negotiate salary bands.
You can just invent a billion different job titles, but you could also just figure out what each person is happy to accept a job for and bump their salaries by the saving you make on not employing people to create and maintain and negotiate salary bands.
This may just be your personal feelings though. I know quite a few people who work for public schools and government entities throughout Florida who really really are uncomfortable with their salaries being public knowledge, and at least one has felt it has been used against them.
In some countries you can look up anyones salary, Nordic countries for example.
Do you feel their entire society is harmed and uncomfortable?
Your whole argue is basically it might make a few people uncomfortable for a generation. While completely ignoring any benefits for future generations.
Do you feel their entire society is harmed and uncomfortable?
Your whole argue is basically it might make a few people uncomfortable for a generation. While completely ignoring any benefits for future generations.
Nordic countries also have a different culture and values than we do (not better, not worse, but different). This is normal that subjects that are taboo in one area are not taboo in another area, and things that work for one culture may not necessarily work out for our culture.
There's a very specific culture in the US that favors income opaqueness, and it's not necessarily employer based. My sister in law is very uncomfortable having us know that she makes 70k a year for whatever reason. I know real life stories of people who make 150k in low cost of living area and people around them treating them like they can afford to pay for their dinner when they hang out because they make so much more then them.
We live in a society that has MUCH more pay inequality than a lot of other 1st world countries and we are a society that heavily values income and wealth over other social signals, and because of that money has become a sore subject.
Then you add the job situations where if you make a lot more than other people (maybe you literally deserve it because of the value you bring to the company) it can be an uncomfortable situation if peers find out because now the company has to justify why person X is worth more than Y without insulting them, risking a lawsuit, or making them leave.
To be clear, I am vastly for pay transparency for many reasons (especially minority and gender equality) but let's not pretend like it can just be airlifted into America's culture just because it works in other countries.
There's a very specific culture in the US that favors income opaqueness, and it's not necessarily employer based. My sister in law is very uncomfortable having us know that she makes 70k a year for whatever reason. I know real life stories of people who make 150k in low cost of living area and people around them treating them like they can afford to pay for their dinner when they hang out because they make so much more then them.
We live in a society that has MUCH more pay inequality than a lot of other 1st world countries and we are a society that heavily values income and wealth over other social signals, and because of that money has become a sore subject.
Then you add the job situations where if you make a lot more than other people (maybe you literally deserve it because of the value you bring to the company) it can be an uncomfortable situation if peers find out because now the company has to justify why person X is worth more than Y without insulting them, risking a lawsuit, or making them leave.
To be clear, I am vastly for pay transparency for many reasons (especially minority and gender equality) but let's not pretend like it can just be airlifted into America's culture just because it works in other countries.
The only reason people are uncomfortable sharing their salaries is because : A. wages in america are pathetic and their ashamed. B. Because it's been told to them that this is 'proper' and 'ethical', that to 'share' this information is a corporate 'sin' and just really poor manners.
People who work in most professions do as they're told. They've been told to do this since they were in school, which was actually setup the way they are to funnel kids into factory jobs where they will -you guessed it - do as they're told.
Total openness about wages is one big step towards conquering income inequality. You can see it play out in the news lately w/ the strikes, the rise of /r/antiwork, the growth of unions, etc...
People who work in most professions do as they're told. They've been told to do this since they were in school, which was actually setup the way they are to funnel kids into factory jobs where they will -you guessed it - do as they're told.
Total openness about wages is one big step towards conquering income inequality. You can see it play out in the news lately w/ the strikes, the rise of /r/antiwork, the growth of unions, etc...
> In some countries you can look up anyones salary, Nordic countries for example.
You can, but you wouldn’t. Even if possible, pulling up your colleagues salaries would usually be considered incredibly creepy in Nordic countries.
You can, but you wouldn’t. Even if possible, pulling up your colleagues salaries would usually be considered incredibly creepy in Nordic countries.
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This is often the case in lower per capita income area's where you have a public sector worker demanding a pay increase (i.e higher taxes) but are making 65-70K, where the tax payer they are wanting more money from is making 40-50K, the tax payer tends to not believe the appeals to poverty of said public sector employee
Genuinely curious, how is the US Federal Government and Universities a good example of transparency increasing pay bands?
If anything, those are some of the most repressed wages in the economy…
If anything, those are some of the most repressed wages in the economy…
Totally incomparable. Almost all of those roles are on non-negotiable payscales set by the agencies, with very tight working hours.
And as for infighting and jealousy, it is very existent: not over money, but often promotions given out due to patronage, seniority ranking for choosing work duties, people abusing probationary procedures to retaliate against others... public service has plenty of misery for people on the wrong end of things, and it's a major factor for why unions are still strong there.
Public service salaries are public because it's public money. That's it. Don't glorify it.
And as for infighting and jealousy, it is very existent: not over money, but often promotions given out due to patronage, seniority ranking for choosing work duties, people abusing probationary procedures to retaliate against others... public service has plenty of misery for people on the wrong end of things, and it's a major factor for why unions are still strong there.
Public service salaries are public because it's public money. That's it. Don't glorify it.
I don’t really understand your comment. The original concern was that if workers in a private company knew each other’s salaries, there would be particular problems. I am claiming that those haven’t appeared in my experience with public salaries.
You have named many problems with working in public service. That doesn’t seem really relevant, though; I certainly am under no illusions that this is a perfect environment, just that salary transparency is not disastrous.
You have named many problems with working in public service. That doesn’t seem really relevant, though; I certainly am under no illusions that this is a perfect environment, just that salary transparency is not disastrous.
I'm saying salary transparency problems don't appear in the public sector because there is no social basis for them to appear. And as a corollary, that even when this aspect of possible inter-employee strife is removed, that people in those work environments still find ways of warring against one another. So why would you think adding an additional anxiety-inducing way for people to relatively rank one another in the private sector would lead to anything positive?
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This style of pay leads to Tenure based pay, not performance bases pay.
