[HN Gopher] The 'hidden resignation': employees are checked out
___________________________________________________________________
The 'hidden resignation': employees are checked out
Author : Apocryphon
Score : 93 points
Date : 2022-01-29 18:47 UTC (4 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (tidymails.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (tidymails.com)
| pojzon wrote:
| Well.. "Family reasons" are the biggest reason employees in my
| current company leave.
|
| Ppl are really tired and have enough assets to sometimes take few
| years breaks.
|
| Removing highly skilled workforce from equation just "because
| they feel like it" was never taken into consideration by any
| employer..
| dathinab wrote:
| For some companies "Family Reason" can be the biggest reason
| for people to stay.
| rubyist5eva wrote:
| As an employee that is not checked out, and have to work with
| people that are obviously checked out - it sucks. It's like a
| cancer, it will infest your organization and rot it from the
| inside.
| spaetzleesser wrote:
| I believe the reason a lot of people are checking out is that
| inside companies there is an increasing disconnect between
| reality and what companies are saying internally. When I started
| working 30 years ago you went to work, did your job for 8 hours
| and went home. Everything was pretty straightforward. Working
| hours were well defined and benefits were well defined. You knew
| you could stay at the job for a long time. Nowadays a lot of
| companies inundate with a ton of propaganda and talk about
| culture, inclusion and blablabla. At the same time they demand
| more and more time and effort while offering less stability, you
| have to report status every day, the salary of the top guys keeps
| exploding while the little guy barely gets a raise.
|
| People can see through the propaganda and become cynical. This is
| not only inside companies but also through entire society. I
| think trump's success and things like Qanon are a result of this.
| bachmeier wrote:
| I've talked to quite a few people that haven't left their jobs,
| but weren't happy that their employers took advantage of the
| pandemic to shovel extra responsibilities and duties on them. I
| can believe the post.
| NAHWheatCracker wrote:
| I closed the post when the example is an executive who's making
| $300k a year.
|
| An executive being checked is a problem as much as any other
| employee. However, executives are the ones who seem culpable of
| not updating policies of the company.
| jimbob45 wrote:
| Yeah I felt the same way. His sources are one friend and a
| McKinsey study. If he'd reported _just_ the data, I'm not sure
| anyone would have naturally come to the same conclusion as him.
| that_guy_iain wrote:
| Literally the reason I've not gotten a new job over the past
| 18-months was that I would rather focus my time into my own side-
| project than focus on a new job. I have pretty good job security
| and I really focus my mental efforts into my future than a
| company's future.
| theteapot wrote:
| "My friend on $300k/yr ..." blah blah. Some people have real
| problems.
| Spooky23 wrote:
| The opening premise is a little weak. It's not an example of deep
| dissatisfaction, but a rational choice.
|
| When you make $300k, disrupting your life for $100k isn't really
| compelling. It's honestly not enough money to compensate for your
| standard of living and family life. And frankly, the divorce will
| cost more.
| happytoexplain wrote:
| "A little weak" may be an understatement. My eyes are still
| wide from the casual implication that turning down a promotion
| from 300k to 400k due to the position's negative impact on your
| life is somehow an example of a new trend of employees
| dissatisfaction. In what universe is that not a totally normal
| decision?
| heavyset_go wrote:
| Executives are used to dangling raises over our heads and
| expecting us to dance for them. They're perplexed as to why
| people are choosing not to dance this time around.
| VLM wrote:
| In the old days the extra after-tax $30K you'd make from a
| promotion like that would improve your quality of living. Not
| so much now.
|
| You could buy a somewhat nicer car. But now cars all look the
| same anyway, and are a liability if you live in the city.
|
| You could take a somewhat more elaborate vacation during the
| 2% of the year you're not chained to your desk at work. But
| now covid... So if you're just going to sit at home anyway...
