Comment by Rapzid

1 year ago

This isn't the greatest submission and lacks any semblance of context. The poster is in Netherlands apparently and the new team in Germany? I have no idea what to make of this.

9 comments

Rapzid

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bsimpson  1 year ago

Google pays people by region. As I recall, SF, NYC, and Seattle get full wages, and other geos get discounted by a certain percentage. If you live in the US but not in one of those metros, your pay could be ~15% lower.

Yesterday's layoffs seem to have been framed as reorgs. Some teams have been wholly dismissed. Some have been consolidated (two teams -> one team).

There does seem to be a pattern that favors people in lower cost regions. For instance, two teams get combined and the higher cost manager is laid off. Or a whole team is laid off, but those duties are being restaffed by people in a lower wage office.

  • CydeWeys  1 year ago

    > As I recall, SF, NYC, and Seattle get full wages, and other geos get discounted by a certain percentage. If you live in the US but not in one of those metros, your pay could be ~15% lower.

    Seattle is actually in the tier below SF and NYC, which makes its pay around 10% less. However, it's mostly a wash when you consider that Seattle doesn't have state income tax, so your net is roughly the same in both places.

  • sitkack  1 year ago

    Wages by Geo is a Urs Hözle move, whom should get paid in NZ dollars.

    • paganel  1 year ago

      Interesting, didn’t know that. I remember older threads of people fawning his accomplishments, but nothing about him being a cheap b*stard when it came to his colleagues salaries. We should do more of this name and shaming in our industry, it’s one of the few levers we still have at our disposition.

      1 reply →

    • lotsofpulp  1 year ago

      Wages by geo is just “pay the lowest price you can for the requisite quality of product/service you need”, which is what effectively every person does day in and day out.

  • bananapub  1 year ago

    for many many yearsr it's been a SVP-level project to move people and teams out of the expensive US parts to cheaper regions - Munich was a particular target for some reason (maybe it was the cheapest medium eng office in that timezone). there used to be a lot more carrot, though.