Which some people like, and will excel in such an environment, however also can lead to other problems. I prefer performance based pay, vs tenure. If a engineer is turning out project after project, completing task after task why should they be paid less simply because they were hired 3 years ago, where Dave down the hall has been there 30 years but has 1/2 the output making significantly more because of tenure
Which some people like, and will excel in such an environment, however also can lead to other problems. I prefer performance based pay, vs tenure. If a engineer is turning out project after project, completing task after task why should they be paid less simply because they were hired 3 years ago, where Dave down the hall has been there 30 years but has 1/2 the output making significantly more because of tenure
Because those categories are not so neatly separated as you think they are. Most work is done in teams, and some enable others to churn out project after project by takingn care of the maintenance, meetings, documentation, etc. It's hard to say who did more, but it's also hard to say someone in the team has more output than others.
Are the wheels of the car more productive than the frame? I agree with those that say this is a discussion not worth ones time. I can always go to another team, or go at it myself, if the pay isn't what I want.
Are the wheels of the car more productive than the frame? I agree with those that say this is a discussion not worth ones time. I can always go to another team, or go at it myself, if the pay isn't what I want.
> I can always go to another team, or go at it myself, if the pay isn't what I want.
In industries that have tenure-based pay, you often cannot do this because you reduce your pay when you switch companies because you reset your tenure.
What you’re describing is an uncommon scenario (at least in the US) where within a given industry some employers are paying for tenure and others are paying for performance. This is uncommon because pay for performance tends to win out because it attracts the best talent, at least in highly paid fields. Pay for tenure probably results in higher average pay across a role but lower pay for the top performers.
In industries that have tenure-based pay, you often cannot do this because you reduce your pay when you switch companies because you reset your tenure.
What you’re describing is an uncommon scenario (at least in the US) where within a given industry some employers are paying for tenure and others are paying for performance. This is uncommon because pay for performance tends to win out because it attracts the best talent, at least in highly paid fields. Pay for tenure probably results in higher average pay across a role but lower pay for the top performers.
I work in a tenure based field (academia) and years of exp are the main ingredient in your payscale.
I think generally that a competent manager without too many direct reports can have a good sense of who’s contributing more in the end, even when mixing apples and oranges like you describe.
>> It's hard to say who did more
no it is not really, but to use your car analogy, should a wheel on the car that is flat, and slowing the car down be paid the same as the 2 wheels that are operating to spec?
Because non-performance based pay tends to flat tires....
no it is not really, but to use your car analogy, should a wheel on the car that is flat, and slowing the car down be paid the same as the 2 wheels that are operating to spec?
Because non-performance based pay tends to flat tires....
Performance based pay seems great in theory, but in reality is not so simple. For one, how do you measure performance? Whatever system you come up with to measure it, you will have people trying to game the system to make themselves appear more valuable than they are.
I'm sure there are other things that factor into it, but I'd suspect that people who have worked with you for a long time (1 year+ close contact) would get a very clear idea of your competence and reliability.
The hard part is expecting people close to you to be honest to management.
The hard part is expecting people close to you to be honest to management.
I also don’t know how accurately we can rate our colleagues productivity… it is hard to separate out how you feel about the person on a personal level.
But in government entities usually the immediate superiors have very little leeway to change your salary, so the employees know it's pointless to argue over differences in a salary that has very strong rules that very few people can influence.
In private companies on the other hand there's usually a much larger margin for salary to be negotiated, which incentivizes the consequences you mentioned.
In private companies on the other hand there's usually a much larger margin for salary to be negotiated, which incentivizes the consequences you mentioned.
That is endogenous to publicizing salary data. If the data were public, you might make an argument that all engineers need to be paid more or that you need a promotion rather than lobbying your manager.
Are the salaries formulaic or table-lookup in that case?
If everyone got paid the exact same amount, there’s no penalty to publishing the salary number (that everyone already knows).
The problems start to drift in when salaries are individually determined (hopefully based on contributions to the company).
If everyone got paid the exact same amount, there’s no penalty to publishing the salary number (that everyone already knows).
The problems start to drift in when salaries are individually determined (hopefully based on contributions to the company).
This seems to combine two different things... public salary data and fixed salary bands. You can have each of those things without the other.
For example, pro athletes all make different amounts of money, individually negotiated, but the amounts are public.
For example, pro athletes all make different amounts of money, individually negotiated, but the amounts are public.
Interesting. In most European countries, as an employee of the state, you are (generally) paid by role/tenure. This is not the case in WA?
It used to be the case until the 1980's, whereupon there was a deliberate shift away from quantifying the value of a role and towards quantifying the value of a candidate. Somewhat counterintuitively, this was a deliberate measure to reduce exposure to discrimination lawsuits. The reasoning was that you could always argue that candidates were unequal in their experience/competence/etc., hence the observed wage differences within a single role. To be clear, there are upsides to this arrangement as well, namely: the ability to negotiate one's salary.
Rather funny that if you order by salaries, the top ones are by far the sports coach. That's the peak (or close to) of human existence I guess.
While it's expected in capitalism, I find it sad that tax dollars go into those salaries (don't start the "they make more revenue than their salaries" thing. Government is not a business)
We don't generally set salaries by the employee's proximity to the peak of human existence: find me an economic system that does and I'd learn about it. In this case, like it or not, the football program brings a lot of value to the University in terms of notoriety and money.
Yes, and I find it sad. It's a personal opinion, I understand that. "panem et circenses" I guess.
For context is a typical north american phenomenon and not common everywhere.
For context is a typical north american phenomenon and not common everywhere.
>(don't start the "they make more revenue than their salaries" thing. Government is not a business)
Governments may not be, but universities most definitely are. Unless/until we move over to a system of 100% tax-funded universities sports teams are an important source of revenue for them.
Governments may not be, but universities most definitely are. Unless/until we move over to a system of 100% tax-funded universities sports teams are an important source of revenue for them.
