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KSRandom195 t1_iud5mnr wrote

Reply to comment by somerandomii in Microsoft’s first median pay report shows racial gaps in top jobs by AP24inMumbai

> I live in Australia and we get paid less because our dollar is weaker. Are you suggesting companies should constantly adjust salaries to account for currency fluctuations?

What is the value of your labor to the company? That’s what you should be getting compensated for, and that doesn’t care about currency exchange rates or cost of living.

> I’d also get paid less if I move to a city with less demand for my skill set. If I want to maximise my pay I need to go where the demand is, regardless of which company I work for.

Industries like software don’t have a “local” demand. A software engineer in Sydney can do a job as well as a software engineer in San Francisco. So there isn’t “less demand” in Sydney vs San Francisco, there is a global demand for software engineers.

Yes some jobs have local demand, a factory can’t have workers around the world from it. But Microsoft is a software company with a few hardware exceptions.

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somerandomii t1_iufj97f wrote

Even if it were reasonable, most employment contracts don’t support a floating wage. You get a salary and the compensation is tied to a currency. To do it any other way would be impractical unless we overhauled the global economic systems. An equivalent of a global EU or something.

As for “software employees can work from home” that’s just not true. A lot can a lot of the time, but security-sensitive material is almost impossible to control remotely. And having people in the same space does increase collaboration and cross-pollination of skills and ideas. Despite the narrative, companies aren’t pushing for return to the office just to stroke the egos of middle managers.

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KSRandom195 t1_iufpqr7 wrote

Sure you’re not a middle manager with that last paragraph?

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somerandomii t1_iuk8de7 wrote

I’m definitely not and I’m pushing for more WFH at my office. But there’s a difference between 2 days a week and being in a different country.

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somerandomii t1_iuk8ei5 wrote

I’m definitely not and I’m pushing for more WFH at my office. But there’s a difference between 2 days a week and being in a different time zone.

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