Ask HN: How happy are you working as a programmer? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: How happy are you working as a programmer?

#421

Post by vonmoltke » Mon, Feb 01, 2016, 6:20 PM UTC

NDizzle wrote: post #373

sciguy77 wrote: post #324

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Woah, can you expand on this? Are you a contractor or a government employee? What makes it laid back? Are the deadlines just more reasonable?

I have a good friend who lives in Alabama and works for one of the many DoD contractors. When he leaves work at 5pm he actually can't access his work email. Nobody can send him anything from work on an unsecured line. When he leaves work at 5pm on a Friday, nobody can contact him about work related things until he is on site at 8am on Monday morning. He's a senior level unix admin. That can't ever be paged. I'd say t…

Depends on the company and facility situation. I worked for several years in such an environment, but the facility was open 24/7. You could be paged at any time for critical issues, but of course would always have to come in to find out what it actually was. Not being able to bring work home just led to the expectation that you would spend more time in the office.

Re: Ask HN: How happy are you working as a programmer?

#422

Post by hellameta » Mon, Feb 01, 2016, 6:20 PM UTC

shade23 wrote: post #357

hellameta wrote: post #331

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The appeal of physical labor? People only do physical labor because they are either unlucky or simply lack the knowledge to choose another path. I don't expect that to be the popular perspective on "PC" hacker news but that is the real world for you. Show me a gardener who wouldn't want to make 6 figures instead of breaking their back day in and day out for close to if not minimum wage? Appeal? Yeah right.

I disagree with your POV.I would rather say that everyone likes a change.Most of the programmers have very active lifestyle where they pursue physical labour based hobbies.To bring in an age-old platitude , "Everything is good in moderation" .You have extremes like a person who decided to leave programming to become a farmer[1]. And several other examples like this exist.What you need to understand is the satisfactio…

I see your POV but simply don't think it's realistic. Not to mention the salaries you linked are, as far as I can tell, lower than most 'white collar' jobs.

Most gardeners, plumbers, construction workers etc. are NOT artisans. They are just normal people trying to get by as best as they can with the means that they have. They often have lower level of education etc. etc. This is the real world. Not to mention that most programmers don't actually like programming... it's just the myth perpetuated on these (and other alike) boards. These are 90% of programmers that aren't on HN etc. They just don't care. They don't love programming at all - it's just their job.

This passion for creation is great - but it's simply too idealistic. Most people hate their damn jobs and hate it mostly because of how exhausting it is to make not very much money.

Re: Ask HN: How happy are you working as a programmer?

#423

Post by existencebox » Mon, Feb 01, 2016, 6:22 PM UTC

marknutter wrote: post #275

Any time I catch myself complaining about my career I do my best to jolt myself out of it. That's not to say I have nothing to complain about or that aspects of my career and my job can't be improved, but my god, is there really any other profession in the world that is as lucrative, open, and challenging as programming? There are no bullshit certifications to go through, the best tools and resources are free and ope…

I can't "disagree" with your post persay, but I can say it doesn't take into account people with different prioritization. That a job is Lucrative does not make it enjoyable. Challenging, as well, can be good, but a day of constant mental challenge does leave you feeling absolutely drained, despite what some sister comments are implying. (And before the inevitable "you have a silver spoon job" comment, I started my working life as a mover for a few years to pay for school/living expenses; It's a different sort of tired for sure, but both sorts keep you from exercising various leisure activities post-factum; but again to preempt comments, yes, mental work does leave your body in better shape in the long run and as I say below, grateful for that)

At the end of the day, and perhaps this is in itself a very egocentric world view, I'd be hard pressed to find any work that if I were doing it _as work_ I'd be happy doing. I chose programming because I have a knack for it, have focused my time on it to build skills, and as you say, it's lucrative. But every second of the day (and the implied unpaid overtime that seems prevalent in our industry) there's a little thread in the back of my head going "there's so much to see/do in the world, and already so little time." I want to make music, learn to paint, visit countries I've never heard of, but as long as supporting a family, covering healthcare/retirement savings/housing costs etc are all in the picture, even with as lucrative a career as we have obtaining those ends is a long process that you will likely emit some blood and tears for.

