RE: Daily Discussion No. 3: Working and Wages - Minimum, Maximum, Fair - What IS "Fair?"
I was the #1 salesman in the country last year for our company. Would my bosses be better of hiring someone else at a lower salary but incur massive losses on the sales side?
Aha, but companies evidently don't act rationally, like that. A friend of mine was a senior software engineer at Dell and was forced to leave through "managed attrition" and replaced with two fresh college recruits whose combined pay was less than his. My wife was an of the highest ranked brokers at Bank of America and was fired and replace by three off-the-street trainees they could pay $15/hr instead of her $110K a year. How did they fire her? For submitting a vacation request "incorrectly." Yes, a wrongful termination lawsuit followed...
Although they are anecdotal, I have talked to others over the years who admitted they were-- quite literally-- told that they should look for other employment because "it didn't look good to shareholders" that they were being paid as much as they were and that two people could be hired to do their job.
Talk about a non-incentive to do well!
And yes, these are important dialogues to be having...
1st off, sorry that your wife had to go through that. Human to human, that couldn't have been a pleasant experience to go through. Hope you/she have recovered from it :)
Back to the matter:
Good call and definitely reasonable observations. But I think there may be some reasoning behind these decisions that may not be so cut & dry.
I assume most companies act in their own self interest. It doesn't pay to not act rationally. Although the layoffs/firings are unfortunate for those involved, they are most likely in the best interest of the company.
It is the free-market speaking loud and clear. You are no longer worth what we pay you. It sucks. I can only imagine. But if you had that high of a paying job, you probably have a pretty good resume and can find other work which will pay hopefully as much. Who knows?
Not fun to be on the end of it. But put yourself in the shoes of the people doing the firings. In your scenarios, massive companies. Dell & BOA. They don't get to the size they are paying people X times what they're worth. It's an unfortunate no-brainer for them. But, it's business. It's not meant to be lovey-dovey.
I don't see it that way. Sure, you may propel towards the upper echelon and eventually get chopped down. But it's not a bottomless pit. If you made it that far, you can do it again somewhere else.
If you're afraid of doing well at your job with the fear of being laid off because you're too expensive, feel free to take less money in exchange for guaranteed job placement :)