Employees reveal Google has cut the pay of WFH staff

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t think this practice can last for remote jobs. My last employer tried to cut my pay when I moved and I just quit and got a job with another company that wasn’t doing that. Why would I accept less pay just because I moved to a lower COL area? I’m doing the same job. It was particularly dumb on their part because they were already struggling to fill similar positions. Google may get away with it because they are paying above market, but even they are likely to find some of their competitors scooping up remote workers by offering to pay them SV wages in Idaho.

This.

And that’s what your former employer hoped. They were doing you a favor.

They hoped they could have yet another opening they couldn’t fill? I kind of doubt that, but maybe. It’s just so odd to hear all these employers bellyaching about how they can’t hire enough people at the same time they are doing stupid things like cutting pay for people just because they moved. Whatever. If that’s what they want to do, have at it. I’m not playing.

That and at one time, cutting people based on things like their vaccination status. People will just go to other jobs where they are valued and respected and paid well. The days of companies ruling everything are coming to an end. There are a lot more opportunities now.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t think this practice can last for remote jobs. My last employer tried to cut my pay when I moved and I just quit and got a job with another company that wasn’t doing that. Why would I accept less pay just because I moved to a lower COL area? I’m doing the same job. It was particularly dumb on their part because they were already struggling to fill similar positions. Google may get away with it because they are paying above market, but even they are likely to find some of their competitors scooping up remote workers by offering to pay them SV wages in Idaho.

This.

And that’s what your former employer hoped. They were doing you a favor.

They hoped they could have yet another opening they couldn’t fill? I kind of doubt that, but maybe. It’s just so odd to hear all these employers bellyaching about how they can’t hire enough people at the same time they are doing stupid things like cutting pay for people just because they moved. Whatever. If that’s what they want to do, have at it. I’m not playing.

They clearly wanted local talent. You were that talent locally. You wanted to move and work remotely. They reluctantly agreed and adjusted accordingly. Managing a remote workforce is not easy. From the employee perspective it may be great. Neither you nor your employer were happy. You adjusted accordingly. They move on. If you were just a bit more valuable they would’ve ponied up more $$$.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is what many companies are doing. Its not an uncommon practice. PreCovid we had many threads about how much of a pay cut was worth a remote position. I took one and it worked well for me for many years! No surprises here

+1 There was a hug thread about this in late 2020 (I think) when Facebook announced this approach. Even with adjusting for cost of living differences, it’s not like these big tech companies are paying small company crap wages. Why should Google pay SV wages for the employees that opted to move to Idaho?

Because wages should be tied to the work and not the location.

You can believe that all you want, but employers disagree.

That's BS. Most employee who work remotely are highly sought after. The ones who go into office have to b/c they don't have options.

[Anonymous]

I'm a recruiter at a megacorp and can say this is definitely hurting us. I've got a position that's coded for either in office or remote that has been open for months. Our pay scales are split up into about 15 geographic regions. I've had gotten no qualified candidates who would work in the office at the pay rate that is offered there (DC, high COL). I have had a few in other areas of the country who would work remote. But they won't take the pay that we're offering for their geographic region, but they would take the pay we would offer if they worked in the DC area. So the position sits open. But that's "company policy." So stupid.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:People who WOS should be paid more than those who WFH if they are (roughly) doing the same job. Because the WOS set incurs greater expenses with childcare; commuting, etc. And it really annoys me when my colleagues who are able to WFH are “working from the Caribbean this week” (we know it, but our directors don’t - thanks to zoom backgrounds) and we have to plan our meetings around their schedule in a different time zone, or they have to keep leaving meetings early because of “poor internet” in Mexico City or Greece or wherever they are currently “WFH.”

I see patients so I have to WOS. We also have to deal with emergencies with actual in-person sick patients that bleed into after work hours - when the people who WFH can’t be “found” because it is not their “core hours.” So I have to pay for a nanny and I pay for my commute, but we all make the same money.

It’s not fair. Many people are leaving medicine, and this doesn’t help. It’s basically a 2 tier system where radiologists and molecular pathologists and other doctors who can WFH live a fabulous life, but the rest of us are in the hospital seeing patients in person (which really is a critical need) and struggling to get vacation time and even time to go to the dentist. But we are making the same money.

I’m sorry - that is really unfair! Thank you for being there patients.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is what many companies are doing. Its not an uncommon practice. PreCovid we had many threads about how much of a pay cut was worth a remote position. I took one and it worked well for me for many years! No surprises here

+1 There was a hug thread about this in late 2020 (I think) when Facebook announced this approach. Even with adjusting for cost of living differences, it’s not like these big tech companies are paying small company crap wages. Why should Google pay SV wages for the employees that opted to move to Idaho?

Because wages should be tied to the work and not the location.

You can believe that all you want, but employers disagree.

That's BS. Most employee who work remotely are highly sought after. The ones who go into office have to b/c they don't have options.

That’s not always true. Plenty of grunt work that didn’t require much talent gets shoveled off to remote employees. I think some full-time remote workers think too much of themselves and that’s part of the problem. It exists in-office too, but remote workers aren’t around people who can help deflate their self-perceptions.

