[spudlyo]

I was surprised that this was a real thing when I stumbled upon the r/overemployed subreddit. Not sure how many of the folks who self-report their success in doing this are LARPers, but it's remarkable that anyone gets away with this.

I have a hard enough time attending all the meetings and completing my work in my actual job, I couldn't imagine taking on another and balancing the two somehow.

[telchior]

Anecdotal, but my wife was doing 2.5 remote jobs simultaneously for a while, and apparently performing above expectation in all of them. However -- meetings were her major complaint, and she eventually burned out and quit the two full time jobs due to excessive and (according to her) pointless meetings.

One of the companies asked her to stay on as a consultant. They ended up hiring someone full time... who spent all their time in meetings, while my wife did the actual work. For significantly less pay, of course.

So yes, overemployed remote workers really exist, but at least in her case it was largely due to incompetent management.

[gsk22]

> So yes, overemployed remote workers really exist, but at least in her case it was largely due to incompetent management.

I mean, incompetent management may have allowed the situation to persist. But your wife "working" 2.5 jobs for (presumably) the expected hours of just one of those jobs can't be blamed on management. She chose to accept all 3 of those positions with the knowledge that she wouldn't meet the conditions of employ.

I'm not a "send 'em to jail!" type, and I have little sympathy for large corporations, but let's not pretend it's anything less than time theft.

[wpietri]

What makes it "time theft", whatever that means?

US employers have worked very hard to make many of their workers "exempt" [1] such that they don't have to pay for overtime and can make people work egregious hours without getting in legal trouble.

If that's not "time theft", then I don't see why an exempt worker who can do the work of two people shouldn't get paid for doing the work of two people. It would be different if they were hourly workers and they were double-billing for the same hour, of course. But I don't think that's what's happening here.

[1] https://www.investopedia.com/terms/e/exempt-employee.asp

[gsk22]

You can still "double-bill" in an exempt position.

Most employment contracts I've seen stipulate an expected work week of 40 hours. If I sign 3 contracts like that, now I would need to work 120 hours to fulfill the obligation. And as long as someone collects the paychecks from all 3 jobs without fulfilling the contractual requirements of those jobs, well, that is sort of the definition of theft. Money gained without performing the work necessary to earn it.

[wpietri]

I don't think I've ever seen an employment contract for an exempt position that specifies the number of hours to work. So yes, if somebody is foolish enough to sign that, they might get in trouble. But again, I doubt that's the case here.

[telchior]

I think you're making an unwarranted leap here. The management never complained about or monitored hours worked; the requirements of the job were simply completing tasks. Which she did, as I said, at or above expectations (the company she continued consulting for is still trying to rehire her at "full time", but they really just mean adding more responsibilities and tasks).

Sure, there are lots of jobs where "time theft" is a useful concept, but there are a lot of others where it isn't. I'd go so far as saying that thinking in those terms can be another sign of incompetent management.

[gsk22]

Are you really claiming that all 3 companies would have approved the situation if they knew?

Of course not, which is why overemployed people hide this information from their employers.

[telchior]

That's a bit different than claiming time theft, isn't it? That's more of a suspicion that someone couldn't possibly be doing a good job if their attention is split.

The two full-time companies objected strenuously to her leaving and made various offers to keep her around. Would they have suddenly decided that they were deluded and that she was actually a horrible employee if they knew the truth? Possibly, but that doesn't mean they're in the right.

The real problem here is that a large portion of managers actually have no idea what constitutes a good employee or good job done. So they try to figure it out through second order observations like how many hours are worked, how convincingly the employee acts like they're good at doing their job, or how they report on their progress in meetings; and they get upset when they find out information that makes it seem like the employee should be doing a worse job.

I'm being a bit harsh, since I'm not immune to the same thoughts and uncertainties; I have an employee of my own who has two other part-time jobs and at times I've questioned whether that's OK. When I really examine the work he's doing, though, the answer is always the same: he's doing a good job, and the rest of his time is none of my damn business.

[gsk22]

> That's a bit different than claiming time theft, isn't it? That's more of a suspicion that someone couldn't possibly be doing a good job if their attention is split.