|
| You could afford fancier bespoke hand made full business suit
| and tie, I assure you much more comfy than off the rack if
| professionally tailored especially after the first ten hours
| at work. But now uniforms are a sign of lower socioeconomic
| class not higher so once you can afford your jeans and tee
| shirt there's one small step up in fit and comfort with
| designer tee shirts and designer jeans, but the days of the
| $5000 business suit are over except for a handful of legacy
| companies. Put on your comfy covid pajamas and VPN in from
| your bedroom, do all your work in four hours and pretend to
| be busy the rest of the time, or play video games on the
| other screen while pretending to pay close attention to
| meaningless zoom meetings.
|
| You could give more to your family back when people balanced
| family and career. But now you're not allowed family at those
| kind of levels, so it would just be more alimony/child
| support payments or you're childfree or you're lonely and
| being rich and lonely isn't any better than being poor and
| lonely.
|
| You could buy fancier furniture to impress people you don't
| care about when you host parties. But now covid... so why
| bother earning $14000+ to pay for the $7000 couch if nobody
| will be impressed by seeing it?
|
| You could buy somewhat fancier entertainment, the front row
| seats or the season tickets. But now covid, and
| generationally everything is just streamed over the internet
| anyway.
|
| You could pay more for better places to hang out and possibly
| meet a date, singles night at the bar and all the baby boomer
| stuff that's pretty much gone now, at least compared to how
| it was when I was a kid. Online dating eliminated that, and
| covid pounded nails in that coffin.
|
| I think in 1980 going from $300K to $400K would have had a
| much larger impact than in 2022 and not just due to
| inflation.
| rdtwo wrote:
| I feel you man. The only thing you can really buy is more
| house. And mostly yes reason I need more house is because
| of all the things Covid broke and took away.
|
| Plus houses are up 20-30%. And double in the last 5 years
| so you can't really buy that either as no way salaries kept
| up.
|
| Inflation is real bro, just doesn't seem that way because
| people on the low end are getting poorer and poorer every
| day
| Spooky23 wrote:
| Inflation isn't really that bad if you own a house.
|
| Back where I grew up in a farm-town turned exurb, people
| are worried about gas prices because they need to drive
| 30 miles to do anything.
| VLM wrote:
| Inflation is a thing but the world is also much less
| classist, at least economically, today.
|
| Back in my boomer parents era, my grandpa had to get a
| promotion for my boomer dad to afford expensive hobbies
| like photography or listening to 60s rock.
|
| For my kids, hobbies are just clicking a free app on
| their school issued "free" tablet. Its hard for kids
| today to understand hobbies and lifestyle used to be very
| expensive and your participation depended on how much
| money your parents made.
|
| It used be a sociological class thing, like on resumes
| and college applications being into home photography
| meant you were upper middle class for jobs and schools
| whom wanted to filter on that class membership. Now those
| hobbies mean a kid once tapped an icon on his phone, and
| has about the same hiring/application significance.
|
| I would guess there are still mainstream-ish hobbies
| today that are still expensive, but I'm trying to think
| of what they are, if you cross off stuff cancelled by
| covid. I guess fandom of expensive streamed services,
| fandom for HBO netflix ESPN disney+ cbs streaming service
| shows is one of the few remaining ways to show off wealth
| in public. Fandom is kinda tacky anyway.
| joyeuse6701 wrote:
| You could invest it and work towards an early retirement.
| dehrmann wrote:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Backward_bending_supply_curve_...
|
| It's entirely possible that new job would have been an hourly
| _wage_ cut.
| Spooky23 wrote:
| That, plus when the reckoning for all of this crazy mess
| comes, the road warrior sales execs are the first people to
| get the sword.
|
| Sometimes slumming it more a mere $300k in the home office
| gives you a tactical advantage.
|
| It's different if you're a grunt at a bank who gets some
| crazy gig at a big cloud company to lock in the "customer" or
| deny your skills to competitors -- as long as you don't think
| you're actually worth that.
| dehrmann wrote:
| To be fair, $300k won't buy you that house in Palo Alto.
| netfl0 wrote:
| Look on ~glassdoor and analyze the reviews of ex-employees.
