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I Don’t Care How Well You Code, Understand Your Compensation

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Re: I Don’t Care How Well You Code, Understand Your Compensation

#181

Post by pjc50 »

alanwatts wrote: post #155
pjc50 wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Finance is bad, but it's kind of a least-worst situation. What's the alternative that doesn't rely on philosopher-kings or omniscient omnibenevolent central planners?

>What's the alternative that doesn't rely on philosopher-kings or omniscient omnibenevolent central planners? Distributed sharing economies, like that of most tribal organizations.

I'd like to see your anthropology cites for "tribal organisations", please. Especially for those larger than a hundred thousand members.

Re: I Don’t Care How Well You Code, Understand Your Compensation

#182

Post by ryandrake »

olavgg wrote: post #69
flexie wrote: post #56

I think it's mostly supply and demand, timing and where you live. But those are the factors we rarely talk about. Instead, people complain they are not compensated enough relative to the importance of their work, their intelligence, the hours put in, their title or the length of their education or the risk they take. If people were paid according to the importance of their jobs, I would argue that plumbers, sewage wo…

Yes programmers are well compensated, but they are also in very high demand. One day at a big family union I got three phonecalls from recruiters. My whole family rolled their eyes, while I politely said no to those recruiters with below average offers. I told them that this is usual, I get a few phonecalls from recruiters every week. None of them who work as doctors, teachers, accounting, geophysicist, even an old C…

To be fair, most programmers also have never experienced a recruiter literally cold calling them sight unseen with a job offer. It's usually "hey can we chat, I know of a great company..." which is so different from a job offer it's meaningless.

Re: I Don’t Care How Well You Code, Understand Your Compensation

#183

Post by cm2187 »

riskable wrote: post #178
cm2187 wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The point of the article is not so much about what should be the right level of compensation for technical people but rather the issue of technical people not bothering to understand the terms of the financial agreements they get into. If they did examine the terms, as you said supply and demand would ensure the terms are fair.

> If they did examine the terms, as you said supply and demand would ensure the terms are fair. Only if all parties have all the information. The person being hired has now idea how desperate the company is for their skills, how much they're willing to spend, or even if the pay being offered is good for the location/position in a lot of cases.

And the company has no idea of whether the person being hire is as good as he pretends to be. This uncertainty goes both ways.

Re: I Don’t Care How Well You Code, Understand Your Compensation

#184

Post by lgieron »

riskable wrote: post #173
lgieron wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Exactly, in fact I think that if you want to stay healthy then working as a construction worker is great: you get physical excercise, fresh air, low stress level. Risk of injury is pretty low, and wages are pretty good. There's a pretty significant risk of DEATH (guys falling off from scaffolding, someone accidentally driving over you with an excavator etc.), you need to be on your toes a lot of the time or you'll…

There's degrees of risk associated with the type of construction work you do. I know someone who used to be a pipe fitter. Unless he showed up drunk at the job site (which may have happened a few times, hah) I don't think he was ever at risk of being run over by a backhoe or having something dropped on his head. Roofers, on the other hand, have extremely high risk of severe injury and death. Those guys are nuts! If I…

On the other hand, I've recently seen a wall painter balance on a thin and wobbly piece of wood stretched over a stairway (if he falls, it's going to be about 4 meters down and onto concrete stairs). That was apparently necessary to reach some parts of the ceiling. I wouldn't be surprised if electricians or plumbers had to do to this kind of (to me) completely crazy shit from time to time.

Re: I Don’t Care How Well You Code, Understand Your Compensation

#185

Post by shimon »

scandox wrote: post #127

People who care about money will always have trouble understanding people that don't care about money - and vice-versa. (Obviously, the context here is a milieu in which everybody has enough for basic needs.) It's all about head space. Caring about money is quite a binary thing: once you engage with it, it's a huge commitment - intellectually and emotionally. People who don't care about money understand that they're…

I don't see why it should be so polarized. You can care enough about money to understand the components of your compensation. You can also care about quality of life enough to make decisions that trade money earned for other goals.

There's an attitude of "money is unpure" that is destructive. Even if you are not motivated mainly by money, you will need to understand it so that you aren't taken advantage of by people who are motivated and fluent. Thinking you are above this is just an excuse for laziness - it's about as realistic as saying you're above eating healthy and exercising.

Re: I Don’t Care How Well You Code, Understand Your Compensation

#186

Post by epimetheus »

flexie wrote: post #56

I think it's mostly supply and demand, timing and where you live. But those are the factors we rarely talk about. Instead, people complain they are not compensated enough relative to the importance of their work, their intelligence, the hours put in, their title or the length of their education or the risk they take. If people were paid according to the importance of their jobs, I would argue that plumbers, sewage wo…

I know a water treatment plant worker, two plumbers, and an electrician in the Kansas City area, and they all make as much, if not more than my programming contemporaries. For instance, a friend tried to get me to work at Cerner for ~75-80k (good money in the Midwest), but those plumbers were making that plus some (45 dollars an hour, so in some cases would make more depending on overtime), the Electrician worked for himself and though I don't know his yearly earnings, he was making closer to 60/hr (based on a quote to install a ceiling fan, and since he was a HS buddy, he probably gave me a discount). The wastewater plant worker? He's a manager now making 100k or so, but started out at 60k, not bad for the midwest as well.

I'd not trade my cushy, indoor job for that, mind you, just the idea that trade workers necessarily make peanuts, I believe, is without merit.

Re: I Don’t Care How Well You Code, Understand Your Compensation

#187

Post by lgieron »

randallsquared wrote: post #175
lgieron wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Exactly, in fact I think that if you want to stay healthy then working as a construction worker is great: you get physical excercise, fresh air, low stress level. Risk of injury is pretty low, and wages are pretty good. There's a pretty significant risk of DEATH (guys falling off from scaffolding, someone accidentally driving over you with an excavator etc.), you need to be on your toes a lot of the time or you'll…

> On top of that, your boss is often an asshole (there's none of the white collar world politeness). Being an asshole has very little to do with crude language.

I actually didn't meant the language only. I think white collar workers (well developers at least) are pampered. Almost every boss I had paid at least some attention to my wellbeing on the job. I don't think that's true in blue collar world where, by nature of the job, you're just expected to "tough it out".

Re: I Don’t Care How Well You Code, Understand Your Compensation

#189

Post by vtlynch »

flexie wrote: post #56

I think it's mostly supply and demand, timing and where you live. But those are the factors we rarely talk about. Instead, people complain they are not compensated enough relative to the importance of their work, their intelligence, the hours put in, their title or the length of their education or the risk they take. If people were paid according to the importance of their jobs, I would argue that plumbers, sewage wo…

>I think it's mostly supply and demand, timing and where you live. But those are the factors we rarely talk about.

I think those are the exact factors constantly mentioned by the HackerNews community.

Re: I Don’t Care How Well You Code, Understand Your Compensation

#190

Post by LanceH »

ryandrake wrote: post #180
colanderman wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be fair, no teacher I have ever known has stopped working at 3:20 PM. Grading and planning often go far into the evening.

Additionally, no teacher I have ever known has had the summer off. Summer is when they do catch-up work, lesson planning, etc., the technical debt payback of the teaching world. (source: three parents/step-parents were school teachers)

To be fair, no teacher I've ever known as received only 10 day vacation and 10 holidays.

They have over 20 days of holidays built in during the school year and a legitimate two months off between years.

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