What happens if an entire class of workers loses faith in their careers • Hacker News Board

Re: What happens if an entire class of workers loses faith in their careers

#581

Post by pzo » Sat, Aug 08, 2026, 5:40 AM UTC

dec0dedab0de wrote: post #162

This dropped off the front page in the time I read it, I assume because of the controversial gate that favors upvotes to comments (which I am making worse by replying to others). It is a shame, because this really resonated with me. I've been working in tech for over 20 years now in various roles, and this is the least I have cared about it. I used to want to get better, and was constantly excited about learning new…

I worked around similar problem just working from coworking space and/or traveling.

For cowork you don’t often have to commute as much (more options around), can arrive late, don’t have to dress to nice. For some you can still change your homebase at least for few months temporarily.

But you can still have physical coworkers (even if you don’t work with them), have chitchat not relate to work, go to lunch together. You can also have routine and separate your professional life from personal one.

Re: What happens if an entire class of workers loses faith in their careers

#582

Post by geertj » Sat, Aug 08, 2026, 5:45 AM UTC

cheschire wrote: post #228

dec0dedab0de wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have been in tech for the tech for over 20 years now, heck over 30 years as a hobbyist. I have lost almost all interest in it these days. It feels increasingly meaningless, and actively harmful. I know it is my own fault for neglecting my health and relationships, but I can't help but feel this career makes the most important things more difficult.

Were you chasing the feeling of successfully solving a problem? Have you replaced problem solving with LLM chats? Maybe instead of engineering, you’ve been subtly shifted into project management and hate that career. But it’s tough to engineer much these days. Instead I find I’m PM’ing the bots more than solving problems.

> But it’s tough to engineer much these days. Instead I find I’m PM’ing the bots more than solving problems.

I’m genuinely curious about your perspective as I have almost the diametrically opposite view. I love chatting with the bots as they can build the thing I want, how I want it, much faster than I could. The output still feels mine. Maybe not line by line, but definitely architecturally. The speed makes me feel, sometimes, almost superhuman.

Do you take emotional ownership in the shape output artifact itself, or merely that it works?

Re: What happens if an entire class of workers loses faith in their careers

#583

Post by throwaway1183 » Sat, Aug 08, 2026, 5:48 AM UTC

thraway3837 wrote: post #543

I think what happened is that a lot of the wrong personalities entered technology for all the wrong reasons. Some of us started in the 80s or 90s and got into it with personal projects and treating the PC as a hobby. It is satisfying to be able to command a hunk of metal and get it to do things. And it can do boring stuff really fast and repeatedly. And that alone was exciting. The majority of us would stay up into t…

Oh my god!! You nailed it. I see two categories in tech. One the builder, innovators, tinkerers, those who just wanted to use tech to draw their ideas to life.

Then other is artisan, those who took pride in organizing and craft.

Second one is having miserable time. The former like me are having a blast. I love tech for that reason.

I stopped talking to people who think LLMs are waste. It's because they don't even touch it. They think it's a taboo to touch it.

So anything in tech is exciting because it enables us to do so many random things. Wish more people learnt about it.

Re: What happens if an entire class of workers loses faith in their careers

#584

Post by purplemoonx » Sat, Aug 08, 2026, 5:48 AM UTC

marginalia_nu wrote: post #54

Saw a meme on mastodon the other day contrasting people of the '90s going online to escape from offline reality, and people of the '20s going offline to escape from online reality. There's something to that. I think a big part of it is just how incredibly toxic the web has become. If you spend any time online, as most tech workers do, you have exceptional resiliency if you're able to stay sane and level headed. Going…

The fact you say "on mastodon" proves it's effectively centralized, just pointing that out

Re: What happens if an entire class of workers loses faith in their careers

#585

Post by throw-the-towel » Sat, Aug 08, 2026, 5:49 AM UTC

csomar wrote: post #570

THX1137 wrote: post #286

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> forcing me to go out every day and talk to human beings face to face, even just little things like making sure I was showered and dressed every day This part is strange to me. I've worked from home for about 10 years and I've never once had an issue with twice-daily showering, meeting people face-to-face, going out for coffee, going outdoors, going to the gym, etc. The fact I can just go sit in a park, on a hiking…

The previous poster doesn’t realize he is part of the problem. He wants everyone to go back to the office so that he can see people face to face again and have the social pressure to wash himself. Makes you wonder why no one wants to be his friend? If you are ever in a situation where you are alone and no person works for you, realize you are most likely the problem. It took me a while to figure it out and it’s hard…

> Makes you wonder why no one wants to be his friend?

