No, we do not have luxurious jobs. Other people have really really shitty jobs. Software developers are just getting the kind of relative pay and conditions improvements that a much larger number of people took for granted in the 60s and 70s. It's everyone else who is fucked.
This is semantics. The point is, relatively speaking , our jobs offer good conditions to the average circumstances.
Yeah, you're right. But "luxurious" has connotations that go beyond "good conditions". It's not a luxury to be treated with dignity and respect, paid decently and allowed to make time for your family. That should be normal, and the real problem is that it isn't normal for enough people.
Yes we make more money, but we also take our work with us and the stress that comes along with mentally taxing work. It's 11pm and I might be thinking of a problem at work I've been tangling for for the past 4 days. A gardner or a construction worker leaves work and _leaves work_, you feel me?
And your'e stacking that up against the stress the gardener or construction worker has of losing their job and not having a million other options, or not being able to support medical insurance for their family because of what they earn? Even excluding that, having worked in a fairly brain dead job I found the stress of 9 hours a day doing something that dull WAY more stressful than being able to use my mind but bein…
I'm not saying "we have problems, 'they' don't". I'm illustrating the fact that EVERYBODY has problems. Software development isn't all peachy 100% of the time. [Let's call it 80% of the time ;)]
technology workers complaining about recruiters is analogous to young, attractive people complaining about people hitting on them constantly. it sets off the same b.s. detectors in my brain. to me, it's really just a childish and transparent way of bragging. even reasonable people slip into these modes when they are faced with an abundance of opportunity, most of which they don't want or feel are beneath them.
Yeah, but I think the problem with cut-and-paste recruiter spam is that it's not really an opportunity. Most of the "offers" I get don't match my skillset and would not result in a job even if I pursued them. They simply increase the noise in the channel and don't add any value to anyone.
I am not sure if you are trolling or not. Maybe I have read your comment incorrectly. There are some people in this world that are working in their job because of circumstances beyond their control. Just look at the folks in North Korea or most parts of Africa. Those of us who have "luxurious" jobs did have a choice, those other folks don't.
I'm not trolling. I'm saying that software developer lifestyles only look good because of the terribly poor conditions many other people work in, both in developed economies and in more obviously poverty-stricken places. We're lucky not to be those people, but to me "luxury" implies either greed or wastefulness - that as software developers we're getting some kind of unreasonably good deal from the world. I don't thi…
> We're lucky not to be those people, but to me "luxury" implies either greed or wastefulness - that as software developers we're getting some kind of unreasonably good deal from the world.
I don't agree with that definition of "luxury", and I think there are many others who also do not. Luxury is about comfort and choice, not greed and wastefulness.
No, we do not have luxurious jobs. Other people have really really shitty jobs. Software developers are just getting the kind of relative pay and conditions improvements that a much larger number of people took for granted in the 60s and 70s. It's everyone else who is fucked.
An experienced software developer earns perhaps double the national average wage in the UK, depending on where they are in the country (it may be considerably more than double, it is never less than comfortably above the average). Real wages are below their early 70s peak by about 14% right now. By my calculation that puts an average programmer in a considerably better position than most people would have been seeing…
Pay in the UK is awful for a lot of middle-earning jobs like ours.
The US and Australia pay far more. I basically had to go contract when I got back here so that I could match the money.
This. We enrich "business guys" with connections to billion dollar exits while we ourselves make middle-class or slightly upper-middle class wages. Meanwhile anyone willing to take out the loans to put themselves through Dental school will eventually make more than we do and if they have the motivation to open up their own practice, much more than we do.
I agree with the sentiment, but I think your facts are a bit off and reflect HN insularity. The median 33% household income ("middle class") in the US is $30,000 to $62,500 ( household ). Even if you are the sole earner in your household, it is still unlikely that you make less than $62,500. If you do make less than that, ask for a raise. If you don't make less than that, or your combined household income is more tha…
By any reasonable definition, being well-off means being able to take out a mortgage on a house, afford occasional vacations to other parts of the world, invest in the stock market, support a family, put your kids through college, give to different charities, save for retirement, all in addition to helping family members in need, which one would do under any circumstances. A software developer might be able to do these things in California, but only barely, unless they have a very cushy arrangement or they've ridden an exit for a startup. Those at the median household income in the US (or anywhere else) are being shafted. The economy is broken.
If you really don't like recruiters, feel free to send them to http://www.rankarecruiter.co.uk/ - it's a joke side designed to waste their time, just like they waste ours.
Yes, working from home is great. It is a luxury. Working at your own pace is also nice. But working "on the Internet" means you're also comparing yourself to the best, brightest, and driven. Then it seems like you're achieving maybe 10% of what you seemingly could be, because you're setting your own goals based on what you see out there. It's like getting stuck in traffic. You can point out that I'm sitting in climat…
> no amount of explaining will make it go away
Tell that to everyone who comes to terms with it and is at peace or is content and thankful for their situation?
Yes, working from home is great. It is a luxury. Working at your own pace is also nice. But working "on the Internet" means you're also comparing yourself to the best, brightest, and driven. Then it seems like you're achieving maybe 10% of what you seemingly could be, because you're setting your own goals based on what you see out there. It's like getting stuck in traffic. You can point out that I'm sitting in climat…
So what is the hack that keeps us from constantly taking our luxuries for granted? Just as with the traffic situation, how often do we find ourselves complaining about having to do the laundry or the dishes or vacuuming or even heating up something for dinner -- all fairly small and easy tasks thanks to the help of technology, which took much more time and labor in a previous generation?
Yes, it's true that the complaining pushes us to find ways to make our lives even easier. But in the meantime, why are we unable to sustain our enjoyment for what we've got? If we could just change our thinking on this and begin to appreciate the amazing place we've reached on a more regular basis, imagine how much happier we'd all be. But what's the hack to do that?
No, we do not have luxurious jobs. Other people have really really shitty jobs. Software developers are just getting the kind of relative pay and conditions improvements that a much larger number of people took for granted in the 60s and 70s. It's everyone else who is fucked.
This. We enrich "business guys" with connections to billion dollar exits while we ourselves make middle-class or slightly upper-middle class wages. Meanwhile anyone willing to take out the loans to put themselves through Dental school will eventually make more than we do and if they have the motivation to open up their own practice, much more than we do.
Many (or most) of the great technology companies have technical founders that benefit tremendously from a successful exist. Equating "business guys" with "the man" who get all the benefit and engineers as the poor labor is misguided and ignores basic facts.
Every technology startup that blows up have people with engineering backgrounds in positions of senior management. Across levels of seniority, engineers often make as much or more money as their non-technical counterparts. If you want to stay at the individual contributor level as an engineer that is, of course, totally fine, but you should compare yourself to other IC's in the organization without technical skills. I think you will find yourself to be very well positioned financially.