Well, such things are hardly confined to this company or even the game-industry. Or even just US. This actually seems more common practices these days, especially in "modern Western" countries.
I have a bachelor degree, which you would think will land you a good job and a good pay, especially after a while. But these times, over here a bachelor degree is just a ticket to unemployment and/or low paying jobs with a lot of overtime that isn't paid, but expected as part of a maybe future promotion. Our chances of finding a job are even lowered because of the government obligated work guidence institutes. They don't help people with bachelor degrees because we supposedly have no trouble finding a job and when we don't find one, they just hand us some that nobody wants to do. All the while they provide classes which they sell as "equal to a bachelor degree skill" (which they are not), to anyone without a degree or just a highschool degree. To even further the damage for bachelors, with those classes they provide discounts to employers for employing these people. Which ends up making bachelors very unintersting and as a bachelor you end up with the shittiest jobs with the lowest pays (and then they are surprised young people don't want to go to college anymore).
And this is just the part of searching for a job.
Since my bachelor degree I haven't gotten any decent jobs. The few I got, they expected a lot for not even a minimum wage (atleast not minimum of a bachelor). Although I did my job well, I never got any salary increase (except with one employer) and they always found silly excuses. I even got fired at one company because they didn't hold up to their end of the agreement when I got a new assignment and I made them aware of our agreement. And they used excuses like my hobby's, because I took photography classes and did drawing and such. Here's the kicker: I was hired as 50% programmer and 50% graphics designer, but I was never allowed to do those things and all I was allowed was being a software testing "consultant". I got fired because after a year and a half doing their way (which normally was just for 6 months), I was holding my foot down and said I wanted to do what I was initially hired for.
My last job I had, before my several years of unemployment and now trying to be self-employed graphics designer, was maybe the worst, but in a different kind of way. I was unemployed because I was/am transgender. All the interviews went well at first, because these days they want some women in the IT for political correctness bullshit. So I gotten to a lot more IT interviews as a woman than as a male. But those interviews fell into the water as soon as they realized what I was. I even had an interview where one guy couldn't stop laughting (while he thought I didn't notice). Even confronting them with it, they denied having anything against someone like me. But after a few weeks we got proof they lied about why I "didn't make the cut".
Anyway, at last there was an employer that wanted me. Not at first (when I was still presenting male), but after 6 months or so they called back. Problem was that by then I was "obligated" to present myself as a women, as part of the transition. To my surprise, it didn't bother them and they still hired me. The reason why they weren't startled is that they had found my website about transgenderism. So I was glad that they still called me over. And it was job I always wanted (making animations with "Flash" [now Animate]). They actually couldn't wait for me to start and asked me to start a few weeks earlier than was possible contract-wise because there weren't a lot of people who could work with the older version of Flash (who knew, right).
I took the job even though it was "far away" and low pay, but we had an agreement that would only be the first few months. At first it was fun and hour wise, they held up to the hours we agreed upon. Once the contracts were signed though, things changed. All of a sudden they expected me to do overtime (without being paid for it), didn't matter that I started early (they also started to accuse me of not working in the morning when I was alone). They expected me (and the others) to work from early morning to late evening everyday, for a minimum wage (again, not a minimum wage of a bachelor). The others where not that old, mostly basicly 1 to 2 years fresh from school. But I was already older and had my fair share of being taken advantage of, so I knew where they heading. With a first evaluation, they already started to nitpick. Basicly, they were already setting up the path for not giving me that raise a few months down the line. And then the worst part happened. They didn't outright say it, but they were blackmailing me for being transgender and how my employment chances were on the labormarket. So they told me to better think twice what I would, before I would end up on unemployment again with being who I was. Before my hormone-therapy, this was something I could handle they would've really gotten their answer right there and than and how I despice people who blackmail others. But I was already on hormones for a few months. That "though wall" around my heart wasn't really there anymore, so what they said at that moment, really stung hard.
I still had some days off to spend, because I worked there a few weeks before contract, so I took those to think long and hard about what I would do. I ended up quitting, because I didn't want to work for a company that blackmails their personel.
Actually, there was also another company (not in IT) that end up blackmailing me and blaiming me for stuff after they noticed their blackmail didn't work on me. They still owe me a months worth of pay 'till this day.
That WB is going to fix this... I highly doubt they will. Like most companies in such a situation, they'll probably just do the bare minimum on the outside 'till their image is restored and everything else will be covered up. Even if something is your dreamjob, it isn't worth being taken advantage of. Because in the end you'll lose yourself and you still end up broke.
It's always funny how our modern society "likes" to see and believe the horrible working conditions in second and third world countries. But when this happens in first world countries, you're basicly considered a liar and being laughed at.
Well... my message got out of hand I see. Probably a lot of tl:dr 's coming at me :p.