| heavyset_go wrote:
| Glassdoor is gamed by companies and the reputation management
| firms they hire to hide bad reviews with glowing ones.
| Minor49er wrote:
| Sometimes bad reviews get scrubbed on Glassdoor
| encryptluks2 wrote:
| Then when you ask them about it, they say it was a database
| error and your review was "lost"
| PragmaticPulp wrote:
| Check multiple sources. It's almost standard HR practice to
| generate fake positive reviews on Glassdoor and petition to
| have negative reviews removed.
| savant_penguin wrote:
| "A friend of mine recently turned down a job promotion that
| included a raise of $100,000 a year. He has some financial
| flexibility to turn down the offer, since he's already a mid-
| level executive at a Fortune 1000 company and makes about
| $300,000 annually. He said he determined "it just wasn't worth
| it" since the promotion called for more travel and more time away
| from family"
|
| That makes absolute sense. Many people would no sell even more of
| their time if they cannot enjoy other aspects of their lives. But
| if it's really the kind of position that requires you to give
| your family time away for the company, they'll likely have to pay
| even more to fill that position.
|
| That's why I don't find surprising at all that executive pay is
| so much higher than the average employee's. At some level it's
| hard to justify the extra cash in exchange for your life away.
| Lots of qualified people would not take that deal
| marstall wrote:
| This misses the point.
|
| People are checking because they can - no-one is looking.
| malermeister wrote:
| ... and because they want to because it turns out working a
| full-time job producing value for somebody else is soul-
| crushing to a lot of folks.
| taubek wrote:
| Some 5 years ago I decided to change job when my health started
| to go down the drain due to stress...
| thrill wrote:
| A few years ago I finished a one year demanding contract
| position I was paid well for. I decided to take some time off,
| bought a sportbike, and spent a year riding with motorcycle
| instructors on twisty mountain roads, spending a good 10 hours
| a day in the saddle, only not riding when my wife had the day
| off. When I finally got saddle sore, but much better off
| mentally, I began looking for a new job, and the first
| interviewer was shocked, shocked I tell you, that I would "just
| fuck off for a year". Glad I didn't get that gig I think. The
| next one hired me and put me to work the same day I
| interviewed.
| hinkley wrote:
| Isn't this the 'if people aren't in the office where I can keep
| an eye on them then they will just screw off' argument?
|
| If this pandemic is ever over it's going to be interesting to
| watch the pendulum swing back and forth.
| ngngngng wrote:
| At this point it's over whenever we decide it is. So depends on
| what color state you live in.
| Ancapistani wrote:
| Politics aside, this makes no sense to me. I live in a very
| red state, my employer is in a very blue state. I'm far from
| unique in that arrangement.
| JoeAltmaier wrote:
| My youngest son and I are planning a company. My middle son has
| started his own company. Both are, to the world, 'covid
| resignations'.
| scrooched_moose wrote:
| I recently left a job that I was 100% checked out of. It was a
| fine job before Covid but something about the switch to remote
| absolutely ruined it.
|
| Things that used to take 2-3 hours to plan started taking 6 weeks
| as management insisted on being deeply involved. Instead of
| infrequent project check-ins, 18 hours a week was blocked off to
| management updates. Shortly before I put in my 2 weeks I had
| project update meeting where my status was something like
| Accomplishments: held status update meetings on 11/1, 11/3, 11/8,
| 11/12, 11/15, and 11/18.
|
| That job broke me and I just stopped caring. The new one is much
| better.
| Simon_O_Rourke wrote:
| First job I left to go back to college, but quite honestly I had
| checked out of that place and hated the team I was on. Was a
| pretty large networking company, spent all my time writing RFPs
| and vendor specs, zero time writing software.
|
| Next one was a cheap tech startup that worked by recruiting
| people for peanuts, including hiring cab drivers doing night
| courses in IT, and placing them in telcos looking for business
| analysts for multiples of what they were actually getting paid.
| Hated the cheapness, left after a few months.