So am I Happy as a programmer? Probably more-so than I'd be in many other fields, and certainly grateful for what I have. Am I Happy in an absolute sense? No, I wouldn't say that; and no amount of comparative logic, despite recognizing the ego-centrism, is going to help me reconcile that internally. I'll do my work best I can, not whinge too much, (pushing for a better system in the interim where appropriate for the selfish sake of my own "happiness"), but the moment I get "out" will be one of the truly happiest days of my life. (I could see myself eating those words, and I'll certainly own up to it if that's so, but I don't see that as likely from where I'm currently standing)

Re: Ask HN: How happy are you working as a programmer?

#424

Post by cgopalan » Mon, Feb 01, 2016, 6:22 PM UTC

dota_fanatic wrote: post #378

marknutter wrote: post #275

Any time I catch myself complaining about my career I do my best to jolt myself out of it. That's not to say I have nothing to complain about or that aspects of my career and my job can't be improved, but my god, is there really any other profession in the world that is as lucrative, open, and challenging as programming? There are no bullshit certifications to go through, the best tools and resources are free and ope…

Indeed. But what about everyone else? The longer I work in this field and the more I understand about optimization and physical processes, the worse I feel about the work I do and the work of most programmers. Not "but it's just a social app?!" people, but the people in medicine, law, education, small business, hardware, logistics, etc, all pushing business forward bit by bit, automating away the repetitive pieces an…

"Count me in as someone who, given the support of basic income, can and will live frugally and give my working self 100% towards ethical objectives, as I understand them."

Amen, brother/sister, amen. Exactly how I feel. Also I see you are empathetic towards animals. I have adopted animal welfare and animal rights as my single biggest ethical objective. After working for about 20 years on writing software for domains like transportation, telecommunications, social media, I have decided enough is enough and am going to work towards doing some work (mostly software-related) in the animal welfare area this year and increase it every year. I am not saying anyone who works in the other fields are bad, since people working on different things is what makes the world work. I just feel that I should separate work that pays the bills (Wb) and work that is meaningful (Wm) to me. And the goal is to minimize Wb and maximize Wm in the 24 hrs available. With basic income, Wb would be zero, so that would be ideal.

Re: Ask HN: How happy are you working as a programmer?

#425

Post by goldbrick » Mon, Feb 01, 2016, 6:23 PM UTC

hipsters_unite wrote: post #383

logfromblammo wrote: post #350

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It depends on the contract. For the most part, the scrutiny of government auditors ensure that you actually can't work more than 40 hours in a single week. Sometimes the contract also ensures that the work cannot be done outside of a government-controlled facility. So if you're the actual do-the-work peon instead of someone in any of the several tiers of useless middlemen, you work regular 8 hour days, get 10 or 11 p…

11 or 10 paid holidays? Do you mean that's the total number of holiday days you get in an entire year? Does that include public holidays?

To me as a US English speaker this meant public holidays, since we normally call the other type of holiday "vacation". He probably gets at least 10-15 of those as well.

Re: Ask HN: How happy are you working as a programmer?

#426

Post by vonmoltke » Mon, Feb 01, 2016, 6:24 PM UTC

logfromblammo wrote: post #350

sciguy77 wrote: post #324

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Woah, can you expand on this? Are you a contractor or a government employee? What makes it laid back? Are the deadlines just more reasonable?

It depends on the contract. For the most part, the scrutiny of government auditors ensure that you actually can't work more than 40 hours in a single week. Sometimes the contract also ensures that the work cannot be done outside of a government-controlled facility. So if you're the actual do-the-work peon instead of someone in any of the several tiers of useless middlemen, you work regular 8 hour days, get 10 or 11 p…

> For the most part, the scrutiny of government auditors ensure that you actually can't work more than 40 hours in a single week.

