Always will be
Comment on It’s a dark time to be a tech worker right now
chemicalwonka@discuss.tchncs.de 4 months ago
always been
Municipal0379@lemmy.world 4 months ago
EatATaco@lemm.ee 4 months ago
Is this a joke? Software development regularly comes out on top as one of the best jobs. Good pay, relatively low stress, and good work life balance.
theneverfox@pawb.social 4 months ago
Good work life balance? Low stress? Well paid? Not soul crushing?
Nah fam. Pick one, hope to get your second pick, and if you’re lucky, skilled, and play your cards right you can get three. You might get none of them.
No one gets all four… Despite what it sounds like, it’s an inherently creative job where you rarely get to pick your project and are regularly put on an impossible timeline.
Wage suppression is well documented, and for some reason no one gives raises… Despite the fact even the best devs need half a year, bare minimum, to be fully up to speed with a mature system. If you’re lucky, when you jump after 18 months (the optimal time at a place to keep your salary growing, especially in the first decade) you’ll inherit a system in good condition with people who can explain it. If you’re very lucky.
That being said, it’s one of the only middle class industries left. I recommend it to everyone who has the aptitude - it’s one of the most useful skills to have, even if you rarely use it.
maegul@lemmy.ml 4 months ago
Hmmm. I’ve seen threads on social media from experienced devs having been unemployed for a year now and rather devastated by it.
corsicanguppy@lemmy.ca 4 months ago
I know a guy who was let go a year ago. Dude’s like 170 IQ - and while people say that, this guy’s dizzyingly smart. 3 degrees, he can teach, code to spec, rebuild your delivery pipeline so it fucking howls, manage nerds, and he’s been interviewing like it’s his job for a year without lasting results.
Some shitty company in Connecticut just flew him out for a project wrap-up, as he’s been helping save their ass since their completely out-of-his-depth manager reached out on a public forum for some clue. Like, without him they’d’ve been 4 kinds of fucked and he was looking for something to keep him sane for a few weeks.
Handshake and a free dinner and sent him packing. Because they could. They got what they needed, and they foolishly think they can get it again when this idiot fucks up again in a month.
I worry a lot of nerds are getting fish-hooked like that, when they just want to make things go and maybe also eat regularly.
afraid_of_zombies@lemmy.world 4 months ago
Pretty common with OEMs. They hire to develop the new product line, let them go, and make the products until they literally can’t anymore.
SatanicNotMessianic@lemmy.ml 4 months ago
I’m not disputing their experiences - I’ve replied otherwise on this thread - but I’m going to guess that a lot of those experienced devs didn’t go through the 2000-2002 ish dot com crash, or maybe even the 2008 recession.
Sometimes the money goes away for a while. The money has currently gone away. Eventually they drop the interest rates, people decide that real estate or EVs aren’t sexy anymore because they’re overbought, and the money floods back in. Then it gets too much, to the point that some kid gets $60M for the idea of selling barbecues and charcoal over the internet, and the cycle repeats.
We thought Keynes fixed this but then decided it was more fun for a handful of people to make shitloads of money and then crash the economy every decade or two.
maegul@lemmy.ml 4 months ago
Some claimed to have been around long enough to gone through the 2008 recession, but dot com crash would certainly be very unlikely.
SatanicNotMessianic@lemmy.ml 4 months ago
I’ve been working in tech in one form or another since about 1994 and even before that if you include “writing some software for some guy’s cash register.” I’ve been through a few of these. They suck, but two years from now it’ll be forgotten.
aesthelete@lemmy.world 4 months ago
Spot on. A word of advice to people in the tech field: save while the sun shines because another thing you can’t time besides the market is when the money will be flowing your way.
I’m somewhat optimistic about the long term prospects because if new technology isn’t the future then what is?
But seriously, don’t pretend like your high salary will last a lifetime and plan accordingly.
rambaroo@lemmy.world 4 months ago
I don’t think the money is magically just going to come back this time. I doubt that interest rates will ever drop to the levels they were at before the pandemic.
The market is insane right now. Basically every position I see has 1000+ applications. Really wish some of these rookie candidates would go chase gold in some other industry because they’re making it harder for qualified people, and the vast majority of them turn into shit devs.
treadful@lemmy.zip 4 months ago
It can also be a common occurrence and devastating to an individual at the same time. It sucks, and people vent.
I’ve been in this game a long time and been laid off from about half my gigs. It sucks every time. If it wasn’t for the fact that the pay is good and that I like doing it, I probably would’ve moved to something more stable already.
Taleya@aussie.zone 4 months ago
A certain subset of dev thought they were untouchable. Now they are finding out they’re the same level of peasant as the rest of us. Hard fall. :/