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Ask HN: Are you unable to find employment?

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Re: Ask HN: Are you unable to find employment?

#531

Post by w4ffl35 »

scarface_74 wrote: post #529
w4ffl35 wrote: post #520

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

I have never even thought who was replacing me or worried about my job being replaced by “foreigners”. I’ve had 10 jobs over almost 30 years and I’ve been laid off twice - once when a company got acquired and once this year and I got Amazoned last year. It’s never taken me more than a month to get a job once I started looking. I kept my skill set and resume up to date, always prepared to interview and I have a great…

Good to know. Thanks for your feedback. It certainly isn't fun to hire, train and then be replaced by foreigners. Going years without being hired is especially difficult. Being raised poor, white, hyper religious, kept out of college and forced to teach myself everything from high-school onward made the struggle even harder. I can imagine that being black as you say made your struggles different than mine, but difficult none the less. Keeping ones skills up to date certainly is essential. I too have never worried about foreigners replacing me. I do not have a great network. People most certainly don't hire me solely due to being white.

Interestingly, the current issue isn't so much getting hired as it is getting an interview at all. This has started after the rise of chatgpt. No one has bothered to ask me what the issue is and has instead jumped to conclusions which I'm personally quite entertained by. As I said in my original post: my situation is unique.

(Edited some words for clarification)

Re: Ask HN: Are you unable to find employment?

#533

Post by scarface_74 »

w4ffl35 wrote: post #531
scarface_74 wrote: post #529

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have never even thought who was replacing me or worried about my job being replaced by “foreigners”. I’ve had 10 jobs over almost 30 years and I’ve been laid off twice - once when a company got acquired and once this year and I got Amazoned last year. It’s never taken me more than a month to get a job once I started looking. I kept my skill set and resume up to date, always prepared to interview and I have a great…

Good to know. Thanks for your feedback. It certainly isn't fun to hire, train and then be replaced by foreigners. Going years without being hired is especially difficult. Being raised poor, white, hyper religious, kept out of college and forced to teach myself everything from high-school onward made the struggle even harder. I can imagine that being black as you say made your struggles different than mine, but diffic…

I didn’t claim that I had it harder either…

My mom was a well connected school teacher where I grew up and my dad a factory worker (both still living and just celebrated their 56th anniversary).

I was programming in assembly language on my Apple //e in 1986 in sixth grade.

The tech environment is one of the most egalitarian industries. I have never seen signs of systemic discrimination.

Surprisingly enough, the only reports I’ve heard about widespread discrimination are by Indians against other Indians…

https://www.reuters.com/business/sustainable-business/caste-...

Re: Ask HN: Are you unable to find employment?

#534

Post by w4ffl35 »

scarface_74 wrote: post #533
w4ffl35 wrote: post #531

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Good to know. Thanks for your feedback. It certainly isn't fun to hire, train and then be replaced by foreigners. Going years without being hired is especially difficult. Being raised poor, white, hyper religious, kept out of college and forced to teach myself everything from high-school onward made the struggle even harder. I can imagine that being black as you say made your struggles different than mine, but diffic…

I didn’t claim that I had it harder either… My mom was a well connected school teacher where I grew up and my dad a factory worker (both still living and just celebrated their 56th anniversary). I was programming in assembly language on my Apple //e in 1986 in sixth grade. The tech environment is one of the most egalitarian industries. I have never seen signs of systemic discrimination. Surprisingly enough, the only…

I can tell you that i have faced some extremely difficult adversities. I don't talk about it online or to people outside of a few that I hold very close. I didn't have an easy upbringing or life in general. I got lucky a few times, and I've pushed myself as hard as possible the rest of the way.

I'm not surprised by the stats you shared. The most discrimination and workplace harassment / bullying I've recieved is from white people. Me and the Indians, Russians and black people I've worked with got along great -- and some of the white people of course.

Re: Ask HN: Are you unable to find employment?

#535

Post by vbi8iBEX »

odiroot wrote: post #317
RGamma wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And it's not just in programming-related jobs either. Parts of industry and the blue collar market are shitting themselves in Germany right now. Two people I know have been let go (pumps and wood sectors resp.). Another (metal construction) is getting barely more than minimum wage. There's only one dude (chemical engineer) who is doing well (nearing 100k at 5 years work experience). The others are getting by. Politic…

> And it's not just in programming-related jobs either. Parts of industry and the blue collar market are shitting themselves in Germany right now. > Politicians are still complaining about Fachkräftemangel, These two things can be, and in fact are right now true at the same time. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Structural_unemployment Everyone coming from an ex-Warsaw-Pact country most probably already lived through th…

I think this is the most interesting and telling comment i've read. Inflation destroyed the world economy.

Re: Ask HN: Are you unable to find employment?

#536

Post by binary132 »

vunderba wrote: post #503
Yoric wrote: post #378

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Never seen the word used in that sense. As far as me or my dictionary are concerned, a rubric is a category, or perhaps a chapter. :shrug:

Consider purchasing a better English dictionary. I worked in the ESL/EFL industry for years and never encountered the word rubric as a synonym for category/chapter. It is commonly used to refer to a guideline or rule.

I was actually pleasantly surprised when I looked it up in an effort to "own" gp to see its etymology.

Re: Ask HN: Are you unable to find employment?