I thought so too but apparently only a select few universities have profitable sports programs. For most universities it’s a cost.
Isn’t it basically PR to attract students, who in turn will pay very expensive tuition (often backed by student loans, and guaranteed by the government to boot, meaning it can be cranked up really high)?
That’s a great point. It could be seen that way. Though it’s certainly not how it’s usually explained, and I don’t think most people would see that as a satisfying answer. “Sports are profitable because they allow us to charge you more” just doesn’t have the same ring.
> It's human nature to compare and I feel it would be counterproductive to know what individuals I'm close to make compared to having idea of the median, top, etc bands for the level I'm at.
'Counterproductive' depends on your perspective - considering fundamentally everyone is working to get paid (no matter how much you love your job), a 'productivity' metric for a worker (not the company) could be amount of money earned per working hour (GDP per hour is a metric of productivity for the nation - so why shouldn't earnings per hour be a metric of personal productivity?!).
Salary discussions informed with information can be highly 'productive' in that it is one of the best ways to increase your earnings per hour worked, with no change to the hours/effort you put in, if you are being paid less than people doing a similar role with similar skills/output.
Assuming you are working a 40 hour week, a 10% pay bump because of an informed discussion is equal to working an extra 5 weeks across the year in terms of earning (and that's assuming you get paid overtime!). And if a 30 minute conversation is worth 180 hours of work (or potentially thousands of hours if you work there a long time), that's pretty productive in the scheme of things!
'Counterproductive' depends on your perspective - considering fundamentally everyone is working to get paid (no matter how much you love your job), a 'productivity' metric for a worker (not the company) could be amount of money earned per working hour (GDP per hour is a metric of productivity for the nation - so why shouldn't earnings per hour be a metric of personal productivity?!).
Salary discussions informed with information can be highly 'productive' in that it is one of the best ways to increase your earnings per hour worked, with no change to the hours/effort you put in, if you are being paid less than people doing a similar role with similar skills/output.
Assuming you are working a 40 hour week, a 10% pay bump because of an informed discussion is equal to working an extra 5 weeks across the year in terms of earning (and that's assuming you get paid overtime!). And if a 30 minute conversation is worth 180 hours of work (or potentially thousands of hours if you work there a long time), that's pretty productive in the scheme of things!
That's what I saw working at Google, and it seemed to create a morale issue that didn't otherwise need to exist. Everyone I worked with that was unhappy with their relative compensation was getting a firehose of money either way.
My boss recently confided that he, his boss, and I are all “within a Starbucks habit” of each other. For some reason I love that analogy.
Strange, most people prefer more information to less. Employees knowing more leads to them better able to negotiate (not just arrive at higher numbers initially, but clearly know what skills they need to better negotiate the next time). Unless they're being treated unfairly, there's no downside.
Those people who were paid a few hundred dollars less - why were they paid less?
Those people who were paid a few hundred dollars less - why were they paid less?
> It's human nature to compare
No, that's culture not nature.
No, that's culture not nature.
Can you cite a human culture where individuals do not compare their accomplishments/compensation/etc with others?
Outside of the US and the HN bubble.
So no.
People are competitive and compare themselves to others everywhere. If you think otherwise, then 1) share something real that supports your belief, and 2) consider that whatever bubble you’ve constructed for yourself is misleading you.
People are competitive and compare themselves to others everywhere. If you think otherwise, then 1) share something real that supports your belief, and 2) consider that whatever bubble you’ve constructed for yourself is misleading you.
Please spare the strawman. Some societies are well known to be hypercompetitive, other are less, and same are profoundly egalitarian. This has been widely researched by anthropologists and there's plenty of literature on the topic.
(oh and if you still insist on anecdata, I know plenty of people who consider distasteful to compare your wealth to your neighbors, both from Europe and from Asia)
(oh and if you still insist on anecdata, I know plenty of people who consider distasteful to compare your wealth to your neighbors, both from Europe and from Asia)
> Some societies are well known to be hypercompetitive, other are less, and same are profoundly egalitarian. This has been widely researched by anthropologists and there's plenty of literature on the topic.
And yet you still can’t provide a single concrete example of a non competitive society.
It has not gone unnoticed that you’re moving the goalposts and suddenly you’re comparing relative levels of competitiveness which is wholly different from your claim that it is not natural to be competitive. Don’t complain when someone knocks down the strawman you set up yourself.
> I know plenty of people who consider distasteful to compare your wealth to your neighbors
Nearly no one compares their wealth to their neighbors directly. This is bad taste even in the US. Asking someone their salary is generally considered quite taboo unless you’re in the process of negotiating a salary worth a new company.
> both from Europe and from Asia
This is interesting since I can find you endless threads online from Europeans asking if American engineers really make so much and why they make so much more. This sounds like comparison to me.
I can also find endless articles discussing the rise of status symbols (iPhones, luxury cars) among the middle class in China and India as their wealth rises.
And yet you still can’t provide a single concrete example of a non competitive society.
It has not gone unnoticed that you’re moving the goalposts and suddenly you’re comparing relative levels of competitiveness which is wholly different from your claim that it is not natural to be competitive. Don’t complain when someone knocks down the strawman you set up yourself.
> I know plenty of people who consider distasteful to compare your wealth to your neighbors
Nearly no one compares their wealth to their neighbors directly. This is bad taste even in the US. Asking someone their salary is generally considered quite taboo unless you’re in the process of negotiating a salary worth a new company.
> both from Europe and from Asia
This is interesting since I can find you endless threads online from Europeans asking if American engineers really make so much and why they make so much more. This sounds like comparison to me.
I can also find endless articles discussing the rise of status symbols (iPhones, luxury cars) among the middle class in China and India as their wealth rises.
> you’re moving the goalposts and suddenly you’re comparing relative levels of competitiveness
No, you set that goalpost by yourself. Read the thread again.
No, you set that goalpost by yourself. Read the thread again.
Perhaps! But my 2 year old always wants the bigger bit of food, even if they won't eat it!
