Anonymous wrote:FB attracts top notch software developers and trains them very well. If they want to piss all that talent off by cutting their salaries in half (even for those who are just as or more productive while wfh), then I will happily hire them for my company.

Anonymous wrote:I would do the COL calculations for NEW hires, not for dislocated employees who are likely traumatized during a pandemic, facing job loss by partner or spouse, etc. They can keep the same salary for the current employees with a grandfather policy.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't really understand all of the outcry here. I would have interpreted this policy as saying something like "we don't really want people to work at home, but we're willing to let them do it if it will save us money." Which sounds fair enough. I'm not sure why anyone would want to move from SF to middle-of-nowhere, USA, personally, but maybe it works for some.

That's fine if you make the announcement BEFORE approving WFH/remote plans. It sounds like FB decided to cut salaries AFTER telling people they could work remotely. That's just a sht thing to do (in addition to sounding like it would violate an employment agreement). And is the sort of thing that makes people go looking for new jobs.

Look: people working for companies that are facing hard times seem unhappy but willing to accept pay cuts, if it means keeping their jobs. People working for companies doing better than ever should expect they won't be treated like crap by that company, financially, I think.

I see no problem with this policy applying to new employees, that said, so long as they go in knowing what the policy is.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Perhaps a dumb question, but wouldn’t you need to know the pay cut before determining if the new location really has a lower cost of living to justify the salary cut?

Having been involved with salary studies for satellite offices, I can report that professional consultants for such things price out salaries at ridiculously lower targets even in high cost areas. They priced out San Diego lower than our Midwest HQ—it was ridiculous.

My guess is that companies like FB already have some form of this for satellite offices. They'll just expand it. I imagine you can ask what your salary would be, too.

My guess is that the COL adjustments will be published internally at some point and it will likely be state-based. The gamesmanship that might go on in the east coast (NH versus MA for instance) won't be such a big deal for tech companies because the western states are much bigger.

Anonymous wrote:This has been my thought since WFH started to become a big deal in the past decade: companies figure out that they don't need to maintain expensive offices for all of their people all of the time. Employees figure out they can live further from the workplace and deal with the bad commute less often or maybe never go at all.

Eventually, capitalism happens and companies make the rational decision to pay people less if they can. You don't have to pay silicon valley salaries to get good people if they can be in Sacramento, Charlotte, Mumbai, Manila or Nairobi.

Anonymous wrote:I would do the COL calculations for NEW hires, not for dislocated employees who are likely traumatized during a pandemic, facing job loss by partner or spouse, etc. They can keep the same salary for the current employees with a grandfather policy.

Anonymous wrote:I would do the COL calculations for NEW hires, not for dislocated employees who are likely traumatized during a pandemic, facing job loss by partner or spouse, etc. They can keep the same salary for the current employees with a grandfather policy.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Perhaps a dumb question, but wouldn’t you need to know the pay cut before determining if the new location really has a lower cost of living to justify the salary cut?

Having been involved with salary studies for satellite offices, I can report that professional consultants for such things price out salaries at ridiculously lower targets even in high cost areas. They priced out San Diego lower than our Midwest HQ—it was ridiculous.

My guess is that companies like FB already have some form of this for satellite offices. They'll just expand it. I imagine you can ask what your salary would be, too.

My guess is that the COL adjustments will be published internally at some point and it will likely be state-based. The gamesmanship that might go on in the east coast (NH versus MA for instance) won't be such a big deal for tech companies because the western states are much bigger.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That is effed up

Why? Seems reasonable to me to take COL into account.