The reason employers would not approve isn't because the employee's attention is split, but because the employee would not be meeting the conditions of employment!

40 hours is the commonly accepted definition of "full time" in the US, and this is often written into employment contracts as well. Additionally, employers generally have expected working hours where the employee is available for meetings, mentoring, pair programming, etc.

So, how can you fulfill the expectations of multiple "full time" jobs while only putting in the time for one?

[ipaddr]

Many employers would not approve of the friends you keep or the ladies you date. None of their business.

[deely3]

Counterpoint: friends and ladies relations not defined in signed contract. Working hours - yes.

[anikan_vader]

>> time theft

But her time is not their property, and so there is nothing illegal about her doing with it as she pleases. You can’t steal something that is already yours.

[spoonjim]

It’s the company’s fault for not working their employees to the bone. If they did, this would be impossible.

[LocalH]

I think the collective employer sphere has stolen way more time from their employees than the other way around

[yjftsjthsd-h]

> while my wife did the actual work. For significantly less pay, of course.

What kind of consultant is paid less?

[haswell]

That probably depends a lot more on her previous title than the consulting title.

I could definitely imagine scenarios where a meeting-heavy middle/upper management job pays quite a bit more than consulting.

[telchior]

Ah, just to clarify: she was also working far fewer hours. The meetings really were the primary time sink.

[KMag]

This is where we figure out that overemployed people are using deepfakes to be in multiple Zoom meetings at once.

[spoonjim]

Either your wife is a massive outlier in skills, or the company just isn’t working her hard as they could be. As remote work opens jobs to the broader world, Americans are quickly going to find out that if they can’t generate the business impact of a Serbian or Chinese developer working 60+ hours a week they are going to find themselves in a very unpleasant situation. Some Jeff Dean sorts could do that in 5 minutes a week but most people can’t.

[telchior]

Sure, you're right. I wouldn't say that the problem is that the companies are not working her as hard as they could be; I'd say that what they think is a full time position should actually be part time. But they've refused to see it that way, for one reason or another.

We (Westerners in general) would indeed be screwed if you could just replace people with cheaper workers from other countries. It's not that simple, though. Language and cultural differences are a massive barrier. I say that as someone who has worked with a lot of East and Southeast Asians who are brilliant, hardworking people -- but it still takes a lot of effort to figure out how to work together, and that's at a startup scale where you can really pay attention to each person. Larger companies tend to have a lot of outsourcing horror stories.

[spoonjim]

Certainly, today, an on-shore American developer has more ability to generate business impact than an offshore Southeast Asian developer. But I think that's more because of the bias-laden and chummy way that companies are managed, which is an artifact of office-driven culture. Remote work cultures will be more based on written communication and demonstrated results, and then American developers not in the FAANG skill bracket are going to find out that they are not a very attractive buy when someone almost as good is available for 1/5 the cost.

[telchior]

Yeah, I thought so too. Then I started hiring (for my very small startup) in SE Asia. And, well, maybe I'm biased and chummy, but it just wasn't incredibly smooth sailing. This is purely remote, almost all written communication, etc.

I have no regrets and still employ the same people today, but it just wasn't so straightforward as you're making it out to be. I think it's actually easier for a startup to have, let's say, an entirely Indonesian team including the founders, targeting an American market, versus a startup having an American founding team then start hiring in Indonesia. (For big companies I don't know, but I'd imagine it all gets even more complicated.)

[Firmwarrior]

Haha, man, I had the same thinking ("Surely I can find some genius programmers in Asia or Eastern Europe willing to do the same work for a fraction of the price") but the reality is very different

I had no luck with it at all myself. I'd get completely useless low-quality crap work out of these guys when I got anything out of them at all.

I think you'd have to hire some local managers and maybe send over some experienced devs from the USA to train up the locals, at which point it'd only be a matter of time until they realize their new worth and jump ship for FAANG or whatever.