|
| Then it was a FAANG company, which looked after it's people
| really well, but the frickin politics really grind you down, left
| there after a few years after my team got shuffled around on a
| whim from some exec.
|
| Last role was a utility company, and it was a total mess
| internally. Vested interests, complete underfunding of the data
| processing systems, and major consulting firms scamming them for
| millions a year to produce meaningless reports. Impossible to
| make an impact, or even bring things up to code... For example,
| there was zero version control on software, zero! Things were
| tested on production. I stayed there far too long, should have
| left the first day, like a few hires actually did.
| VLM wrote:
| I remember when the "Joel Test" of 12 characteristics of
| successful software companies came out around the turn of the
| century I figured it would be obsolete in mere months or at
| most a year or two; by 2001 or 2002 at most, who wouldn't be
| using version control?
|
| Here we are in 2022 and ...
| ljm wrote:
| You could pick up Peopleware or 5 Dysfunctions of a Team
| today and wonder if it was written in the past couple of
| years.
| VLM wrote:
| It actually gets worse in a way, in the 2010s there was a
| bit fad in compsci to redo the 70s, so we LISP'd up again.
|
| I bet in the 2050s we'll be rediscovering strong typing and
| lisp again, and pretending its all new again.
|
| I donno if JCL and RPG and COBOL will come back; probably
| will eventually. If they do come back I hope its after my
| time.
| darkengine wrote:
| Peopleware is astonishingly relevant and short enough to
| finish reading over a weekend. Definitely recommend it to
| anyone starting a career in tech. Then give it a second
| glance 5-10 years in and see how many more workplace anti-
| patterns you recognize from your experience...
| make_it_sure wrote:
| The main reason they are leaving is because there's a shortage of
| jobs due to the pandemic and they get more offers with a better
| pay. Once pandemic is over, this will get back to normal.
| encryptluks2 wrote:
| I believe it is more of a occupy wall street type movement
| where people are sick of being exploited by a system that is
| one sided.
| toomanydoubts wrote:
| Doesn't make much sense. Don't you mean shortage of
| workers(actually, shortage of workers willing to work bad
| jobs)?
|
| I don't see how a reduced job supply would lead to higher
| salaries.
| toomanydoubts wrote:
| Feels like another one of those articles written by execs to
| execs to stroke their own ego and pretend that the fact they
| underpay and overprofit isn't the main reason why employees are
| sick of working for them.
| Viliam1234 wrote:
| According to the article, 40% of employees would still be happy
| if they at least received a "thank you" once in a while.
|
| But they won't.
| fsckboy wrote:
| looking at one person who didn't want the job isn't really an
| example of anything. Somebody will take the job, let's consider
| that person and then generalize...
| datavirtue wrote:
| I live for my side projects. I spend most of the week forcing
| myself to complete things at work. It helps greatly if I feel
| like I have momentum, but the more senior I get the more it feels
| like companies have a lot of trouble keeping me busy on things
| that need my attention. I have spent the last five years on stuff
| that has not shipped. As I have become more and more demotivated
| by this I have also greatly dialed back my output. I still get
| the same glowing reviews I got when I was playing the workaholic.
| I have had it up to my eyeballs working for people that can't
| organized. I should probably go into management or something
| but...meh. Not worth it.
|
| I want equity. I want to know exactly where the business is going
| without worrying about seemingly random arbitrary pivots and
| wasted effort. If we aren't marching to market dominance I want
| to go on paid time off until they get their shit together.
|
| Instead, I'm phoning it in and working on my shit.
| soared wrote:
| Oh god on mobile the text is like 20 characters wide, so each
| line is like 3 words.
| Youden wrote:
| Reader mode fixes that and it's available in Firefox regardless
| of your OS.
| mtoddsmith wrote:
| The editor is expected to do their own formatting now that
| their developer has checked out.
| ignoramous wrote:
| orig: https://www.businessinsider.com/hidden-resignation-
| workers-e...
|
| archive: https://archive.is/WkGXH
| foundart wrote:
| Yeah, not so great. The layout improved when I rotated 90deg.
