[cloutchaser]

Second hand information: Apple on average takes 2 years to fill an empty position. They almost never lay anyone off, just find another role for someone.

It's where the evil corporation narrative falls down, apple makes sure they hire the right people and then keep them. It's the way it should be.

But even for other tech companies, people on HN need to look outside of tech and see what life is like, there are people on here who literally had the best possible jobs in the entire history of humanity, with prepaid 3 meals a day, free daycare, free gym, free everything, yet somehow think that these companies were evil exploitative capitalists.

I'm sorry - no. These were the best employers in the world. Now there's a serious downturn in the economy, they are firing like 5-10% of staff. That's nothing. Try being a factory worker at a Tyson food factory in the midwest, or a foxconn factory in china, then you'll understood how good these tech companies treat their employees.

[jonathankoren]

I’m sorry, but this is just class war crap. Instead of pitting workers against each other like the plutocrats want, always ALWAYS remember that even with all that non-monetary compensation, the executives are still taking more 100x of the value created by the worker.

This is like complaining about some athlete getting paid millions to risk their health for entertainment, while not once giving a thought about the billionaire that pays them.

No one is buying a ticket to watch Jerry Jones sit up in a skybox. Similarly, no one buys a piece of software or a chicken breast because of some exec cruising away on inertia.

[ryandrake]

Bingo. Billionaires win when they convince thousandaires that millionaires are the real problem.

[toyg]

The fact that they coddle some of their workers (typically a very small minority), doesn't mean they are not exploitative capitalist enterprises. The two are different concepts.