
Amazon Will Pay You $5,000 to Quit Your Job - scottkduncan
http://time.com/58305/amazon-will-pay-you-5000-to-quit-your-job/
======
jordn
The first (and stated) effect of this policy is to weed out the unmotivated
employees.

However, Dan Ariely has explained that the secondary effect is potentially
more powerful. For those that choose to stay, they will forever live with
their past action of having turned down lots of money to work there. So, when
they're having a crappy day and hating their job, they're probably thinking
"why didn't I take the money and quit?!". The only way to reconcile their
thoughts and actions is to explain that, in fact, they must really love this
job and therefore should work hard at it. This effect is known as ‘Cognitive
Dissonance’[1] and is fascinating.

Here's a link to a video of Dan explaining this[2] and a _really_ excellent
Coursera course he does on Irrational behaviour[3].

[1]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_dissonance](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_dissonance)

[2] [http://bigthink.com/videos/dan-ariely-zappos-and-the-
offer](http://bigthink.com/videos/dan-ariely-zappos-and-the-offer)

[3]
[https://www.coursera.org/course/behavioralecon](https://www.coursera.org/course/behavioralecon)

~~~
tgb
I recall hearing about that for Zappos, but here the offer is repeated every
year. Doesn't that ruin the effect - you know you can get (potentially even
more) by quitting in a few months? And if it's only offered at certain times
of the year, then there'll be a bunch of people hanging on until the offer
comes around again.

~~~
jordn
Well, I suspect there will be people postponing quitting for a few months just
so they can cash out with the offer. That's undesirable for Amazon.

But I doubt you'd have people staying in a job they dislike for another year
just to get an extra $1k when they do quit. Also you'll have compounded
another year of turning down cash to work there so the cognitive dissonance
might be even stronger.

~~~
avar
If the offer is annual and they add an extra $1000 per year then on average
the disgruntled employee has to wait 6 months to quit and get a higher
severance, not 1 year. Which means that 1/4 of those employees only have to
churn through 3 more months to get an extra $1000, hardly something nobody
would do.

The obvious solution to fix this flaw in the system would be to raise the
offer daily instead of annually, be approximately $1000/365 =~ $2.74 per day.
Or more simply by $20 per week, which comes out to about the same per year
($1040).

~~~
SifJar
I think you misunderstood jordn's comment. When he said "staying in a job they
dislike for another year just to get an extra $1k when they do quit." I think
he was talking about a hypothetical situation were an employee has been
working for Amazon for, say 2 years, and got offered the $2k. They'd be
unlikely to wait another full year, just to be able to get $3k when they quit.
In other words, if they want to quit, they will do so at the closest offer
(e.g. $2k) rather than waiting another year AFTER that offer to get a larger
one (e.g. $3k).

Of course it's likely employees would wait e.g. 3 months to get the "quitting
bonus". In fact, jordn quite clearly stated that also, in the first line of
his comment.

~~~
avar
Right, I'm just elaborating and pointing out that this caveat only happens as
long as the offer is structured in such a way that you have a _massive_
increase to it at a specified time once a year.

Then if you hate your job and you're close to that specified time it's in your
interest to wait, even though the point of the policy is that Amazon would
rather that you quit.

If they just increased the offer with more granularity they wouldn't create
that conflict of interest. You'd only get more money as a function of the time
you stayed on the job, so you might as well quit right away instead of waiting
a few months for a much larger payout.

------
nemtaro
As someone who actually worked at Amazon for a few long years, I'm always
skeptical of such seemingly positive news, and often think "hmm, could this be
another marketing trick to influence people's perception of Amazon rather than
actually changing anything", and %90 of the time I'm right :)

Here's how their typical financial offer is structured for new software
engineers:

1st year: signing bonus + relocation bonus + 5% of stock grant

2nd year: signing bonus + 15% stock grant

3rd year: 40% stock grant

4th year: 40% stock grant

If you quit within the first year, you have to give the relocation and signing
bonus back. That's much much more than $1k. So there's a strong financial
incentive / golden handcuffs to keep you there for at least 1-2 years, even if
you are unhappy!

After the 2nd year, the financial incentive of staying is still there in form
of the large stock grant (which has grown due to their stock price rising)
that you've been promised and waiting on for a long time.

I can see someone rationally and happily taking the incentive after the third
or fourth years and quit (i.e. after they've done damage to the work
environment as an unhappy/unmotivated employee, and no longer have to give a
fortune back to the company)... but before then, I doubt it'll change the
behavior of any currently employed, overworked, over-paged, under-paid, under-
appreciated software engineers.

Who this policy might affect though is future hires, and their perception of
Amazon. People who have a choice between offers from MS and Amazon for
example. They might consider this an interesting policy and assume that it
would have improved employee morale at Amazon even though it's common
knowledge that Amazon has terrible work life balance, etc.

I should also note that the Zappos policy makes a lot of sense to me, but this
is very different from that, as is the employee culture of Zappos from Amazon.