Maybe it starts as nature, and builds without self-reflection to culture.
This lack of self-reflection in babies nature is why I like philosophers such as Kant that build a self reflexive analysis through rationality (and thus build a culture based on thought rather than basic want)
Why would you let that level of immaturity dictate any kind of business decision?
Isn’t this how levels.fyi works?
Yes. But their data is not coming from every employee out there. I believe their data are largely self-reported so perhaps biased toward the slice of people proud enough of their salary to report it? You also have to trust that they verify the salary reports somehow, which they say they do.
I’d like to see an anonymized dump straight from one or more of the big payroll companies. I think I’d find that a little more believable.
I’d like to see an anonymized dump straight from one or more of the big payroll companies. I think I’d find that a little more believable.
The other problem with levels.fyi is ambiguity around grant vesting, stacked refreshes and stock appreciation.
Typically in an offer letter the dollar figure shown will be a 4-year grant, submitters are supposed to divide that number by 4 to give the annual comp, but I suspect some don't realize this and submit the full 4-year grant + annual salary. This is solved by verifying the offer letter, but that's only one form of verified salary.
They also let you verify via W2, and with W2 you are seeing stock appreciation plus stacked refreshers, so this can be very hard to assess, especially with a decade-plus bull run in tech stocks. Naive observers looking at the data would be shocked how many of those 7-figure salaries actually came from $300-$400k total comp offers that benefitted from stock appreciation.
Typically in an offer letter the dollar figure shown will be a 4-year grant, submitters are supposed to divide that number by 4 to give the annual comp, but I suspect some don't realize this and submit the full 4-year grant + annual salary. This is solved by verifying the offer letter, but that's only one form of verified salary.
They also let you verify via W2, and with W2 you are seeing stock appreciation plus stacked refreshers, so this can be very hard to assess, especially with a decade-plus bull run in tech stocks. Naive observers looking at the data would be shocked how many of those 7-figure salaries actually came from $300-$400k total comp offers that benefitted from stock appreciation.
Good companies show salary bands to internal employees. If they don’t do it, I think the reasons are pretty obvious.
If you pay people fairly, why would you keep that information secret?
This happens with many companies when there is internal realization that the same labor is being paid unfairly. I’ll never forget hearing from a colleague whom I admired their work being paid half of what I was paid. The difference? They were much older and had no formal education. I was a new hire with a degree. This absolutely floored me and they gave our boss an ultimatum of matching the market rate. It worked out for them and their career.
You should know your market rate at the current company you’re at. Most people don’t have that transparency today and seek new opportunities because of it. It absolutely feels terrible to know that a loyal productive employee is getting paid significantly less than a new hire who will jump ship in a year or two.
If the company is going to min/max compensation, you have to take that into your own hands and play the game of getting what you’re worth in the market. Ironically most people do that by jumping ship temporarily and coming back with what they wanted in the first place.
Managers should be actively looking out for their employees. It’s their main priority of retention. HR needs to give them enough budget to keep up with the market and not be greedy. It costs much more in the long run when there’s retention issues anyway.
You should know your market rate at the current company you’re at. Most people don’t have that transparency today and seek new opportunities because of it. It absolutely feels terrible to know that a loyal productive employee is getting paid significantly less than a new hire who will jump ship in a year or two.
If the company is going to min/max compensation, you have to take that into your own hands and play the game of getting what you’re worth in the market. Ironically most people do that by jumping ship temporarily and coming back with what they wanted in the first place.
Managers should be actively looking out for their employees. It’s their main priority of retention. HR needs to give them enough budget to keep up with the market and not be greedy. It costs much more in the long run when there’s retention issues anyway.
>>They were much older and had no formal education. I was a new hire with a degree.
how long were they with the company? it could be age and formal education was not the factor in this situation but rather wage compression.
This happens alot with long tenure, as market rates for a position outpace internal annual salaries it does not take long for market wages increasing at 10% annual where internal increase of 3-5% (and some years with pay freezes) cause people that have been with a company for 8 or 10 years to see a massive difference between their salary and what new people start at.
It is always why people experience 20-30% pay bumps for changing companies, companies continue to refuse larger annual salary increases, only adjusting the pay when they attempt to find new talent on the market.
>>Managers should be actively looking out for their employees. It’s their main priority of retention. HR needs to give them enough budget to keep up with the market and not be greedy.
The reality is neither one of these people control this. Senior management sets the over all salary budget. With in that determines what individual can get. If Senior management say on the whole the salary budget can not increase more than 5% then you can not give every employee an 8% raise, you could give some and layoff a few, or you high performers 8% and some 3%, etc...
Senior management needs to take retention seriously, most do not
There is also a belief that "salary is not everything" and putting in a game room, or having some other "office perk" will retain people for lower costs than increasing their salary.
how long were they with the company? it could be age and formal education was not the factor in this situation but rather wage compression.
This happens alot with long tenure, as market rates for a position outpace internal annual salaries it does not take long for market wages increasing at 10% annual where internal increase of 3-5% (and some years with pay freezes) cause people that have been with a company for 8 or 10 years to see a massive difference between their salary and what new people start at.
It is always why people experience 20-30% pay bumps for changing companies, companies continue to refuse larger annual salary increases, only adjusting the pay when they attempt to find new talent on the market.
>>Managers should be actively looking out for their employees. It’s their main priority of retention. HR needs to give them enough budget to keep up with the market and not be greedy.
The reality is neither one of these people control this. Senior management sets the over all salary budget. With in that determines what individual can get. If Senior management say on the whole the salary budget can not increase more than 5% then you can not give every employee an 8% raise, you could give some and layoff a few, or you high performers 8% and some 3%, etc...
Senior management needs to take retention seriously, most do not
There is also a belief that "salary is not everything" and putting in a game room, or having some other "office perk" will retain people for lower costs than increasing their salary.
They were older, but hired less than a year before me. We had the same job responsibilities, same title, and similar qualities of work.