| [deleted]
| contractside wrote:
| I spent a decade taking massive risks to gain an extremely rare
| set of skills. I joined a top company, and was immediately put
| into a corner and my job devolved into a weekly "checklist"
| meeting. All feedback and input I gave, based on my extensive
| experience, was ignored. Then I was systematically harassed for
| expressing innovative or creative ideas.
|
| So I redesigned my job to do as little as possible and focus most
| of my effort on side contracting.
|
| I have zero friends at work. I joined a year ago and feel no
| connection. I never met anyone in person at my role. Haven't been
| into an office.
|
| I feel like an unwelcome outcast and largely unwanted and no one
| understands my background, talent or skillset. Basically: I am an
| intern despite my skills.
|
| There is something extremely dehumanizing about remote work.
| Because corporations can do this to you and no one is the wiser.
| There is no mechanism to gain any social status it feels like.
| People who had insider access before I got here will always have
| advantages over me. I'm not going to have opportunities to stand
| out or advance my career.
|
| Furthermore: The entrenched folks actively shut down anything
| that isn't in their interests.
|
| It feels like 100% of the exciting projects are automatically
| assigned to people with inside access.
|
| I was removed from all the key meetings and email threads by
| people threatened by me trying to talk about ways to improve
| products and systems. Now I'm in an information black hole of
| exile.
|
| So yeah, I'm doing contracts on the side and coasting. This was
| the same as my last job.
|
| Remote work has completely deteriorated white collar work for me.
| waynesonfire wrote:
| TLDR, you're stealing and thanks for sharing your justification
| that I presume allows you to sleep at night.
| s5300 wrote:
| Not exactly what I got out of reading that.
|
| Your response sounds slightly like the one professor in my
| department who screamed out pirating your overpriced books is
| stealing while every other professor in the dept. told us to
| pirate our books or simply handed out flash drives with the
| pirated books on them.
| theknocker wrote:
| oblio wrote:
| Always focus on punching up, not down.
|
| An individual employee can rarely abuse a large corporation
| more than the corporation can abuse the employee.
|
| If OP is in this situation, then the corporation is fine with
| what's happening, presumably for other reasons (could be even
| to keep him from a competitor's payroll).
| Noumenon72 wrote:
| A corporation has deeper pockets and less awareness, so you
| can abuse it pretty far -- stealing triple your salary,
| obstructing a whole department to make your life easy. When
| a corporation abuses me they find there is only so much
| juice to squeeze, since I can't possibly produce more than
| twice as much as they pay me for.
| heavyset_go wrote:
| No one is forcing anybody to employ the OP. If their employer
| is happy with their output then they'll keep paying them.
| flyinglizard wrote:
| He's not stealing from anyone. Stealing means taking
| something that isn't yours. He's engaged in a willful
| transaction with an employer, it's just that it leaves him
| enough time and capacity to do side work. I'll believe in
| good faith that his employment is constantly monitored and
| evaluated.
|
| From the employer side there are sometimes considerations why
| to keep someone around. Could be morale, regulations, keeping
| resources for something legacy or something in the future,
| etc.
| phendrenad2 wrote:
| OP is doing the job assigned to them. Sure, the higher-ups
| might not have SAID "do the minimum required", but that's
| what they expressed through the corporate culture they set
| forth. Personally I could never work somewhere where I'm
| expected to effectively not work, no matter how much they
| pay. But people have bills, and family to support, so I can't
| fault someone else for taking a mind-numbing "fake work" job.
| They tend to pay well.
| buscoquadnary wrote:
| No the employer is choosing to pay for him not to work.
|
| If a company pays me $200 an hour to write children's stories
| and then at the end of the day burns all the stories in front
| of me it isn't me who is stealing from the company, nor is it
| necessary that I write high quality stories for them.
|
| As long as I don't talk about Bruno I'll be fine.
| hutzlibu wrote:
| "As long as I don't talk about Bruno I'll be fine."
|
| Is that a reference to something known?
