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Comment by toyg | Hacker News Reader

Maybe supply is still way lower than necessary, considering that proficiency requires several years of training and practice on technology that changes very often. Maybe the supply pool is still effectively limited to certain “socioeconoethnic” groups, and often companies self-sabotage by requiring candidates to live in certain areas.

In my experience, the attitudes of software developers, as seen all over the web, are basically the definition of “privileged” in a way that does not match almost anything else. “I didn’t like my manager, so I quit and spent a few months counting my $$$ until I found something I liked more” is something that very few other professions can flaunt. This is, incidentally, why old-school managers are basically incompatible with the sector: in any tech hotspot, you literally cannot threaten or bully a tech employee, unlike any other employee. I bet lots of people high-up hate this so much.

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And yet, lots of software developers do quit and spend a few months off, and then go work somewhere else. Because managers do threaten and bully employees. This is considered 'normal' for the field. One running joke in my circles is that developers never 'take vacation'. They simply wait a few months between jobs, because they're never at one job for more than a year or two.

The other way to look at this is: companies pay programmers ridiculous salaries because the working conditions are so hated. Junior programmers (even those who have never been to college) are paid about as well as dentists, and they still often quit after a couple years. This is way above the $75K happiness threshold. We literally can't pay them enough to stay working for us!

Hypothesis: software development is one of the few industries that I've interacted with where the workers haven't organized yet. When there's no union for collective bargaining, what lever does an individual employee have, other than asking for yet more money, or quitting?

P.S., In what industries do you commonly see managers threatening or bullying workers? I haven't seen that at all.

If the ridiculous money is (partly) compensation for the bad circumstances, would you expect the compensation to sink if a union improves the situation?

I'm not sure how this is in different countries. I've not heard that many horror stories in Germany, but most work here is also not VC-backed startups, and the compensation is much lower in comparison. The non-vc-investing might of course also be a reason for lower compensation, when your valuation can't explode, attracting the top developers is less of a priority.

> P.S., In what industries do you commonly see managers threatening or bullying workers? I haven't seen that at all.

Sales (a lot!), restaurants (pretty much every line cook I've ever spoken to mentions it, and what I read in comments online sounds like it's the same in all countries), call centers, transportation off the top of my head. The main difference is that they're usually not paid well.

> companies pay programmers ridiculous salaries because the working conditions are so hated.

I think any blue-collar worker would be laughing his ass off at this statement.

> paid about as well as dentists, and they still often quit after a couple years. This is way above the $75K happiness threshold.

Fuck-you-money actually enables this sort of freedom, since you're less scared of going jobless for a few months thanks to all the fat you've stored. So might as well quit and think about things for a while. Over certain levels, the meaning of one's job can take priority over immediate compensation.

> We literally can't pay them enough to stay working for us!

In the end, everyone deep down would rather not have to work for someone else, or to not work at all. Programmers in tech hotspots are lucky enough to actually be able to do it, and pretty often too, without any serious repercussion. For many, this is a golden age the likes of which we've never seen.

> In what industries do you commonly see managers threatening or bullying workers?

All of them - we wouldn't have unions otherwise. There is a reason the word "boss" has negative connotations.

> In the end, everyone deep down would rather not have to work for someone else, or to not work at all.

I very much disagree. I like that my company cares about things like sales/marketing/HR/finance so I don't have to. And anyway, for most jobs, you need a supporting structure that has your back, like a company or a government agency or whatever. Sure, you could start your own company, but at that point you'll most likely spend more time doing management rather than actual work. I like that I can focus on my technical role since I'm very much not a manager type.

If you didn’t have to earn money to live, you wouldn’t need to have a company or whatnot - that is my point.

You still want to accomplish goals, and most goals require some sort of organization that bears the initial/ongoing investment and provides you with the back office etc. For instance, even if you're the best surgeon in the world, you won't be about to run a hospital all on your own.

> You still want to accomplish goals

why do that when Civilization V exists?

Ask Susan Fowler whether you "cannot threaten or bully a tech employee" in a tech hotspot.

https://www.susanjfowler.com/blog/2017/2/19/reflecting-on-on...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Susan_Fowler

"I had a new job offer in my hands less than a week later."

The minute her boss actually told her she was "on thin ice", she was out. Despite her being effectively outside the preferred "socioeconoethnic" groups that most companies self-restrict to, she was practically free at all times to walk out and get an equivalent (or likely better) job. That's a massive privilege.

You missed the part where she was subjected to systematic intimidation by Uber and private investigators working on their behalf after she left.

This can happen in any sector - but in most of them it's also pretty hard to find a well-paid replacement job in a week, so it's more effective and less reported.

Developers have that attitude because it’s a technical creative profession. You are tied to what you create so it has emotional impact if you don’t put in the emotional framework to deal with business realities.

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