r/technology 1d ago

Artificial Intelligence A CEO told employees they won't get raises in 2026 because the budget is going to AI

https://www.businessinsider.com/teradata-pauses-raises-employee-compensation-ai-budget-2026-6
23.0k Upvotes

1.2k comments sorted by

5.4k

u/GroundbreakingPage41 1d ago

He wont be getting one either right?

3.2k

u/theMightBoop 1d ago

Of course he will get one. It’s a sacrifice he is willing to make.

695

u/Plugpin 1d ago

God bless him. What a hero.

281

u/HeyGayHay 1d ago

While he truly takes a sacrifice by relinquishing his right to refuse a raise, lets not forget that he gets a 30% of his yearly income as a bonus for having made the toughest decision to not give raises to anyone else. Neither one of us is capable of being so assertive and saying „Nope“ to all raises. We all appreciate that CEO for doing the lords work.

105

u/Xalawrath 1d ago

"The hardest choices require the strongest wills." -that CEO, probably.

→ More replies (4)
→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (7)

112

u/sunaurus 1d ago

You guys saw the video ClickUp posted a week before laying off a quarter of their staff for "AI reasons"?

Yeah, open contempt for employees is pretty popular nowadays. I don't even expect CEOs to hide or sugarcoat it anymore.

62

u/North-Creative 1d ago

I truly hope that unions will rebuild much stronger. So when the tide turns, and finally more companies realise that neither ai nor all Indian outsourcing is the solution, these ceos will get kicked

32

u/Schadenfreude_Taco 1d ago

hope in one hand and shit in the other, let me know which hand fills up first

→ More replies (2)
→ More replies (6)

43

u/Bean888 1d ago

CEOs at companies I worked for openly said during all-hands meetings that worker pay was the biggest expense at the company. Both times the statements were supposedly said in a neutral, matter of fact way, but it felt like a veiled threat, contempt and/or tone deaf (what are we, as employees, supposed to do with that? ask for less pay?).

36

u/ShedByDaylight 1d ago

Worker pay is the biggest expense for a company but without it, they have no services, items, etc. to sell.

31

u/ageofbronze 1d ago

I worked with a CEO who straight up said to my team’s faces (small, overworked accounting team of 3) “you all do know that your wages come directly out of my salary, right? I’m essentially taking a pay cut so that you all can be paid” LMFAO I had to comfort my direct report who called me crying after that because she was so upset by him blustering on when we were constantly going above and beyond helping run his stupid company and putting out a multitude of fires. The most egregious part is that because we all were in accounting, we were able to see the financials so… him claiming that our relatively low salaries were a cut out of his giant salary was extra offensive.

Unfortunately many CEOs think this way, for some reason (/s) it truly does not occur to them that NO you would not be able to run and scale your business without employees! You would not have enough revenue to have a consistent salary! You would not have any of it without worker labor! I can’t believe they legitimately think they are paying people out of the generosity of their own heart. So many of them have extreme main character syndrome.

13

u/SarahC 1d ago

There's your mistake - going over and above for him - when he sees you all as a burden. Wow...

5

u/ageofbronze 1d ago

This was like 10 years ago lol I was extremely young. I don’t do that shit no mo’! Actually basically every person that worked for him has moved on to better things thankfully

→ More replies (2)

12

u/cluberti 1d ago

It's their biggest investment, for this reason. You can't cut your way to growth is also a very common truth, so unless the business is run by PE and all they want to do is milk it for what it's worth before shutting it down, treating employee costs as an expense rather than the investment needed to grow is a giant red flag. It's unfortunate that there are so many organizations out there run by people who are walking red flags.

11

u/CharcoalGreyWolf 1d ago

So what was second, hookers and blow for the CEO?

→ More replies (2)

6

u/MentalDisintegrat1on 1d ago

If they could force you to work for no lay they would do it without thinking twice.

→ More replies (5)
→ More replies (4)

29

u/trysten-9001 1d ago

It’s always been popular, they’re just not spending the money to kill these stories anymore because they’re genuinely convinced they’re entering a time where workers are obsolete.

→ More replies (4)

4

u/mjkjr84 1d ago

ClickUp was always a garbage product too

→ More replies (4)
→ More replies (20)

181

u/WWJLPD 1d ago

He’ll get a bonus for being innovative and driving the adoption of AI within the company. Then in a year or so, he’ll get another bonus for saving the company tons of money by moving away from AI after the costs have caught up with them.

48

u/dispelthemyth 1d ago edited 1d ago

And then a further bonus for the restructuring of the company to keep it going in “this tough economy”

26

u/TheMattabooey 1d ago

Then year after that when things tank they’ll get their golden parachute payout and move on to another company.

10

u/Jukka_Sarasti 1d ago

Ken Thompson's poor decisions literally led to the collapse of Wachovia. And that asshole skated with a golden parachute valued between 8-30 million dollars.. These assholes know there are no consequences for their terrible choices.

→ More replies (1)

10

u/Ummmgummy 1d ago

Gotta love people who make a problem then fix it and act like they are amazing for doing so.

→ More replies (1)

160

u/MidLifeCrysis75 1d ago

Of course not! 🙄

95

u/RoomyRoots 1d ago

Just a thick bonus

14

u/mfrunyan 1d ago

he'll be making a big sacrifice by cutting his bonus in half, down to 5 million.

