Verizon Workers Strike on East Coast After Deadline Passes

> Verizon said that the average annual salary and benefit package for an associate in their Eastern region is $130,000. In the New York City/Long Island region, Verizon technicians currently have an average total wage-and-benefit package worth in over $160,000 a year.

> Verizon said that the cost of medical coverage for an East employee and one or more family members currently averages nearly $20,000 a year. In one of the company's East plans, the annual cost for this coverage is over $23,000 a year. The company said these costs are higher than the national average for family healthcare coverage of about $16,800.

These are well-paying union jobs. The problem is not the union, or Verizon itself. The problem is the constant Wall Street pressure on companies whose workers are unionized and enjoy good pay and benefits. From the perspective of investors, having a division that returns under a billion dollars in net income annually on tens of billions of dollars of invested capital is a huge drag on the whole company.

Overall both jobs bored me to tears and prompted me to learn how to code. Now happily a coder for a living.

What's a fair wage? It's a competitive wage - it's a wage similar to what other people doing that job get.

What's a competitive wage? It's a wage high enough that you are willing to work there, rather than somewhere else.

Or in other words, both conditions already happen automatically. That's kinda the whole point of capitalism.

If people think they are underpaid, they should each ask management to correct it. If management does not value all or some of them enough to do that, those that are undervalued are better off leaving for greener pastures.

That being said, after a certain amount of income, more income does not equal happiness. Rather than be a slave to trying to get more, I am inclined to ask myself if what I am doing is worthwhile, if what I make is over the minimum required for happiness and if what I make is fair under the Nash Equilibrium. If all are yes, I am fine with it. Others might be happier if they do that too. If they are working in an industry that pays below what is necessary for happiness (and this probably increases with dependents), they should find another career.

The Nash equilibrium suggests that focusing on the greater good is the best for everyone. Not to mention, I find focusing on the greater good to be more rewarding than the blind pursuit of wealth.

It also appears to be the case that Verizon's employees are overpaid rather than underpaid:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11488829

The total benefits for a Verizon technician on Long Island are $160,000 a year while the median for this region (across all professions) is about $50,000. Until today, I had never heard of a job for a technician that reached 6 figures.

These high salaries might have triggered Verizon's change of focus to wireless from wired and investment in 5G. The strike is probably going to accelerate Verizon's shift to wireless, which requires fewer employees and is non-unionized.

What gets me is the dichotomy between "big tech" and everyone else employing programmers/designers/UXers doing exactly the same kind of work but for 1/3-1/2 the pay. But hey, when those companies have quarterly EPS above $5, they might start paying better, too.

a) held that overtime is due to salaried workers so, abuse your employees at your own risk,

b) held that salary collusion is illegal and fined companies millions

Also I have no desire to be forced into a union, dues forcibly taken from my paycheck, thanks.

There is no information anywhere that says the employer is doing anything by doing that that will help them get what they want. There is a lot of literature that says its a bad idea - for their own enlightened self interest. We do automation of things. If there is no multiplier inherent in that, we should not be there to start with.

I'll caveat this with the statement that there may be things where it's just inherently that way, in the way that a surgeon must be there or human life is in the balance. Pushing your CRUD changes isn't likely to tip the scales on human life one way or the other. I've been in sprints where the fate of the company hung in the balance; I worked those hours. In the end it failed because it was going to fail anyway. It was worth doing, but this was cases where we knew it would fail if we didn't.

There's no need for collective action. There is a need for many, many people to recognize what codependency is and adjust their behavior. I know all the "But I..." in the list. BTDT. But the truth is that until you stop, it won't.

I make 200K+ and Mark Zuckerberg makes 35 Billion. There is no sane reason for this kind of BS.

I don't see my generation of engineers tolerating clowns like Zuckerberg the way the previous generation tolerated Larry Ellison and Bill Gates. It's a different world. Expectations are different. The only thing he brings to the table is mindless ambition. It's highly overrated and damaging and the world does not need it at this point. He and his ilk will be taken down.

We need more Linus Torvalds, Jimmy Wales and Sal Khan's who are capable of thinking that their creations are more than just about world domination at any expense.

Tax-advantaged savings accounts are to reward savers who might not otherwise save. They don't mean that everyone deserves tax-free saving.

We need to recognize that we live under a regime in which bankers have the entire populous by the throat. To live a decent life by American standards, nearly everyone has to take out loans for every major purchase and ends up paying 2-3x the nominal cost in interest. Let the massive scale of this sink in for a moment and you'll get some concept of just how powerful, all-consuming, and critical the banks are in this country.

Savings is anathema to this loan-based society that's been concocted. If someone has substantial savings, they may not need a loan, and that's very bad for the powers that be (because they won't get 2-3x the cost of the item over some years). Keynesian economics has been taken to its logical conclusion of sub-zero interest rates and practically everyone is indentured to their lienholders and employers. "The Road to Serfdom" indeed.

But I agree with the problem of pensions but I would also add that today's managers don't want to fund them the way they should. Instead, they set aside some money and assume a very rosy growth rate that doesn't always materialize. Even with that inflated expected growth rate, pensions are often still underfunded. An employee should be free to contribute to such a perpetuity if he so chooses.

Underfunded pension liabilities will likely take down several large cities over the coming years.

In the uk you have to account for pension liabilities as if tomorrow 100% of your scheme members became liabilities which is only likely to happen if there is a zombie Apocalypse.

One has to ask who benefits from this dodgy change to acounting rules.

Otherwise: agreed that these things are rarely reduceable to a single scalar (amount of profit).

Those that are not (which the wireline business should be in, given its very high barrier to entry and low number of competitors) do not go to zero in the long run because of the market power they control and tacit collusion with other players in the market. The 'razor thin margin' likely exists not because of competition, but because of inefficiency in the way the business is run.

I do think that trying to shame or regulate companies into serving unprofitable areas is the wrong way to go about it. If it's that important, then subsidize service in those areas so it's actually profitable. But Americans seem to hate obvious subsidies, and prefer to make them weird and convoluted instead.