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mhoye

So, funny story: remember how that Stanford professor described last years' layoffs as a "social contagion" exercise, where CEOs were just doing it because everyone else was doing it?

news.stanford.edu/2022/12/05/e

Well everyone get your surprised face ready but it was in fact a coordinated effort by execs, large shareholders and hedge funds to cover up mismanagement and suppress wages:

teamblind.com/post/How-we-got-

Did I say funny, I meant awful, typo sorry those keys are right next to each other.

3 Oct 2023 at 12:12 | Open on mastodon.social
76 comments
mhoye

In hindsight "Stanford business professor says these things just happen and nobody is to blame" should have been an obvious red flag.

Edit: I think this should be elevated to a general rule. Any economist or "professor of business" describing things in animal-behavior terms - instinct, herd, whatever - is prima-facie evidence a group of very rich people were up to some nefarious shit behind the scenes six months earlier.

3 Oct 2023 at 12:14 | Open on mastodon.social
Baldur Bjarnason

@mhoye I mean, what the Stanford professor said about lay-offs being a really bad idea that usually harms both the company and the laid off employees is still true

Everything he said about why it happened is bullshit, of course. Unless you mentally substitute "social contagion" with "greed-inspired idiocy" or something 🙂

(This is a recurring phenomenon in biz/economics studies. They can often demonstrate specific negative outcomes, but almost never positive outcomes or ultimate causes)

3 Oct 2023 at 16:22 | Open on toot.cafe
Baldur Bjarnason

@mhoye But that Blind post is really interesting and does seem to support what a lot of us were thinking at the time.

3 Oct 2023 at 16:23 | Open on toot.cafe
mhoye

@baldur I suppose that's true, but "layoffs are very bad and have awful human consequences" followed by "enh, y'know, sometimes these things just happen and they're nobody's fault", when they are in fact specifically the fault of some specific people for specific reasons is just giving those people intellectual and moral shelter and helping them escape accountability.

3 Oct 2023 at 16:36 | Open on mastodon.social
Jeff Abrahamson

@baldur @mhoye I wonder to what extent his conclusions about effects on health extend to Europe. The context in the U.S. is far more brutal. I'm sure it's not great for people here, either, but I'm reluctant to assume the same health consequences.

3 Oct 2023 at 18:43 | Open on piaille.fr
Schroedinger

@jeff_abrahamson @baldur @mhoye I think the impact is probably similar here in Europe. Especially if you are in a niche market - where there are only a few companies who can really use your skills.

4 Oct 2023 at 10:29 | Open on metalhead.club
Davida Taylor

@jeff_abrahamson @baldur @mhoye
Oh yes, it is happening here in Europe as well, At least here in Germany. Worse is watching the Auto Industry implode, taking out of tech workers and skilled workers too. Sad.

7 February at 17:06 | Open on mastodon.online
Geoff Berner

@baldur @mhoye if you think it's "idiocy" that their side carefully, secretly and effectively organized and coordinated their attacks on your side, that might be an insight into why you keep losing to their side.

3 Oct 2023 at 19:18 | Open on zeroes.ca
Sylvain Drapeau

@Geoffberner @baldur @mhoye

You talk like it's a war waged on equal grounds by armies of like power and resolve...

What if someone was tipped off in advance of the layoffs. Then what? How do you "defend" against this attack?

3 Oct 2023 at 20:14 | Open on mstdn.ca
mhoye
Sylvain Drapeau

@mhoye @Geoffberner @baldur

Good point.

I don't know how it works in the USA, but in Canada, unions in tech jobs are mostly non-existent. Lots of work to be done before it's an effective protection.

3 Oct 2023 at 20:44 | Open on mstdn.ca
tyil

@axnxcamr@mstdn.ca @mhoye@mastodon.social @Geoffberner@zeroes.ca @baldur@toot.cafe USA has practically no unions because that's a communist idea and Americans generally prefer to just suffer tremendously than use an idea created by The Enemy.

