I'm not shedding any tears for the companies that failed to do their due dilligence in hiring, especially not ones involved in AI (seems most were) and involved with Y Combinator.
That said, unless you want to get into a critique of capitalism itself, or start getting into whataboutism regarding celebrity executives like a number of the HN comments do, I don't have many qualms calling this sort of thing unethical.
This whole thing is flying way too close to the "not debate club" rule for my comfort already, but I wrote it so I may as well post it
Multiple jobs at a time, or not giving 100% for your full scheduled hours is an entirely different beast than playing some game of "I'm going to get hired at literally as many places as possible, lie to all of them, not do any actual work at all, and then see how long I can draw a paycheck while doing nothing".
Like, get that bag, but ew. It's a matter of intent and of scale.
I can't find anything indicating that the guy actually provided anything of value in exchange for the paychecks. Ostensibly, employment is meant to be a value exchange.
Most critically for me: I can't help but hurt some for all the people on teams screwed over by this. I've been in too many situations where even getting a single extra pair of hands on a team was a heroic feat. I've seen the kind of effects it has on a team tthat's trying not to drown when the extra bucket to bail out the water is instead just another hole drilled into the bottom of the boat. That sort of situation led directly to my own burnout, which I'm still not completely recovered from nearly half a decade later.
Call my opinion crab bucketing if you like, but we all live in this capitalist framework, and actions like this have human consequences, not just consequences on the CEO's yearly bonus.
Yeah, that kind of comment is going to fly over the head of a lot of stupid people.