I would say that the company preyed on their age & education to low ball them. I knew what I was worth and asked for it and got it.
In my experience, it's less senior management and more payroll defining company policy especially at big tech. Senior managers get those pools to work with. Yes there are bonus/merit pools based on performance throughout the groups, but what I'm referring to is the company proactively matching market rate for employees they actually want to retain. Too many people leave purely for compensation and this is well before the pandemic/reshuffled market. Those retention gaps cause so much churn because those responsibilities are now spread throughout the remaining members. It's a cascading problem of not being able to hire fast enough, even at the biggest companies with the best benefits out there.
Merit bonuses hardly even keep up with inflation and are disguised as "you doing a good job, here's a 2-3% raise!". It's a winner-take all game even in the most privileged of positions in the workforce. Companies make even some of the best managers immoral by concealing or feigning ignorance about this information. You have to play ball just to get what you want or else you'll be walked over like a doormat.
I would say that the company preyed on their age & education to low ball them. I knew what I was worth and asked for it and got it.
In my experience, it's less senior management and more payroll defining company policy especially at big tech. Senior managers get those pools to work with. Yes there are bonus/merit pools based on performance throughout the groups, but what I'm referring to is the company proactively matching market rate for employees they actually want to retain. Too many people leave purely for compensation and this is well before the pandemic/reshuffled market. Those retention gaps cause so much churn because those responsibilities are now spread throughout the remaining members. It's a cascading problem of not being able to hire fast enough, even at the biggest companies with the best benefits out there.
Merit bonuses hardly even keep up with inflation and are disguised as "you doing a good job, here's a 2-3% raise!". It's a winner-take all game even in the most privileged of positions in the workforce. Companies make even some of the best managers immoral by concealing or feigning ignorance about this information. You have to play ball just to get what you want or else you'll be walked over like a doormat.
It pays for engineers to be able to inflate and justify their worth, especially when moving ships.
It is not about everyone getting equal pay. It is about everyone having equal visibility. The former creates unmotivated employees, the latter creates one of two outcomes: 1. Satisfaction of relative comp for the amount of work done -or- 2. Understanding of what is valuable in this venture; how to spend your time
Often times in larger establishments (after playing enough politics to gain visibility), I found myself in camp (2). What you think is important is seldom actually important to the powers that be. If you find yourself disagreeing with the last statement, go hug your management team / coworkers!
It is not about everyone getting equal pay. It is about everyone having equal visibility. The former creates unmotivated employees, the latter creates one of two outcomes: 1. Satisfaction of relative comp for the amount of work done -or- 2. Understanding of what is valuable in this venture; how to spend your time
Often times in larger establishments (after playing enough politics to gain visibility), I found myself in camp (2). What you think is important is seldom actually important to the powers that be. If you find yourself disagreeing with the last statement, go hug your management team / coworkers!
> getting equal pay.
To be clear, IMO, people want equal total comp per input. We have to consider all inputs like, including the person themselves (some comp is worthless to me personally, eg certain health benefits for situations I will never have, or considerations for needs that I do not have.
* average and best/work weeks of hours worked
* stress load
* future value of today's learnings
* inconvenience factors - like do I have to work during my kids' <important event>
* feel good factor -- obviously personal Am i working on shiny fluffy things or bombs?
* extrinsic compensation like "clout" or "status" -- Do you think working at google might give you some "cred" or greater viability in the dating pool? that's a form of comp
I'm sure the list goes on an on, hence one reason that seeing Engineer 5 yrs exp, $X comp is too little info to compare what you _should_ be paid, though informative of what you _could_ be paid if you conformed to all the variables of that job .
To be clear, IMO, people want equal total comp per input. We have to consider all inputs like, including the person themselves (some comp is worthless to me personally, eg certain health benefits for situations I will never have, or considerations for needs that I do not have.
* average and best/work weeks of hours worked
* stress load
* future value of today's learnings
* inconvenience factors - like do I have to work during my kids' <important event>
* feel good factor -- obviously personal Am i working on shiny fluffy things or bombs?
* extrinsic compensation like "clout" or "status" -- Do you think working at google might give you some "cred" or greater viability in the dating pool? that's a form of comp
I'm sure the list goes on an on, hence one reason that seeing Engineer 5 yrs exp, $X comp is too little info to compare what you _should_ be paid, though informative of what you _could_ be paid if you conformed to all the variables of that job .
Considering that there has been a fair amount of collusion to suppress engineer salaries, are you surprised that engineers feel unmotivated? People work harder to hold onto something they value.
Do you have evidence for this? I feel it would be difficult to orchestrate collusion across thousands of private companies especially during our current skilled labor shortage.
> Do you have evidence for this?
Ooooooh boy, do we! This type of behavior from the technorandians is about as well established as gravity: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-Tech_Employee_Antitrust_L...
Ooooooh boy, do we! This type of behavior from the technorandians is about as well established as gravity: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-Tech_Employee_Antitrust_L...
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What you think is important is seldom actually important to the powers that be.
Underrated point. People should reflect on whether the powers that be might actually know what they are doing. Not always and everywhere, but be open to the possibility.
Underrated point. People should reflect on whether the powers that be might actually know what they are doing. Not always and everywhere, but be open to the possibility.
I would be concerned about the correlation to increased resentment to increased transparency. If you want to know if you are paid fairly there is a “talent marketplace” to do price/value discovery. Employees do not have the full breadth of information managers use to set compensation and mangers cannot share their reasoning. Some employees are more motivated by title or other types of recognition other than comp as well.
Isn't the end goal of title/recognition using that to get an even better job later, and presumably the compensation that comes along with it? At the end of the day, being Principal vs. Senior doesn't pay your mortgage off faster, get you a nicer car, or put your kids in a better school. Once we reach a certain point I think it obviously becomes more important - if you live in a LCOL area, making $300k TC as a Principal vs. $350k TC as a Senior, I'd probably go Principal too. But if you're still trying to set your life up, fund your retirement, finish off that 529 for your kids, etc., it seems short sighted to go after anything except a higher TC.