4 Oct 2023 at 5:37 | Open on fedi.tyil.nl
Aaron

@mhoye @axnxcamr @Geoffberner @baldur I would also take this opportunity to mention that unions are unnecessary if you work for a worker coop. It's like the union *is* the employer. It also reduces the wealth inequality problem, since the shareholders are the workers instead of wealthy rent-collectors. Imagine if our employers actually worked for us.

7 February at 17:36 | Open on techhub.social
Aaron

@mhoye @axnxcamr @Geoffberner @baldur (But yes, if you can't work for a coop, unionization is the right choice.)

7 February at 17:37 | Open on techhub.social
Geoff Berner

@axnxcamr @baldur @mhoye that's kind of my point. The problem here is that many employees believe their company's purpose is to solve tech problems, when the actual animating purpose of those in charge is to lord it over people like them. The tech solutions were always a means to that end. You can't resist something that you won't first acknowledge as reality.

3 Oct 2023 at 20:53 | Open on zeroes.ca
Sylvain Drapeau

@Geoffberner @baldur @mhoye

I had misread your original point then, as we now are in total agreement!

3 Oct 2023 at 20:57 | Open on mstdn.ca
McNeely

@baldur @mhoye I had always assumed "social contagion" was mean to be a semi polite euphemism for some of these guys decided it needed to happen for their wallets and then it became a reality bc everyone else could point to others doing it.

4 Oct 2023 at 0:45 | Open on indieweb.social
Kevin Granade

@baldur @mhoye the only way "social contagion" fits the narrative is in the upswing, "everyone is hiring so the predictions must be right".

7 February at 22:43 | Open on tech.lgbt
Jan

@mhoye
@mhoye Gotta level with you man, Standford professor or not, so far nobody managed to convince me in the slightest that it was about anything other than pure unadulterated corporate greed.

3 Oct 2023 at 19:04 | Open on hachyderm.io
Asbestos

@mhoye
TBH pretty much anything is an indication that some uber rich people have been up to some nefarious shit

3 Oct 2023 at 21:30 | Open on toot.community
Jake Staines

@mhoye so what you're saying is that... incredibly rich people are animals?

5 Oct 2023 at 11:44 | Open on mastodon.online
Seiðr

@mhoye I am shocked, SHOCKED, there's gambling going on in here!

3 Oct 2023 at 12:47 | Open on mstdn.social
esmevane, sorry

@mhoye do you remember around the time the layoffs started, there was a letter going around from a London hedge fund basically urging a company (Google?) to do this in order to “correct the market” or something. I forget the exact wording

3 Oct 2023 at 13:09 | Open on mastodon.esmevane.com
Camerondotca

@mhoye an economist was wrong? [surpisedPikachu.jpg]

3 Oct 2023 at 13:43 | Open on mastodon.nz
Cass M 🇨🇦 :mstdn:

@mhoye anyone claiming social contagion, with a straight face, doesn't have a clue about how powerful people collude to remain power.

3 Oct 2023 at 13:46 | Open on mstdn.ca
Stanley Nerdlinger

@mhoye
Early this year the CEO of Salesforce said he was being pressured by hedge funds to lay off employees

3 Oct 2023 at 14:31 | Open on lor.sh
John Panzer

@mhoye doesn’t this describe illegal collusion to suppress wage growth? Something tech companies have been dinged for in the past…

3 Oct 2023 at 14:31 | Open on mastodon.social
Codex ☯️♈☮

@mhoye

This kind of shit is why tech workers desperately need to unionize across the industry! The CEOs are absolutely unioned against us already, we have the receipts and we have the suppressed wages too!

They're replacing senior devs with complex inside knowledge of their business by bootcamp grads for 1/4 of the pay, and the trend of it has enshittified the entire Internet to the point where the whole system is collapsing!

When will collectively put down our keyboards and demand better?

3 Oct 2023 at 15:13 | Open on hachyderm.io
Bryan Smart

@mhoye @talon Meanwhile, if someone were to suggest the US government is encouraging and assisting millions of people to annually cross the southern border to depress wages during a time of high inflation, they'd call you names and demand you be deplatformed for spreading conspiracy theories and daring to question the motives of our benevolent corporate masters.

