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Comment by spamizbad | Hacker News Reader

Wow, you actually encounter people willing to take you up on #3 these days? They're either in love with your company or desperate for work.

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Someone who opts-in to #3 is not necessarily desperate. In fact, to the contrary, they likely also want an opportunity to feel the company out and be more confident in their choice to stay/leave at the end of 3mo.

There's nothing preventing them from quitting after 3 months with a normal offer.

Depends on the contract. Over here (Finland) it's very common to have a three months "trial period", during which both the employer and employee are free to terminate the contract at (practically) any point and for any reason. However, after that three months, you need to give a one month advance notice to quit and firing someone becomes more complicated too.

Same here in Australia; I'm about to start a trial period of a few months with a single week's notice for termination from either side.

(Every job I've held has had this in some form or other. I'd wager it's common in countries with termination rules that aren't quite so, uh, "at will" as the US'.)

That "opportunity" is not worth having no company-provided health insurance, nor is it worth paying both halves of the FICA tax, except for the desperate.

Because it's impossible to pay someone at a higher hourly rate than they would be paid as a full-time employee?

It's not the easiest thing in the world to explain, no, which is why I bet most people who do the temp-to-perm thing don't bother, and just pay the contractor according to their yearly salary. After all, if they don't know enough not to take the term-to-perm offer, why complicate things? ;)

That may be. I have no interest in what other companies do, really.

I'm happy to pay higher hourly during the contract to compensate for the lack of benefits.

I'm happy to pay a (naive) employee more than they asked for because I know what the position is worth and have no interest in tricking them.

This isn't generosity, it's just good long-term business IMHO.

How about a W-2 contractor with benefits?

Agreed. It's an excellent way to make sure the only people you hire are desperate for any work.

Just filter out the latter and you're golden ;)

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