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The Burnout Machine

unionize.fyi

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Re: The Burnout Machine

#151

Post by __loam »

stared wrote: post #100

Software engineering is one of the ways of playing life in "easy mode" (I moved from academia over a decade ago, and I know the difference). This blog post tries to paint it differently - and it feels like it lacks perspective compared to virtually any other occupation. > We’re living in a world where billion dollar tech companies expect us to live and breathe code, demanding 80 hour weeks under the guise of "passion…

Incredible that people like you will watch the industry lay off hundreds of thousands of workers then turn around and make this argument. It's like devs are allergic to any semblance of labor solidarity.

Re: The Burnout Machine

#152

Post by parpfish »

JimTheMan wrote: post #134

These articles about work conditions in tech feel profoundly out of touch with the rest of the world. It's like reading a gazette from Mary Antoinette talking about how tough her life was (pre-revolution..) The rest of the world outside of tech, looks at tech and sees a bunch of very overpaid developers with quite cushy perks... Like sure, it would be great to unionise... But if tech workers don't acknowledge their p…

in the grand scheme of things, it's true that tech workers have very cushy nice jobs. but that doesn't mean we shouldn't try to make our jobs better.

tech workers should be at the vanguard and come up with imaginative ways to "disrupt employment" the same way we always talk about disrupting everything else. four day work weeks (or less), full remote, codetermination, equity/profit-sharing, etc.

we should use our privilege to raise the bar and set a precedent for better working conditions that apply upward pressure to make things better for all the less privelged jobs.

Re: The Burnout Machine

#153

Post by mateo411 »

wyager wrote: post #60
test098 wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Labor_history_of_the_United_St... pretty much every team in blue collar industries which have been able to negotiate better working conditions, better pay, and more time off.

But tech isn't a blue collar industry, and this is about tech unions.

I agree. Unless you are programming Java.

"Java is a blue collar language." - James Gosling

Re: The Burnout Machine

#154

Post by floriannn »

stared wrote: post #100

Software engineering is one of the ways of playing life in "easy mode" (I moved from academia over a decade ago, and I know the difference). This blog post tries to paint it differently - and it feels like it lacks perspective compared to virtually any other occupation. > We’re living in a world where billion dollar tech companies expect us to live and breathe code, demanding 80 hour weeks under the guise of "passion…

I have a sub-40 week at one of the big tech companies, idk why this article is being so confident that we are all pushing 80 hours?

We are tech workers, we need time to go to the bouldering gym and to take our Patagonia hoodies to see the outdoors.

Re: The Burnout Machine

#155

Post by VirusNewbie »

wyager wrote: post #70
philjohn wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not demanding per se, but when you're stack ranked against people who ARE ...

A lot of these pro-labor-reg people argue (and I agree with them!) that the ROI on additional hours worked past 40 is pretty bad. If this is the case, then someone working an extra N hours a week won't actually move the needle that much when it comes to performance ranking. My experience has been that the people who choose to work super long hours do not actually perform much better, if at all, than those who don't.…

right, but a lot of people at Big Tech are looking for the sweet spot of productivity, and it very well may be 45 hours a week or 48 or something, and to others that is unacceptable.

I don't see very many senior level folks in FAANG who are "5:01" engineers. There is pressure, but you're compensated quite generously for it.

Re: The Burnout Machine

#156

Post by getnormality »

woah wrote: post #107

For some reason this sounds AI-written, especially this paragraph: > Companies love to brag about their innovation, but the real innovation is finding new ways to make us disposable. Permanent employment? That’s for suckers. Why pay benefits and offer job security when they can churn through contractors and freelancers like cheap code? And don’t get me started on those non-compete clauses - designed to keep you locke…

I was scrolling the comments waiting for someone to say this. And it was this same paragraph where the GPT smell got overwhelming. LLMs love punchy but meaningless metaphors (how are contractors and freelancers like cheap code? what is cheap code?) and punchy but generic turns of phrase ("that's for suckers", "let's get real for a minute", "don't get me started").

It reminds me of when Elon Musk used to show off how unfettered Grok was, how free to be edgy. Everything it said sounded like this.

Re: The Burnout Machine

#157

Post by jimbokun »

legitster wrote: post #114
stared wrote: post #100

Software engineering is one of the ways of playing life in "easy mode" (I moved from academia over a decade ago, and I know the difference). This blog post tries to paint it differently - and it feels like it lacks perspective compared to virtually any other occupation. > We’re living in a world where billion dollar tech companies expect us to live and breathe code, demanding 80 hour weeks under the guise of "passion…

> This blog post tries to paint it differently - and it feels it lacks perspective with virtually any other occupations. On one hand, misery and happiness are relative. On the other hand, try telling a construction worker how hard our lives are sitting in chairs clicking buttons. My dad used to have to do things like hot tar roofing to pay the bills. So I still consider it a blessing to get to work in software. I thi…

I think burnout is Cool Hand Luke being forced to dig a ditch and fill it back up again, for days.

It’s putting in effort without seeing anything concrete to show for it.

If you tar a roof, you can see a roof that will keep out the rain. If you cook a meal, you see someone who was hungry but now full. A lot of jobs don’t have that feedback loop.

Re: The Burnout Machine

#158

Post by dnissley »

ryandrake wrote: post #105
philjohn wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not demanding per se, but when you're stack ranked against people who ARE ...

Exactly. As usual, HN commenters are rat-holing on the precise meaning of "demanding 80 hour weeks" and trying to refute it by saying "Well, ackshually, companies don't spell out an explicit requirement for exactly 80 hours, therefore there exists no pressure to work long hours!" Example given: When one of your co-workers gets visible praise and maybe a small spot bonus for burning the midnight oil, working a heroic…

These companies attract hyperanxious and/or hypercompetitive types (among many others, e.g. the hyperdeluded "save the world" types, the hypermaterialistic "drive to work in cars worth 6 figures" types, etc). You don't accidentally end up in a big tech job. Most people have to grind leetcode in order to get into these companies -- you know full well what you're getting into. Your offer letter may actually state "people come to this company to do the best work of their lives".

Re: The Burnout Machine

#159

Post by __loam »

lr4444lr wrote: post #126
jakelazaroff wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let’s take the NYT Tech Guild. They negotiated a new contract following a strike last November. Here are some of the things they won: > Enhanced job security with ‘just cause’ protections > Guaranteed wage increases for the first time of up to 8.25% (plus additional base rate discretionary compensation) that prioritize the largest wage increases for the lowest paid members over the life of the contract > Additional c…

As a fairly progressive news outlet attracting staff with certain sensibilties in the NYC area and selling views to people who are the same, the NYTimes board of directors has a vested PR interest in tolerating unions with the large amounts money they have to pay for the privilege. I'm not convinced the company is better served by unionized employees over the rest of the tech scene, which has to innovate to stay solv…

> Knowing someone in tech there who refused to join the union, I was told these guys aren't particularly the best or smartest colleagues she's ever worked with to put it mildly.

Hackernews poster go 5 minutes without insulting your peers challenge: impossible.

Re: The Burnout Machine

#160

Post by Foreignborn »

rco8786 wrote: post #82

> You know the pitch - beanbags in the office, free kombucha on tap, and "Agile" processes that are supposed to make everything more flexible, more efficient No offense, but was this written a decade ago? All of that stuff is long, long gone. > demanding 80 hour weeks under the guise of "passion." Not my experience at all. From startups to big tech/FAANG, silicon valley and otherwise. Never been asked for an 80 hour…

it’s because they used an LLM to edit the prose. It has all the signature marks.

There might be good content there, but it’s full of AI slop.

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