NYT: Fringes vs. Basics in Silicon Valley (high-tech worker exploitation?) [View All]

[DeepModem Mom]

Fringes vs. Basics in Silicon Valley
By MATT RICHTEL
Published: March 9, 2005


....Electronic Arts, based in Redwood City, Calif., has become the focal point of a debate over whether technology companies are exploiting workers by demanding long hours and using on-campus fringe benefits while skimping on tangible benefits like overtime pay, and rewarding worker loyalty by sending jobs to cheaper labor overseas.

The debate has called into question the longstanding Silicon Valley compensation formula in which long hours were soothed with stock options and bonuses. But with no technology boom to fuel stock prices, and new accounting rules making options much more expensive to grant, stock options are no longer the currency that has fueled the traditional Silicon Valley work ethic.

Electronic Arts, responding to this financial shift and to its labor critics, plans to announce this week that it will depart from tradition by beginning to pay overtime to some workers. Those workers would no longer be eligible for options or bonuses.

The move, while not unprecedented in the Valley's recent lean years, is certain to be watched closely by executives at other technology companies....

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The clash between Electronic Arts and its employees was prompted by an online essay late last year by the wife of a game programmer. She accused the company of driving its workers to the point of collapse. The lament, widely circulated and discussed, has ignited an industry debate over whether there is a need to rethink the rights of high-technology labor....


http://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/09/technology/09games.html?8hpib