[Anonymous]

I work from the office 5 days a week because that is the nature of my work. I like going in. I think nothing beats in-person human interaction. I mentor some of the young people (fresh out of college) who work for us and you cannot do that effectively when you are 100% remote. Networking, creativity, etc., all works better in person. I get people wanting flexibility and maybe only coming in 2-3 days but 100% remote especially when you live far away seems less than ideal for most jobs.

[Anonymous]

I would 100% be willing to take a pay cut if it meant I wasn't tied to living in the DC area. Silicon Valley salaries are high because the cost of living is high just like DC-area salaries are higher because of cost of living.

Maybe these employees should look at how the government does things with locality pay. It's fair.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I work from the office 5 days a week because that is the nature of my work. I like going in. I think nothing beats in-person human interaction. I mentor some of the young people (fresh out of college) who work for us and you cannot do that effectively when you are 100% remote. Networking, creativity, etc., all works better in person. I get people wanting flexibility and maybe only coming in 2-3 days but 100% remote especially when you live far away seems less than ideal for most jobs.

So much this. The companies I have worked for have been very flexible as far as core work hours and temporarily working remotely. There are just some things in creative fields, like IT consulting, that require a level of in-person interaction.

[Anonymous]

Guys, I'm not sure the issue here is about working in an office v. working from a home.

This is about appropriate compensation based on geographic location. The rationale would be the same if a company hired somebody to work in a HQ office in NY or a satellite office in Tucson....

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t think this practice can last for remote jobs. My last employer tried to cut my pay when I moved and I just quit and got a job with another company that wasn’t doing that. Why would I accept less pay just because I moved to a lower COL area? I’m doing the same job. It was particularly dumb on their part because they were already struggling to fill similar positions. Google may get away with it because they are paying above market, but even they are likely to find some of their competitors scooping up remote workers by offering to pay them SV wages in Idaho.

This.

And that’s what your former employer hoped. They were doing you a favor.

They hoped they could have yet another opening they couldn’t fill? I kind of doubt that, but maybe. It’s just so odd to hear all these employers bellyaching about how they can’t hire enough people at the same time they are doing stupid things like cutting pay for people just because they moved. Whatever. If that’s what they want to do, have at it. I’m not playing.

They clearly wanted local talent. You were that talent locally. You wanted to move and work remotely. They reluctantly agreed and adjusted accordingly. Managing a remote workforce is not easy. From the employee perspective it may be great. Neither you nor your employer were happy. You adjusted accordingly. They move on. If you were just a bit more valuable they would’ve ponied up more $$$.

No, they didn’t want local talent. If I had moved to LA, my pay would have been the same. It was based entirely on the area I lived in, not whether I was remote or in person, local or not local.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I work from the office 5 days a week because that is the nature of my work. I like going in. I think nothing beats in-person human interaction. I mentor some of the young people (fresh out of college) who work for us and you cannot do that effectively when you are 100% remote. Networking, creativity, etc., all works better in person. I get people wanting flexibility and maybe only coming in 2-3 days but 100% remote especially when you live far away seems less than ideal for most jobs.

That’s fine, but these policies are not based on remote v hybrid v office. They are based entirely on where the employee lives. An employee working remote on the DC area gets paid the same as an office worker in the DC area. When the remote employee moves to Montana, her pay goes down because it is lower COL. When the remote worker moved to NYC, her pay goes up because it is higher COL.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Guys, I'm not sure the issue here is about working in an office v. working from a home.

This is about appropriate compensation based on geographic location. The rationale would be the same if a company hired somebody to work in a HQ office in NY or a satellite office in Tucson....

No. Some of it is definitely about whether being in an office is or isn’t more valuable and therefore deserving of more compensation. COL is also a factor but not the only one.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is what many companies are doing. Its not an uncommon practice. PreCovid we had many threads about how much of a pay cut was worth a remote position. I took one and it worked well for me for many years! No surprises here

+1 There was a hug thread about this in late 2020 (I think) when Facebook announced this approach. Even with adjusting for cost of living differences, it’s not like these big tech companies are paying small company crap wages. Why should Google pay SV wages for the employees that opted to move to Idaho?

Because wages should be tied to the work and not the location.

You can believe that all you want, but employers disagree.

That's BS. Most employee who work remotely are highly sought after. The ones who go into office have to b/c they don't have options.

That’s not always true. Plenty of grunt work that didn’t require much talent gets shoveled off to remote employees. I think some full-time remote workers think too much of themselves and that’s part of the problem. It exists in-office too, but remote workers aren’t around people who can help deflate their self-perceptions.

Just b/c someone is in the office, doesn't mean they are productive. Plenty of people go to office and waste time--go out to lunch, shop online, gossip, etc. Oh but b/c they are in person, they must be working or are more committed...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Guys, I'm not sure the issue here is about working in an office v. working from a home.

This is about appropriate compensation based on geographic location. The rationale would be the same if a company hired somebody to work in a HQ office in NY or a satellite office in Tucson....

No. Some of it is definitely about whether being in an office is or isn’t more valuable and therefore deserving of more compensation. COL is also a factor but not the only one.

Is it? The Google policy is based on paying COL for geographic region, not in-office v. out-of-office.

To be sure, there is a conversation to be had about what you said. But I would invert it- is working remotely more valuable to employees than a slightly higher paycheck? It isn't so much that employers value people being in the office so much as workers value being at home.