Wow, what a way to be bitter and defensive.

Re: What happens if an entire class of workers loses faith in their careers

#586

Post by NateEag » Sat, Aug 08, 2026, 5:52 AM UTC

tossitawayplz wrote: post #97

A lot of people truly enjoyed the craft and creativity of building something. That is being stripped away. The building is being outsourced now. In some cases, the design too. Everything they once enjoyed and took pride in is being done by machines now. That is not a good feeling. Imagine you are a master craftsman, a furniture builder. You sourced the wood, designed the furniture, built it by hand, took pride in you…

You have channeled a great deal of my anxiety, stress, anger, and sorrow with this comment.

Every day at my job I search for a chance to write some fragment of code by hand, a place where just for a moment I remember the joyous struggle to be a craftsman.

I have the sense that you're right - musicians, writers, illustrators, actors, animators - they largely seem to hate the way the genAI companies vacuumed up everything that was meant for other people to feed the soulless dreck-vomiters.

I wish I knew the way to unite the programmers who were and are craftsmen with the artists who desire well-crafted tools that respect their artistic autonomy and creative freedom.

There could be some good cooperation there, if someone could solve the coordination problem.

Thank you for sharing your thoughts - I empathize strongly and appreciate what you had to say.

I hope your quest goes well.

Re: What happens if an entire class of workers loses faith in their careers

#587

Post by quijoteuniv » Sat, Aug 08, 2026, 5:56 AM UTC

Animats wrote: post #221

Addressing the question in the title, "What happens if an entire class of workers loses faith in their careers", look at what happened to printers. That was a good skilled trade for centuries. Then it just went away. Phototypesetting took the high volume end. Desktop publishing took the low end. Computer-controlled presses took press operators. And then the newspaper business died. I've heard homeless former printers…

Isn’t it better to find out that a lot of corporate work may not have much intrinsic meaning now, rather than just before you die? At least then you get a chance to do something about it.

It seems to me these changes are much more daunting if you live in a country where no job means no health insurance, and where the pay gap between skilled and unskilled work is huge. That makes an existential question about work into a very material one.

Re: What happens if an entire class of workers loses faith in their careers

#588

Post by bazodedo » Sat, Aug 08, 2026, 5:57 AM UTC

purplemoonx wrote: post #584

marginalia_nu wrote: post #54

Saw a meme on mastodon the other day contrasting people of the '90s going online to escape from offline reality, and people of the '20s going offline to escape from online reality. There's something to that. I think a big part of it is just how incredibly toxic the web has become. If you spend any time online, as most tech workers do, you have exceptional resiliency if you're able to stay sane and level headed. Going…

The fact you say "on mastodon" proves it's effectively centralized, just pointing that out

To be fair, saying "overheard an argument at the pub" wouldn't imply that theres but a single pub in the world.

Re: What happens if an entire class of workers loses faith in their careers

#589

Post by barrenko » Sat, Aug 08, 2026, 5:57 AM UTC

nradov wrote: post #260

MichaelZuo wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Obviously there is some latent risk in choosing a career anywhere, that the demand disappears. There can’t literally be zero risk of structural demand changes.

I'm pretty sure there's literally zero risk of structural demand changes for law enforcement. Defunding the police isn't going to happen and there's no plausible path toward automating most of the work. Security cameras and robots can only do a fraction of what will be needed.

We've already defunded the police, and you can see the ramifications all over the world.

Re: What happens if an entire class of workers loses faith in their careers

#590

Post by throw-the-towel » Sat, Aug 08, 2026, 5:58 AM UTC

paulorlando wrote: post #559

This came up in a few responses below as various roles have been replaced by machines (gas station attendants, printers, travel agents...) so I'm responding in a new thread. When it comes to revolting against industry change, there's a good paper by Eric Hobsbawm called The Machine Breakers. Yes, he's focused more on the Luddite-style reaction of destruction. But interestingly, he notes two types of machine breaking.…

> That solidarity was more naturally built in places like coal mines where workers were closely collocated and was more difficult to build in framework knitting, where workers were scattered.

Did someone just say "WFH"?