261–270 of 1001 posts
Seriously, why people in tech are opposed to unions? In Europe, unions and Betriebsrat (works committee) are the norm. Why not in the US?
My only experience dealing with an union as a SWE, in Germany at that, has been a negative one. It shaped my opinion on the topic.
My firm made billions last year too and just laid off hundreds of engineers (a decent %) Some of the best engineers, those that I respected the most, went. People who make no sense. After last year's layoffs they told us they were "done" and it was "all behind us". Last year then turned out to a better year financially than 2022 (we have access to the top line numbers) You can't trust anything anyone above you in the…
I see what you are saying. I am an engineer-turned-EM and you don't know me, so please take everything I say with a grain of salt: > Your job is NOT safe. Nothing will make execs happier than having this line of thought popularized amongst engineers. It will allow them to hire cheaper, and exploit existing engineers more. I think a better way to put it is: "A job is not your family, and a job is not your identity. Yo…
It means that you need to be responsible for yourself, and not allow thoughts like "I'm a valuable employee", or "I have too much seniority", or "my manager and I get along great" to convince you management won't lay you off or fire you or that they owe you anything.
As others have said, the employer-employee relationship is first and foremost a business relationship, i.e. transactional: you work and they pay you. When that relationship doesn't work any more for one side or the other, it ends.
It does often happen, of course, that professional friendships or even personal friendships develop. You are, after all, spending a lot of time with your co-workers. But don't think your good relationships or friendships will help if the business decides a layoff is necessary.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
At least where I live it takes ~4 - 5 years education to become an electrician. Do you know people who switched from IT to electrician because their salary got lower?
> At least where I live it takes ~4 - 5 years education to become an electrician. That's about the same as it is for IT, isn't it? Most decent IT jobs wanting a four-year CS degree. And changing careers has retraining costs but not for some 18 year old who hasn't picked one yet. Which can balance out the supply and demand five years from now just as well as a 30+ year old changing careers. > Do you know people who sw…
Ah ok. I though you where talking about people currently working in IT switching over to become an electrician.
Seriously, why people in tech are opposed to unions? In Europe, unions and Betriebsrat (works committee) are the norm. Why not in the US?
As a European I'm curious which unions and industries are you talking about? I've been working tech or tech-adjacent jobs my entire life here and I've never been in a union nor do I know any friends (developers / designers) that are in a union. And I'm going to conferences and meetups on a regular. I'm not saying unions don't exist (probably more so in certain industries), but for devs to be in a union in Europe? Nev…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Mass layoffs work when there was over-hiring (management's fault) or there was a big revenue downturn (market forces). This time it was because of over-hiring at the COVID mania. People left safer jobs to join FAANGs tempted with higher salaries and a prospect of improving their CV. And now they are dumped back into the toughest tech jobs market in 20 years. This is totally a fault of management and none of them are…
I really don't agree with this line of thinking. > Mass layoffs work when there was over-hiring Ok, let's define "over-hiring". Google... had 99k employees in 2018, 119k in 2019, 135k in 2020, 156k in 2021, 190k in 2022, 174k in 2023. and made $136b in 2018, $161b in 2019, $182b in 2020, $257b in 2021, $282b in 2022, $297b in 2023. They basically doubled their headcount to double their revenue. How is that over-hirin…
They've been cut a lot last year, but no news about it.
Also there are cuts in high cost of living locations. Why to keep people in California if you can hire in Warsaw and pay x0.25 of US rate there?
Seriously, why people in tech are opposed to unions? In Europe, unions and Betriebsrat (works committee) are the norm. Why not in the US?
US restarted hiring quickly after the layoffs, but EU has still a hiring freeze in several FAANGS.
Seriously, why people in tech are opposed to unions? In Europe, unions and Betriebsrat (works committee) are the norm. Why not in the US?
As a European I'm curious which unions and industries are you talking about? I've been working tech or tech-adjacent jobs my entire life here and I've never been in a union nor do I know any friends (developers / designers) that are in a union. And I'm going to conferences and meetups on a regular. I'm not saying unions don't exist (probably more so in certain industries), but for devs to be in a union in Europe? Nev…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
In the US, when you say "labor union", people think of a factory worker standing in a picket line outside some dinosaur car assembly plant in Flint, Michigan that's about to close anyway. The media has very successfully demonized unions, and many skilled workers believe the company line that unions drive down average wages, make it impossible to fire useless people, charge heavy membership fees, etc.
I usually think actors, writers, athletes, doctors, lawyers.
Actors and other have "Guilds", lawyers have a "Bar"...
(sure the other two you mentioned have unions but...)
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I see what you are saying. I am an engineer-turned-EM and you don't know me, so please take everything I say with a grain of salt: > Your job is NOT safe. Nothing will make execs happier than having this line of thought popularized amongst engineers. It will allow them to hire cheaper, and exploit existing engineers more. I think a better way to put it is: "A job is not your family, and a job is not your identity. Yo…
For anyone reading this, please don’t subscribe to this level of cynicism. For SWEs at Google and almost anywhere else, the wind has blown very favorably for you and that’s something to be celebrated. The direction of the wind has shifted, but we can never expect it to stay blowing in one direction forever, even if others get lucky and catch one like that. You will no doubt set your sail and take it to new and wonder…