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Poor in Tech

megelison.com

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Re: Poor in Tech

#61

Post by wdb »

creshal wrote: post #29
ideamotor wrote: post #19

Assuming the trip to Greece was a joke was pretty good, as was the comment about hearing other people’s hobbies and just thinking about the expense. There are definitely cultural signifiers from wealth. Discussing housing endlessly is the biggest one.

Taking a 3 day vacation overseas definitely is a joke. You'll spend as much time sitting in a plane or waiting at the airport as you'll spend at your destination, how's that supposed to be relaxing?

Plenty of people fly to New York or Vegas for a long weekend from Europe

Re: Poor in Tech

#62

Post by incrudible »

"Meg Elison is a California Bay Area author and essayist"

Many people will warn you about taking drugs or dropping out of school. Far too few people will warn you about becoming an author or moving to the Bay Area.

Re: Poor in Tech

#64

Post by culturestate »

8fGTBjZxBcHq wrote: post #17
culturestate wrote: post #5

To me, this reads more as a list of "from outside the valley bubble" signifiers than it does as a list of things that people who've grown up in poverty might do, even if the former was a result of the latter. There are some exceptions - not noticing missed paychecks is the biggest - but most of it is just stuff that happens every day in other offices. Making your lunch at the office and not bringing Advil from home?…

I don't really see this as a valid criticism of the list though. A person identified a bunch of ways they are not like almost all of the rest of their coworkers. Do they have the information, experience, or responsibility to accurately categorize the specific cultural origin of every single one of those differences? Does it make the argument weaker if they miss a couple? Maybe a little but it's still strong.

I don't want to trivialize what the author is feeling, but when the conclusion they draw is...

> Because they have never been poor, they had no idea what I might do. Why would I steal, when everyone clearly has enough? What even is scarcity? Why drink yourself to death tonight when there’s another sponsored event a week from now? Why eat like there will never be enough, when there has always been more than enough?

...I think it's worth discussing whether they may have misidentified the real root cause.

Re: Poor in Tech

#66

Post by creshal »

wdb wrote: post #61
creshal wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Taking a 3 day vacation overseas definitely is a joke. You'll spend as much time sitting in a plane or waiting at the airport as you'll spend at your destination, how's that supposed to be relaxing?

Plenty of people fly to New York or Vegas for a long weekend from Europe

It's just as stupid going the other direction IMO.

Re: Poor in Tech

#67

Post by giantg2 »

culturestate wrote: post #5

To me, this reads more as a list of "from outside the valley bubble" signifiers than it does as a list of things that people who've grown up in poverty might do, even if the former was a result of the latter. There are some exceptions - not noticing missed paychecks is the biggest - but most of it is just stuff that happens every day in other offices. Making your lunch at the office and not bringing Advil from home?…

"Making your lunch at the office and not bringing Advil from home? I know generationally wealthy investment bankers who do these things"

Generally they don't like to waste money. That's part of how they stay rich for generations (as opposed to someone who hits the lottery and the next generation is basically back to where they started in many cases).

Re: Poor in Tech

#68

Post by olingern »

I grew up poor and now live and work around "never been poor" folks. Classism 100% exists. The thing that I noticed most folks can't grasp is the appreciation for the small things and the security they have.

I find that people who have never experienced being poor are often lacking in both humility and "can do" attitudes.

For me, not being wealthy is a feature, not a bug. I realize I'm speaking from a place of privilege now, though.

Re: Poor in Tech

#69

Post by Ekaros »

jasode wrote: post #44
est31 wrote: post #10

> I knew I was the only poor person at my tech startup because I was the only person who would say hello to the cleaning lady as she meekly made her rounds around us when we worked late. Everyone else had a long habit of ignoring anyone like her. That's IMO the worst behaviour of the rich listed in this article. I've heard stories that at Google, the non-engineering workers at campus may not socialize with engineers…

>What kind of society is this that Google is building? Aren't you even allowed to acknowledge someone else's humanity? The social interaction dynamics that happens at the Google building is a reflection of society at large. As another example, I've worked at the offices of charity institutions where the higher level white collar workers ignore the cleaning people. The common theme is that humans in general (and not G…

I would say that having individual pictures of teachers make sense as those are the people students have most personal contact with. Now the other administrative staff and cafeteria ladies should be at same level.

Re: Poor in Tech

#70

Post by wdb »

MattGaiser wrote: post #3
mcherm wrote: post #2

I've seen this before. Not often, because the companies I have worked at have rarely hired someone from this social strata. But in the cases where we have, I have seen the alienation. Aside from the obvious "be genuinely friendly", does anyone have suggestions of what to do as a coworker to support someone suffering from this cultural barrier?

> I knew I was the only poor person at my tech startup because I made more there than I’d ever made before; a daring amount I had been afraid to ask for during the offer process. I discovered through misadventure that I still made less than any of the executive assistants, or the receptionist. I was, in fact, the lowest-paid person in the building including the interns. I hadn’t known what was possible, so I couldn’t…

One of the reasons why companies don't want you to share your salary ranges with colleagues
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