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Being a Developer After 40

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Re: Being a Developer After 40

#531

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Two people of the same socioeconomic standing but of different races. One has a lower bar to entry into college because of affirmative action and a easier time getting a high paying job because of diversity needs. Who has the privilege here?

There's no exact solution to these problems, and I will admit that affirmative action is more of a band-aid than anything else, but POC (I only speak for the US here) in general are worse off economically, have a criminal justice system that disproportionately incarcerates POC for similar non-violent crimes as whites through stop-and-frisk and racial profiling, are stripped of their voting rights The concept of white…

POC (I only speak for the US here) in general are worse off economically, have a criminal justice system that disproportionately incarcerates POC for similar non-violent crimes as whites through stop-and-frisk and racial profiling, are stripped of their voting rights

The uncomfortable truth we need to be talking about is that POC commit a disproportionate amount of the crime in the US, and so nothing you said should come as a surprise. The fact that we can't have an open and frank conversation about this is part of the problem. Promulgating white guilt and a perpetuating a victimhood complex in everybody else does nothing to move things forward. It keeps people from empowering themselves and fosters divisiveness. In fact thinking that these other cultures need our help because they are incapable of lifting themselves up without us is actually pretty condescending. It sounds a bit bigoted if you ask me.

But to say that all other things equal, a white person and a black person of the same economic status is equal in our society is blatantly false.

I never said they were equal. In this specific hypothetical I'm saying doors open more easily for the black person.

Re: Being a Developer After 40

#532
post #265
post #242

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No, the poster you are responding to is absolutely right -- we need a better language for this thing we are talking about today. You again are getting all hung up on wine and roses (things being good ) when that's not what is being discussed by your partner in this discussion. It's worth going back to the original essay discussing "white privilege" -- the text can be found at http://ted.coe.wayne.edu/ele3600/mcintosh…

> I can swear, or dress in second-hand clothes or not answer letters without having people attribute these choices to the bad morals, the poverty, or the illiteracy of my race. You've never heard of "White Trash" or "Rednecks" (a.k.a Bogans in Australia) or how "uneducated" the South is in America (nevermind that Alabama outranks California in graduation ranks)? > I am never asked to speak for all the people of my ra…

As you are happy to point out, no one asked me to :)

Re: Being a Developer After 40

#533
post #258
post #253

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Gotta agree. You don't have to be a racist to benefit from racism; just look at the Federal Housing Administrations redlining policies and look at the great rates on home mortgages your grandparents got (if they're white Americans). Why do people view this as an attack on their character? It's just a bunch of facts, spelled out in legislation.

> look at the great rates on home mortgages your grandparents got (if they're white Americans) I am a "white American" and my grandfather grew up in a home with dirt floors then built his home with his own hands (twice, because his first home burned down). Quit making such pompous assumptions.

Sounds like he didn't get a mortgage. Again, why are you taking this personally or as an attack on your character?

Re: Being a Developer After 40

#534

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just like a white man can suffer from socio-economic disadvantages, a woman of color can benefit from class privilege. Who do you think it's going to have an easier life? Obama's daughters or some boys from the Appalachia region? It's unfair to discuss gender and race without considering class. It is also unfair to claim disadvantage in one without acknowledging benefits from the other two. This is also the biggest c…

> It's unfair to discuss gender and race without considering class. Think about the practical consequences of what you're saying. Having a discussion about gender, race, class, etc. alone is challenging enough. Do you really want to say that we shouldn't discuss any of these issues unless we agree to simultaneously discuss all of them? What about all of the other factors that can also lead to inequality? Does that se…

You have to keep in mind where we are. HN isn't a group of people who read bell hooks and Gloria Steinem. HN is a group of men who boycotts Github for hurting their fee fees.

If I don't concede on class issues then my comment would have been flagged and downvoted into oblivion. I hope at least it got a couple of people do think about gender and race.

Anyway, I upvoted every one of your comments. Thank you for fighting the good fight. I really don't have the energy to argue with ignorant people anymore.

Re: Being a Developer After 40

#535
post #320

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No one is attacking your grandfather. The previous poster is simply pointing out the better mortgage rates many white Americans of his generation would have received as a direct result of the racist culture. From Wikipedia [1] > For example, in Atlanta in the 1980s, a Pulitzer Prize-winning series of articles by investigative-reporter Bill Dedman showed that banks would often lend to lower-income whites but not to mi…

> No one is attacking your grandfather. The previous poster said "your grandparents". A narrow minded assumption that every white person reading his comment would/should identify with. > The previous poster is simply pointing out the better mortgage rates many white Americans of his generation would have received as a direct result of the racist culture. Then quit complaining to the current generation(s). Grow up, st…

Redlining is part of the immense capital transfer from blacks to hashtag-not-all-whites that America is famous for. Understanding this capital transfer is useful in considering why economic inequality persists today -- and you can certainly use it to figure out why parts of Appalachia and the South have such poor white populations as well.

It sounds like you're pretty emotional about your grandparents' life, and that's cool; it shouldn't preclude discussion of history that acknowledge the intentionally differential effects of Reconstruction, federal support for homeownership, federal sentencing laws for drug crimes, voting law, etc. These are all facts in history that have effects on what is possible now, because they have determined what we're starting from. Why say that the Armenians are still allowed to be traumatized about what happened in the 1920s while black Americans aren't allowed to talk about mortgages in the 1980s? It just isn't very logical. We should be able to talk about all of this.

