

Facebook raises minimum pay for contractors to $15 per hour - var_eps
http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/05/14/us-facebook-wages-contractors-idUSKBN0NZ00C20150514

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PaulHoule
If you work four jobs like that you might be able to live in Fresno and
commute on the back of a pick up truck to San Jose.

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pyrophane
Your comment was initially amusing, but then I did the math and realized how
little $15/hour actually is. If someone were able to work the equivalent of
full-time, they'd make what? 15 * 40 * 52 = 31,200? Where could you live
anywhere near a Facebook office on that? Seattle? Definitely nowhere
convenient to their bay area HQ.

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VOYD
Definitely not Seattle.

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civilian
Definitely yes in Seattle. 33% of 31k is 10.3k, divided by 12 is $861 month
for what you should pay for rent. (I can't remember if this number should
include utilities, but yeah.)

Just padmap 850/month. You can even get within walking distance.
[http://www.padmapper.com/#](http://www.padmapper.com/#) A lot of these
listings include rooms within an apartment/house.

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johnrob
The real issue isn't wages - it's cost of living. If we really want to make
people's lives better, we need to address whatever causes prices to increase
(limited housing supply is probably the biggest culprit).

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gooseus
I was under the impression is was foreign demand for high yield real estate
investment vehicles?

I don't know a lot about real estate though.

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Sanddancer
For those wondering what this means, it means that a Facebook contractor would
still be in the lowest quarter of income earners in Santa Clara County [1]. As
such, one would qualify for rental assistance, etc from the county, as the
going rate for a /studio/ is $1200/month [2]. The inflated wages of the tech
industry have placed an unbearable burden on the average person.

[1] [http://www.hacsc.org/section-8-housing-programs/waiting-
list...](http://www.hacsc.org/section-8-housing-programs/waiting-lists-
applicants/income-limits/)

[2] [http://www.hacsc.org/section-8-housing-programs/housing-
choi...](http://www.hacsc.org/section-8-housing-programs/housing-choice-
voucher-current-participants/voucher-payment-standard-fmr-utility-allowance/)

~~~
johnbabboozle
'Lowest quarter' is a huge range. I don't think it's scandalous that Facebook
pays it's lowest skilled workers in the lowest quarter of wages.

If I looked at actual pay and actual expenses I might agree, but lowest
quarter isn't a good argument to make.

~~~
Sanddancer
The links have the pay and average expenses in them. Average pay for a studio
is $1200/month, way out of the range a facebook contractor could afford.

~~~
johnbabboozle
Yeah but your headline was 'lowest quarter' as if that said it all.

It's like those people who say it's a scandal that half the population earn
below the average wage.

Why would you expect someone who earns below average to be able to afford an
average apartment? Do you know what average means and how averages work?

~~~
Sanddancer
I expect them to be able to afford /an/ apartment, which they cannot. Do a
search on craigslist for apartments under $833, which is a third of their
monthly income, and tell me how many apartments you see. Facebook's wage means
their contractors are still essentially in poverty.

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someonefromsome
Key point here... It would be interesting to see if they have anyone making
less than that currently.

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mliker
>>>Contractors will also receive...a $4,000 new child benefit for parents who
do not receive parental leave

Contractors definitely did not receive that before...So that's another key
point

~~~
someonefromsome
I like that one :-)

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nemmonszz
Wow. It boggles my mind that any contractor working for Facebook would be
making anything near that low.

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csbrooks
Good for them! I like it.

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danbruc
A really bold and fair move would be to pay them comparable to their
developers and other staff. Of course not going to happen anytime soon.

~~~
johnbabboozle
Why is that fair? They don't have the same education (in general), they aren't
doing the same job, they don't contribute the same value, etc etc etc.

~~~
danbruc
Why should a developer working 40 hours a week earn more than say someone
cleaning toilets 40 hours a week? Both are investing 40 hours of their time,
both add value worth 40 hours of work. Actually cleaning toilets seems a way
less pleasant job and should be paid better. On the other hand the developer
spend more time in education not getting paid and has to recapture this
investment. They would probably not end up with the exact same wages but I see
no justification for enormous differences.

The supply and demand situation is of course very different allowing
developers to ask for high wages and on the other hand allows forcing the
toilet cleaner to work for a low wage but this does by no means make this
fair.

~~~
Lawtonfogle
Because one skill takes vastly more investment to perform and it also is able
to be performed by far fewer individuals (meaning competition for those that
do exist).

~~~
danbruc
As I said it is of course totally okay to get back the investment you made
with your longer education. But the difference over the lifetime between being
a developer and a toilet cleaner is way larger than that. Your second points
is just exploiting the supply and demand situation - you can ask for a higher
wage if your skill is rare but it does not mean you deserve it.

~~~
Lawtonfogle
Why do you deserve to get back the investment made on the education? Is
'deserving' an oracle, where you stick in some action and it arbitrarily
assigns the conclusion of 'does' or 'doesn't'?

~~~
danbruc
Let's ignore supply and demand for the moment. What would be a fair wage? I
argue it would be fair to get paid as much as you invest, an hour of work is
an hour of work, in first approximation no matter what you do. Pretending to
work obviously doesn't count, you really have to work as good as you can. If
you do a hard job, say risking your health in a mine, you should get paid
better because of that. There should also be some gradient to account for
skill and experience compared with others doing the same or similar work. And
if you spend several years at university to obtain the skills required for the
job this is an upfront investment that has to be paid back by the wage or
their might be a lack of incentives to go down this road.

In essence it really boils down to you invest an hour of your lifetime -
working or upfront to get prepared for the job - and you get paid for that
hour, what exactly you do does not matter much modulo some adjustments for
especially risky or unpleasant jobs.

~~~
Lawtonfogle
That is like saying that the gold watch should cost the same as the gold
plated watch, which shouldn't depend upon the supply and demand of the
materials it is made out of. Also, considering most digital goods can be
copied in mere seconds, it would appear that they should be priced at $0.01.
As for food, beef that is 30% fat should cost just as much as beef that is 3%
fat.

And heaven forbid we apply this to relationships. If you are looking for a one
night stand and spend the required hours, then you must get a one night stand.
The supply and demand of your particular looks/social skills aren't factored
in, only the time you invested.

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nashashmi
Maybe min. pay is supposed to be an entry level work. Duration will probably
get you either directly hired or later laid off.

If that is the situation, why would you pay more than $15/hr.

Also, I wish there was a context of this "minimum pay" policy.

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vivab0rg
One would be forgiven to think a company like Facebook, with a market cap of
224.82B, would pay a little more?

~~~
theli0nheart
Why would market cap have anything to do with it? Walmart has a larger market
cap than Facebook ($239B) and pays $9 / hour to its workers [1].

[1]: [http://money.cnn.com/2015/02/19/news/companies/walmart-
wages...](http://money.cnn.com/2015/02/19/news/companies/walmart-wages/)

~~~
x5n1
Walmart also makes significantly less per worker than Facebook.

~~~
francoisdevlin
Thus proving the point about market cap...

