Facebook will increase hourly wages for some content moderators

Image: Ilana Panich-Linsman / The Washington Post / getty

Facebook wants you to know that it’s feeling generous. 

In a Monday blog post, the social media company announced that it will raise hourly wages for some of its contract employees by next year. The move follows criticism that Facebook underpays content moderators forced to constantly slog through the worst digital detritus that humanity has to offer. 

The exact amount of the raise depends on where the employees in question live, and what type of work they do. For starters, this change only applies to contract workers in the U.S., and a chef in Seattle will not see as large of a raise as one in San Francisco. 

“The work we do to connect people around the world would not be possible without the talented and dedicated people who do contract work at Facebook,” reads the blog post. “They are employed by outside vendor partners to work either part-time or full-time and provide important services across content review, security, culinary, transportation and other teams.”

Content moderators, in particular, will see their base wage raised the highest. Facebook says that those working for “vendor partners” in the Bay Area, New York City, and D.C., will eventually earn $22 per hour. Those in Seattle will earn $20, and workers in other U.S. metro areas will earn $18. 

This is up from a base wage of $15 an hour for those who do a “do a substantial amount of work with [Facebook].”

“Content review at our size can be challenging and we know we have more work to do,” continues the blog post. “We’re committed to supporting our content reviewers in a way that puts their well-being first and we will continue to share steps forward on this important topic.”

The company also announced a series of changes designed to mitigate the soul-crushing work that is moderating Facebook. Specifically, expanded on-site counseling, “resiliency training,” and the ability to temporarily blur graphic images are all forthcoming. 

If you do contract work for the company in one of the aforementioned fields that isn’t content moderation, the promised future wages are a little different: $20 per hour in San Francisco, New York City, and D.C., and $18 in Seattle — also up from $15 an hour. 

The kitchen staff at Facebook’s Menlo Park office unionized in 2017. 

Importantly, many of Facebook’s content moderators live outside of the United States. A 2018 documentary, The Cleaners, highlighted one such group in the Philippines. A New York Times report from May of last year focused on a “deletion center” in Berlin that employs 1,200 content moderators for Facebook. In other words, while nice, this promised raise doesn’t touch many of those working to keep Facebook relatively sanitized. 

And sure, this increase in wages is no doubt meaningful to those who will receive it. However, according to MIT’s living wage calculator, $20 per hour still falls below a living wage for a single adult with no children living in San Francisco. For an adult with one child that number is $39.86.

But hey, Facebook cares. It promises.