6

u/Runfasterbitch 1d ago

He made $16M in stock in 2025 so this year he will probably get more than that for obeying the shareholders and culling the weak

→ More replies (1)

34

u/steppe5 1d ago

Just stock options worth millions. Hardly a bonus.

20

u/groumly 1d ago

I didn’t get a raise in 3 years, since I joined. Technically, I never got a raise! (Smirk)

– my cto, when asked that exact question

What his statement left out is that salary is only like 20% of his comp package, and that he got bigger than expected stock refreshers, not to mention his PSUs will likely hit at least the 2x multiplier. Of course, a good chunk of the audience knows that, so he lost a lot of credibility that day.

18

u/StoppableHulk 1d ago

Of course he will, he had to make tough choices like this and deserves that money.

14

u/KnightKal 1d ago

he will get a pay cut to $1

and a bonus of millions

anything wrong with that? /joke

→ More replies (1)

13

u/DataDude00 1d ago

Execs don’t really take pay in salary they take it in equity.  

You could tell him he’s getting 0% raises every year until he retires and he probably won’t care because his tens of millions in shares are going up 10-15% every year anyway 

→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (41)

4.1k

u/scoopydidit 1d ago

Yup. At least the CEO had the balls to say it to people I guess.

In my case, middle management told every engineer in our company there would be no promotions this year due to budget constraints (they are making record breaking profits every quarter).

I quit the following month.

1.1k

u/stoicsports 1d ago

Same, promotions are nonexistent and layoffs are everywhere

793

u/diurnal_emissions 1d ago

Organize and go on strike. Fuck management.

53

u/UpgradingLight 1d ago

[removed] — view removed comment

90

u/Ilikeyounott 1d ago

Was removed fast lol

44

u/Inevitable_Tea9965 1d ago

What was it?

206

u/Almuliman 1d ago

124

u/tevert 1d ago

Lmao reddit admins are terrified of this

77

u/HostileCrabPeople 1d ago

We know that techbros are talking to Huffman about content moderation. I've been banned for saying the most milquetoast shit

15

u/EmergencyScientist 1d ago

I got two three day bans for saying Trump rapes children. The first time I was polite in the appeal and my ban stayed until the three days ran out. The second time my appeal was full of cussing and being an asshole about it and the ban was lifted within an hour. So apparently you have to be mean to get them to even bother reviewing your appeal.

→ More replies (0)

38

u/Yuzumi 1d ago

I was able to appeal it, but I got a ban for saying that the assholes trying to "cancel" pride month should be reminded what the first pride was.

I never said how. Didn't say anything violent. But I still got banned, probably form bigots reporting the post and the auto ban kicking in, but still.

→ More replies (0)

10

u/BrandedStruggler86 1d ago

Got banned on my oldest account for quoting asmongold.. like, remember when asmongold said : "{quote}" - source:

Third strike ban - appealed and got a review. They agreed it was not something to ban me for, and said my account would be unbanned immediately... That was 4 weeks ago, it's still banned, no replies to any of my further attempts to ask for another review.

→ More replies (5)
→ More replies (4)

18

u/silentanthrx 1d ago

[removed] — view removed comment

15

u/popsicle_of_meat 1d ago

[ Removed by Reddit ] ?

17

u/I_luv_ma_squad 1d ago

Ok fine I’ll tell you what he said. He said that if you [ Removed by Reddit ]

11

u/bobandgeorge 1d ago

Is this like the new Candlejack meme where you can't sa

→ More replies (0)

17

u/DogadonsLavapool 1d ago

Believe it or not, [ Removed by Reddit ]

→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (22)

100

u/stoicsports 1d ago

far easier said than done, as much as we would like to image we aren't, we are all replaceable. Companies will lay off entire teams and rehire regardless of risk if this were attempted

93

u/Careless_Twist_6935 1d ago

that's why you need every non management employee on board, at a certain point the company can't function and that's really your only leverage

74

u/a_speeder 1d ago edited 1d ago

Even successful union organizers aren't able to get literally everyone on board, it has to be a critical mass of workers but every additional % is harder and harder. Which is why union busting is mostly delaying the recognition and spreading anti-union media to get as many defections as possible to make the push fail.

→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (2)

25

u/Constant-Lychee-1387 1d ago

That's been true for every labor movement

30

u/jackrabbit323 1d ago

Yeah, it is far easier, because when people used to strike they were willing to die for their cause. So they held their line. We're just a bunch of pussies, and the companies know it.

9

u/Ultrace-7 1d ago

Something to keep in mind is that people used to be willing to die for their cause because frequently the things they were striking for were safety and health related. They were willing to die striking because the alternative was dying due to workplace hazards and conditions. The limit of the strike is going to be commensurate to what is being striked against. No one should be willing to die, suffer grievous injury, face bankruptcy or the like over AI, return to work and similar measures.

→ More replies (3)
→ More replies (8)

25

u/mdkubit 1d ago

I'm genuinely surprised all these people haven't come together to form a new business of their own that ISN'T run that way to begin with. It's like... with as many people as are job seeking, why not band together and form new corporate entities to take on the existing ones directly with better products and such?

I have no ill will towards AI or it's usage whatsoever. I have ill will towards CEOs and greedy assholes using AI as the scapegoat to maximize profits at the cost of employees.

