[misterbwong]

OP's link should really include the full title:

Ikea’s boss solved the Swedish retailer’s global ‘unhappy worker’ crisis by raising salaries, introducing flexible working and subsidizing childcare

Cutting it off there just makes it seem like ikea thinks "more money = happy workers" when in reality it is more nuanced than that.

[dredmorbius]

HN has an 80 character title max length. The full original title is 157 characters, nearly double that.

The alternatives generally suggested are to shorten the original title, omitting needless descriptives or words (e.g., counts, emotives, etc.) if possible, or barring that, to substitute alternative text, preferably from a subtitle or passage from the article (both to avoid editorialising):

dang comment: <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9908533>

Guidelines: <https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html> ("In Submissions", title guidance.)

Something's got to give, though, and the submitted title is accurate so far as it goes.

If HN's readers can't be trusted to read even the title of an article, well, the whole premise of a an article-based discussion site seems somewhat imperiled. This may well be the case, of course ...

[notpushkin]

This one is 75 characters:

> IKEA solved ‘unhappy worker’ crisis by raising salaries, flexible schedules

It's not really grammatically correct I think, but otherwise seems like a good compromise: we only leave out childcare subsidies, which is another monetary compensation, and do mention flexible work schedules which is a non-monetary benefit and might be crucial to IKEA's strategy.

[nonrandomstring]

> Ikea’s boss solved the Swedish retailer’s global ‘unhappy worker’ crisis by raising salaries, introducing flexible working and subsidizing childcare

Kid aid plus dosh foils toil says Swede sofa shop boss

surely there's a command line tool for abstract2dailymail

[ranguna]

Salary raise, childcare, flexible hours fixes 'unhappy worker' crisis says IKEA

78 characters

[jp57]

Subsidizing childcare is also "more money", but only for some workers. If the others don't notice or don't care that they're getting paid less for the same work that's great for the company.

I am in favor of flexible work arrangements, and I have no idea if those have costs to the company, or how much more you'd need to pay the workers to accept the less flexible arrangements.

[CalRobert]

It's weird, in some ways, that we offer benefits. Give people the money and let them use it how they like. When I lived in California I LOVED the parking cash-out law, it meant a few thousand more a year because I rode a bike to work and didn't need a parking spot.

Although, one challenge with things like childcare is that if you applied this on a society-wide level you wind up with childless people having more money, thereby being better able to outbid parents for essentials like housing (this is why a housing scarcity is so insidious). Of course, whether that's a bad thing or not depends on perspective. I have two kids myself and despite living in Europe childcare was so expensive we dropped to one income.

[malfist]

Look, I'm a DINK, don't have kids, never plan to have kids, don't even like kids. But child care is important to both the parents and society. Not subsidizing child care often means one parent has to leave the workforce, and that's almost always worse off for everyone than if they were able to afford child care and can contribute

[grecy]

For the people that want the childcare, it’s better than more money, because it’s tax free

[coldtea]

>Subsidizing childcare is also "more money", but only for some workers. If the others don't notice or don't care that they're getting paid less for the same work that's great for the company.

Such an american thing to say.

No, we don't mind having the company pay colleagues' children childcare on top of our (equal to theirs) salary. We'd hate to be in a society where such a petty mindset would be common, that would be living in some kind of social hell.

[amtamt]

Considered "valued" vs considered "useful" is probably the analogy that should be used here. Subsidizing childcare signals "we value you", while flat increae is signaling "you are useful to us", which can make a lot of impact on moral.

[bcrosby95]

If the childcare is on site, then it's not just money, but also time. When a place I worked at had on site child care it saved me 30 minutes per day.

[akira2501]

> when in reality it is more nuanced than that.

More money = happy workers, unless of course, you don't give them money, but also other economic benefits that are equivalent to money. I'm not seeing the nuance.

[idiliv]

How are flexible working hours equivalent to more money?