~~~
sib
Note that this offer is for fulfillment center employees, not software
engineers.

~~~
gxs
Thank you for clarifying this, it was a source of confusion for me as well.

Not to sound elitist, but what is $5k to a software engineer making 120k/year
regardless of the cost of living in Seattle.

This makes more sense.

~~~
fletchowns
$5k is still a lot of money for somebody making $120k/year

~~~
Igglyboo
It's no where near as much money as it is to the people who are actually
getting the offer. It's like 2 weeks pay for an engineer and 2 months pay for
a warehouse worker.

------
JackC
Purely on a legal level, getting your most disgruntled employees to identify
themselves and waive all claims in exchange for $2,000-5,000 is probably a
pretty good deal.

~~~
muyuu
From what I've read, they have plenty of employees with zero rights to claims,
under schemes like German "minijobs" (
www.reddit.com/r/technology/comments/1szub2/9000_workers_at_amazoncoms_german_operations_were/
)

------
bobjordan
About 5 years ago during worst of the downturn, I took $20,000 USD option our
consulting firm gave and voluntarily quit a $120,000 base salary job. At the
time, I thought that job sucked pretty bad and was looking for an out anyhow.
I've been an entrepreneur ever since.

No quick success story to tell - I've been bootstrapping for 5 years in China
and it's been hard. But I've been happier overall focusing everyday on pretty
much whatever-the-hell I want to think about, and my business just broke $1M
USD revenues this year by doing that, so overall it seems right decision for
me.

Policies like this are probably a win-win for all involved.

~~~
EC1
What do you do? Why China?

~~~
bobjordan
I came to Shenzhen China because I'm a manufacturing guy and this is the place
to be for that. Plus the 8% YOY growth and low labor rates here give a better
chance for bootstrap success. And finally, yes, I got a hot girlfriend during
my visit and wanted to stay a while. She's now my wife.

I first started a technical sourcing/manufacturing/engineering consulting
company. Then later started a 2nd company that uses the experience and
engineers in my consulting company, but instead of consulting we just do
direct sales of custom designed products and tooling, like a virtual ODM.

------
ninv
It starts with 2000$ then 1000$ increment per year up to 5000$

This deal is for warehouse employees only and most of the people(90%+) working
in warehouse are contractors.

They handpick employee(s) and once a year and offer him/her this deal.

BS!

~~~
mfisher87
The article made it sounds like a universal offer, maybe I could see per-
business unit, but not per-employee. That would require you to already know
who the dissatisfied workers are. The stated point was to discover early who
is not satisfied in their job.

Do you have a source on that?

~~~
duskwuff
As others have mentioned: keep in mind this offer is for warehouse employees.
There's lots of hard metrics being gathered on those employees, so it's
straightforward to figure out which ones are underperforming.

------
orky56
This reminds of the unlimited vacation policy. Essentially with both these
policies, the company is deflecting issues regarding job satisfaction and
burnout onto the employee. The employee almost gets bullied into not taking
the offer so as to show that they are above the petty reward. These
psychological games are not created by chance; they are instituted to keep
everything black and white, with us or against us. By drawing a line in the
sand, they are eliminating the necessary conversations employees should be
having with HR or supervisors to improve the workplace and their own
individual situations.

------
afterburner
Although nobody else seems to have mentioned it, this sounds to me like they
are trying to avoid employees being dissatisfied but sticking around in order
to get severance pay. Obviously if you quit voluntarily, no severance pay, but
Amazon gives you a bit of money anyways (much less than severance pay), so
that maybe you won't stick around longer than is good for either of you.

~~~
phamilton
Is it really much less? Last time I was let go I was given less than $5000
severance pay, and that was as a developer.