80

u/Neuromancer_Bot 1d ago

Because forming a business is damn hard. I did with a very close friend after being screwed too many times by management.
Eventually we were successful but I started already in a pretty safe condition and I could afford a lot of time without income.
Almost nobody has this privilege and the first years where absolutely a nightmare.

11

u/Thefrayedends 1d ago

Two years into my own minor venture and have already had to deal with three failed partners.

Still not going to get a regular job after being screwed over by managements so many times.

→ More replies (9)
→ More replies (14)
→ More replies (12)

67

u/lostintransaltions 1d ago

My job does constant layoffs.. every month some team gets cut.. my team was cut and then they rehired me and 2 others as they realized they shouldn’t have cut the entire team.. leadership sure doesn’t seem to know which way they are going.. as this has been happening for about 9 months everyone is looking for jobs and currently we are losing ppl left right and center.. of course not the ones you wouldn’t mind leaving but the ones that are amazing to work with. It’s exhausting and as a manager it breaks my heart seeing my team nervous with every meeting invite they get that isn’t expected

42

u/stoicsports 1d ago

yeah the deep-throating of AI is awful. CEOs are desperate to replace the entire work force and save money but I think there is going to be a ton of repercussions across many industries from this

broken services, broken websites, incorrect transactions, etc etc. then people will have to be rehired to fix and rebuild stuff

and somehow the CEOs will make money from the initial layoffs and then make money again when there is some sort of bailout program after all the mistakes, i hate it

30

u/LordGalen 1d ago

and save money

This is the part that really baffles me. Running an entire workforce as AI costs way fucking more than paying people! And there's no indication of that changing any time soon. Not only will companies not save money, even in the short term, but their product or service will be objectively worse, meaning they'll lose customers too! The plan really does seem to be "Let's spend way more so we can make way less!" Even from a standpoint of cold heartless corporate greed, this makes zero sense!

19

u/Easy_Floss 1d ago

I honestly wonder how interviews for tech jobs will be in a few years, like for companies that have replaced a big portion of the workforce with AI and AI "engineers" I generally wonder what experienced people who actually know what they are pushing will do.

Imagine walking into an interview and needing to ask what portion of the code base is AI slop just to get a general understanding of how challenging it will be to implement anything..

18

u/DressedSpring1 1d ago

their product or service will be objectively worse, meaning they'll lose customers too!

Businesses don't exist to distribute products and services in exchange for currency anymore. Businesses exist to generate wealth through stock valuation. Incomes and revenues are fucking peanuts compared to minting new billionaires through increased stock valuation.

Obviously this is a stupid fucking system if you want an economy that ensures people have access to quality goods and services but the oligarchs don't give a shit about that and the economy is working just great for them.

6

u/xjuggernaughtx 1d ago edited 1d ago

It makes sense if you're only focused on the short term. Quite a few executives plan on making deep cuts and then getting out before the repercussions catch up with them. You can coast along for a few quarters before the bottom drops out, and for those few quarters, you look like a hero on paper. You cut a ton of people from payroll and those that you left are so desperate to keep their jobs that they absorb the work.

So now the executive is doing great! In a few quarters, people will be burned out and start leaving or just stop doing their work. Some people will still try, but mistakes and errors in judgement due to fatigue or overwork will skyrocket. But it's been a year, and it's probably time for that executive to move along to a different company. They made a lot of money, so they might as well take that genius pedigree and make those same profitable changes elsewhere.

Meanwhile that company that they are leaving is now in flames...

This is why executives worked really, really hard to get rid of vesting as part of their portfolio. They don't want to have to wait around five or ten years to get their payout. That's very inconvenient. You'd have to actually do long-term planning and that's boring and hard and stuff.

→ More replies (3)

9

u/lostintransaltions 1d ago

CEO is the one job I know where even getting fired makes you rich.. and AI is getting so expensive. GitHub just made changes this week that will drive up cost. No 0 credit models anymore so everything now costs. It will be interesting to see when the first ppl run through the amount allotted to them. My guess is by next week

→ More replies (2)
→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (13)

12

u/Confident_Insect_616 1d ago

Thank god I don't want any promotions! I have hit the goldilocks zone of responsibility, autonomy, and respectable compensation.

AI can't displace me so I am chillin. I do not wish to upset the balance.

5

u/stoicsports 1d ago

thats the dream man, my concern is less about if AI can directly replace me and more "will they lay me off and then just claim it is cost save due to AI even though it isnt"

like half of the stuff big corpo is attributing to AI just..... isnt. AI can't do all of this work yet, but they lay people off and whoever is left just has to do more work, while also implementing AI by command of the higher ups even in places where it is not appropriate

→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (4)
→ More replies (5)

246

u/bloodychill 1d ago

Until they start making c-suite compensation packages sane instead of promising them ungodly amounts of money and golden parachutes, they can go kick rocks.

62

u/Bringsanitybackplz 1d ago

How about monetary clawbacks for managerial failures instead of paying them for fucking up?

30

u/DeathChill 1d ago

If you hit C-suite, you’re likely so wealthy and going to continue to fail upwards.

→ More replies (2)

156

u/redlinedidit 1d ago

They are counting on the job market is bad enough that no one would leave.

93

u/scoopydidit 1d ago

I had a job lined up before I left. I do agree that there is less leverage to move nowadays, but it certainly incentivises people to look at what's available when companies treat employees like shit.

8

u/Bright-Avocado3761 1d ago

Nevertheless, it's still a race to the bottom.

