Despite reporting profit of $1.3 billion last quarter, which it described as “another quarter of solid results,” eBay today suggests that there is a “Need for Change.”
It sounds like they aren't even hurting, they just are ritualistically cutting off a pound of flesh for Wall Street.
Sites at that scale that cannot afford errors, downtime, or system breaches operate massive IT teams just to keep the systems running. That's before even touching Logistics,Advertising, customer service, seller outreach, brand management, human resources, etc, etc. Ebay in 2023 had 132 Million customers. That's 12,000 customers per employee per year, or 32 customers per employee per day assuming they worked the full 365 solid. A rather lean storefront actually, probably propped up significantly by the labor of their third-party sellers.
We need laws around layoffs, stat. It shouldn't be legal for execs to layoff a thousand people and still keep their own jobs. It's their failure that caused the issue in the first place - they've been safe for too long.
Honestly I am curious what the logistics of a ratio cap between lowest and highest paid employee would result in, say 1:10.
Now there's a lot more to consider but I think restricting the impact onto the managements possible pay by layoffs (while also capping their pay) would encourage upper management who cares about their workers and company alike, and also kill the layoff cycle thats used to boost end of year reports
I mean, I'm not a lawmaker, but ideally if execs do layoffs they should either have to also layoff a certain percentage of upper level execs dependent on the # of people laid off, and/or the company or execs should have to pay fees dependent on the # of people laid off.
I'm sure those 1,000 people will have no problem finding work... Once all the other places are done with their layoffs and AI has filled in the gaps, and... Welp, maybe i have to reconsider that first statement 😬
best advice for anyone looking for work these days is to learn a trade. I'm sure the drive for unimpeded profits will eventually crater even those types of jobs through AI and automation, just not as soon.
You know, I ignored my interest in programming for many years, instead opting for a trade, specifically aviation maintenance. I went to school for 2 years for it, passed tests, got licensed, got otj, got taxi quals, engine run certified, and a whole host of stuff.
I also broke my body doing it for $18, after years and years and years, I finally made $25 an hour, whoopie.
I worked around hazardous chemicals, dangerous equipment, high voltage electricity. I stood on concrete floors all day busting my knuckles.
I fell off a ladder and smashed my face on a keel beam, requiring I get stitches. I saw other people get much more hurt than that.
I did all of this with the constant pressure that if I fuck my job up, people are going die, and I will go to jail.
I went back to school, got a job as a software engineer at a midsize company that never is in the news and you have never heard of, and get to sit at home and make 3 times the salary. There are 10 other companies in the same block as mine that have 3-400 hundred person engineering teams, there are lots of jobs for developers outside of the silicon valley bubble, we mostly just hang out and do our thing.
Until trades start paying more, it's just not worth it. I'm sure someone will come in and say that they are a plumber and make $1000 an hour or something, but I can say, there were 500 people in the facility I worked at with the same qualifications as me making the same $18.
I'm betting AI will "fill the gaps" for a while until profits start to drop due to AI not being ready for primetime in most capacities. Then they'll start hiring back real people to fix the damage for a few years before trying it all over again.
This should cover their asses on that big lawsuit they just lost for harassing that poor old couple. Projected profits would be down ~$300m over the period of time they intended to pay this out, I assume, not much of a mathematician. Gross.
eBay is following in the footsteps of Google, Discord, Twitch, Unity, and more — by laying off loads of workers this January instead of right before the holidays.
Despite reporting profit of $1.3 billion last quarter, which it described as “another quarter of solid results,” eBay today suggests that there is a “Need for Change.” Company president and CEO Jamie Iannone writes that “there is more we can do to ensure our success,” and argues that eBay should be a “more nimble” company that “makes decisions more quickly” to position itself for “long-term, sustainable growth.”
Never mind that last quarter, eBay CFO Steve Priest already said he was “extremely proud of our teams for delivering on their quarterly financial commitments, maintaining prudent cost discipline, and executing key deliverables in support of our strategy.”
eBay also argues that it hired too quickly, an excuse tech companies have been trotting out for over a year: “While we are making progress against our strategy, our overall headcount and expenses have outpaced the growth of our business,” writes Iannone today.
It asks that all US employees work from home tomorrow while the company processes this news.
Incidentally, Iannone’s predecessor — former eBay CEO Devin Wenig — got a $57 million severance package after the company cyberstalked and harassed a pair of its critics, sending them live insects, a bloody pig mask, and a funeral wreath.
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