Most likely on welfare
It's da first of tha month.
Where have all the laid-off tech workers gone?
231–240 of 451 posts
Re: Where have all the laid-off tech workers gone?
#232I can't find another job even with a FAANG background. The market is brutal. Maybe my only choice is to start a startup.
Are you expecting a salary similar to the one you were getting at a FAANG though? Because that seems to be the main issue - FAANG people thinking they're worth way more than they actually are.
You're worth as much as you get paid. This applies to business owners negotiating business contracts and employees negotiating salaries.
Don't understand the hate on FAANG salaries as it sets a precedent for higher tech salaries.
Re: Where have all the laid-off tech workers gone?
#233This whole debacle really made it clear that there is no way to be an ethical success in capitalism at the highest levels (CEO, Board, C-Suite generally, SVP).
It is literally impossible to be a public company CEO or senior manager for that matter, which is the goal of most founders in this sphere, and not be slavishly devoted to maximizing profit margin at all costs and irrespective of anything else. Why? You'll be fired if you're not. Once you're past Sr. Manager you'll be challenged on whether you side with your employees or the stock price. We all know who chooses which.
Want to start a high tech company or even a company with high CAPEX or OPEX entry points? Better get a ton of capital, and guess what, that capital wants ownership because the theory is "they deserve it." The reality is money required to do anything (duh!) and you have no choice, because your broke friends can't afford the 500k you need to hire all those well paid FAANG engineers away.
Fine you say, those are the spoils of victory. Well so here's the problem...if all that money only cares about maintaining the power structures and whitewashing their Rand inspired business sins via "charity" or perhaps "running for president" and that group gets smaller and smaller, what's the rest of folks to do?
I ended up writing about this [1] and now I'm doing everything I can to build or support syndicalist organizations crowding out for-profit investor driven companies.
At this point, tech is just an extension of finance. There's no counter-culture here, it's maximum capitalism and we're ubering humanity off a cliff.
I've stopped trying to be in tech and founded a non-stock democratic cooperative that does residential waste hauling [2,3] and hopefully we'll be picking up trash by July.
I'm about to send out our first mailer to two major residential groups. I'm open to anyone who wants to give us a loan or be hired eventually. andrew@seegull.co
Re: Where have all the laid-off tech workers gone?
#234Earlier quoted context omitted.
Actually even this is wrong. Every laid off employee with a LinkedIn account that changed their employer on LinkedIn. I typically am not in a hurry to change mine.
Waiting 2-3 months to see if new job is a good fit is usually a smart move.
I don't know if people are still doing the /r/overemployed thing, but I imagine you aren't in a hurry to change it if you are.
It's also possible that the recently-laid off are settling for lower salaries but more employers to make up for it
Re: Where have all the laid-off tech workers gone?
#235Earlier quoted context omitted.
I get the impulse, but why isn't this viewed as profoundly selfish?
Is your reasoning here that it is selfish, because not everyone can do that, and if everyone could/did, then society would collapse due to no food production, garbage collection, emergency services, law enforcement etc, as all those people would also be out painting/kayaking etc? I ask because as I first read your comment I was unable to see the selfishness, since GP outlined that they lacked the financial means to s…
Right, my thinking here is that the dream of running away from the very society that granted you the freedom to run away seems like you're not "paying it forward" enough, to enable others to have the freedom you'd be taking advantage of.
Rather, I would imagine the "not-selfish" version of this would be to spend your life doing those things, and finding ways to help others get to where you're lucky to be.
I just find the "I'll get mine and fuck off" attitude to be less than ideal.
Re: Where have all the laid-off tech workers gone?
#236> John Deere, an American tractor-maker, has been snapping up fired tech workers to help it make smarter farm machinery. Oh yay. Who wants to work for a company that is actively antagonistic against its own customer base?
The same people that wanted to work for Meta and Amazon?
Yeah, any of FAANG is well-qualified to work at John Deere, from that angle.
Re: Where have all the laid-off tech workers gone?
#237[flagged]
Re: Where have all the laid-off tech workers gone?
#238Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm the lead engineer at one of these and you nailed it. If I catch anyone "innovating" we have a talk about what it is they're working on to make sure it's part of our core business. It very rarely is. I probably suck to work for in that way, but the reality is this is not a job about pushing the envelope, it's a job about executing as cleanly as possible. You work at one of these if you love to implement simple tec…
> If I catch anyone "innovating"
It's in quotes because it's not actually innovative, in every case (so far) it's an NIH instance.
Re: Where have all the laid-off tech workers gone?
#239Earlier quoted context omitted.
you sound like a kafka system implementor. why would you hire software devs to implement kafka instead of kafka system implementors?
Outside of FAANG, roles aren't guaranteed to be this specialized. If you can't adjust and expect it to be done like they did it at your FAANG, you're going to have a tough time being productive.
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Re: Where have all the laid-off tech workers gone?
#240This whole debacle really made it clear that there is no way to be an ethical success in capitalism at the highest levels (CEO, Board, C-Suite generally, SVP). It is literally impossible to be a public company CEO or senior manager for that matter, which is the goal of most founders in this sphere, and not be slavishly devoted to maximizing profit margin at all costs and irrespective of anything else. Why? You'll be…
I suspect you'll never be able to compete, is the problem. You might not be a profit maximizer, but everyone you interact with is a cost minimizer, and ethical solutions will inevitably be more expensive.
This is not to rain on your parade (I agree with you!) but I see the only solution as political via vastly higher taxes on higher incomes to support social services. The only place we are remotely close to having any influence is in the political realm, in the economic world, we are completely irrelevant.