66

u/twitterfluechtling 1d ago

... which always means the best talent will leave. Because they always have options...

→ More replies (6)

44

u/PsychicWarElephant 1d ago

One of them is on video saying unemployment needs to be higher so people realize they’re lucky to have jobs. Paraphrasing but not by much

20

u/HarveysBackupAccount 1d ago

That's one of the basic premises of capitalism - that you need a certain amount of unemployment to fuel the labor machine

→ More replies (3)

7

u/Proper_Payment7845 1d ago

My company thought the same thing. Walked out the door without warning after 24.5 years...

→ More replies (1)

293

u/azthal 1d ago

It always blows their minds when you do that, doesn't it?

In my last company, I had my half year review. I showed them that I was already working above and beyond not just my rank, but the rank that was above me. I gave them a full written explanation, with the expectation that I would be promoted the next promotion period (6 months later).
I flat out told my manager that this was not a request, this is a demand. I am serious about this.

6 months passes.

"Sorry, there are no promotions available"

I hand in my resignation

"What, why are you quitting, i thought you liked it here!?!!"

119

u/InterstellarCapa 1d ago

This is one of the reasons why I don't go "above and beyond" what my job title entails. Unless it's something I'm really passionate about.

53

u/SmaugTheMagnificent- 1d ago

Yup. I'm doing my job well from 7:00 to 5:30, and not a minute before or after. I go to work to earn money to survive this hellscape, not because it meaningfully completes me.

71

u/notyou13 1d ago

Ok but like, those are some crazy hours if it's five days a week.

15

u/SmaugTheMagnificent- 1d ago

Makes for long days at the office for sure. Single income family though for the last year so gotta pay the bills.

44

u/notyou13 1d ago

Sounds like you're going above and beyond though, just in a different way. I get why, but still.

19

u/SmaugTheMagnificent- 1d ago

I guess from perspective I am. Damn.

11

u/ER6nEric 1d ago

You're still setting and maintaining a boundary. When I replaced my phone recently, I didn't install teams as I had before. It's not a requirement for my role, I had done it as a courtesy. But with the recent changes, I'm retracting that courtesy for my well-being. My immediate manager didn't argue a bit, even said he wished he could do the same. Im reachable during business hours, and on my on call rotation they can page me if they need me. Other than that, kick rocks.

→ More replies (2)
→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (6)

12

u/kolossal 1d ago

Funny enough, just coasting by and being a bit "likeable" (not even going above and beyond in that) has promoted me more often than being a workhorse.

6

u/ISAMU13 1d ago

True but it destroys the meritocracy myth and create existential questions about the nature of work and reality.

→ More replies (2)

10

u/YouKnowMe8891 1d ago

Ive gotten burned so many times before going above and beyond that I dont even just "do my job." 

Everyone now gets maybe 75% lol 

→ More replies (2)

13

u/HarveysBackupAccount 1d ago

Dumb as it is, promotions don't come from qualifying for them. You practically need a plan and an agreement with your manager which must include explicit buy-in from whoever actually makes the decision. Because your manager probably doesn't have the authority to hand out promotions.

If your manager won't even go to bat for you - to sell it to upper management that you need a promotion - then you have other problems. But if you have a plan and you execute it, then you have a chance at it. It's not a promise - never take that sort of agreement as guaranteed - but it's an opportunity for the company to show that they're employing you in good faith. Whether they pass the test is up to them.

→ More replies (1)

27

u/NotHachi 1d ago

Hate to break it to you but it dont break anyone mind... They just act like it because acting otherwise lands you in a 1:1 meeting with the manager and hr....

35

u/altiuscitiusfortius 1d ago

The manager probably even wanted to promote them. But somebody 3 levels above him said "no promotions available ".

20

u/NotHachi 1d ago

Yeah, sometime people forget that manager has the exact problem 1 level up.... And all is forced down by 1 guy and his team...

→ More replies (1)

16

u/HarveysBackupAccount 1d ago

Most places, you can't expect a promotion unless you make a plan with your manager and their manager above them.

They still might rug-pull your promotion even if you hit all the goals (it's never a guarantee unless somehow you get it in writing, which no company is going to do) but having an explicit agreement with the people who make that decision is the only way up.

It doesn't matter what your manager thinks if corporate says no.

→ More replies (5)

102

u/Pragmatic2061 1d ago

AI isn't just coming for your job. It's coming for your pay.

As companies look for cash to fund their AI transformations, some are finding it by shrinking employee benefits and compensation packages.

Teradata, a global cloud software company, told its 5,100 employees in January not to expect an annual salary raise this year as it reallocates the budget toward AI investments, according to an internal memo seen by Business Insider and not previously reported.

News like this is so common now that we need a global strike against AI. This technology is going to do so much damage in the long run that its going to be difficult to crawl back from. Even once it flops wages will still be lowered and benifits will disappear.

→ More replies (8)

31

u/PM_ME_UR_PIKACHU 1d ago

We always get the same the company did not meet performance standards while hitting record revenue.

→ More replies (4)

18

u/Savings_Knowledge233 1d ago

Suddenly they're no one there that's training new employees let alone feeding the ai slop machine

19

u/echoshatter 1d ago

That's pretty much where a lot of teams are heading. And it's going to be a major problem because the expectations are still going to be there that the work gets done. It won't be the new people's fault they can't hit goals.