Have yet to encounter a contracting environment where is is true. In fact, I was explicitly told that since I was salaried I was expected to put in whatever work it took to make deadlines, despite only putting 40 hours down on my timecard. Considering the facility I worked in had a DCAA office embedded in it I find it hard to believe the government did not know this was going on.

Re: Ask HN: How happy are you working as a programmer?

#427

Post by geebee » Mon, Feb 01, 2016, 6:26 PM UTC

zzalpha wrote: post #56

laxatives wrote: post #20

6/10. I'm less than 3 years into my career, but I think I've worked for some of the best companies with great pay, benefits, environments, etc, including a tech giant and two startups. End of the day though, work is boring. Its always work. Your time and effort is going towards making someone else rich and their priorities are more important than your own. The only things I really look forward to are vacations and ev…

Uhh... I have to ask: what, exactly, were you expecting? Exhilarating highs and a path to millions? It's a job. Most people don't have jobs that'll make them "rich". Be glad you aren't living paycheck to paycheck, or worse, are unemployed because the job you had was optimized away with computers. To be blunt, there's a sense of entitlement evident, here, that I have trouble grokking. You get to spend all day in a com…

I agree with you, but there are two very different angles on this.

On one hand, there are programmers complaining that they can't get exactly the job they want at what they feel is good pay. Your answer to these complaints is fair enough - lots of people have it tough. Nobody is entitled to a job on their own terms. You choose your own life.

The other angle is the employer who complains about the "shortage" of software developers out there who have top skills and are ready and willing to work for the salary the employer feels is fair in a big, loud, open office with little autonomy or job security. This second, employer-based sense of entitlement is no less appalling in my opinion.

I'm going to guess we disagree on the stress level involved in being a programmer, where you are almost always pressured to commit to deadlines on things you don't yet understand, where people blame you for schedule slips, where you are tempted to compromise to meet deadlines but know that you are cutting corners that may lead to real risk, where you can make errors that destroy data and/or prevent thousands of people from getting work done, where you may severely compromise secure data, and so forth.. in short, I do think it is a job that people can reasonably find very stressful. I think that people overstate the "cushiness" of programming and IT jobs. These jobs can really induce and trigger anxiety, it doesn't take an entitled whiner to feel that way, at all.

Say what you will about programmers, it's the employers (at least here in the States) whose sense of entitlement about who they should be able to hire at "market rate" is so strong they will lobby congress rather that pay more or find ways to make the job less stressful.

Re: Ask HN: How happy are you working as a programmer?

#428

Post by zenlikethat » Mon, Feb 01, 2016, 6:28 PM UTC

hardwaresofton wrote: post #389

marknutter wrote: post #275

Any time I catch myself complaining about my career I do my best to jolt myself out of it. That's not to say I have nothing to complain about or that aspects of my career and my job can't be improved, but my god, is there really any other profession in the world that is as lucrative, open, and challenging as programming? There are no bullshit certifications to go through, the best tools and resources are free and ope…

If I'm reading you right, "realistic shot" = 1 in 10 succeed right? I'm not saying that's right or wrong, good or bad, but just to let people know that's generally the statistic that gets thrown around for becoming profitable as some new tech startup trying to make it. I am unsure if that stat is VC-funded only or contains bootstrapped startups and VC-funded ones. I absolutely agree with your post. This is what I fee…

I think the original poster just means that, compared to other industries, the odds of success starting a software company (especially a bootstrapped business or consulting business) is a lot higher than other industries. I'd take software odds over the odds of starting a restaurant that succeeds any day.

Re: Ask HN: How happy are you working as a programmer?

