Rule of Acquisition 48: The bigger the smile, the sharper the knife.

Probably because just like they abuse their family members, they abuse you. That's my 0.02.

"Talk rather than pay" came with MBA-style management in the 1980s along with thing like calling employees "human resources".

There was a period not that long ago when this kind of stuff was very visible as ridiculously over-inflated job titles (but not pay) in Tech Companies and I did know quite a lot of people when I was in Startups who had job titles which were way above their actual responsabilities or simply ridiculous (whilst I, as a freelancer, just got paid very well and didn't really had a job title).

Calling them 'family', doesn't make them family.

They'll call employees 'yer lordship' if it'd save them 2 cents.

anything to avoid paying you a living wage.

As family, we have to know how to sacrifice for the greater good, the growth of family.

It's a hard thing to break. Like, I should know better, I'd been a wobbly for several years, and yet I STILL Fell for it at the beginning of the pandemic. With their whole "We are committed to ensuring that we don't' have to lay off anyone, that's why everyone is getting a pay cut on a reverse scale, from our CEOs taking a 90% pay cut to our freshers taking a 1% pay cut" and then they cut my hours in half, again to ensure everyone could keep their job, and then I was out on my ass. I guess I thought since I was a westerner employed by an Indian company, that they truly did have a different mindset than just profit, again based on great brainwashing (I mean training). And several times since then I've thought about how great it was to work there and I hoped I had a chance to go back again.

It fucks with minds.

Obviously here we know its bullshit. But I'm willing to be that a lot of us have worked in places like that before. There is usually some people that work there not doing so well, poor or depressed or both and more, with reasoning that this is not the best place to work but there kinda looking out for me. People with thoughts that I don't know where else to go, I have no skills,