Sixers

The 76ers’ Salary Reduction Plan Didn’t Even Last 24 Hours

By Kevin Kinkead

Published: Mar 24th, 2020 · 2:04 PM EDT

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All of that negative publicity resulted in this:

Sixers ownership statement to ESPN: ''….After listening to our staff and players, it's clear that was the wrong decision. We have reversed it and will be paying these employees their full salary." https://t.co/0mn1NthccQ

— Adrian Wojnarowski (@wojespn) March 24, 2020

We have a full statement from Josh Harris here:

Our commitment has been to do our best to keep all of our employees working through this very difficult situation. As part of an effort to do that we asked salaried employees to take a temporary 20% pay cut while preserving everyone’s full benefits — and keeping our 1500 hourly workers paid throughout the regular season. After listening to our staff and players, it’s clear that was the wrong decision. We have reversed it and will be paying these employees their full salaries. This is an extraordinary time in our world – unlike any most of us have ever lived through before – and ordinary business decisions are not enough to meet the moment. To our staff and fans, I apologize for getting this wrong.

This was really just a staggered furlough, with employees only working four-day weeks, so it wasn’t like they were logging the same amount of hours and only being paid 80%.

Still, the feedback was so strong that the Sixers decided to scrap their temporary salary reduction less than 24 hours after it was first leaked to the press. That goes down as a colossal fuck up attributed to team ownership, and a rare example of Twitter bullying actually resulting in something positive.