~~~
afterburner
Hmm, I'm in Canada, and while the legal minimum here probably isn't much
higher than the US, maybe companies tend to offer more. Could just be what
I've heard of in the largish engineering companies I've been in.

~~~
danielweber
In general, there is no requirement for any severance in the U.S. It can be
negotiated for, and in certain specific cases laws may require either notice
or severance.

------
donretag
At my company, I am both the most unmotivated and most productive employee.
Where would that leave me? :)

~~~
lss456
I have to disagree. Something motivates you. If you're highly productive,
something is motivating that. The question is what?

~~~
donretag
I love being a software developer and I am great at my job.

My other coworkers are nowhere near as talented and the lack of peers greatly
contributes to my frustration (which makes me unmotivated).

------
smurph
Big defense contractors have a yearly VRIF (Voluntary Reduction In Force),
which is when they offer slightly better than average retirement packages to
expendable older employees. Young people would never get the offer (because
they couldn't retire) and important older engineers would also never get the
offer, even though many of them wanted it. This is a big improvement over that
since it can be used by younger employees and the employee decides
unilaterally if they want the package.

------
pvnick
A few years ago I worked at a place where the CEO instituted this policy in
the wake of reading about Zappos doing it. I remember him standing up at the
weekly company meeting and offering a few thousand dollars to anyone who quit.
The thing is, a week earlier, another coworker had put in his two weeks, and
the look on his face upon hearing that announcement... I'm not sure if he ever
got the money, but oh well. C'est la vie.

~~~
mediaman
What was your experience of the impact that policy had at that company?
Anything? Did any lower performers leave to take the incentive?

I've been curious about implementing this at my own company but I'd be
interested in someone's actual experience with it, vs. hearing about it from
people incentivized to claim it worked well because it was their idea to
implement.

~~~
pvnick
I actually don't think it had much impact at all actually. Although it wasn't
a huge amount of money. I remember thinking "meh".

------
jotm
I'd take $5000 to quit a job in an Amazon warehouse:

[http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2013/11/25/amazon-staff-
inve...](http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2013/11/25/amazon-staff-
investigation_n_4335894.html)

[http://www.forbes.com/sites/eamonnfingleton/2013/11/25/amazo...](http://www.forbes.com/sites/eamonnfingleton/2013/11/25/amazon-
com-is-accused-of-slave-driving-after-bbc-secretly-videotaped-warehouse-
conditions/)

[http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2512959/Walk-11-mile...](http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2512959/Walk-11-miles-
shift-pick-order-33-seconds--Amazon-works-staff-bone.html)

[http://www.vice.com/en_uk/read/jean-baptiste-malet-amazon-
wa...](http://www.vice.com/en_uk/read/jean-baptiste-malet-amazon-warehouse)

:-) ... :-(

------
ForHackernews
Does this apply to Amazon's subcontractor warehouse employees? Because those
are some jobs seriously worth quitting for $5,000:
[http://www.motherjones.com/print/161491](http://www.motherjones.com/print/161491)

This would never be worth it for a developer working for Amazon proper.

------
ozh
Zappos pays you $2,000 to quit... during the recruiting process

[http://www.businessweek.com/stories/2008-09-16/why-zappos-
of...](http://www.businessweek.com/stories/2008-09-16/why-zappos-offers-new-
hires-2-000-to-quitbusinessweek-business-news-stock-market-and-financial-
advice)

~~~
r00fus
That's new hires who've done at least a week of training, not applicants.
There's a world of difference in between.

------
readmylist
Amazon runs through whole towns. That is an understatement. They arrive and go
through 8-10 counties worth of people. Every person that they let go was not a
bad employee and every employee they kept was not a good employee. Amazon is
assholes. They have their temporary staffing agency because they don't want to
pay health benefits. If Amazon kept all the good employees that the staffing
agency gave them then they would no longer need the staffing agency.

Staffing agencies are expensive, they are not really that much cheaper. If
Amazon got rid of the staffing agency they could pay the employees they
already have more money and there wouldnt be a question if employees are happy
or not, motivated or not.

The buy outs are just to keep their staffing agency busy. How is the staffing
agency going to say all of a sudden, "You know what, we dont even require a
diploma or a GED anymore, we did before but now we don't".

With their staff agency they are burning money right in front of employees'
faces while telling them that they cannot pay them one dime more. They have
pissed off and cleaned out half the freaking state now they will hire anyone.
Now they are going to pay some perfectly good employees to leave. Really these
employees are exceptional. If you can last somewhere for 2-3 years where most
people can't last 2-3 weeks, you are a valuable employee. That is Amazon's
problem: They do not value people.

------
yen223
Isn't this just a cheaper version of a voluntary separation scheme? Makes
brilliant sense actually.

~~~
judk
This is a disruptive Internet version.

------
prbuckley
I wonder what the chances of labor coordinating and everyone deciding
collectively to take the offer at the same time? That would put Amazon in a
tough spot and allow labor to negotiate a better deal. Amazon must be very
confident that won't happen.

Maybe this type of program says more about the weak state of organized labor
in the US then it does about breeding a healthy and good company culture.
There seems to be something you can read in between the lines with this.