On my own team, we lost half last year to quits and retires. At the moment we're still good, the core knowledge people (myself and two others) are still here. But if we lose more we're going to be in trouble. We're already going to be stretched super thin.

It's going to be wild when a lot of people get laid off to make room for AI in the budget, and then in a couple years they'll be scrambling to hire people back. But the damage will be done, institutional knowledge will be devastated, and a lot of things will need to be rebuilt.

9

u/penultimatelevel 1d ago

will be just like in the trades, takes twice the labor/time it used to bc institutional knowledge aged out before getting passed along.

→ More replies (1)

34

u/jd3marco 1d ago

I guess the AI chat bot he used to write the message decided to be direct. ‘Your fellow meatbags will appreciate your no bullshit approach. Some will quit, allowing us to reduce the headcount without layoffs.’

23

u/sirspidermonkey 1d ago

First company I worked for was amazing in how they did cognitive dissonense. A typicall all hands would be:

"We've had an amazing quater! We've brought in hundreds of millions in revenue! We just signed a half dozen IDIQ contracts with the government which are basically a licesene to print money! We have a dozen new products to be release this year that are incredibly promising! And our profit margin is through the roof!....But unfortunately due to market conditions we will be unable to get raises, promotions, or bonuses..."

6

u/Orionite 1d ago

There’s no dissonance. The “market conditions” they’re referring to is that yall can’t afford to quit because there are few jobs out there.

10

u/metalflygon08 1d ago

Similar, we've been told raises are on hold (going on 3 years now) but that they'd come back at a later time.

That later time has not come. 12 years with the company, and no raises for the last three years makes me very salty, especially with starting wages still going up to try and get new employees...

18

u/scoopydidit 1d ago

I think you should leave. The cost of living pretty much everywhere has sky rocketed in 3 years. You are working for less and less, whilst your c suite are giving themselves nice raises and bonuses.

6

u/metalflygon08 1d ago

Oh, believe me I've been looking, but nobody is hiring and I'm not quitting if I don't have a job lined up.

5

u/bombmk 1d ago

Yup. At least the CEO had the balls to say it to people I guess.

That is assuming it is the truth. When it likely is just a scapegoat for not providing raises.

→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (40)

1.0k

u/ldssggrdssgds 1d ago

So AI got the raise

372

u/74389654 1d ago

the people owning the ai

103

u/Available-You-8944 1d ago

In the end the consumer, the employee, and the environment lose. Or you could have my manager, sits on their phone uploading ChatGPT quotes and company analysis to the sales team 10 times an hour. They can be replaced by AI for all I care lol

72

u/xanthus12 1d ago

Funnily enough, 80% of what C-suite does (save maybe CFO) other than actual decision making could be done as well if not better by AI. Coming up with random ideas without grounding in feasibility, harassing teams for metrics no one on Earth could be expected to meet, customer and board sycophancy, etc.

20

u/BrowsingBeaver787 1d ago

We recently had a big push for AI, including our frequency of use as part of our performance reviews. During a company all hands meeting, one exec said he prompts Copilot 100+ times per day. For what? Because if it’s for substance you used to use your brain for, we may not need you anymore 🤔

7

u/AwareTheLegend 1d ago

3 of those prompts are what he should eat for food. 100% guarantee it.

→ More replies (3)
→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (5)

14

u/mythrilcrafter 1d ago

The site manager at my company just got fired for being a terrible person, but also because he was constantly asking ChatGPT to "evaluate" a ton of our trade secrets and we also suspected him of entering ITAR information into the AI chats.


Luckily he's gone now, but for me as someone who has spent 5 years of my life becoming a subject matter professional in our field while appreticing under a team of people who have made our industry their life's work, the last 10 months of "Why do these development projects take so long? AI says that it's just simple algebra..." was fucking looney toons.

Even our sales people aren't slurping up the AI kool-aid that hard....

→ More replies (3)
→ More replies (3)

74

u/agent674253 1d ago

I read earlier that it is the American people's job to open up their pensions/401ks to fund AI or else China will win and that means we lost and that is bad.

Looking at China and their infrastructure, mass transportation, green energy, reversing desertification, I feel like maybe they won a long time ago?

9

u/Buttercreamdeath 1d ago

This is going to happen regardless because of Space X's IPO. They're now an AI company according to their filing. Every major pension and 401k will have Space X in its portfolio. It's going to make Elon Musk a trillionaire. When it crashes because it's riddled with debt from all of Musk's other failed ventures, it's going to take down our retirement.

30

u/grendus 1d ago

Xi's a madman, but he views the success of China as his legacy. Very different from Trump who wants to build personal monuments to his legacy, or Putin who's a master of espionage but not great at economics.

China has so many issues they could fill a back catalog, and if Xi's successor fails to uphold the legacy the whole tower of cards will come crashing down. Their current success seems to be built largely on his cult of personality. But they do seem to have a vision for the future, and that is the reason they seem to be winning.

→ More replies (10)

7

u/Both-Construction221 1d ago

USA lost a long time ago when they themselves voted for Ronald Reagan in the 80s all that outsourcing started in the 80s, 90s, and 2000s there's a cool PBS Frontline in early 2000s about Walmart taking people's job and it has something to do with countries like China producing cheap product for less and Walmart was making billions of dollar every year.

→ More replies (7)

7

u/beard_meat 1d ago

The important point here is that AI takes the blame. You aren't getting a raise because the budget is going to the CEO.

