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Tech's Elite Hates Labor

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Re: Tech's Elite Hates Labor

#411

Post by mrzimmerman »

baron816 wrote: post #125
treis wrote: post #15

Sometimes I can't even begin to comprehend the POVs I read on the internet. The FAANGs and adjacent companies treat their workers better than pretty much any other company in the world. The idea that workers there are somehow this abused underclass is ridiculous.

A lot of Leftist tech workers like to think they’re working in a coop. They think the company should exist to serve their needs, rather than the needs of investors and customers. It’s a recipe for catastrophe.

This is such a naive perspective of the world. The company should care equal parts about the the needs of the people who consume the product and those who produce it doing actual work.

The idea that a company can produce a product without caring about the quality of how the product is produced is laughable in any Econ 101 classroom. Additionally there are plenty of models of businesses in the US and Europe where the labor force is included in business decisions.

Your idea that the people making a living from building a product want to destroy it and their own livings, are some how not aligned with the customers—who want a good product and will return if it is good—is completely without logic or knowledge of market economics.

Re: Tech's Elite Hates Labor

#412

Post by hackerlight »

amrocha wrote: post #406
hackerlight wrote: post #301

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This misunderstand markets. It's not about some abstract and subjective notion of difficulty. It's about how much value you bring to the table in the context of labor market supply and demand. You are 10x more valuable to your company than a cleaner, so you get 10x the pay. Why? Because your skills are more scarce than a cleaner, and because you can have a bigger impact on the company's profitability by writing code…

I'm not misunderstanding anything, I just disagree with you. On one hand you say pay is based on value brought to the company, on the other hand you say it's based on scarcity. If it's value then how come the same engineer, bringing the same value, would receive different pay based on the country they live in? Clearly that's not it. So maybe it's scarcity? That drives up pay, but it's not enough by itself. Markets fo…

> On one hand you say pay is based on value brought to the company, on the other hand you say it's based on scarcity.

These things aren't separate unless you're using a colloquial definition of "value" which would be inappropriate. If water was more scarce, it would be more valuable and the market would price it more than $0.005/L or whatever it is. My wording implied these things are linked: "it's about how much value you bring to the table in the context of labor market supply and demand." Which, I admit, wasn't the most precise or clear way to word that.

Things hold $ value for two reasons: (1) the thing has perceived utility (we need water to survive, this is the demand side), and (2) the thing is scarce (this is the supply side).

The CEO ticks both boxes. There is high demand for a competent CEO because a bad one will cause Apple's market cap to go down by billions, and a good one the opposite. There is short supply (scarcity) because less people can run Apple well than can write code well. You may disagree personally, but the market, that is the people in charge of hiring the CEO, doesn't. And the market is what sets the price of labor.

Re: Tech's Elite Hates Labor

#413

Post by somsak2 »

diebeforei485 wrote: post #344
throw93 wrote: post #331

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Again, which entity forces the employer to write these terms in the offer letter in the first place? Govt or courts can't. If you as the person interviewing asks for these terms, employer can just say no and move on to next person in queue. In other countries the notice periods are written in law. But then again, do we really want to wait(& trust) for the govt which is heavily lobbied by FAANG to legislate this? Isn'…

No entity forces startups to convert ISO's to NSO's when early employees leave the company, but they did it because it made their offers more competitive. The legal default was ISO's that expire quickly. It's the same. If companies hear loud and clear from both their employees and from people they want to hire, they will do it if they want to compete. Heck, any smart company might do it voluntarily to make it harder…

In fact, the legal default is that ISOs convert to NSOs, but the vast majority of startups force-expire them. Indeed we have seen that if no entity forces a startup to allow an employee-friendly policy to go forward, the company would rather fuck the employee and blame it on "it's the law," even if it isn't.

Re: Tech's Elite Hates Labor

#414

Post by strawpeople »

sneak wrote: post #384
strawpeople wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is no evidence that management problems are harder to solve than coding problems. Not only that, but when coders make mistakes the impact can be large and the responsibility clearly falls on the coder, whereas when managers make mistakes, the responsibility is diffused to their subordinates. Managers should either be paid a lot less, or be fireable by their reports when they make mistakes.

There is! Management would be replaced by cheaper management if it were possible to do so at the same level of quality. Either corporations are insane immoral pathological paperclip/profit maximizers, in which case any manager would be replaced with a cheaper version or even a algorithm, or they're not and managers aren't worth what they're being paid. If the CEO or upper management is so fungible, why aren't they be…

You’re confusing leverage and political positioning with competence and capability.

Not that all managers are incompetent. Some are indeed inspired and or excellent. However these are rare. Just as there are many average engineers who aren’t very productive, so there are many managers who aren’t very capable and are just in their position because they were in the right place at the right time.