#537

Post by tiffanyh »

m_ke wrote: post #86

It's not just you. I have an Ivy league degree, worked in deep learning since alexnet at a leading startup in the space, was a CTO of a startup that got acquired and have referrals from very senior people at the top FANG companies and still struggled to get interviews. I also have research scientist friends with Neurips papers, ones that solved long standing open math problems and even they are struggling to get hire…

> was a CTO of a startup

Could it just be, the more senior/executive level you are - the harder it’ll always be to find another comparable job.

The funnel gets smaller the higher up you are.

Re: Ask HN: Are you unable to find employment?

#538

Post by zeroc8 »

sunshine-o wrote: post #66

I am wondering if this is not just "normal". If we look back tech jobs have been growing fast since at least the 90s. We have basically put everything on computer and the internet in the last decades with some obvious efficiency gains. But how far should we continue to invest in this and expecting a return on investment? At the same time, in the west, agriculture or manufacturing jobs have been annihilated. Could the…

That's the way I see it too. All that AI crap isn't going to make our lives any better. It even might have the opposite effect. Few people are getting super rich while everyone else just suffers. Previous tech revolutions like PC, internet or Iphone let anyone participate and the benefits were pretty obvious. Now, less so.

Re: Ask HN: Are you unable to find employment?

#539

Post by vbi8iBEX »

sixstringtheory wrote: post #507
throwaway847492 wrote: post #62

Creating a throwaway account for simplicity. I was/am a hiring manager, mostly for startups. Market is rough right now for sure but I also want to share some flags I’d personally note when looking at your website / LinkedIn. 1. You have experience in a lot of technologies, which sometimes is good, but can also be the case where you don’t have expertise in any of them. 2. According to LinkedIn since 2016 most of your…

This should be the top comment. OP is looking for confirmation bias and got plenty here, but they really need to introspect on how to be a more appealing coworker. Linking to Jack Posobiec’s tweets and complaining about being called a racist on hacker news, on your linkedin account, just makes you look radioactive. And dumb: linkedin is for hustle porn; 4chan, twitter and their derivatives are for online political wa…

OP most certainly is not looking for confirmation bias. OP is looking for other people's experiences, as OP asked for in the original post. OP is quite happy working alone making video games, but would prefer to be working full time with a paycheck.

It's really fun (no sarcasm) watching all of you people jump to the wrong conclusion as you judge my motivations and reasons for posting this though.

Aside from seeing a few posts and knowing he's right wing, I don't even know who Jack Posobiec is. Politics isn't my main thing. As I stated above, I am "socially apolitical". I have my opinions and my affiliations and I mostly keep it to myself unless it benefits me to do otherwise.

Re: Ask HN: Are you unable to find employment?

#540

Post by vbi8iBEX »

throwaway847492 wrote: post #62

Creating a throwaway account for simplicity. I was/am a hiring manager, mostly for startups. Market is rough right now for sure but I also want to share some flags I’d personally note when looking at your website / LinkedIn. 1. You have experience in a lot of technologies, which sometimes is good, but can also be the case where you don’t have expertise in any of them. 2. According to LinkedIn since 2016 most of your…

I actually didn't ask for feedback on my personal situation. But since you've decided to dig into my profile and offer up advice from a throwaway publicly i will defend myself publicly -

1. > No expertise in technology:

Strongly disagree. I'm an expert in python, javascript, c#, application development, object oriented programming, agile, communication, and much more. I guess this isn't shining through on my profiles. Will have to find a way to fix it. There are many companies who value a generalist skill set.

2. > 2016 "gigs"

I had health issues starting in 2016 which derailed my career. I took what I was able to get and was still able to progress. I was promoted from eng I to eng II prior to the health issues. Later I was able to land a job as VP of engineering.

3. The lead engineer (VP of engineering) role that I had was a complicated situation - I performed my duties well and was rewarded handsomely. Working for startups doesn't always end well. From there I took time off to work for myself and you're correct, that's when the downturn started. Had I known AI would be released and jobs would dry up, i wouldn't have taken the risk of starting my own company at that point in time.

4. I havent worked for huge companies my entire career, much of it has been for start-ups but Enova, DoubleClick and Threadless are actually well known. Enova is a huge corporation and DoubleClick (one of my first jobs) was purchased by Google which is what lead to them becoming an ad company. Threadless has declined in popularity, but at the time it was extremely popular and well known. Other than that as I said, startups. Idiotic to judge a person based on whether or not the company is well known.

5. I haven't "complained" on LinkedIn. Regardless, i have deactivated my LinkedIn account, which I had planned on doing for the last month. Thanks for giving me the motivation to do so tonight. It is a silly echo chamber that has never lead to anything positive for me. I didn't even have an account until a few years ago so it will not be missed. It's clear that maintaining a LinkedIn social media account is a career hazard. That's the most useful thing your unsolicited feedback has turned up.

6. > political posts

Political posts online prevent me from working? That's absurd. My politics haven't even been stated aside from my position on H-1B and globalism. I should be allowed my political opinions without fear of reprocussion from a biased hiring manager such as yourself, but i really haven't even put any out there other than this post.

I have political opinions, and I am registered to vote, but I'm "socially apolitical" aside from a small amount of activist work I've done which hasn't been broadcast on the internet.

I don't bring politics or religion to the workplace.

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