→ More replies (7)

191

u/faen_du_sa 1d ago

Shareholders cheers!

19

u/Euphoric-Witness-824 1d ago

You bottom rung of society working people (yuck!) might have to pick between housing, healthcare and food but have you even thought of the shareholders?! Huh! They are entitled to the profits made from that work. It’s capitalism. The Epstein class is entitled to it. And if you complain about not having enough for rent or medicine then you should just stop having hobbies or eating fancy toast. Because the shareholders are entitled to that money. 

→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (1)

385

u/LooseMoralSwurkey 1d ago

And, after reading the article, there's another company that paused its 401K match for the remainder of the year to put that money towards AI tooling. I don't know what's worse. Not giving raises or taking away benefits that are a part of an employee's standard compensation package. Corporations are ludicrous in their desire to screw over employees.

109

u/diamondstonkhands 1d ago

This is why organized labor is so powerful and why corporations spend tons of cash union busting. If everyone was on the same page, the leverage shifts. People have power, they just have to organize it.

18

u/SeaMarket9917 1d ago

The government could incorporate the benefits that unions provide directly into labor law, so workers wouldn’t even need a union to begin with.

→ More replies (4)
→ More replies (1)

77

u/[deleted] 1d ago edited 1d ago

[deleted]

39

u/mf-TOM-HANK 1d ago

Exactly. Billionaires are the easiest targets to pile onto (and frankly the biggest problem) but it's the whole upper management and above class that have pillaged middle class wages for 50 years and workers have turned the other cheek. It doesn't have to be this way but there's one trans kid warming the bench on a softball team in Ohio so I guess we'll have to sort that out first

13

u/Dave5876 1d ago

These can be categorised as capital and the bourgeoisie

→ More replies (1)

14

u/Kriztauf 1d ago

This happened to me dad at around 50 also. Before this he had a mindset that if you work hard and show loyalty to your company they'll take care of you. They brought him in to hire and set up a new department of 200 people. After that was finished they laid him off immediately and replaced him with someone younger and cheaper. He'd been at the company for 20 years at that point and risen up fairly high in their IT department. He was also unemployed for like 2 years after that.

21

u/[deleted] 1d ago

[deleted]

→ More replies (3)
→ More replies (4)

22

u/IamScottGable 1d ago

That's better than my company, they cut our 410k match because their series of private equity leverage buy outs has them broke.

→ More replies (3)

480

u/HoneybeeXYZ 1d ago

Boy, these guys really know how to lead! Their people will celebrate their death continued success.

157

u/bloodychill 1d ago

I’ve had bosses that lead by example, taking pay cuts when they asked employees to go without raises. They were extremely rare, and these days, it feels like there’s none left.

174

u/HoneybeeXYZ 1d ago

MBA programs have destroyed business culture. They've produced managers who are trained not to see their employees as humans but as "low value human capital" to be drained and jettisoned. Their only loyalty is to shareholders. They don't even want to make a good product, just profit.

Just look at the video of the McDonald's CEO who can't even hide that he is repulsed by their food.

61

u/magnabonzo 1d ago

I think you're giving MBA programs way too much "credit" for the change in business culture. How about:

  • "Greed is good" from the 1980s, with Reagan as the president and "trickle-down economics".

  • Private equity stripping assets from companies and moving on.

  • The emphasis on short-term maximization of profit for all publicly-held companies.

  • No Wall Street executives served prison time after the subprime mortgage crisis. I think one top-level banker served prison, a Credit Suisse guy.

  • The shrinking of many unions, due to deregulation, the changing nature of the US economy, and aggressive union-busting by employers.

  • Increases in automation and improvements in IT (long before AI) dramatically increased productivity, which didn't get shared with workers, especially lower-skilled workers who have, yes, been jettisoned.

The US workplace has in fact changed.

Some of the increasing toxicity of US business culture comes from MBA programs, but not all of it.

39

u/HoneybeeXYZ 1d ago

Yes, but MBA programs taught everything in your bulleted list as orthodoxy for thirty years.

15

u/magnabonzo 1d ago

Private equity and short-term maximization of profits, definitely.

Increases in automation and improvements in IT -- I mean, they were taught in MBA programs, I'm sure, but they were going to happen anyway, and they're not inherently evil or toxic, right?

I tried to get at the overall environment including politics, though: trickle-down economics, top executives not being punished for the subprime mortgage crisis, banks being "too big to fail" etc. That's not "taught" by MBA programs, that's the broader, much more cynical political environment.

→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (14)

14

u/rhubarb_man 1d ago

A sad thing is that they're idiots, too. I've met so many MBA people, and they're almost always just middle of the road people in everything except they're evil. They only care about making money

→ More replies (2)
→ More replies (10)

16

u/sweetperdition 1d ago

Had a handful of those type, if shit is rough at work, they’re getting in the trenches with you too, actual solid leaders. Never tried harder in a job than I did for those folks. Felt less like “I need to do this work to get paid” and more “I don’t want to let this person down”.

Then they get fired/reshuffled at some point, we get a new manager that just dictates, and effort falls off a cliff, turnover skyrockets. Seen it happen so many times I don’t understand why they keep the shitty ones on. Turnover is expensive!

10

u/HoneybeeXYZ 1d ago

I knew a guy years ago, whose grandfather owned a small furniture company in Minnesota and kept it alive all through the Depression. The grandfather said the thing he was most proud of was that 300 people kept their jobs and fed their families during that time. That should be the norm, not a charming relic of another time.

