It sounds like another place when I first arrived. We were actually part of a large corporation, but our office essentially had one task and we were autonomous and anonymous. So our office was run exactly how local mgm’t wanted, largely with whom they wanted, while a logo on the door (and our paychecks) indicated that we at least nominally worked for the corporation. However the nepotism at that place was alternately laughable and infuriating. Then the Telecom Act of 1996 meant that the rest of the company was allowed to contact us… But everything you said rang true about this place in its early days. (The good part was we had frequent happy hours or dinners and the mgm’t would pay.)
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Because a democratic workplace would be “socialist”
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It’s easier to exploit people when you convince them they deserve the mistreatment, especially if you can persuade them that the suffering builds character.
As an angel investor, the lazy route he has to increase profits is to convince the labor that they should accept less than they are worth.
In the old days, this would be considered an intimidation tactic. Amongst gentlemen, it’s the art of the deal. Nowadays, it’s just financial negging.
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I work in technology. For me, I’m directly competing with those in India or China who are earning $10K to my $60K.
Am I six times more productive?
I’d better be. Otherwise, the only reason I’m earning money hand over fist while not putting in the 50-60 hours a week they are is because of who I know - sorry, where I was born.
The reality is that the world is becoming more equal very quickly indeed. And for us North Americans who make up the global 1% (48K household income), it’s becoming very bumpy as we move towards a more equitable system as we move to a more global $10-20K average.
Equality sucks when it’s me that’s being equalized…
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What is this place where you live that is hot on democracy? I want to move there. Here in the United States, it’s government of the wealthy, by the wealthy, and for the wealthy.
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Only you are not being equalized, or talking about true equality.
You are talking about competing against people who have far less overhead, and work in a country with artificially low value on the local currency, making the US currency go 10-20x’s further.
It is like how a small studio apartment where i live is no less than $900 a month in an ok neighborhood, and my friend in Texas has a 2 story house for an $800 a month mortgage.
Seeing discrepancies like that from state to state is going to happen, but trying to price yourself like the out of country workers is never going to be a viable business model. The fact that you live and work in the USA is going to change how you can charge, but it also makes it more imperative that USA companies utilize freelance employees from the USA. Smart ones do, knowing a short term gain will be a long term loss.
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I’m takin’ my own advice at my 50 person company …
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Why are we seeing so many of these pissed off, classist, racist diatribes from the tech sector?
Trump. He’s the current king of classist, racist blowhards, and I think he’s made it “ok” for people with similar mindsets (like over-entitled techies) to shout “you’re a loser” diatribes across the net.
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There’s nothing new here. For decades, CEOs have been arguing they created the value in the companies they run, get paid millions, and complain about how the workers demand more and more when the employees only want a living wage and a life. These same CEOs then move onto another company, where they’re paid millions more because supposedly they did so well in their last position, and they fail miserably. Why? Because they really don’t know S**T!
This Bro Culture entitled BullS**t is just a continuation of the tradition of privileged idiots being placed into positions of power because of who they know or going to the right school. The Oligarchy lives! Long live the Oligarchy.
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Doesn’t have to be. I’m fond of the concept behind this. There are other thing we can do, too.
That culture - as you are experiencing - is toxic and destructive and ultimately causes burn out. That’s broken.
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At first, we got in to tech because of our love of the machine, action at a distance, and to ride the wave of progress. Then it happened. In the mid to late 90’s VCs started throwing money at anyone with a mouse. That’s when the entitled bro-hams, trust fund tinkerers, and college frat coders showed up to get their piece of the pie. Tech has never recovered. We are still awash with the kind of douche nozzle who first asks the question “What I.T. sector pays the most right now?” The love is dead.
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I saw a staggering example of this at a library where I worked. One year it was reported that the inflation rate was somewhere around 1% and the head decided that for the first time ever annual raises should match the inflation rate. But since the raise budget was fixed (one of the perks of a non-profit) the remainder was put into a “bonus fund”. Bonuses would be awarded to employees whose supervisors felt they regularly excelled at their jobs.
One of the quirks of the library is some people worked in well-defined multi-person departments where they worked closely with their supervisor. Others worked in smaller specialized areas where their responsibilities varied greatly and their “supervisor” was a higher-up who had no clue what they did. Even if these people were talented and excelled at their jobs they were shut out of the bonus process because, in some cases, their supervisor simply forgot to nominate them.
And the library head decided the names of all the bonus recipients should be published in spite of being warned by several people, including HR, that it was a really bad idea.
Needless to say the whole plan had a wondrous effect on morale, and had the added feature of weeding out hardworking knowledgeable people.
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“There’s often a reason why your founder, VC, or those who manage you are in the position that they are in – they worked for it.”
More likely someone else did.
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I used to have a lot of arguments with my more radicalized friends about the validity, ethics and effectiveness of violence as a political tool. I used to argue against it, taking the stance of most typcial european social democrats, that the use of violence is always wrong and can never accomplish anything.
I might have been wrong.
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It’s the Trump effect.
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Nobody wants to fight, but somebody has to know how to.
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Yeah… the bonus fund. Once, I asked for a raise, and was told that instead, I’d get bonuses for projects completed. Uh huh. I never did get a bonus, but the boss loved to show off his “custom jewelry” and brag about buying his wife new tits for Christmas. I dearly wanted to tell him he got ripped off on both counts because neither was particularly well crafted, but I said nothing.
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What the hell is “duck”??? Duck what? Duck is when you crouch or sidestep and the punch lands elsewhere. So, what is this guy thinking duck means?
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