In Norway, everyone's salary data -- well, net income for tax purposes -- is public information.
https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-40669239
https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-40669239
Albeit, you have a dedicated quota of searches – and the one you search for also gets a message that you search for him/her. So in effect, I'd suspect very few uses this to get the sense of your colleague 's pay. Rather, I'd guess its mostly used by journalists and the most curious to poke into public officials, rich people or simply celebrities.
People always like to mention the nordic countries but how many people have been there? I was an exchange student in sweden in high school. It was very far from ideal, although the country was gorgeous and the people were extraordinarily friendly and helpful.
All salaries of all companies of all roles should be public. This info being kept from job seekers unfairly tips the balance of power to the job provider when negotiating salaries or even when deciding on which company to join.
Couldn't the same information be used by companies to signal each other and collude on price setting.
For example they may start paying the same just based on a job class, which isn't a favorable outcome.
For example they may start paying the same just based on a job class, which isn't a favorable outcome.
No. Because companies are already doing this. At least for my employer they’ve told us that they talk to their “peers” in the industry to set prices for labor. So more a yes and a no.
BUT if candidates were able to know what the bands are they could move wages to a more fair equilibrium. Here’s how I think it would play out.
There are two scenarios. If radical transparency were to be enacted AND all companies share the numbers before hand putting all their equivalent roles at the same salary levels then not much would change since I think this is already happening at least in Europe and specifically in Berlin.
But if companies started publishing this data over time say over months such that all information about salaries and compensation outside of wages was revealed in say 18 months (giving the market time to adjust I.e folks to leave to go to higher wage paying firms) then workers could readjust their wages to a more fair market rate. This is how I think things would play out — or so I hope when in reality it’ll likely just be the former case.
People will fight for salary transparency and the firms will give it to them but they will have shared salary information already because a Python engineer is a Python engineer whether they’re at a mid level company or a FAANG company. And then nothing will change other than folks will likely all try to cluster around the top end of their now disclosed salary bands — more folks will get marginal raises I guess but it’s not the large shift or readjustment of entire sectors and employees I had hoped for.
BUT if candidates were able to know what the bands are they could move wages to a more fair equilibrium. Here’s how I think it would play out.
There are two scenarios. If radical transparency were to be enacted AND all companies share the numbers before hand putting all their equivalent roles at the same salary levels then not much would change since I think this is already happening at least in Europe and specifically in Berlin.
But if companies started publishing this data over time say over months such that all information about salaries and compensation outside of wages was revealed in say 18 months (giving the market time to adjust I.e folks to leave to go to higher wage paying firms) then workers could readjust their wages to a more fair market rate. This is how I think things would play out — or so I hope when in reality it’ll likely just be the former case.
People will fight for salary transparency and the firms will give it to them but they will have shared salary information already because a Python engineer is a Python engineer whether they’re at a mid level company or a FAANG company. And then nothing will change other than folks will likely all try to cluster around the top end of their now disclosed salary bands — more folks will get marginal raises I guess but it’s not the large shift or readjustment of entire sectors and employees I had hoped for.
I would be satisfied with distributional statistics per company by years experience and required educational, with job responsibilities coded in some coherent way (e.g. BLS).
I really don't care if Barbara in accounting made more than Stan in Marketing. What I want to know is movements of the market. Currently the best source of this information is tech-based with biased incentives (levels.fyi, Glassdoor, in either direction) or recruiters, who have their own incentives.
In the US, State and Federal agencies could share this data feasibly, if not for certain policies.
I really don't care if Barbara in accounting made more than Stan in Marketing. What I want to know is movements of the market. Currently the best source of this information is tech-based with biased incentives (levels.fyi, Glassdoor, in either direction) or recruiters, who have their own incentives.
In the US, State and Federal agencies could share this data feasibly, if not for certain policies.
In the US, State and Federal agencies could share this data feasibly, if not for certain policies.
I read stuff like this about salaries, budgets, contracts, etc. regarding various US federal/state/local governments quite often. In reality, almost all that info is already publicly available. Often in excruciating detail.
For example: the salary of ever single NYC employee (cops, teachers, etc) https://www.seethroughny.net/payrolls/city-of-new-york. Every California state employee salary (and pensions) https://transparentcalifornia.com/. Many state and local government employee salaries are collected by https://openpayrolls.com/.
Federal gov contracts at https://www.fpds.gov/fpdsng_cms/index.php/en/. Most states have similar sites for their contracts.
The issue in government transparency in the US is not transparency per se. It's that few people bother to actually dig through the raw data or perform good analysis of it.
I read stuff like this about salaries, budgets, contracts, etc. regarding various US federal/state/local governments quite often. In reality, almost all that info is already publicly available. Often in excruciating detail.
For example: the salary of ever single NYC employee (cops, teachers, etc) https://www.seethroughny.net/payrolls/city-of-new-york. Every California state employee salary (and pensions) https://transparentcalifornia.com/. Many state and local government employee salaries are collected by https://openpayrolls.com/.
Federal gov contracts at https://www.fpds.gov/fpdsng_cms/index.php/en/. Most states have similar sites for their contracts.
The issue in government transparency in the US is not transparency per se. It's that few people bother to actually dig through the raw data or perform good analysis of it.
I wasn't clear in my original post, apologies. I was referencing private employer data that is reported for unemployment insurance purposes.
I would be happy with just knowing this, not so much what each person makes, but:
title or level and min salary, median salary, and max salary for the roles in the company.
Furthermore, each employee within a company should know what the salary bands are for their titles/roles. This should be common knowledge.
I know and am honest with myself and my manager of my skills. If I know what min and max and median is on my team I can negotiate appropriately with how/where I fit in the team productivity-wise. I am not going to ask for the top end of my team for my title if I know I am not producing. Likewise do you want to lose talent to a competitor because they're making the bottom of the range but producing at the middle or near the top?
title or level and min salary, median salary, and max salary for the roles in the company.
