The opposite is true: it was penny-foolish and pound-wise. As Glenn pointed out -- the door desks were an expensive and ergonomicaly unsound symbol that told a true story about frugality and the relationship between the company and the employee. Because of the omnipresent symbol of frugality, many cost saving decisions were made that undoubtedly paid for the cost of the door desks many times over.

The less happy side of the symbol: that amazon really didn't care about employees was reinforced in other ways as well. A common refrain from Jeff: if you're not happy here, leave. Life is too short to be unhappy.

In some senses that's a bold answer, and an honest one. But note that the answer was very, very rarely: what can we do to make life better here?

The door desks were also a symbol to us all that if you wanted to work at a place that cared about your health, well-being, and happiness, you might very well want to move on.

But, to be fair, three counterbalancing factors held people there: hard engineering problems, the very real prospect of wealth, and working on a product that was very, very successful. I never heard Bezos give anyone the sugar water speech: he didn't have to. It was obvious that Amazon was changing the world.