It means they found the median, put it a bit lower. Then said “good enough”
this post was submitted on 19 Sep 2026
460 points (99.6% liked)
Political Memes
12534 readers
2482 users here now
Welcome to politcal memes!
These are our rules:
1) Be civil
Jokes are okay, but don’t intentionally harass or disturb any member of our community. Sexism, racism and bigotry are not allowed. Good faith argumentation only. No posts discouraging people to vote or shaming people for voting.
2) No misinformation
Don’t post any intentional misinformation. When asked by mods, provide sources for any claims you make.
3) Posts should be memes
Random pictures do not qualify as memes. Relevance to politics is required.
4) No bots, spam or self-promotion
Follow instance rules, ask for your bot to be allowed on this community.
5) No AI generated content.
Content posted must not be created by AI with the intent to mimic the style of existing images
founded 3 years ago
MODERATORS
it means they offer a salary that low that it makes you far more competitive than other workers for the same job. And so it mean you are "invited" to put your employer's interest before yours... especially on your wage and your efforts.
Some leftists would say you are exploited and abused... be carefull to do not lisen to them: the employer doesn't know how to challenge their arguments...
It means "we don't want to say it in public in case over of our existing wage slaves sees it and realizes they're being fucked over."
Remember, it's not illegal to discuss pay with your coworkers, no matter how much HR and your boss say you shouldn't do it.
Means they compete with the other businesses for how little they can pay you and still get you to show up for work.
It's supposed to mean the salary can outcompete what's offered elsewhere for similar positions.
But I mean they're only saying this if they're not telling you the salary and if they're not telling you then you know it's not gonna be competitive with others. If it was they would put it out there to attract more applicants.
it's like when a credit issuing company says they have 'comparable rates'. really? you have rates that can be compared to other rates? crazy...
24.99% apr interest is certainly 'comparable' to 0.99%..
it doesn't compare well, but one can still do the comparison.
Actually, I know this isn't what you're referring to but a key strategy amongst lenders is to obfuscate their rates with bullshit fees.
In Australia they have to publish a "comparison" rate that includes all ascertainable fees.
We have a similar regulation in Denmark, where lenders must write the annual cost percentage including all fees. There's also a maximum legal limit to the percentage and an even lower limit for which loans are allowed to be marketed.
Since it's a percentage, it mainly affects loans of small amounts, where the fees would be a larger percentage of the total cost. The purpose is to get rid of the predatory "consumption" loans.
I wish we could do the same to restaurant bills, where the advertised price only shows the price of the main meal to compete/compare with other restaurants, while the total including drinks might be double or more.
"Save up to 20% or more!"
And here comes Salary from the back with a second wind but Bills shows no sign of slowing down. They're toe to toe but what's that? Bills suddenly pulls ahead as if the previous part was just their warm-up. Bills are unstoppable! This certainly won't help the rumors about inflation enhancing injections.
There is a solution to this, but it's about as popular as dropping a fat log in the middle Sunday mass: a Maximum wage. Would shut down price gouging and wage disparity right quick though. That level could be set rather high and still work BTW, so don't dismiss it off hand.
And what's this?! It's "Capitalism" out of nowhere! "Who could have seen it" close on their tail, followed by "Satire is dead," and "Consequences Be Damned" trailing!
If they publically stated the competitive salary, it would be competing. Can't have that. /s
It's better when they write "salary according to union agreement", but not much, because it means they'll pay the absolute minimum of that agreement without room for negotiation.
I think it's better to have a negotiation, but they could still advertise the span which they had planned on budgeting with. "expected salary between x and y depending on qualifications"
Unfortunately, when they do write an amount, it often attracts unqualified applicants who think they can fake it till they make it, which is a a waste of everyone's time, especially if they do get the job.
It's always better to have a union
Absolutely.
My union contract doesn't specify a minimum wage, so they are forced to have the negotiation anyway.
As a union representative I often get questions like why the union doesn't raise the wage or require a minimum wage. (Mostly from non members). It just doesn't work like that in this line of work. The union contract gives them the right for negotiation, not a minimum figure, because we don't want to get the fucking minimum. We gave them the right to ask for more. Use it. If they don't know how to, I suggest they join the union and learn how to do it.
Unfortunately my work is too atomized to really organize (remote company/management, all workers operate independently at different job sites). Definitely want to move to a job that has or can be unionized.
I've heard from friends that a lot of older unions are setup in such a way that make negotiating and even making amendments within the union incredibly difficult, limiting their power against corporate.
I've heard Secrets of a Successful Organizer is a great book on the subject I've been meaning to read
I know that trouble only too well.
Office jobs are difficult because workers don't really share the floor the same way that people in shops or logistics etc.. Office workers don't really give a shit about what happens on the other side of their closed office door, and "other departments" are generally considered to be obstacles rather than co-workers. It's difficult to be unionize. It needs an ambassador who can cross all the closed doors and preferably also management.
In my case that's me, because I work in a role that requires me to get in touch with everyone across the organization in my daily job. I never actually ran for the post. It was more like looking around the table and choosing who could do that.
The union was very helpful in guiding us through the process, and the courses on organizing is time well spent.
However I do also know of the troubles internally in unions. Our union is a democracy, but it has more hierarchical layers than that of the government of the country. It's based on both location, sectors and what not. Plenty of old geezers keep claiming a chair on some board because they know damn well that they won't get hired anywhere else afterwards, and don't dare do anything but status quo.
I voluntarily joined the local board to get this cleared out. Small steps at a time, because it is a democracy, but we are slowly getting closer to making the democracy more direct. I might even lose my own seat because of it, but that's fine with me. I just want it done.
Unions are facing a hard generational change, because there seems to missing a lot of people in between the old and the young to make a smoother transition. Again I'm sort of in the middle, being gen-x, and I'm always voting for the younger ones.
I can only encourage young people to participate and change the unions from within to reflect the young members better if they don't think the union is doing good enough. In a lot of ways it's more efficient than trying to make a political party change how they vote on a law.
From a selfish point of view, it's been very interesting. I've learned many things and been able to influence actual changes for many people.
Interestingly, this does not seem to be a problem for people with a BS, ER, I mean BA in business.
Well it's still a problem for everyone around them.
It means minimum wage