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Laid Off, Now What?

bharathpbhat.github.io

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Re: Laid Off, Now What?

#291

Post by notxnphbk »

dccoolgai wrote: post #12

These are all great tips. It is a really well-written article with great advice. I just come away from this with a crushing sense of depression driven by the following thoughts: I can't believe this is how the country I live in treats people who bring their high-demand skills here. 60 days or get out. This absolutely effects every engineer. Even the most racist ones: that there is a bedrock of people they are allowed…

> I can't believe this is how the country I live in treats people who bring their high-demand skills here.

Well, I highly doubt American companies are pushing for this treatment. They benefit the most from getting whoever they want to hire however they want to hire them.

So, you must be implying that this "treatment" is coming from a non-corporate entity?

> that there is a bedrock of people they are allowed to treat this way puts a hard ceiling on your own compensation.

This argument is strange, because you are implying that it is the corporations that are kicking people out. But, I am not sure that aligns with their incentives.

So, if the corporations are not the ones kicking the desirable people out then why would losing that person force them to put a hard ceiling on others potential compensation?

I am not sure I follow the logic.

> I can't believe this is how interviewing works in this field.

I 100% agre. It is broken. But, I also think we are not being honest as to why. If we think logically (and game-theoretically) then it is easy to assume that these corporations have a huge incentive to engage in this behavior. Could it be that they have a sea of choice beyond anything the tech industry has ever had before?

Re: Laid Off, Now What?

#292

Post by jgwil2 »

creato wrote: post #244
rhexs wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think there's certainly some truth to coding interviews being an effective mechanism in shifting hiring towards H1Bs. It's much easier to say that Americans can't do the job when you create a test around studying for 500 hours to memorize hundreds upon hundreds of coding puzzles in order to build up a mental encyclopedia of how to quickly apply your algorithmic "training" to the puzzle of the day. I'd bet H1Bs are…

This is an absurd characterization of coding interviews. I've been on both sides of big tech interviews, and I've been at a few companies. I've seen two extremes. At one end, the company had pretty lax interviews, and I rarely interviewed anyone while I was there. The quality of people at this company was relatively low, from my small sample size of coworkers. At the other end, a company well known for challenging co…

I've worked with people that I consider pretty smart, and they definitely study (and enjoy) the kinds of problems that are given in interviews. 500 hours may be an exaggeration, but I think the idea that this stuff comes naturally to successful people is a bit ridiculous.

Re: Laid Off, Now What?

#293

Post by jen20 »

scarface74 wrote: post #214
jen20 wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is what management companies are for.

And they take 10%-20% of your monthly rent and at least half of the first months rent of a new lease. When I was in real estate, the banks would only credit your income at a 75% occupancy rate. It’s hard to break even on an income basis with rental real estate. When your property is vacant, you’re still on the hook for the mortgage. More than likely, your income is going to be lower when you’re forced to leave the co…

I'm aware - the answer to "Have you ever tried being a landlord if you are in another part of the same metro area that is only an hour away?" is no, but I do from another country, right now, using a management company.

Re: Laid Off, Now What?

#294

Post by TeaDrunk »

kinkrtyavimoodh wrote: post #186
addicted wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The whole argument that Democrats, who have voted for bills that help resolve H1B issues by vast majorities and Obama passed executive actions that among other things allowed H1B spouses to work, provided a grace period, and until Republicans sued and had it rolled back in court allowed for H1 B green cards to be filled from infilled green cards in other categories, don’t really care is a remarkably wrong statement,…

> and the other side doing pretty much all the can within the legal powers they have to improve the situation Except they aren't. There is a clear 'caste' system when it comes to the immigration Democrats care about. Their primary focus is on immigration across the Mexican border (a lot of which is often technically or borderline 'illegal') which they want to make as legitimized as possible as the Hispanic community…

I actually don’t know if this is true. Everything you listed about chinese/Indians not voting or being engaged civically applies very broadly to the Hispanic vote also. Hispanic engagement is quite low, because of many immigrants cannot vote (same as Chinese/Indian), Because civic engagement isn’t common (again same) and language barriers. Additionally the idea that Hispanics are a democrat leaning population isn’t true. Many sub populations are staunchly religious (catholic) and would vote to overturn roe v wade same as evangelicals.

Additionally, the focus on DACA and Hispanic immigration may be because of size: Indian and Chinese immigrants aren’t even 5% of the USA out together, while immigrants just from Mexico are a whopping 11% of the USA.

Re: Laid Off, Now What?

#295

Post by mostlyghostly »

vmception wrote: post #287
dccoolgai wrote: post #12

These are all great tips. It is a really well-written article with great advice. I just come away from this with a crushing sense of depression driven by the following thoughts: I can't believe this is how the country I live in treats people who bring their high-demand skills here. 60 days or get out. This absolutely effects every engineer. Even the most racist ones: that there is a bedrock of people they are allowed…

> I can't believe this is how interviewing works in this field. These pressures are why I can barely bother landing a software role anymore. I'm competing with people that have real pressure to study these algorithm brainteasers, switch into system architecture mode, and then switch into behavioral mode. "Oh thats cute you spent 45 minutes a few times a week doing a brainteaser? I just did 600 of those in a month, an…

And most of these tests are basically bullshit, in terms of real world impact.

What's the contest here? Who's most desperate, most willing to sacrifice their life and health for pennies on the dollar?

Seriously. I'm a middle aged guy with kids and parents to take care of. I'm not in a position to spend 30 hours / week doing bullshit puzzles & memorizing an algo book for crap that is basically irrelevant to my job.

You know what I'm good at?