3 Oct 2023 at 15:24 | Open on mstdn.social
Donald Ball
mhoye

@bryansmart @talon

When people cross the border looking for work, maybe ask yourself: who's giving them that work?

It's not the government. When documented citizens who pay taxes get jobs, the government sees their cut; undocumented people, not so much.

Just something to think about. Maybe they've been telling you to hate the wrong people.

3 Oct 2023 at 22:39 | Open on mastodon.social
Bryan Smart

@mhoye @talon They're getting work from the businesses that are donating to politicians to maintain their supply of undocumented cheap labor. Those businesses don't want to pay fair wages that citizens demand. Those businesses don't want legal immigration, nor do they want a closed border. They want people who are grateful for anything, and scared to complain. They also want anyone opposing their exploitation to be called names, so the exploitation can continue.

3 Oct 2023 at 22:50 | Open on mstdn.social
Hugo Estrada

@talon @bryansmart @mhoye Those business people do want close borders. The harder it is to cross, the more power they have over the undocumented immigrants

8 February at 4:07 | Open on functional.cafe
Veirling | #MMIWG
Aviva Gary

@mhoye What?!?!?! No.... They would never...

*clutches pearls, looks for a fainting couch* 🙃

3 Oct 2023 at 20:58 | Open on noc.social
Internet Rando
Evan Light

@mousey @mhoye @hugoestr Heaven forbid that the working schmuck have, you know, some dignity, self-respect, and quality of life. Evidently, these rich people believe that's just for them.

8 February at 4:46 | Open on tenforward.social
Hugo Estrada

@mhoye @elight @mousey They are willing to lose money, pay money, to humiliate workers, people trying to live and raise families

8 February at 12:41 | Open on functional.cafe
spherulitic

@mhoye kind of also demonstrates that these were bullshit jobs to begin with. Does it matter if this work gets done? Nah, the real money is made when the ownership class goes to the market and puts everything on black

3 Oct 2023 at 21:21 | Open on tech.lgbt
James Brooke

@mhoye What a shock! Corporate elites operating from short-term, narrow self interest. Sympathy is after all, a form of suicide to the typical CEO.

3 Oct 2023 at 22:47 | Open on mastodon.social
Pēteris Krišjānis

@mhoye unions. This is why they are needed.

3 Oct 2023 at 23:50 | Open on toot.lv
Schroedinger

@mhoye I would agree (I have been made redundant a few times - it sucks).

And when it becomes difficult, when times are testing, having loyal staff, who know that they will be protected by the company, is what will make the difference.

It convinces me more and more that those in charge of most of the larger companies are fundamentally incompetent at running a business.

4 Oct 2023 at 10:34 | Open on metalhead.club
Spatula

@mhoye

>

>

>

Major wall st fund managers and stock holders started putting together a plan to put pressure on the wage and RSU growth. There were multiple leaks on Reddit (which is where I got the early wind of these planned industry wide layoffs) where hedge fund employees and staff were talking about dumping as high as 300-500K tech employees over year to put serious pressure on wage growth.

Is it just me, or does it seem like the coordinated laying off of people to manipulate the job market and people's wages should be a thing that isn't legal?

@mhoye

>

>

>

Major wall st fund managers and stock holders started putting together a plan to put pressure on the wage and RSU growth. There were multiple leaks on Reddit (which is where I got the early wind of these planned industry wide layoffs) where hedge fund employees and staff were talking about dumping as high as 300-500K tech employees over year to put serious pressure on wage growth.

4 Oct 2023 at 23:04 | Open on tech.lgbt
TProphet

@mhoye I wouldn't be surprised if the guy who wrote this up was a low level AV tech, with better insight than the collective brainpower of some of the world's most successful tech executives.

5 Oct 2023 at 1:16 | Open on defcon.social
Metafrastis

@mhoye Everyone but Apple, that is. Not enough mismanagement to cover up there?

