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Meta tells staff it will cut 10% of jobs

bloomberg.com

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Re: Meta tells staff it will cut 10% of jobs

#111

Post by zimza »

sdevonoes wrote: post #97
matchbok3 wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Care to explain? Rather than these jugemental one-offs?

You are normalising layoffs in companies that are not losing money. If you are a regular employee, this kind of behaviour affects you, but hereyou are saying “it’s alright folks, it’s just business “. Sure thing these kind of layoffs are not illegal, but there must be something else in life than raw corporate behaviour when it comes to work, don’t you think? The other scenario is that Meta doesn’t layoff people. The…

Sadly a lot of people see profit as the only incentive.

Re: Meta tells staff it will cut 10% of jobs

#112

Post by lamasery »

matchbok3 wrote: post #59
trjordan wrote: post #20

It's an honest surprise that this isn't spun as "internal AI efficiency gains." They want the efficiency, of course there's AI component, but they're not pre-claiming victory. Neat. It's worth remembering that there's an _actual_ underlying economic problem here. Interest rates are up. AI spending is expensive. A dollar invested in a company needs to do _more_ than it did 5 years ago, relative to sitting in treasury…

Layoffs are a very normal thing for businesses to do. There is nothing "cowardly" about it. Would you rather them never hire them in the first place?

> Layoffs are a very normal thing for businesses to do.

Didn't used to be, except in extreme circumstances. Was seen as a really bad sign.

To the extent there's "science" on this, it's a lot less clear than you might think that a policy of reaching eagerly for the layoff-button is long-term beneficial to companies, i.e. there's a good chance it's a cultural fad, you do it because "that's what's expected" and perhaps investors get skittish if you don't, for the circular reason that... that's what's expected.

Re: Meta tells staff it will cut 10% of jobs

#113

Post by aprilthird2021 »

vostrocity wrote: post #91
kbar13 wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

why do we feel that way? it's becoming more and more likely that developments in AI lead to a K graph in experience / value - senior / self sufficient workers will be significantly more valuable than ever. unless you mean that the quality of domestic workers is declining, which i'd agree in most things (tho for some things like software i think still has a chance)

I don't think the quality of US workers has to decline. The quality of workers in lower CoL places like India simply has to increase, and it has. Both of the companies I've worked for have opened India campuses in the past few years.

I hire for such companies and the quality of US workers vs foreign workers who move here on visas is much different. To be fair, foreign workers who move here on visas tend to be the rich and highly educated of their own country and US workers are more distributed across SES. They also have more education on paper bc they usually need a masters or more to be eligible to work here

Re: Meta tells staff it will cut 10% of jobs

#114

Post by HoldOnAMinute »

trjordan wrote: post #20

It's an honest surprise that this isn't spun as "internal AI efficiency gains." They want the efficiency, of course there's AI component, but they're not pre-claiming victory. Neat. It's worth remembering that there's an _actual_ underlying economic problem here. Interest rates are up. AI spending is expensive. A dollar invested in a company needs to do _more_ than it did 5 years ago, relative to sitting in treasury…

Imagine a world where people could just be happy with returns on investments. Even treasury bills.

Can't we all just be happy?

Re: Meta tells staff it will cut 10% of jobs

#115

Post by lotsofpulp »

Analemma_ wrote: post #102
thewebguyd wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Correction, the layoffs will be followed by massive re-hiring overseas in 6 to 18 months. The domestic jobs aren't coming back.

I’m curious why this meme is so sticky. In the early 2000s people were also panicking that all the software jobs were going to India and never coming back. It was so pervasive it made the cover of Wired magazine, but it never happened. Why is this time different?

Maybe it did happen, but the expansion of broadband internet, and then mobile broadband internet, caused an enormous demand for additional and different types of programmers that was unable to be satiated by people outside of the US.

Re: Meta tells staff it will cut 10% of jobs

#116

Post by smallmancontrov »

Analemma_ wrote: post #102
thewebguyd wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Correction, the layoffs will be followed by massive re-hiring overseas in 6 to 18 months. The domestic jobs aren't coming back.

I’m curious why this meme is so sticky. In the early 2000s people were also panicking that all the software jobs were going to India and never coming back. It was so pervasive it made the cover of Wired magazine, but it never happened. Why is this time different?

Remote coordination tools are no longer utter dogshit.

Re: Meta tells staff it will cut 10% of jobs

#117

Post by 121789 »

Forgeties79 wrote: post #55
121789 wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

this seems a little hyperbolic without knowing details. they probably already cut around 5% every year for performance anyway (their performance reviews probably just came out). i could pretty easily see the rest of the reduction being unprofitable businesses like VR that they don't want to invest in anymore, it might not be due to AI at all

Given facebook/Zuckerberg’s history it’s tough to give them the benefit of the doubt. From day one it’s been ruthless, harmful ambitions and business practices. It is a bad company that does bad things. They also burn capital at insane rates on projects nobody wants then fire everybody involved (see: the metaverse, the very reason they rebranded to that dumb name)

I can pretty much agree with everything you said in the first line

but for the second, I guess I don't consider that terrible? they make risky bets, pay people tons and tons of money to try them, then if it doesn't work out they shut down the projects and let the people go? that feels like every startup except the employees actually get compensated. if that's driving the extra layoffs, it's hard to feel too bad for people who have probably been paid millions already

Re: Meta tells staff it will cut 10% of jobs

#118

Post by oxag3n »

Well, they could layoff 100% and world would be a better place to live.

It really sucks for software engineers though - first these companies made a hype out of "coding" and hacking to build those monstrosities, now they switched to squeezing the accordion to keep the music going. This is not the first time and I hope not the last one - just need new Yahoos of 20s to pop up.

Re: Meta tells staff it will cut 10% of jobs

#119

Post by oytis »

fl4regun wrote: post #94
oytis wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What would they do with this self-determination? It's not that Meta is producing something useful you know.

maybe they could produce something useful with that self-determination? or are you being sarcastic?

Meta, as an organization, is not designed to produce anything useful. If someone at Meta thinks they could organize a programmer collective that would make its members good (or any) money, they can just walk out and do that. Computers are cheap, means of production are not limiting people's capacity to earn living with code.

Re: Meta tells staff it will cut 10% of jobs

#120

Post by matchbok3 »

sdevonoes wrote: post #97
matchbok3 wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Care to explain? Rather than these jugemental one-offs?

You are normalising layoffs in companies that are not losing money. If you are a regular employee, this kind of behaviour affects you, but hereyou are saying “it’s alright folks, it’s just business “. Sure thing these kind of layoffs are not illegal, but there must be something else in life than raw corporate behaviour when it comes to work, don’t you think? The other scenario is that Meta doesn’t layoff people. The…

Layoffs mean a company doesn't have productive, profitable work for a set of people. The broader profitability of the entire company is entirely irrelevant. Should employee x subsidize employee y? That's nonsense.

Should a company keep someone on payroll and have them do nothing until profit reaches 0?

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