~~~
NorthGuy1
This policy is specifically designed to weed out all but the most desperate
employees. When you're living paycheque-to-paycheque you can't afford to
strike. The reason I pay union dues is to top up that strike fund.

------
everyone
Yeah Amazon are great to their permanent workers, management and so on. But
what about the vast of majority of permatemp workers who do all the moving,
warehouse work etc. ?

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=waeMkka60po](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=waeMkka60po)

------
ritchiea
This is genius. Many people feel stuck in jobs they don't like for financial
reasons. They're surely not as productive as they could be if they were
happier. Providing even a small bit of assistance to help them out the door
helps both sides. Employees don't feel trapped and employers don't have to
wonder if their employee is just have a rough time or if he/she does not want
to be there any longer.

Not to mention, as another commenter pointed out [1], once you decline the
money you will look back and remember you made the decision to stay when
presented an opportunity to leave.

1\.
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7572688](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7572688)

------
_wdh
I would be amazed if anyone accepted this offer, it's not enough money to
justify making every other job interview afterwards harder. I bet it's just a
PR trick to make them look like better employers after the warehouse
conditions were exposed.

~~~
imgabe
How does it make other interviews harder? Saying you left because you felt the
company wasn't a good fit for you and they offered you a sum of money that
gave you a little leeway to plan your next move sounds perfectly reasonable to
me.

------
muyuu
I wonder where do they apply this policy? There are plenty of sob stories of
sweatshops in Germany (for instance).

If this is a global policy then the argument that they're the scum of the
Earth with regard to employees cannot hold much water.

------
bowlofpetunias
Seems to me that this can only work in countries with little in the way of job
protection.

If you want to get rid of someone in most EU countries, it's going to cost you
a lot more for them to sign away their rights by quitting. From that
perspective, this is just an attempt to get rid of people cheaply.

But exactly those people you actually want to take the offer won't, they are
much better off forcing their employer to either fire them or make them a
better offer.

------
vaadu
Can we get the US federal government to institute this policy? With the caveat
that once you quit you are prohibited from collecting a federal paycheck
elsewhere.

~~~
tomasien
At first I thought you meant that the US Government would just pay anyone to
quit their job AND I LOVED IT! I still think it's a good idea, and I know
everyone probably thinks that first idea is stupid, but I think it's great.
Getting people to feel comfortable quitting their jobs is the only way we're
going to reinvent this economy.

------
MBCook
A similar policy at Zappos was discussed a few years ago on the Freakonomics
podcast. Here's the transcript:

[http://freakonomics.com/2011/09/30/the-upside-of-quitting-
fu...](http://freakonomics.com/2011/09/30/the-upside-of-quitting-full-
transcript/)

------
nargz503
I would think that it would be more of a tiered system. For some higher pay
employees it might benefit them to remain in unsatisfactory job just to make
the big bucks. They are then draining amazon and not contributing like they
would be if the y were truly pleased with their job

------
Pxtl
So in other words, there's now a $5000 hiring bonus if you can figure out a
way to jump ship to Google or any of Amazon's other competitors. Sounds good
to me.

------
donutdan4114
I very much agree with this. A great way to weed out employees who aren't
happy there, and as such, will be unmotivated, unproductive, and bring down
overall morale.

------
qwerta
Voluntary redundancy offer is pretty widespread. But there is usually
exception for developers and other highly qualified people. Devs cant quit :-)

~~~
walshemj
There is always the wally solution ie deliberatly mess up.

------
smackfu
One tricky bit is that it seems to be only once a year. So someone just moving
on normally wouldn't easily be able to take advantage.

------
JTon
I wonder what the tax implications of taking this offer are. My gut says it
becomes considerably less desirable. Too bad

------
dorfsmay
If you leave, work somewhere else for six months or a year, can you come back
at Amazon?

------
blazespin
Isn't this just Severance?

~~~
ninv
Yes my friend it is. Someone downvoted me for suggesting this.

------
codeonfire
Most blue collar workers turn over in a year, so this is just PR fluff.
Companies can and do write them up at any time for the smallest of mistakes
and then fire them, often within the first three months. Any statement made
about a manual labor job and "After the first year" is ridiculous as is the
tuition plan.

~~~
sockgrant
Do you have a source?

~~~
codeonfire
I worked similar jobs for several years.

------
elwell
So OpenSSL team has opportunity to make $3K profit and not have to deal with
Heartbleed-scale shenanigans?

------
sharemywin
Too bad the guy didn't take his design and patent it. Then turn around and
license it to GE and all their competitors.

~~~
sharemywin
posted this on the wrong thread.