5 Oct 2023 at 12:11 | Open on mastodon.online
mhoye

@dgavin Apple didn't over-commit themselves to a magical future of endless growth at the start of the pandemic.

5 Oct 2023 at 12:41 | Open on mastodon.social
Khleedril
Metafrastis

@khleedril @mhoye No, they didn‘t. But they also didn‘t grow unreasonably during the early COVID phase.

7 February at 18:55 | Open on mastodon.online
Bee O'Problem

@khleedril @mhoye @dgavin they seemed to turn up their noses at both blockchain and metaverse at least. Their take on AI is to leverage it to sell more iPhones as well instead of trying to make customer support worse.

So far Apple seems to be staying Apple, for better or worse.

8 February at 2:44 | Open on mastodon.gamedev.place
Metafrastis

@beeoproblem @khleedril @mhoye Apple never uses technology for technology’s sake. If it doesn‘t serve a purpose for the user and improve an aspect of our digital lives, they wait. If it can‘t be implemented in a way that respects users privacy they wait.

8 February at 8:23 | Open on mastodon.online
Maddler the Badger
PR ☮ ♥ ♬ 🧑‍💻

@mhoye “Major wall st fund managers and stock holders started putting together a plan to put pressure on the wage and RSU growth.”

TCI via Christopher Hohn. When I read this on FT in Nov. ‘22 at the time ChatGTP was released it to me, was the trigger point for mass layoffs.

“ Fund Management, the activist hedge fund helmed by U.K. billionaire , touted a massive stake in parent on Tuesday as he called on the company to cut costs by reducing its head count and paying workers less, becoming the latest high-profile investor slamming the formerly high-flying tech sector amid broader market weakness.”

<forbes.com/sites/jonathanponci>

@mhoye “Major wall st fund managers and stock holders started putting together a plan to put pressure on the wage and RSU growth.”

TCI via Christopher Hohn. When I read this on FT in Nov. ‘22 at the time ChatGTP was released it to me, was the trigger point for mass layoffs.

“ Fund Management, the activist hedge fund helmed by U.K. billionaire , touted a massive stake in parent on Tuesday as he called on the company to cut costs by reducing its head count and...

7 February at 11:43 | Open on ioc.exchange
FR4NÇ01S 🖍️

@mhoye
How this isn’t outlawed yet???

Can’t a general attorney act on this, to preserve general interest, common good and public rights???

If you still needed a proof that that particular country is an undemocratic oligarchy, there you go…

7 February at 13:50 | Open on piaille.fr
mhoye

@furansowa The short answer is that it's not collusion if you're rich enough.

7 February at 13:54 | Open on mastodon.social
FR4NÇ01S 🖍️

@mhoye
So yes, the justice system does make differences.
That is the definition of partiality.
The rot is at its core then.

The notion isn’t difficult to get though.
La Fontaine, 17c., was already denouncing it : “Depending on whether you are powerful or miserable, court judgments will make you white or black.”

And +400 years later, the rich still can get away with such felony and perfidy…

@mhoye
So yes, the justice system does make differences.
That is the definition of partiality.
The rot is at its core then.

The notion isn’t difficult to get though.
La Fontaine, 17c., was already denouncing it : “Depending on whether you are powerful or miserable, court judgments will make you white or black.”

7 February at 14:05 | Open on piaille.fr
Holir_

@mhoye you mean to tell me having the same 100 people on a bunch of the boards with 2 major financial firms ( Black Rock Vanguard) connected the majority of our economy is bad for regular people?

7 February at 14:53 | Open on infosec.exchange
Jordan (Damn Good Tech) 4hire

@mhoye I'm always surprised whenever people talk about layoffs and forget to mention the Great Recession we've been under for the past 16 years.

Companies are hurting so they resort to fake hiring in order to pretend that they're growing. This ends up leading to layoffs.

What we need to do is think outside the box to get us out of this economic recession. It's not going to take votes. Dems & Reps are blinding the American people. It's going to take bold decisions on business leaders' parts.