| gwd wrote:
| Apparently a song from the new Disney movie:
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bvWRMAU6V-c
|
| Haven't seen the actual movie though, so don't know
| exactly what the deal is with Bruno.
| lacogubik wrote:
| I believe it's reference to new Disney movie Encanto -
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bvWRMAU6V-c
| dasil003 wrote:
| You gotta get out man. If you truly have these unique skills
| it's just a matter of finding someone who understands the need
| and you get along with. Remember that corporations are made of
| people, they have no consciousness and are not homogeneous.
| Essentially one bad manager or bad team can completely screw
| your opportunity locally, but it doesn't mean there isn't a
| good fit elsewhere in the company or in another one. Bias
| towards the smallest company that needs your particular
| skillset.
| jkic47 wrote:
| Not judging, but why wouldn't you leave and find another
| company that values your ideas? Staying sounds like a recipe
| for ulcers.
| flyinglizard wrote:
| Not judging but it doesn't seem like the problem is
| necessarily with their specific employer (or will get better
| with another employer).
| cjsplat wrote:
| +1 on the get out asap statements.
|
| If the contracting is actually keeping your skills sharp,
| you'll probably do better 100% time.
|
| I contracted for 5 years and what I found was that I was hired
| for my skills, but not paid to grow those skills substantially.
| Given that I focus on multi-year hardware/software projects, I
| was definitely falling behind true leading edge with each
| project.
|
| In silicon valley, every day you are working on something that
| doesn't make sense is two days your career falls behind vs.
| someone who is on a true leading project.
| nojs wrote:
| > I spent a decade taking massive risks to gain an extremely
| rare set of skills
|
| Can you elaborate on this?
| akomtu wrote:
| Sounds like a typical corp. You're motivated by doing things
| right, everyone around is motivated by greed, and quite
| predictably, they are minimizing your disruption potential. I
| can see you'd do great as a consultant-advisor to a high-rank
| exec.
| tbihl wrote:
| >You're motivated by doing things right, everyone around is
| motivated by greed, and quite predictably, they are
| minimizing your disruption potential.
|
| Without discounting the frustration of GP, it doesn't exactly
| seem likely that he's the only one who cares in his entire
| org..
| [deleted]
| PragmaticPulp wrote:
| Checked-out employees are a real problem. Checked-out
| _executives_ are an even worse problem, though, because they set
| the tone for their departments and their disconnectedness will be
| noticed by the people working underneath them in the org chart.
| Eventually, the motivated people leave and the only people who
| remain are those who are also checked out (and enjoying the free
| pass from their checked-out boss) or the disgruntled who loathe
| the situation but would rather complain about it than leave. Not
| a fun place to be!
|
| However, the opening example in this article seems different:
|
| > A friend of mine recently turned down a job promotion that
| included a raise of $100,000 a year. He has some financial
| flexibility to turn down the offer, since he's already a mid-
| level executive at a Fortune 1000 company and makes about
| $300,000 annually. He said he determined "it just wasn't worth
| it" since the promotion called for more travel and more time away
| from family.
|
| That's reasonable. You don't have to travel and be away from your
| family to make good contributions to a company. You don't have to
| chase every single raise.
|
| The bigger problem would be this example exec's commitment to
| their side company. An executive who hangs on to their paycheck,
| benefits, and prestigious position while using their time to
| build their own company on the side is not good for a company.
| There is no way this person is maintaining a mid-level executive
| job at a big company, dedicating time to their family, and also
| building their own company on the side.
| bojangleslover wrote:
| Considering he would only take home about $50k from that $100k,
| I bet many of us would have done the exact same thing.
| jkic47 wrote:
| I agree - I am fortunate to be in a state of life where there
| is nothing I want that I can't afford (not because I am rich,
| but because I am satisfied with what we have). Another $xxx K
| is money that will go into a bank that I will probably never
| spend - not worth it to me.
