31–40 of 178 posts
It's supply and demand. It could also be a 4X increase in grads for Computer and Information Sciences degrees since the 90s. Source: https://nces.ed.gov/ipeds/Search?query=computer%20science&qu...
From my time there that was not the case. There was the natural demand for more people on existing projects and lots of (often good) ideas for new projects.
The money just poured in. We could never actually hire close to the approved levels. Internal “fights” were over actual people, not headcount, everyone had tons of open headcount.
I think there was just so much money, revenue growth and margin that management (which was dominated by engineers) just did not care. Fund everything and see what happens, why not?
This is a really terrible article. I suspect the HN comment section will be good, but TFA is not worth reading IMHO (though it is quite short so can be read in a minute or two). > For years, companies like Google, Facebook/Meta, and Amazon hired too many developers. They knew they were hiring too many developers, but they did it anyway because of corporate greed. They wanted to control the talent pool. Aside from all…
> Aside from all the claims with no sources/references whatsoever
It's an opinion piece about many of our shared experiences.
> blaming "corporate greed" for hiring employees?
They explained their argument.
> Isn't it also "corporate greed" to lay people off?
It depends. A struggling company that needs to reduce workforce to survive? No. A company worth trillions laying off en-mass because stock rates are down? Yes, probably.
> Blaming corporate greed for causing high salaries?
They explained their argument in the article
> Let me guess, if they started cutting salaries, that is also corporate greed?
It depends. A struggling company that needs to reduce salaries to survive? No. A company worth trillions cutting salaries because stock rates are down? Yes, probably.
Big Tech and empire builders there followed the classic business rules, additionally highly encouraged by Wall Street.
When its cheap, grow fast, when its expensive shield the bottom line, don't make risky moves and cut the fat.
People are same everywhere, you can't just put the blame on Big Tech. Other industries would do same when given opportunity
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The author seems to have some experience, but they are early career AND in Canada (which is a hard market to land a well paying tech job even at the best of times). Feeling despondent when facing such a double whammy seems unsurprising.
An HTML jockey who gets to call himself "full-stack" because they let him run the mysql server doesn't have the experience necessary to deride the careers of the roughly quarter million technical staff at the large companies as "fake work".
Dissing someone as a "HTML jockey" is just rude. People need to start somewhere, and the class of 20 and 21 had a horrid job market because of early COVID hiring freezes - it recovered for class of 22 but tanked immediately afterwards.
I don't deny that I dislike his opinion on "fake work", but you are falling into the same trap as well. All work is equally important, but wages are a result of a skills arbitrage, so demeaning any kind of work is just plain dumb.
And luck does play a role - class of 08 never recovered financially, unlike class of 07 and class of 09. If you miss the train, it sucks.
This is a really terrible article. I suspect the HN comment section will be good, but TFA is not worth reading IMHO (though it is quite short so can be read in a minute or two). > For years, companies like Google, Facebook/Meta, and Amazon hired too many developers. They knew they were hiring too many developers, but they did it anyway because of corporate greed. They wanted to control the talent pool. Aside from all…
It also caused the "Golden Age of Programming". It's only been a golden age because of high salaries for relatively low effort. So if their needs change, obviously the industry changes. This article has nothing to say really.
>It's only been a golden age because of high salaries for relatively low effort. Money is how you define a Golden Age of Programming? I consider the late 1990s and early 2000s more of a Golden Age, and my reasons for it have nothing to do with making money. The time was of Golden Age because that's when programming became more accessible to the masses. Yes it wasn't without its fault, namely with regards to cyber sec…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
>It's only been a golden age because of high salaries for relatively low effort. Money is how you define a Golden Age of Programming? I consider the late 1990s and early 2000s more of a Golden Age, and my reasons for it have nothing to do with making money. The time was of Golden Age because that's when programming became more accessible to the masses. Yes it wasn't without its fault, namely with regards to cyber sec…
I define golden age by how much I have to do to support my family. How much work there is and ultimately how much $/hr you are paid for it. Your interpretation is also very valid. The article complains about there not being available jobs though, so I went that route.
It's supply and demand. It could also be a 4X increase in grads for Computer and Information Sciences degrees since the 90s. Source: https://nces.ed.gov/ipeds/Search?query=computer%20science&qu...