Tech Jobs Lead to the Middle Class, But Not for the Masses • Hacker News Board

Re: Tech Jobs Lead to the Middle Class, But Not for the Masses

#141

Post by Kinnard » Mon, May 20, 2019, 7:12 PM UTC

neonate wrote: post #50

Kinnard wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How are you able to assess what they are capable of?

That is part of the teaching process, no?

I'm asking how he assesses their capacity, not asserting that he is not able to.

Not a statement hiding in a question :|

Re: Tech Jobs Lead to the Middle Class, But Not for the Masses

#142

Post by strikelaserclaw » Mon, May 20, 2019, 8:00 PM UTC

caseymarquis wrote: post #88

seibelj wrote: post #13

There has always been a bottom-tier category of software development, which is programming at the level of "tweaking wordpress websites". Not that all jobs at this level are doing this, but the technical skill is what it takes to setup, configure, operate, and tweak a wordpress website, which requires some understanding of how websites work, web servers, PHP, JavaScript, CSS, a plugin ecosystem, backups, etc. It is q…

And here I am debugging TCP stacks, reverse engineering custom network protocols, writing ISRs in assembly, and doing fullstack, embedded, and native development while making that same amount. I feel underpaid. :(

If there is one thing i learned in life, there is only little correlation between how much you are paid and how hard your job is.

Re: Tech Jobs Lead to the Middle Class, But Not for the Masses

#143

Post by Chyzwar » Mon, May 20, 2019, 11:03 PM UTC

eropple wrote: post #35

Chyzwar wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Splitting the store into smaller tasks is better. It forces you to plan and communicate your progress. It allows for adjustments in both requirements and estimation. In many business cases, this approach is better. The senior developer should outperform multiple juniors anyway, in most cases, it is seniors that carry progress. Toxic companies will twist a good process and make it horrible. It is not Agile or Scrum to…

Splitting things is not inherently bad. Doing so in an attempt to commodify its application is not inherently bad. Doing so in an attempt to commodify its application is definitely bad for developers' careers .

If you care more about career than team success, project delivery and skills progression you are already in a sad place.

"Commodify of application" is a good thing. This means that your team is flexible and can adapt to changes. It mean that there little of key person dependencies. It makes you go for holidays without worrying that your team will be able to finish a new service because you are one of two people that can navigate AWS :P

Re: Tech Jobs Lead to the Middle Class, But Not for the Masses

#144

Post by csense » Tue, May 21, 2019, 10:18 PM UTC

"Your job screwing bolts on cars disappeared? Learn to code and be a programmer." Great advice for the typical HN reader, but a lot of people who can learn to screw bolts on cars just don't have what it takes to be a good coder.

I don't know if it's due to innate intelligence, upbringing, environment, attitude, or what. But there are millions of people out there who just don't seem to be able to master the abstract thinking required. And I'm not sure they'll ever be able to, regardless of how much education we give them.

What should our economy do with those people going forward? For social stability and ethical reasons, we ought to give them a path to decent middle class lives. How do we make that happen?

I think the key's that from 1880 to 1980, we invented mainly technologies that pulled more and more people into the labor force. Now we've started inventing technologies that push more and more people out of the labor force.

How do we reverse the trend? What kind of technology can we try to invent that pulls in a huge number of people to work, the more laborers, the better?