#429

Post by tertius » Mon, Feb 01, 2016, 6:32 PM UTC

dota_fanatic wrote: post #378

marknutter wrote: post #275

Any time I catch myself complaining about my career I do my best to jolt myself out of it. That's not to say I have nothing to complain about or that aspects of my career and my job can't be improved, but my god, is there really any other profession in the world that is as lucrative, open, and challenging as programming? There are no bullshit certifications to go through, the best tools and resources are free and ope…

Indeed. But what about everyone else? The longer I work in this field and the more I understand about optimization and physical processes, the worse I feel about the work I do and the work of most programmers. Not "but it's just a social app?!" people, but the people in medicine, law, education, small business, hardware, logistics, etc, all pushing business forward bit by bit, automating away the repetitive pieces an…

I think I can add two items to the discussion.

1. People have been automating away other people's jobs for millennia. Even though this has been happening, poverty is at an all time low.

2. It's not your responsibility to make a herculean difference.

I can see that the fewer people (the knowledge of this that you're exposed to) there are that try to make a difference the larger your contribution needs to be to even out all the slackers. At least that's how we feel.

If we all (those who care) felt this way we'd all get stuck and not do anything.

The correct reaction (and only plausible) is to "do your part" as if you were one in 7 billion.

The reason why the richest of the rich (think Gates) have campaigns that are public is because they know, even with their wealth, that they cannot make a very large difference with a lot of people changing their habits be that giving or lifestyle.

Re: Ask HN: How happy are you working as a programmer?

#430

Post by marknutter » Mon, Feb 01, 2016, 6:34 PM UTC

dota_fanatic wrote: post #378

marknutter wrote: post #275

Any time I catch myself complaining about my career I do my best to jolt myself out of it. That's not to say I have nothing to complain about or that aspects of my career and my job can't be improved, but my god, is there really any other profession in the world that is as lucrative, open, and challenging as programming? There are no bullshit certifications to go through, the best tools and resources are free and ope…

Indeed. But what about everyone else? The longer I work in this field and the more I understand about optimization and physical processes, the worse I feel about the work I do and the work of most programmers. Not "but it's just a social app?!" people, but the people in medicine, law, education, small business, hardware, logistics, etc, all pushing business forward bit by bit, automating away the repetitive pieces an…

> But what about everyone else? The longer I work in this field and the more I understand about optimization and physical processes, the worse I feel about the work I do and the work of most programmers. Not "but it's just a social app?!" people, but the people in medicine, law, education, small business, hardware, logistics, etc, all pushing business forward bit by bit, automating away the repetitive pieces and making it easier for those in monetarily advantageous positions to capture the flag.

That's a rather depressing way to look at it. As an engineer, nothing bothers me more than being forced to do a task that can be automated. It's dehumanizing in the same way that working an assembly line or picking fruit in a field is. It's called work for a reason - it's not fun, but it's gotta get done. Every time we automate a dehumanizing aspect of a job, the world collectively benefits.

> It's hard for me to be too happy when I see ubiquitous animal suffering in a system I'm helping to persist, seemingly towards the end of life on earth altogether. Why do I do it? I need money, and I'm only so strong for now. How can I cooperate when the biggest and greatest are of a world of defectors? Selfishness wins? It's all too easy to conclude, "I can't make a difference, not really", and the probability of making a difference drops to 0, prophesy fulfilled. After all, rent is due, student loan is due.

What are you doing to change things?

> Count me in as someone who, given the support of basic income, can and will live frugally and give my working self 100% towards ethical objectives, as I understand them. In the meantime, this whole "but we have it so great compared to everyone else!!" just makes me feel even worse, over-burdened. If I can't make a difference with all these advantages, without seemingly herculean efforts, then who?

Do you really need a basic income implementation for this to work? Can't you simply downsize your expenses to x/10 what they are now, work x/10 as much to pay for them, and do whatever you want for the other (10-x)/10 worth of time?

Or better yet, can't you start a non-profit that actually works on the issues you feel need fixing so you can earn an income while you do work 100% towards ethical objectives?

I don't mean to be rude, but it sounds like you have more excuses than answers.