Tech companies keep falling for the forever fallacy

And many of the people who are working in tech now, have never known anything but boom times and got high on their own supply thinking they are special snowflakes.

I saw my BigTech job that I got late in my career as just another job. I was just as prepared to get laid off, pip’d as I would be for any other job.

Yes because we all know self-reported data from employees on how loyal they are and how bad corporations are is a reliable method to come up with studies that are worth the paper they're written on. Get a grip.

The same way a company can find another employee, the employee can find another job. Also claiming that leaving a company doesn't affect a company's bottom line reflects more about the quality of the work the employee does, rather than the economic reality of the company. If your work doesn't affect the bottom line maybe you shouldn't have the job, that's why you are getting paid to have an impact on the bottom line, not to drink latte, have yoga sessions and raising your children while you are 'working' from home.

Where did I actually say that companies do not ask for loyalty?

You are kind of talking past me and @tombert btw. And you seem to have come here to claim some badassery on your part, and that we shouldn't expend energy on "being frustrated".

> At what point is it the employee’s responsibility to assume that no job is permanent?

Nobody claimed jobs are permanent and that everyone must be protected. Don't fight straw men, tearing them down isn't impressive in any discussion.

If you really wanna dance like that: I am a contractor by choice and changed no less than 10 jobs in the last 7 years and I take 2x less than you, and that's in a good year. I know better than many SV privileged people how rough can it be and I could even claim more "badassery" than you if we start digging deep on the experiences that we both have (for example, I got no real estate of my own even at 43 year old; asking "why" is a completely separate topic; another example is learning to self-onboard in an afternoon).

But that wasn't the topic and I'll ask you not to shift goal posts.

Reading deep into your replies it seems you basically got in here to say "don't complain you spoiled youngsters, work hard like I did instead". I mean OK, cool for you if that makes you feel validated -- we all need that, it's a very fundamental human need so I'm not judging -- but I still don't see how that is related to the topic at hand.

...which is: some of us take issue with empty platitudes said by CEOs and call them out. Yes I know Sundar Pichai doesn't read HN. Hope you didn't intend that as a mind-blowing revelation. This is a public forum, people choose to vent frustrations sometimes.

> I’m saying I don’t spend energy being “frustrated” about what a CEO says who doesn’t know me from Adam.

Cool, you have an opinion what should I expend my energy on. And I disagree with your opinion. Absolutely nothing you can do about what I expend my energy on. Moving on.

> My energy is better spent reading between the bullshit and preparing myself.

A lot of us do that plus "get frustrated about what a CEO says". These two things are not mutually exclusive.

> In tech, if you are properly prepared (in general ignoring the current tech hiring market), a layoff should be no more than a minor inconvenience if you live in a good market or especially now with more jobs going remote.

Yet again, nobody claimed otherwise. And what you say is true and applies to many tech workers, yes.

You seem to have misunderstood the intent between the comments replying to you though. You seem to think some privileged spoiled youngsters "cry you a river". No. We're adults with a lot of battle scars who are jaded by the fact that CEOs are 100% immune to any consequences from firing people.

OPINON: They should be liable, criminally liable even. The "taking full responsibility" part should come at the price of your mansion being taken away from you, sold on auction and the money divided between the fired people, and you the CEO having to live in a cramped apartment for a year (enforceable by the bracelet on your ankle). There should be REAL and INCONVENIENT consequences.

You could disagree. That's fine. What's not fine is completely misrepresenting what was said and insisting that people are spoiled and/or "expending energy" on stuff you feel should not be discussed.

Well cool, feel like you do. I am free to keep doing what I want to do while completely ignoring your opinion.

Hope this clears it up a bit for you, though reading your deep replies makes me think you came here with an agenda and stick to it no matter what is said to you. Which, if true, makes my comment a complete waste of time but hey, it's my time to waste and I enjoy wasting it sometimes.

> That seems like a big claim for which I haven't seen any evidence.

Umm... the entire basis for the article was that there was a belief that market conditions at the time would remain true "forever". That's a very different delusion from thinking there isn't something there.

...and there's plenty of evidence that there was real demand. Real revenue grew significantly during that time. Streaming services saw significant increases in subscriptions. Computer sales were up. In tech in general, sales were up across the board. If you haven't seen any evidence of increases in demand during that time period, I don't think you'll ever see evidence of increases in demand.