Furthermore, each employee within a company should know what the salary bands are for their titles/roles. This should be common knowledge.
I know and am honest with myself and my manager of my skills. If I know what min and max and median is on my team I can negotiate appropriately with how/where I fit in the team productivity-wise. I am not going to ask for the top end of my team for my title if I know I am not producing. Likewise do you want to lose talent to a competitor because they're making the bottom of the range but producing at the middle or near the top?
I am pretty sure Florida publishes all state employees names and salaries. I know for sure you can look at every University employees name and salary from the clerks to the professors with a few seconds of googling and assume the same is true for all the other state employees. This should be a federal requirement for all employers in my opinion.
Imagine trying to fairly buy/sell anything in an opaque market.
Virtually any market with slight differences in each product.
For what it’s worth, this is true almost always for the largest employer in the US: government. That ends up including public universities - at least here in Washington, you can look up the salary of any employee of the University of Washington:
https://fiscal.wa.gov/Salaries.aspx
Go ahead and find me, Spencer Nelson, or any other Software Engineer of any level you want.
Go ahead and find me, Spencer Nelson, or any other Software Engineer of any level you want.
Should have been a football coach...
You can be. What's stopping you? Go out and start a competitive team that can win against other colleges that sink millions of dollars into their program.
If that sounds like too much work, then, well, yeah.
If that sounds like too much work, then, well, yeah.
I know this is a common refrain, but if you can build and run a successful sports organization at the university level you can potentially help bring in tens of millions of dollars to the school. It's very competitive, it's hard (in the sense that there's no playbook to do it the way you can grind leet code for a few months and walk into any junior or mid-level FAANG job), and like most people you're being paid less than the money you're bringing in.
Do the sports programs bring in money for the university or for the sports teams?
There's a somewhat famous UK guy called Charlie Mullins who runs a plumbing Business called Pimlico Plumbers. I saw a clip the other day where he does this experiment with his own business, and the cameras film people finding out what their colleagues are earning. Some people feel quite shafted, others don't want to talk about it. In the end there's a not so satisfying solution. Or at least one that papers over the problem: they find some savings from their suppliers and give the money to the lower paid staff.
But I thought it was an interesting experiment to watch.
But I thought it was an interesting experiment to watch.
I think the problem with Hello Fresh is the quality of their food and drink. It is hotel quality. Smelly bacon, heat traeated orange juice. With a name Fresh, and a product Fully Packaged, there is a great disconnect between their 'mission' and their reality.
This shows the calibre of management and their real mission.
What if people deliberately lie?
If we look at this from a game theory perspective it actually works in their favor. People want to make lots of money, if they lie they're going to lie about being paid more and not less. If enough people lie to affect the overall statistics, then everyone is going to be pissed off at their management for not getting paid as much as everyone else. At this point management has two options: reveal the actual salaries of everyone, to prove that actually everyone is getting paid less than what the stats show (oof), or keep the salaries hidden and deal with a workforce in which every participant believes they are chronically underpaid. Neither of these options are good for management, and the only way out is to hand out generous raises.
They can fire one or two people who put their salary on the form.
They can say that it's because they lied and cannot be considered trustworthy and just hint that there are others.
Strictly speaking telling the truth should be protected, but the backlash would probably inhibit that too.
They can say that it's because they lied and cannot be considered trustworthy and just hint that there are others.
Strictly speaking telling the truth should be protected, but the backlash would probably inhibit that too.
Or, claim the entered compensation is not accurate and maintain the status quo.
Right, but that's the expected response. Of course the company is going to claim inaccuracy. It doesn't grant them any more credibility than they would already have if it turns out they are actually right. Another point for the organizers.
Especially if the goal of this is to pressure management into increasing pay, people will absolutely lie, if only to stir the pot.
I've floated an idea previously here on HN: any company that applies for an H1B must make all salaries public the way public employees' salaries are public. By this, I mean total pay by name and position.
I feel that if I private firm is applying for the power to bestow a public good - the right to live and work in the United States - on the grounds that a qualified worker can't be hired otherwise, it's reasonable for the public to want to evaluate the truth of this claim, which requires information not just about wages for that one position but for all wages paid in that company.
I feel that if I private firm is applying for the power to bestow a public good - the right to live and work in the United States - on the grounds that a qualified worker can't be hired otherwise, it's reasonable for the public to want to evaluate the truth of this claim, which requires information not just about wages for that one position but for all wages paid in that company.
Are these not public?
https://h1bdata.info/
https://h1bdata.info/
They’re also only for the position that is being proposed to be filled. The way companies write those LCAs is nuts. I’ve seen LCAs that don’t match the technology in use, or that paid tens of thousands more or less than I was making in ostensibly the same position.
These used to include base pay only (at least that was the case for me)
> The spreadsheet will be shared with your work email address.
That means the company knows you’re doing this. It’s not legal for them to retaliate for it, but people do stuff that’s not legal.
That means the company knows you’re doing this. It’s not legal for them to retaliate for it, but people do stuff that’s not legal.
So I know there's no real way around this, but the email address verification is kind of a killer isn't it? Can't an Outlook admin just filter for all the inboxes that received an email from hfsalary.org and immediately report which employees signed up for this? I mean, I know on paper they're not allowed to retaliate against this, but wouldn't this impact how management feels about you getting more responsibility and raises etc.?
There's not really any need to go through emails by Outlook admins, since anyone can fill out the form and get access to the names and salaries of the participants. My impression is that the form fill-out is only needed to incentivize more people to share their salaries, not to hide from management. It seems like this being a public initiative is part of the point.
Why bother? Recent salaries for SWE and SWM are already on levels.fyi: https://www.levels.fyi/company/HelloFresh/salaries/
Sidenote: I live in Austin and I get their spam in the mail all the time. I had no idea they were based in Germany! But that explains the crazy-low (by US standards) comp for these roles.
