They didn't decline to boost employee pay -- they declined to make an across the board COL adjustment. Instead they will build the COL adjustment into each person's annual raise along with a performance bonus.<p>You're only hearing about these guys because they are required to report it in their SEC filings.
Google is literally a money printer. They could all go on vacation and the thing would run itself. The fact that they will pay execs these sums to do nothing but start and kill yet another useless side product is embarrassing.
Who is doing anything worth more than a living wage (some amount that meets basic needs where they live, plus some buffer) independent of all the infrastructure built with the know-how, sweat, and blood of others?
Haven’t companies been doing this for literally centuries?<p>It sucks, but it seems that it is what it is. Fortunately people can vote with their feet and googlers in particular are likely to be able to get a pay increase by switching jobs.<p>Short of a straight up profit share it doesn’t seem like there’s a reliable way to guarantee pay increases - stock is a decent hedge but then you can have 80% drops in a year like Peloton.