[phibz]

I can't see how this wouldn't get caught in the US without significantly more criminal activity on the person's part. If you're salaried then they're going to need an I9, meaning you need a tax ID number. So then are you going to open a bank account in this stolen identity's name or are you going to try and setup direct deposit without a name or just a routing number/account ID and hope tye name mismatch isnt caught?

What about the IRS and employment tax your employer pays going to the wrong tax ID that should be reported to you?

I'm sure in some situations it'd work (1099, physical paycheck, lax process), but it seems like you're just setting yourself up to have to break more laws.

You'd be better off just using your own name and keeping a low profile online.

At least then you'd probably only be in violation of your employment contract.

It's stuff like this that's going to make providing recent bank statements and tax records a more common requirement for hire. :-(

[lovich]

Is it illegal to have multiple employers? I should inform all of the members of the board of every company that I've worked for that they should tender their resignation at their other companies.

[Wowfunhappy]

No, which is why GP says:

> You'd be better off just using your own name and keeping a low profile online. At least then you'd probably only be in violation of your employment contract.

Ie, the crime being discussed isn’t having multiple jobs, but taking one job under a fake identity.

[quelltext]

I think the original start of this comment thread was about taking on an extra job and then wiggling your way out of it being discovered by saying it was deepfakes, then another poster saying they cannot imagine having several jobs and winging them. Whether that was assumed to be occurring under fake identities wasn't clear.

So, yeah, I'd say maintaining fake identities is hard no matter what and illegal.

But I think even before that folks are wondering how people can maintain several jobs at the same time, regardless of fake identity or not.

[lovich]

I interpreted the comment I was replying to as someone who felt that running multiple jobs was illegal. I have seen coworkers think that before just based on a a manager telling them it was illegal to work for multiple companies at the same time.

[phibz]

You misinterpreted what I said.

Faking your identity in the US for a job is breaking several laws. Explaining this behavior by saying "I was deep faked" probably won't satisfy law enforcement or the IRS.

Taking multiple jobs under your legal identity isn't in and of itself illegal. But you may be in violation of your employment contract. Meaning it's probably, depends on local laws, not illegal but gives cause to terminate you and possibly be sued.

[GekkePrutser]

Illegal no. But it's usually in an employment contract that the employer must approve of any other employment.

For board members it's kinda part of their job but taking on 2 full time IT jobs is not going to be appreciated obviously.

[lovich]

> employment contract

I’m in the US. Ain’t got no contract for shit because companies don’t want to be committed to a deal with workers. The closest I’ve gotten to a contract is “don’t slander us and you can have this severance”

[phibz]

> I’m in the US. Ain’t got no contract for shit because companies don’t want to be committed to a deal with workers.

Your offer letter usually functions as an employment contract. The thing that spells out your start on a specific date, and we will pay you some amount in some given manner.

It really depends on your local labor laws, which vay from state to state.

[galangalalgol]

Employers in yhe US love contracts. They say things like "all your ideas are ours even if you work on them off ours" and "you can't work anywhere else, after us unless its in retail or food service, because we don't want to compete". That holds up in the states faangs are moving to, to reduce COL.

[lovich]

And my state ignores that and restricts those covenants to default settings or tosses them if the companies go too, far. Also lol at the faangs moving to. They are expanding not moving.

They didn’t leave California, mass, or New York which have major provisions protecting workers, and they chose to build in those locations before you saw them seeking out smaller cities and states

[stevenjgarner]

and what about independent contractors? I have been a technology contractor since the 1970's and I have never had a contract with any of my customers.

[phibz]

You verbally agreed on contract pay rate, payment frequency, schedule, assignment of works, how sensitive information will be handled, whether or not you can subcontract a portion of the work, who provides materials and work accommodations, and a bunch of other important details?

All without a written agreement? I'm surprised you could get people to work with you.

[oyebenny]

True

[walrus01]

There is a thriving ecosystem of scams that uses United States residents as money mules, with the ability to open bank accounts, for ACH deposit, social security numbers, etc.

You might be significantly underestimating the number of extremely gullible people out there.

[phibz]

The fact that stealing people's identity is relatively easy, and a major problem is tangential to my statement:

taking a job under someone else's identity is illegal in the US and claiming you were deep faked if caught isn't likely to work.