Sidenote: I live in Austin and I get their spam in the mail all the time. I had no idea they were based in Germany! But that explains the crazy-low (by US standards) comp for these roles.
just saw an offer in Berlin for 150 base and 320k RSUs coming out to €230k annualized TC!!
It looks like VMWare is paying low in Austin based on levels.fyi, did you get around that somehow?
With more Silicon Valley firms opening up in Europe, Berlin especially, I have heard that it's causing salaries for all engineers to be pushed hire as these new entrants start paying bonkers numbers.
Apparently when Tesla opened in Berlin they were paying such high salaries that local companies got upset. I think it's come down some but why? It should go higher.
Apparently when Tesla opened in Berlin they were paying such high salaries that local companies got upset. I think it's come down some but why? It should go higher.
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levels.fyi is pretty useless (too few data points) for many international locations.
For example, at point of writing there are exactly 12 salaries listed for HelloFresh in Berlin.
For example, at point of writing there are exactly 12 salaries listed for HelloFresh in Berlin.
I think as a principle, symmetric information is quite important for good functioning of a market.
the only reason to obfuscate salaries is to pay people as little as possible and maintain control. any other argument is trying to pit employees self interest against others.
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This company doesnt encrypt your passwords properly on signup.
Coinbase has a single salary per band. The only discretionary pay is performance based but everything has the same base salary and equity. I love this model.
I feel like this gets tried in various ways at different companies. One of the antipatterns it tends toward is that people try to get moved away from teams that don't directly increase KPIs. Things like writing documentation, doing customer support, building internal tools, and other unsexy features get left behind. Meanwhile, all the most ambitious people move toward features that get people to buy things, click on things, focus attention on things, get angry at things, or be stuck on the platform.
I don't understand how this is different in any way from bands which employees are placed in based on performance? Im not trying to be combative, I genuinely do not see how this would realize any different outcomes. It just seems to shift definitions around.
If employees A and B both are in the same band, both do not get promoted in a year, but have different performance ratings, I assume they will end up with different 'performance based pay' raises. Where is the difference to moving them to a different place in the band?
If employees A and B both are in the same band, both do not get promoted in a year, but have different performance ratings, I assume they will end up with different 'performance based pay' raises. Where is the difference to moving them to a different place in the band?
Largely because performance based pay does not have a fixed upside.
Contrast this with a salary band which does have a fixed maximum.
Contrast this with a salary band which does have a fixed maximum.
Both of these can be false (or mostly false). For example at most big firms, performance based comp has a known upside. Something like your bonus is x% of your salary multiplied by some performance indicator based on your eval, and the max is like 2x or something.
Similarly, salary bands can have soft caps, where growth becomes harder as you're further from the minimum, but never becomes impossible. Neither approach is necessary better, but all are used in different places.
Similarly, salary bands can have soft caps, where growth becomes harder as you're further from the minimum, but never becomes impossible. Neither approach is necessary better, but all are used in different places.
This sounds about as appealing as unlimited vacation. Which is to say, not.
I don’t want my immediate manager to have direct control over my pay or my vacation.
I don’t want my immediate manager to have direct control over my pay or my vacation.
How can we know the info is accurate.
Or they could just post their salaries on levels.fyi, which has had this information for years on thousands of companies.
Doesn't levels.fyi focus on engineering salaries? What type of employees is hellofresh made of?
You can check their careers page: https://careers.hellofresh.com/global/en
The only non-tech positions are supply chain management, finance, HR, marketing, sales. Basically the same as any other tech company.
The only non-tech positions are supply chain management, finance, HR, marketing, sales. Basically the same as any other tech company.
That's crazy. I would have thought they have people buying food, designing menus, cooking the food, creatives, analytics, customer service, etc. Maybe that is counted under SCM?
Edit: it looks like they DO have these types of positions, and they dominate the open roles. Software engineers is one of the smaller categories.
Thanks for the downvote, whoever.
Edit: it looks like they DO have these types of positions, and they dominate the open roles. Software engineers is one of the smaller categories.
Thanks for the downvote, whoever.
They do have plenty of supply chain management etc. positions, but look at the categories instead of the numbers. Apple is a tech company and not a factory company despite contracting tens of thousands of factory workers to build their products. Hello Fresh is also a tech company despite hiring hundreds of people working on menus etc.
I don't really get the comparison. Apple's end product is hardware and software (technology). Hello fresh's end product is meal kits.
levels.fyi only focuses on software developers and their managers. No other engineering roles seem to have sufficient data to be useful.
But then the organizers of this couldn't release it on Twitter 6 months from now for street cred, and have all the personal data to boot.
A cynical take, for sure, but I can't think of any other reason why anyone would do this over something like you mentioned.
A cynical take, for sure, but I can't think of any other reason why anyone would do this over something like you mentioned.
I assume that they want very specific salary information, i.e. what Bob makes on Integrations vs what Susan also makes on Integrations vs just what people seem to make at SDE II.
I think the more important question is whether comparing Bob to Susan (or Sam, or whomever) is helpful. I would argue it's not, that it's even unhelpful, unless you know a whole hell of a lot about how Bob and Susan got to where they are right now. Did they have competing offers when they were hired? Did they negotiate a [non-]discretionary bonus into their package? Did they negotiate more PTO or profit-sharing in the form of a non-discretionary 401k contribution? These are all things that won't be immediately obvious but will affect their individual numbers. In aggregate, these aberrations get smoothed out. I don't see any benefit in comparing individuals to each other, but there's a lot of benefit in comparing individual to the average.
But that is what a lot of these initiatives want. They want to be able to say "Bob got X, so I should get X."
It's human nature to compare and I feel it would be counterproductive to know what individuals I'm close to make compared to having idea of the median, top, etc bands for the level I'm at.
I say this seeing younger folks quibble over a difference of few hundred dollars in compensation and worry they are getting underpaid compared to their peers.
Note: Above is an example of highly paid individuals starting out so a few hundred dollar difference wouldn't matter.