- Spotting the bug before it happens, by watching how the team interacts and who is checking their work...

- Parsing client requirements and finding what matters

- Duct tape engineering so we can hit a go-live date when everything else is a smoking pile of delayed dog-shit...

- Talking the client into dropping a feature that we can't deliver and pivoting into something we already have...

Generally of far higher value than some brain teasers...

Re: Laid Off, Now What?

#296

Post by notxnphbk »

Lammy wrote: post #91
kinkrtyavimoodh wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "My grandparents were labor leaders and I'm pretty certain they'd be ashamed I can't or haven't done more to rectify this. Unfortunately tech unions are typically the ones railing against H1Bs entirely. The mere presence of H1B workers fundamentally increases worker supply (by definition). In fact it was the "US Tech Workers Union" that championed recent actions against H1B workers. And let's be honest they were no…

It isn't about worker supply or wages. It's about workers' relative abilities to stand up for something (anything) versus having to keep one's head down and build whatever evil thing management wants built. As long as the "risk of having to leave the country" for speaking up about anything is greater than 0% the obviously-wisest thing to do is keep your mouth shut.

> As long as the "risk of having to leave the country"

So, immigration is generally speaking something that corporations are incentivized to want because they get more manipulatible and desperate employees?

Can we just demand that companies that hire immigrants cannot fire or lay off those immigrant employees for some minimum number of years unless they declare bankruptcy? It might decrease the number of immigrant employees corporations would hire but it would simultaneoulsy ensure a huge amount of safety for the immigrants that do get hired (and for their families).

Re: Laid Off, Now What?

#297

Post by mikem170 »

monksy wrote: post #272
kinkrtyavimoodh wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's no single thing because people's decisions are affected by the sum total of their life's balance sheet. The labor market is something that emerges from the equilibrium of several opposing forces. We as a society decide which causal factors are 'reasonable' and which are 'unfair'. As a simple example, you could argue that 'the wages for married individuals with kids are depressed due to the massive labor pool of…

Should you have to compete for your wage in comparison to individuals from a foreign country with a much lower cost of living? For the most part you can't change your cost of living. (Yes, you can move else where but the delta between how you you keep/earn is pretty much relative around the country) Single people tend to be younger and less experienced. They tend to be represented in entry level positions, and get pa…

>Should you have to compete for your wage in comparison to individuals from a foreign country with a much lower cost of living?

That appears to be the reality we've been living in for a couple/few decades. Airplanes, container ships, and the internet have made the world a much smaller place.

Re: Laid Off, Now What?

#298

Post by vmception »

mostlyghostly wrote: post #295
vmception wrote: post #287

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I can't believe this is how interviewing works in this field. These pressures are why I can barely bother landing a software role anymore. I'm competing with people that have real pressure to study these algorithm brainteasers, switch into system architecture mode, and then switch into behavioral mode. "Oh thats cute you spent 45 minutes a few times a week doing a brainteaser? I just did 600 of those in a month, an…

And most of these tests are basically bullshit, in terms of real world impact. What's the contest here? Who's most desperate, most willing to sacrifice their life and health for pennies on the dollar? Seriously. I'm a middle aged guy with kids and parents to take care of. I'm not in a position to spend 30 hours / week doing bullshit puzzles & memorizing an algo book for crap that is basically irrelevant to my job. Yo…

I'm good at that too, have none of the obligations you do and am just as put off by it.

The market values my skills, but I have to do this stuff on my own now. You can make more than big tech will pay you by building in the crypto assets sector by yourself. In the recent past it was just side-gig consulting at an hourly rate or trying to do bug bounties.

Now you can just hang out on Telegram or Wechat and learn what people need, get paid completely in Tether from people all around the world. Invest in that ecosystem, or get dollars, whatever you want. No, wait times for anything.

Re: Laid Off, Now What?

#299

Post by tdeck »

notxnphbk wrote: post #289
tdeck wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Funny to see this pop up because I happen to know who is behind this cluster of sites (i.e. https://ustechworkers.com/ https://www.cfpup.org/ ) and it's basically one super right-wing guy and some wealthy donors. None of these is a real union or even a real community group. It's wealthy lobbyists who want to oppose immigration. I always thought it was really shady.

> It's wealthy lobbyists who want to oppose immigration That is funny, I would have never thought that wealthy lobbyists would ever be against easy and mass immigration policies to dilute the labor supply. Much better for corporations to hire people who are willing to work either more cheaply or out of a sense of desperation because job demand is lower than the available/willing worker pool. Do you have a sound logic…

To be clear the person I'm thinking of is not a professional lobbyist, he's a PE investor. I don't know/understand his motivation and have never met him personally, this is a "friend of a friend" scenario.

Re: Laid Off, Now What?

#300

Post by sushshshsh »

TeaDrunk wrote: post #290
sushshshsh wrote: post #257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No I'm literally saying marry an american. My wife is from China and I'm from USA. Marrying her ended all of the H1B games overnight.

From what I can see this takes at least four forms, multiple years, and possibly a significant chunk of change to a lawyer. Could you explain the process more since google is telling me it looks like a pain in the ass?

Pretty much any international person can emigrate to the USA by marrying an American. If they're already here on some type of visa like H1B or student visa, just simply upload your passport to NYC's marriage website (or go to Vegas I guess) and get a marriage license. Then have someone officiate your wedding and for a few hundred bucks and maybe 48 hours of planning total you are now legally married.

You can take this marriage to the US government to make an application for a green card for the international spouse, which will be received in less than 18 months typically.

Short answer, find an American (or even just an existing green card holder) that you love, marry them, and now you are able to stay in the country permanently and work in pretty much any tech job you like :)

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