[mod]

> more criminal activity

What part is the current criminal activity?

[phibz]

Taking a job in the US under someone else's name and social security number.

[prefernottied]

In some programming roles - especially during the pandemic - the amount of work you can get away with doing is significantly below what you think. You probably overestimate how much attention people pay to what you're doing and underestimate how easy it is to make a ticket sound harder than it is. And, here in Europe, you can be paid multiple months' wages between clearly giving up and being fired.

Perhaps the most important factor: if you have two jobs, you don't care about being fired.

Source: I'm an immoral, lazy, singly-employed person.

[BizarroLand]

I ended up in that situation by accident before the pandemic for a few months. Working one remote job while I was in office working another job. That time period was great for my bank account and it made me really aware of how I had automated a 40/hr a week in person job into something I could perform remotely on a lunch break.

[sangnoir]

Please name this amazing employer where one can go for months without attending a meeting.

[BizarroLand]

I won't name names but it was a small rural community college that had fired all of their IT except me, and they couldn't let me go until they had a replacement so I worked remotely as I had to move out of state for a family issue.

[ipaddr]

I don't want to work two jobs but the non-meeting employer I envy.

[jamal-kumar]

It's amazing how much work you can get done between multiple jobs when you never actually have to do any of that meeting nonsense in what you do. All of my work with all of the people I work with is conducted over text chats and emails on a basis where we reply when we can, and everyone is happy with seeing a link or screenshot to click on to see the work I've been doing is going well. Everyone I work with is always travelling and often in radically different time zones, so coordinating a meeting MIGHT happen a couple of times a month. Why should I stress waking up early just to get right into the most eye-crossing soporific experience imaginable, or expecting the guy in Africa to stay up late? And also, what the hell is employee surveillance software? You couldn't pay me a million to install some creepy boss spyware on my computer.

[danielscrubs]

Depends a lot on the competence of your manager. If your manager only has taken “management-courses” and have zero information about the domain they are working in how are they supposed to judge efficiency? The glorified babysitter that can only talk about the latest scrum techniques.

I’ve seen IT consultants make quite a lot of money from double dipping and they always seem so stressed which further makes management think they are doing a great job.

This does seem to be more of an EU issue though where management and economics are still among the highest status competences. Working yourself up the ladder here isn’t that common (they don’t earn that much more than the developers).

[sumedh]

> I was surprised that this was a real thing

It can happen mostly when you are working for very big companies, they usually have too many people and projects take a long time to complete because you need to get approval from multiple people. If you already know how things work then you can quickly finish your main job work or sometimes there is no work which gives you time to do your second job.

[doliveira]

Indeed, I can't imagine how inefficient a company must be where an employee is even able to do that.

[vt100]

Yeah, and then the fact that with one tech job, you're already in the top tax bracket, and anything extra you do is taxed at the maximum rate. Diminishing returns on effort...

[cmrdporcupine]

ugh. this happening is going to kill remote work for the rest of us.

[spookthesunset]

Be a contractor and bill hourly. Remote work is far better suited to being a contractor… especially if you don’t particularly care about the company (and if you are working multiple gigs… you really don’t care)

[someperson]

No it won't. Companies will just start measuring and paying for results.

[thesiniot]

They've been trying to do that for quite some time. It's no easy feat.

https://dilbert.com/strip/1995-11-13

[JetAlone]

Talk about a perverse incentive, haha

"I'm gonna write me a new minivan this afternoon"

If only.

[interblag]

I always find this to be a funny point in these conversations. The entire discipline of "agile development" exists because it's so hard to have foresight into the requirements of a software product up-front. By extension, I don't see how we think it's possible to define expectations for employees up-front and then pay them only based on results. If you look at agencies within our industry, for instance, about 0% of them will work on fixed-price contracts - it's always time-and-materials. Knowing what we know about software development, I don't see how individual employment can fundamentally be any different...

[astura]

If it were that simple they already would be doing it.

[Sebguer]

I know at least two people IRL who got away with it for at least some stretch of time.