7 February at 16:13 | Open on mastodon.social
mhoye

Since this post is making the rounds again I want to re-up this part:
7 February at 18:17 | Open on mastodon.social
Perish the thot :sparkles_bi:
A Reptile Dysfunction :verified_dragon:

@mhoye wow its almost like tech workers should unionize or something.

7 February at 21:26 | Open on tech.lgbt
Wendell Bell

@mhoye @aral FWIW, my experience in a VERY legacy industry is that, in plush times, some execs empire-build, think because they have 700 reports, they are Big Men or Women. Then, come more constrained times, call in McKinsey. ZIRP in the Valley does not seem materially different.

7 February at 21:51 | Open on mas.to
Paul Bone

@mhoye <It always has been astronaut meme>.

I feel like layoffs has never not been about poor management. I guess the new part is the coordinated part.

7 February at 22:28 | Open on fosstodon.org
mhoye

@pbone I don’t think that’s new either.

7 February at 22:33 | Open on mastodon.social
johne

@mhoye think of the money companies could save if CEO's are replaced with AI.

7 February at 23:40 | Open on denvr.social
bluestarultor

@mhoye I'm pretty sure any coordination over an industry counts as cartel behavior. Last I checked, that was hella illegal.

Edit: Which is to say I feel there should be grounds for repercussions here.

8 February at 1:07 | Open on tech.lgbt
SaftyKuma

@bluestarultor @mhoye

The major companies involved (MS, Google, Amazon, Meta) should very obviously all be broken up. This was true WELL before the pandemic started.

Having this little real competition is very, very bad.

8 February at 1:33 | Open on mastodon.social
mhoye

@bluestarultor ... but you haven't checked. Not really. You've heard things and made assumptions about what the law means, but you haven't checked. You've just heard things and assumed things.

8 February at 2:43 | Open on mastodon.social
bluestarultor

@mhoye Oookay, let me rephrase that: this should be illegal even if it isn't, and if it is, I hope there are repercussions. Any such case should ideally be swift with at least one of them already under government investigation.

It's not my job to be a legal expert and so I'll leave the rest to them.

8 February at 2:49 | Open on tech.lgbt
Wayne Werner

@mhoye This is my shocked face: 😶

8 February at 2:29 | Open on fosstodon.org
Hugo Estrada
DougN :coffeev:​ 😷 :CApride:

@mhoye “When a few firms fire staff, others will probably follow suit. Most problematic, it’s a behavior that kills people: For example, research has shown that layoffs can increase the odds of suicide by two times or more.”

8 February at 21:48 | Open on mstdn.ca
Eternal, Majesty

@mhoye my company's exec said this at yesterday's all-hands: "We made the company a little smaller last fall. We're beginning to grow again to fill that void."

9 February at 2:39 | Open on toot.cat
For I am CJ :screwattack: :black_sparkling_heart: :screwattack:

if you (like me) weren't following this before now, blog post is a bit convoluted/ poorly articulated, but TL;DR:

"Those same at work forces" that forced people back into office (despite worker productivity & morale being at all time highs) so they could prop up the commercial real estate portfolios of the ultra wealthy...

Also engineered mass layoffs, to suppress wages & "get a jump on" firing people that they want to replace with AI

teamblind.com/post/How-we-got-

mastodon.social/@mhoye/1111710

if you (like me) weren't following this before now, blog post is a bit convoluted/ poorly articulated, but TL;DR:

"Those same at work forces" that forced people back into office (despite worker productivity & morale being at all time highs) so they could prop up the commercial real estate portfolios of the ultra wealthy...

10 February at 0:31 | Open on infosec.exchange
For I am CJ :screwattack: :black_sparkling_heart: :screwattack:

To be clear.. (at a minimum) Microsoft, Google, Facebook, & Apple... fired people "well in advance" because they anticipate that AI will be able to replace workers 'in the future'... and they are currently lying about their actions by selling or otherwise promoting AI as "being an assistant to help people do their jobs better" a.k.a. publicly stating that 'AI won't replace people')

10 February at 0:35 | Open on infosec.exchange
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