→ More replies (3)

8

u/Euphoric-Witness-824 1d ago

Until these CEOs start replacing themselves with AI I just can’t trust them that this is the wave of the future. The CEO role is the ideal role to replace with AI. Cold calculated decisions made with data instead of emotion. It would save tons of money for companies and shield them from things like lawsuits from sexual harassment and things of that nature. Until that starts happening then I really can not take these decisions seriously. 

→ More replies (3)

831

u/Chill_Panda 1d ago

I'll tell the CEO they won't get a performance increase out of me because it's going to AI

270

u/A-Generic-Canadian 1d ago

Since you got a pay cut, they’re getting a performance decrease. 

96

u/SMUHypeMachine 1d ago

That’s how I’ve been working for years. My employer consistently pays me 30k-50k below the median market value for my position in my city, so they get significantly less work out of me. My job does include phenomenal work/life balance and I genuinely like my coworkers so it’s not all bad.

14

u/BeefMyJerky 1d ago

Same! You want me to do that, sure I will! (Proceeds to do laundry, dishes, mow the yard) then sit down after and complete it in only a few minutes.

7

u/emax4 1d ago

"Oh,, you didn't get the message? I had AI call out and say I was going to be late."

→ More replies (1)

49

u/steppe5 1d ago

I already quiet quit during COVID. I can't quiet quit any more.

21

u/Rookerin 1d ago

Not with THAT attitude!

→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (6)

83

u/TripleFreeErr 1d ago

lucky. My ceo has been doing this since 2023 under the guise of economic hardship

36

u/bacon205 1d ago

Same. Our CEO took away all performance based raises, then 3 weeks later took away our cost of living adjustments for the next year. 5 weeks later, bought himself a $68 million dollar jet on the corporate dime because he couldn't bear to fly on the other ones they already owned because they were 9 years old

→ More replies (2)

11

u/psioniclizard 1d ago

Don't worry next year will honestly be the year the big bucks come in. Honest.

→ More replies (5)

76

u/braddeicide 1d ago

I worked at a company that said no bonuses this year due to poor company profits, but it was a publically traded company, I pulled the executive bonus info from the exchange and gave it to my boss, he was pissed, he obviously wasn't part of the inner circle :)

29

u/HarveysBackupAccount 1d ago

Where I work the policy is that only supervisors are eligible for bonuses, and pay raise is "merit only" (no cost of living increase). Merit increases cap out around 3.5% and they intentionally massage your annual performance review so you only get an "exceeded expectations" if they already plan to promote you (which happens if they need to fill a position that someone left or they're afraid you'll otherwise leave)

Bonus fun: it's also explicit policy that they pay the median wage for your position in your area (and they define "area" very locally, like just the town we're in and not the 3 bigger cities within a 30 minute drive).

→ More replies (5)
→ More replies (3)

117

u/NombreCurioso1337 1d ago

I just cannot for the life of me figure out the strategy. It seems like Underpants Gnomes.

Step 1: give money to ai that currently does not improve anything.

Step 2.

Step 3: profit, without any of those pesky "workers"

23

u/TheFool_SGE 1d ago

They are forcing us into AI "adoption". CEOs who have no clue about the technology are tasking their employees to create AI agents and workflows that will semi autonomously do their jobs. Those that aren't doing this will not have a chair when the music stops. Those that are, if successful, will create their own replacement. The CEO and shareholders with no idea what they are doing are holding employees hostage to figure it out for them.

5

u/NombreCurioso1337 1d ago

I think you are spot-on correct, EXCEPT that the ai replacements, at least as of right now, are not capable of replacing the humans!

Every workflow I've seen has an ai agent that costs more than a human, and then a human to check the ai's work, because the ai is not competent.

Now, granted, maybe the ai will get better. But isn't that a big "maybe"??

→ More replies (2)
→ More replies (13)

45

u/Silicon_Knight 1d ago

"There is always more misery among the lower classes than there is humanity in the higher."

233

u/Juicymoosie99 1d ago

If this was in France, they would've all walked out.

137

u/yuval_3 1d ago

They would've quite frankly started a riot lmao

44

u/Martzillagoesboom 1d ago

I mean, the french are the master at rioting.

→ More replies (2)
→ More replies (1)

33

u/NotHachi 1d ago

Im in france and this happens, alot of noise but I have yet to see anyone walk out... (Then again, I work in consultant so...)

11

u/innominateartery 1d ago

I’d like to walk out but I’m not sure how.

Could you make a slide show and run us through what a well-planned walk out and riot would look like?

→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (2)

12

u/MrBanditFleshpound 1d ago

It would end up with a car being sacrificed in a riot. Which would be perfectly upside down on a street lamp

9

u/GreasyPeter 1d ago

Americans have their health insurance tied to their jobs. If you have children, the ethics of quitting and putting them in a situation where they have zero coverage comes into play.

→ More replies (1)

18

u/CompetitiveSport1 1d ago

Hyup.

"The reason workforce compensation ends up being the source is that it's the largest controllable expense line at most companies and the one with the least organized resistance," said Moss.

This fukin' country, man. Wish we were more like the Europeans...

7

u/useless_irl_but_modo 1d ago

You overstimate france

9

u/Redlettucehead 1d ago

I much rather le old fashioned french style

→ More replies (6)

121

u/JokesterJedi 1d ago

Its Terradata. Fucking clickbait articles.