Re: Being a Developer After 40

#536

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just like a white man can suffer from socio-economic disadvantages, a woman of color can benefit from class privilege. Who do you think it's going to have an easier life? Obama's daughters or some boys from the Appalachia region? It's unfair to discuss gender and race without considering class. It is also unfair to claim disadvantage in one without acknowledging benefits from the other two. This is also the biggest c…

How the heck is that a valid criticism of feminism? Feminism is intended to remedy the injustices of the hierarchical arrangement of men and women. That's literally all it is for. One may as well criticize La Raza for not addressing the oppression of Tibetans in China. We already have isms that address class issues; they're called Marxism and socialism. Feminism isn't the mommy ideology that has to welcome all into i…

Are you familiar with the history of feminism?

First wave and second wave of feminism were both coopted by upper middle class white women. Third wave, the current one, pays some attention to intersectionality, but mainstream feminism doesn't challenge the status quo enough. That's why there is backlash against Sheryl Sandberg's Lean In.

A quote from the wiki page: "Black feminism is a school of thought which argues that sexism, class oppression, gender identity and racism are inextricably bound together"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_feminism

However, people on HN bring up class to derail conversation about race and gender, but that's a different can of worms.

Re: Being a Developer After 40

#537
post #490
post #477

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Please include stock grants , because otherwise it's a silly comparison. With that included, I know a lot of people in SV, NYC, and even Pittsburgh who meet that bar. Google, Facebook, Dropbox, Microsoft -- all of these places pay over $200k total compensation for senior engineers. A grant of shares of GOOG or MSFT every year isn't likely to completely disappear within the vesting period...

Stock grants for non-executive employees are rather rare (at least on the East Coast). And even then, once the bubble pops, if you don't sell (there is usually a vesting period), they could be worth much, much less than today. Remember 2000-2001?

I'm confused about this "east coast" thing. Many of the major tech companies that compensate in cash+RSUs operate on the east coast at some scale or another. Heck, in Pittsburgh alone, you can pick from Uber, Google, Facebook (Oculus), and Apple, of the "really big tech companies that give their employees RSUs". You'll find similar options, no pun intended, in NYC and Boston, at minimum.

As I said: The rolling vesting offered by most companies means that you're selling stock every year after your first. So if you ignore the first year (or pretend that it's poorly compensated), it's not that shockingly bad.

Re: Being a Developer After 40

#538
post #450
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I'm pretty sure there are more distinguished engineers and other senior engineering roles paying $750/year in total comp at Google/Microsoft/Apple etc. than there are neurosurgeons. Not to mention tens of thousands of average developers that got lucky with stock options and became millionaires where a doctor of same age is still slaving away as a resident with 24-hour shifts and abysmal pay ($50-$60k year for surgica…

>The market (not society) is treating us developers pretty >well. I am on the East Coast (outside of NYC, though), have been in the software business for 20+ years and know a lot of smart /accomplished people. I don't know a single software engineer who makes more than $200K/year in a senior engineering role, as an employee. (We are comparing salaries, not consulting income or stock options here, which can disappear…

I am not in SV (but still on the West coast) and I know several software engineers making more than 200k/year. That includes stock grants, because it's ridiculous not to when the stock is in a public company and can be immediately turned into cash.

Re: Being a Developer After 40

#539
post #510

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Ok, I thought we were speaking "privilege" however now you're bringing up or conflating oppression, which to my understanding is different. Never the less, even in Sunni areas, I dont think it would be helpful to describe the issue suffered by say Shias as Sunni privilege. This representation is apt to create a greater wedge between the groups. Now, as it pertains people in general, within neighborhoods with a majori…

I don't think you can have privilege without oppression of some sort, whether it's an extreme level of oppression like legalized slavery in America, or a more subdued kind like the economic inequality we have in America today. Never the less, even in Sunni areas, I dont think it would be helpful to describe the issue suffered by say Shias as Sunni privilege. I'd tentatively agree. The value, if any, of "_____ privile…

Consider the urban/rural dichotomy that exists in many places. In such places, even in very homogenous places, you will find a pronounced "privilege". An Osakan in Tokyo, East Londoner in London proper, a farmboy from Högsby vs someone in Stockholm. A mestizo from the country side vs a mestizo MDFer. It's more than race or religious and it's something beside "oppression". Alike people tend to help people like themselves. Sometimes that breaks along class, color, accent, political leanings, ethnicity, physique, etc. You can find someone disadvantaged and someone else privileged by being considered part of a given group.

It seems to me the better way is to empower those groups. Give them resources --be it educational facilities with an emphasis on overcoming a different framework etc. If we want people from East end London to be able to compete with people from London proper, while not building "posers" we'd want to have them understand how one can better fit into that structure (attempting to modify that structure may not be the best approach. For a look at changing an entrenched structure refer to the many revolutions which failed in their grand ambitions at changing their societies (even homogenous ones).

Further, let's say I wanted to do well in China. Do I keep on insisting on being a Yank? Or do I try to adapt to the mainstream culture, learn their "language" -which is more than just knowing Mandarin but other aspects of friendship and interpersonal relationships? It may depend if I want to work for a foreign (non_Chinese company) or local.

Re: Being a Developer After 40

#540
post #415

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Outside of SV and NYC, $150k is more than enough for a single-income family of four to have a solidly upper-middle class lifestyle.

Not, really, if saving for retirement is factored in. Most people aren't saving at all, which is how they manage to maintain that upper middle class lifestyle on what has becoming the equivalent of a formerly lower middle class salary.

So true. Alone its a good salary with retirement needs not so much.
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