| Tydirian wrote:
| If they are in the US they are going to pay ~30-35% depending
| on married vs. single for income from $300-400k (less on the
| first $300k). This is also all income they could invest given
| they don't need it to support their lifestyle. Even it it
| were only $50k this is huge since they could accelerate
| retirement because it would increase the amount they invest
| annually by 2-3x. It's a lifestyle choice for sure but this
| money would have a significant impact.
| TameAntelope wrote:
| $50k/yr doesn't really accelerate retirement as much as it
| would seem. You probably spend at least some of that on
| lifestyle creep, and if you're at $300k/yr already, you've
| likely already gone about as far as you can in tax
| advantaged savings sources.
|
| I'd probably still take it, but I'll admit I'm a bit more
| money motivated than the average person.
| dpark wrote:
| That's nonsense. You certainly _could_ spend that on
| lifestyle creep, but you don't have to (and probably
| shouldn't). Investments also do not have to be tax
| advantaged to be lucrative.
|
| Your argument about an extra 50k could be applied to
| literally any raise.
| TameAntelope wrote:
| Getting an additional $50k hits differently when you're
| making $300k already vs. $50k. Your _first_ $50k is worth
| so much more to you than your second, or third... or
| seventh.
|
| When you already have $300k/yr, your life doesn't change
| by getting an additional $50k/yr. When you only have
| $50k/yr, your life completely changes when you get an
| additional $50k/yr.
|
| People who are in the $300k/yr. position have the luxury
| of choosing other things besides making more money, which
| is what this person we're talking about was able to do.
|
| To put it another way, how much longer will he live, if
| his stress levels are reduced substantially by opting to
| not take that new job?
| dpark wrote:
| You're saying that someone getting a 33% raise won't be
| affected by the extra money. This is absurd for people
| who are making a good professional income. We're talking
| about someone making $300k, not Bill Gates. This is still
| well within the realm of $100k/year being very
| meaningful.
|
| 50k post tax is enough for someone currently maxing out
| their retirement (including mega backdoor 401k) to
| _nearly double their retirement investment_. This could
| cut time to retire in half. Or it's enough to comfortably
| put their kids through college in a few years. Or easily
| pay for private school for your kids. Or it's enough to
| pay for vacations that were previously out of reach. Or
| enough to massively upgrade houses (assuming you want to
| succumb to lifestyle inflation). An extra 50k post-tax is
| absolutely a lot of money to someone currently bringing
| home about 210k post tax.
| lazide wrote:
| If you're comfortable-but-barely-stable relationship
| wise, that extra money would cost you a whole lot more in
| ensuing legal fees. Not counting the emotional pain and
| suffering.
| paulryanrogers wrote:
| Are you saying the extra money and travel could
| contribute to divorce?
| lazide wrote:
| If they are in (or would move to) California don't forget
| to tack on another 10-11%ish in state income taxes for that
| bracket and on amounts spent directly on non-capital assets
| 10% sales tax.
|
| Which is about 50%
| godelski wrote:
| Plus you have to consider the value. What does that extra
| $50k get you? I mean besides a higher bank account score?
| You're already making $300k/yr and living very well off. Does
| the extra spending power get you much more? It seems return
| on value is diminishing. If you're away frequently you won't
| be able to spend that money (well your family can). How much
| do you value time with your family? I'd rather have that
| money to spend _with_ my family than _on_ my family.
| devmunchies wrote:
| The hidden value could be the higher title that you could
| sit on for 3 months and leverage it into another 100-200k
| gain by jumping to another company with the higher title.
| waynesonfire wrote:
| > An executive who hangs on to their paycheck, benefits, and
| prestigious position while using their time to build their own
| company on the side is not good
|
| you have to be specific, whose time are you referring to? It
| matters. Are you assuming the executive is using company time
| to work on his side gig? If so, that's quite the claim. Or are
| you suggesting that it's not good that he's thinking about his
| side-gig in the shower instead of using those brain cycles
| towards his current employer? If that's the case then I think
| you're out of touch on the duty he has towards his employer.