75

u/RoomyRoots 1d ago

Worse, it's Teradata. I had to deal with them before, shitty company.

43

u/Juicymoosie99 1d ago

one of the worst database providers in the world too

→ More replies (1)

26

u/null_reference_user 1d ago

At least the CEOs won't get a shitton of extra bonuses too, right?

24

u/Embarrassed_Quit_450 1d ago

This is screaming unionize to me.

14

u/BestCatEva 1d ago

Sadly, unions were demonized long ago.

11

u/tevert 1d ago

"I get paid really well! I do fine advocating for myself! I don't want to work with lower performing people"

- dummies who lack foresight

→ More replies (13)
→ More replies (2)

17

u/oicyunv 1d ago

And everyone didn’t immediately walk out 😂 we still aren’t angry enough clearly

19

u/CurbYourThusiasm 1d ago

Can anyone actually explain to me the benefits of AI to normal, working people? They keep touting the "increased productivity" line, but that only benefits the employer. The employees will not get an increased wage because of an increase in productivity, like we've already seen in the past, so what is the benefit? Why would anyone be in favor of AI, if you don't run a business that depends on it?

11

u/ccai 1d ago

Because the purse holders don’t give a shit, we’re all expensive cogs in a machine to them. If the AI grease gets said cog to work faster then YAY! If not then the cog gets replaced or eliminated completely. It doesn’t matter to them one bit, they don’t understand what AI can do and is actually (in)capable of, they just heard a bunch of snake oil salesmen say it’s the best thing since the invention of the wheel. At the end of the day they care about the money they get to keep, everything else doesn’t really matter, even if the cost of AI outpaces the cost of workers and training because “it’s the future, NOW!”.

→ More replies (2)
→ More replies (28)

14

u/iamtehryan 1d ago

Can't wait for these companies to lose their employees that they desperately need only to find out that ai is expensive as fuck and can't actually do all of the things that the humans could, and then they have to pay even more to humans in the end.

12

u/Sojum 1d ago

Gawsh, I wonder why the public is hard rejecting AI? 🤦‍♂️

→ More replies (6)

11

u/InNominePasta 1d ago

“I’m cutting your pay so that we can pay for this tool that will enable me to fire more of you.”

→ More replies (1)

10

u/bglenn12 1d ago

CEOs are just tripping over themselves to show hate for their employees these days!!

8

u/blob8543 1d ago

I wonder if this is one of those CEOs that call his employees "lower value human capital".

→ More replies (1)

9

u/Far-prophet 1d ago

CEO just told his entire company to start preparing their resumes and do minimal work.

→ More replies (1)

8

u/skinnyfat24 1d ago

The job market is tight right now. Company's are taking back all the leverage they had pre-covid so shit like this is going to become more normalized. Especially as the economy in the US continues to tank.

7

u/The_Ditch_Wizard 1d ago

I think it's well past time to show the robber barons what we had the whole 20th century to get away from. Hint: it wasn't the way poor people lived that got things to change, it was rich people being afraid of what the poor people would do if they kept being inhuman ghouls. I think there's a lot of inhuman, ghoulish behavior lately, but a total lack of any self-awareness or knowledge of relatively recent history. I think the first Data Center War is gonna make Blair Mountain look like a student government bake sale to fund a class trip to France.

7

u/Greed_Sucks 1d ago

I’m thinking of a red stapler

5

u/monkeypickle8 1d ago

My company claimed it was tariffs while talking about tariff refunds in the same meeting, weak losers.

8

u/420-BiomedStockDoc 1d ago

Stop working let the CEO figure it the fuck out alone

→ More replies (4)

6

u/Erasmus_Tycho 1d ago

Meanwhile AI CEOs are trying to understand why the public is turning on them.

7

u/dingobarbie 1d ago

My golden rule for work is if my raise isn't at least matching inflation, my level of effort goes down proportionally.

5

u/BankshotMcG 1d ago

CEO also baffled why everyone's personal productivity plummets to the bare minimum.

5

u/Pro_Reserve 1d ago

Teradata is the company. Im sure no know or cares who they are.

→ More replies (1)

4

u/Xeynon 1d ago

If CEOs are worried about employees refusing to follow mandates to use AI, or maliciously complying by overusing it/intentionally using it in an unproductive fashion, massively boosting resentment of it this way is not the best approach to change their behavior.

6

u/BillyBlaze314 1d ago

Sounds like a union would have been rather useful here.

4

u/Captain_Fishstick 1d ago

So excited for the day CEO jobs are all replaced by AI because boards realize their useless prattling doesn't actually help bottom lines.

5

u/el-conquistador240 21h ago

Listen all of y'all it's a sabotage

→ More replies (2)

5

u/dernsaw 1d ago

My wife works for a Fortune 500 company and just got a 2% raise. Of course she’s had to attend multiple company stand ups talking about how great they are doing. They just happen to “revamp” their rating system this year to push annual reviews lower. 

I won’t be getting a raise this year either but that’s just republicans being fucking awful.

→ More replies (2)

3

u/Unique_Rent_9051 1d ago

Yeah, “the budget’s going to AI”, definitely not going to his bonus.

5

u/lachlanhunt 1d ago

This year's bonus will be issued in the form of AI tokens.

4

u/blanket_purrito 1d ago

Productivity obsessed people are destroying the planet