God it's so transparent. I'm a software engineer, and I have first hand built software that has made my business teams and execs wealthy. I have sat there and watched them buy new audis and new houses while I'm told "sorry we can't afford a raise this year". And I know I do better than most being in software, but man do they want to keep us arguing about that while they go and buy everything while we squabble.
So I figured I'm also going to do the bare minimum. Good thing my managers aren't actually competent in IT so I can set my own deadlines (with a big juicy margin for doing fuck all and getting money for it)
I worked for a small company that saw growth year after year. We'd have a staff Christmas party towards the end of the year where the boss would thank us for our work and give everyone a bonus of $500. One year the boss was super excited to tell us that we helped build up his company to the point that he would now be opening a new location. He told us this new location was a large investment for him to open and so he would not be giving us a bonus that year and there also would be wage freeze. Thanks for the hard work! Merry Christmas! He sold the company the next year for a few million and retired at 50. I quit after that.
Been there, seen that. We were asked (a long time ago) to forego our Christmas bonus (which was part of our employment contract, so they could not just scrap it) because the company had problems and might get rid of some coworkers if we did not accept this. Later, we learned that this money was needed to finance a managers' golden parachute.
If the company buys "motivational presents" for employees.... the company is already several years or more behind the employment market. You're not unionizing hard enough.
My former employer was tight on funds. We ended up with two rounds of layoffs (hence former). It was when I found out that the owner had a boat that I became disenchanted.
"I have costs." statement is the response for everything, every year. It looks like these type of people come from the same template, read the same book about starting the business.