Re: Tech's Elite Hates Labor

#415

Post by trimethylpurine »

manuelabeledo wrote: post #217
freedsoftware wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's also that good marketing of a product is probably more integral to its success than its engineering. There are so many stories of superior technologies failing because of bad marketing.

Good marketing would make a mediocre product succeed, but it will not save a crappy one. Also, "superior technologies" is a loaded term, because it is in fact very subjective.

Lots of products literally don't work at all and still sell, and even lead their industry in revenue. I wish it wasn't true.

Re: Tech's Elite Hates Labor

#417

Post by _cenw »

throw93 wrote: post #116
treis wrote: post #15

Sometimes I can't even begin to comprehend the POVs I read on the internet. The FAANGs and adjacent companies treat their workers better than pretty much any other company in the world. The idea that workers there are somehow this abused underclass is ridiculous.

This is the kind of thinking that prevents labor from organizing and having no power. You always look at the person being paid less than you or working in "relatively" worse conditions and think oh at least I'm not doing that job. All amenities that these companies "treat their workers" with are not out of goodness of there hearts but they are all designed to keep the worker in the office longer and work longer hours…

> You always look at the person being paid less than you or working in "relatively" worse conditions and think oh at least I'm not doing that job.

The words "middle class" use this slight of hand. Anyone who is not literally burger flipping can be called "middle class" simply by pointing at the people below them. Politicians regularly use it [1]. The proportion doesn't matter if people don't ask. If people knew the proportions, that'd be bad. So please also never talk about your salary with anyone but your closest partner, and never ask how much your executive makes.

The two classes that are important are capital-owning and worker. Even the best paid workers are disposable (see this thread, or Google layoffs) and will never be close to accumulating the wealth someone with generational wealth has. The difference is simply too big. No laying off the avocado toast will fix this. The mobility between those two classes is non-existent, aside from freak accidents.

[1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nd7cohTdRAo

Re: Tech's Elite Hates Labor

#418

Post by sofixa »

ch4s3 wrote: post #396
sofixa wrote: post #375

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Like how exactly? If they had gotten crazy luck with a benevolent king that decided to bestow them rights? I'm struggling to think of a case where subjects became citizens with rights without either violence, threat of violence, or the sovereign getting scared of violence elsewhere. The French Revolution made many of the liberal reforms across Europe possible precisely because many rulers were deathly afraid of getti…

The reign of terror and wars happened after most of the nobility voluntarily gave up their hereditary rights. Even after the storming of the Bastille there had been very little real violence.

This is some weird revisionism. The Reign of Terror was until the Fall of Robespierre, July 1794. The Armée des Émigrés was still going strong and represented nobles actively fighting with France's enemies to destroy the revolutionary regime. The Vendée uprising was facing brutal suppression at the same time, but also existed and had local nobles participating.

Voluntarily is a massive stretch. Even more so when you consider that many that returned after the Restauration tried to get "their" lands and titles back - so it was only the threat of violence that made them abandon everything and run.

Re: Tech's Elite Hates Labor

#419

Post by wolverine876 »

kortilla wrote: post #230
wolverine876 wrote: post #193

This should create enormous business opportunities: Lots of talented, self-motivated, creative, forward thinking, skilled workers looking for a place that values them and is forward thinking, including about employment. Usually, layoffs happen in weak economies. But the economy is strong, unemployment is low. These layoffs are partly about power and ideology - sacrificing business interests. It's a rare opportunity f…

> how often do large companies shed their best people. Less often than they shed under-performers. Hiring during mass layoffs is difficult because it’s a market of lemons situations. You have to sift through the majority that got let go because their manager identified them as performing below average to find the ones that were laid off because some failing departments were shut down.

I think this case is different: The companies may be shedding people who don't want to be in the new 'bossism' culture that focuses on megalomaniacal CEOs (see my description in the GP). At least some companies are arguably prioritizing that culture over talent.

Re: Tech's Elite Hates Labor

#420

Post by danuker »

mrzimmerman wrote: post #399
danuker wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Taking feedback is a sign of maturity and adaptability. Genuinely, what will happen with writers when scripts will be a dime a dozen, because people are going to use these new technologies? Thinking about these scenarios is the POINT of a union, making sure writers stay relevant for the long-term future. Failing to address them makes for a lot of broken dreams and missed opportunities.

It is a fair point (I think your tone is what has set people off, and for the record I didn’t enjoy it either). The real question, in my opinion, is what does humanity do in general with our fellow humans whose labor is displaced by some form of automation? And that fully includes all of us here on Hacker News. Do we prevent the lose of income to people by forming a collective bargaining group (guild, union, co-op—wh…

I think one way to stay safe is to buy shares in competitors or disruptors. If, say, pension funds include automation companies, you get a much more resilient future.
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