
Yelp Employee Protests Low Pay in Medium Post, Is Promptly Fired - walterclifford
http://recode.net/2016/02/20/yelp-customer-service-employee-protests-low-pay-in-medium-post-is-promptly-fired/
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HelloMcFly
When I first read the headlines about this story, I was sympathetic. I lost
nearly all sympathy for her after reading the actual letter and other details.

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dang
Discussed at
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11138086](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11138086)
and many other posts.

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dclowd9901
Growing up, I had these jobs with these wages, in this chronological order:

Landscaper: $6/hr (ages 12-16, living at home)

Target Employee: $7/hr (age 17, living at home)

Video game store clerk: $7/hr (age 18-20, living at home)

Spa/Jacuzzi repair/transport: $7/hr (age 20, college)

Sunglass Hut sales person: $9/hr (age 20, college)

HP Printer salesman: $10/hr (age 20-22, college)

Copy Editor at a population 30,000 town newspaper (age 22-23, living with
roommates): $32k/yr or approx $15/hr

...and so on for about 3 more years (living with at least one other person)
before I transitioned to software development and things took off for me.

You'll notice points where my age is the same. It's because I had those jobs
at the same time.

None of those jobs, not one, had free health insurance (most had _no_ health
insurance, period), and none had 401k matching. None had free snacks, outside
of a coffee machine. None had a fun, vibrant work culture. And with each one,
I was working with the understanding that it was not what I wanted to do for
the rest of my life because it sucked and I hated being poor and I was
determined to do whatever it took to not be.

I don't really know if there's anything to garner from all of that. It's just
my experience, and it makes it difficult for me to understand why people feel
like they should have a job they love that pays well first thing in life.
According to most people I've talked to, that's not the norm.

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mschuster91
> None of those jobs, not one, had free health insurance, and none had 401k
> matching.

> I don't really know if there's anything to garner from all of that.

Yes, there is: the US system is dead rotten to the core. In Germany, there's a
minimum wage and normal jobs automatically carry health insurance, basic
pensions and loss-of-job-insurance. And that's valid for any job, no matter
how "low-level".

Unless you're a real edge case (1-man-companies!) it's really hard to fall
through the nets in Germany. I'm worried about our politicians slashing all
the nets because Hail Capitalism.

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dclowd9901
> the US system is dead rotten to the core

I would absolutely agree with this assertion.

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Uhhrrr
Is there a business in existence that wouldn't fire an employee for a public
post like that?

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notthemessiah
Is it not ironic that Yelp, which relies on public reviews businesses largely
cannot contest has a vastly different attitude when it comes under scrutiny?

I suspect that firing someone can exacerbate a Streisand-like effect.

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davidu
Yelp CEO responded in his 5 most recent tweets:
[https://twitter.com/jeremys](https://twitter.com/jeremys)

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Tempest1981
There is no question -- the rents in SF are too damn high. Reminded me of
this:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kcsNbQRU5TI](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kcsNbQRU5TI)

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KeepTalking
Here is the original article. [https://medium.com/@taliajane/an-open-letter-
to-my-ceo-fb73d...](https://medium.com/@taliajane/an-open-letter-to-my-ceo-
fb73df021e7a#.4qeisha3i)

It would be nice if you could link to the original article

~~~
Mithaldu
He did though.

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hwstar
Isn't employment at will wonderful? /sarcasm

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joaoqalves
In before someone blocks comments here