| [deleted]
| dasil003 wrote:
| Things are different for executives at large companies making
| 7+ figures. It's not about punching a clock and clearly
| delineated time at that point, it's about effectiveness. If
| you only need 20 hours a week to keep things running smoothly
| that's fine, but you also need to be available for a crisis
| 24/7. It's also a reasonable expectation that 100% of your
| "work energy" go to the company. Obviously if you are
| perceived as good enough you can call your own shot (eg. Jack
| Dorsey), but this is the exception not the rule.
|
| That said, personal time for hobbies, even if "business-like"
| on some dimensions (eg. building an app, selling stuff on
| Etsy, etc) are probably fine as long as it is recharging your
| batteries and does not have any real or perceived conflict of
| interest with your primary company.
| thrill wrote:
| 'It's also a reasonable expectation that 100% of your "work
| energy" go to the company.'
|
| Yeah ... no, not even.
| dasil003 wrote:
| That attitude is fair, but it disqualifies you from being
| the CEO of a Fortune 500 company.
| badrabbit wrote:
| I wonder why you don't see "checked out" costco or chickfila
| employees? Yes, if checked out means unsatisfied with what they
| are getting in exchange for labor all the antiwork people are
| that.
|
| There are people that think mistreating others (employee,
| customer, coworkers) is ok because they are paying for it. There
| are also people that think suffering is neccesary and anything
| else is delusional laziness. That's the problem. Given enough
| peace and prosperity the amount of suffering and labor should go
| down along with crime, disease and social instability. Provided
| there is a check on unlimited greed which in the US there isn't.
|
| I think taxes can solve this quite a bit. I am not someone who
| thinks "there shouldn't be any billionaires" or support taking
| from the rich and giving to the needy (justifying theft). My
| proposition is: tax returns and welfare subsidies should be
| covered by the employer not the government. Everyone should have
| the same percent of gross wages collected for tax, when they file
| either they owe the government money or their employer should
| issue a refund.
|
| This will work well if you also consider another proposition:
| everyone should have housing in the richest country on the
| planet. Every county should set a poverty line relative to cost
| of living, 30% of that is expected to go to housing. Landlords
| must pay a community housing tax that is 60% if the extra they
| charge above the 30% of poverty line.
|
| If you make 50k, poverty line is 100k, and you pay 40k/ye in
| rent, your landlord has to pay 6K tax that will go to building
| and maintaining free housing in that same county.
| MattGaiser wrote:
| Can you be a checked out minimum wage employee? I imagine that
| those people are more heavily micromanaged, making skipping
| steps less optional.
| awillen wrote:
| You don't see checked out Costco employees because there are
| supervisors physically present, and it's very obvious when
| those employees aren't working, because their work is
| physically visible. A tech worker working remotely doesn't have
| that same constant, direct ovresight.
|
| Your proposition about a 60% tax just wouldn't work at all -
| with that kind of a tax, landlords wouldn't be able to pay for
| maintenance. I know it's popular in some circles to think
| landlords are just making infinite profit and greedily keeping
| it away from the impoverished, but there are substantial costs
| to owning property, and you can't just make up taxes that
| completely ignore financial reality.
| badrabbit wrote:
| It's a balance, 60% is not from the whole rent, if you charge
| 30% of poverty line you pay 0 tax. Whatever you charge on top
| of that is taxed. Right now the fed poverty line is 20k/yr a
| 3rd of that is roughly 6k/yr which is 500/mo untaxed. If you
| charge 1000 rent you pay 300 tax and keep 700. All it means
| for landlords is they raise rent until they are satisfied
| with net rent. This means they get less tenants or they are
| forced to limit rent based on what people can afford while
| reducing homelessness. It reduces imbalance in areas like LA
| where rent just keeps going up despite how much people make
| and there is little new housing. If you can afforf more rent,
| some of that goes for reducing homelessness so you also have
| less crime and all that too. If you can charge more rent, the
| amount you can keep charging because people will pay for that
| area without considering the poverty and misery it will cause
| will also be limited.
___________________________________________________________________
(page generated 2022-01-29 23:01 UTC)