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Comment by nekooooo | Hacker News Reader

her response to the dm about finding some cheap artists says it all. i'm sure she didn't give her employees payment for making the posters in the past either.

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Of course she paid them, it was just another task they did while on duty, like brewing coffee or taking out the trash. Surely you’re not expecting her to pay someone who is already on payroll and being paid for their time extra because they’re making posters?

If making posters is outside of the scope of their normal job duties as it had previously been defined, then yes, absolutely I'd expect them to be paid extra.

Just because they're on payroll and being paid for their time doesn't mean you can instruct them to do anything you ask.

True. I can’t speak from experience, but this seems like it might often fall within the scope of normal job duties, though.

I assure you, a retail workers job description includes doing all sorts of things, many much less pleasant than making signs. I guarantee you the employee assigned to sign making was happy to be doing that over cleaning the bathroom.

And besides, this is the U.S. Unless you’re in a union, responding to legitimate, legal and business-related tasks from your employer (that don’t exceed your ability to accomplish, e.g. not lifting 100lbs or whatever) with “not in my job description” will get you canned.

if i'm expected to make coffee and art then it's perfectly reasonable to expect more money than if I'm merely expected to make coffee. whether that comes as part of base salary or as some contract-esque arrangement when art is required of me is the kind of detail we can figure out (or you can try to do it with AI and have a lot of people stop supporting you. your call.)

Extra responsibilities = extra pay 100% of the time. Just because it doesn't happen in practice all the time doesn't make it right.

This is probably correct. But also par for the course. I bet there are coffee shops that give skill bonuses or something like that, but I'm betting most don't.

Most folks who do stuff like this just assume it's part of the job and carry on.

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