Coronavirus: Facebook To Give $1,000 Bonus to Employees, Not Contractors (UPDATE)

According to The Intercept, Facebook employees will receive a $1,000 bonus but not contractors.

Techcrunch estimates Facebook has 15,000 content moderators working through third-party jobbers. In a interview with the BBC, Zuckerberg stated that Facebook full-time employees will take over judgments about sensitive topics, including self-harm and suicide, in part to decrease the mental health repercussions of viewing such content on third-partyt\ contractors, and continued he was “personally quite worried that the isolation from people being at home could potentially lead to more depression or mental health issues, and I want to make sure that we are ahead of that supporting our community.”

(Original Report: March 17, 2020) On Tuesday, Facebook told employees the social media giant would give each of them a $1,000 bonus to support them during the Coronavirus outbreak.

According to CNBC, the announcement was made by CEO Mark Zuckerberg in an internal memo to employees.

Currently, Facebook has 45,000 full-time employees but also employs thousands of contract employees. Now, it is not clear if those contracted employees will also receive the bonus.

Facebook is not the only company providing its employees with cash bonuses. Workday announced Monday it would pay cash bonuses worth two weeks’ pay to their employees.

Facebook on Tuesday also announced a $100 million program to assist small businesses impacted by COVID-19. The program’s mission is to provide 30,000 eligible small businesses cash grants and ad credits during the pandemic.

As we previously reported, COVID-19 has already had a significant impact on the economy with forecasts suggesting things will not get better. But, it has had a substantial effect on Facebook itself. Shares of the social media company are down more than 28% year-to-date as Wall Street fears go viral through the market.

Facebook canceled its F8 annual developer’s conference. Earlier this month, Facebook told employees to work from home and pulled out of other meetings.

In other news, President Donald Trump advised limiting interactions and gatherings to 10 people or less. The number of states and cities are calling for people to engage in social distancing due to the coronavirus pandemic is rising. On Tuesday, health officials have issued an important message for all Americans to limit social interactions to help healthcare systems prevent a rise of patients. As of Tuesday, 87 Americans have died with 4,490 infections, an increase of 1,000 confirmed infections from Sunday.