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> Ungodly money. Ungodly benefits. Working interesting problems everyday. Changing the world. Impacting millions of lives. The best of some of the best teams.

The pay is good, but the rest of it is not as good as you make it out to be. There are exceptions, but for the most part projects, teams and impact are usually pretty low.

> There are expectations

Sounds miserable!

In all seriousness, it’s awesome and better than most.

Apple has a toxic side covered up by silence that is unique among most tech companies.

And you want to talk about ungodly money and ungodly benefits, yet there are suicides at Facebook and Amazon. Not to mention in investment banking. All of these things come at a cost.

Okay. So what is your point?

That there are hard jobs everywhere and hard jobs are… hard?

I would also bet stats show suicide rates are higher in other industries.

These are some of the most balanced and progressive organizations between pay and lifestyle.

If your golden ticket is so toxic go get a job that is not at 1/3 the pay. You’ll still be richer than most and I would bet many still find a way to be miserable.

Not all FAANG companies are the same, and your carefree experience does not overwrite others’. You cannot presume to know the experience of companies that encompass tens of thousands of individuals, with untold number of departments and teams. So you were on a low-stress team. Bully for you.

My experience is that the least interesting work of my entire career happened during my times at FAANG corps. They have too many overqualified people and too little difficult work to do, so more than anything you just end up playing code games, and "showing impact" by convincing people to adopt new restrictive policies and whatnot.

If you want real tough, new, interesting work, join a startup or a non-tech company where you can have true impact. Alas the pay will be shit in comparison, that's the tradeoff.

Better, start your own startup. These days anyone who can build a weekend demo and talk coherently for 45 minutes to an investor can raise a few million. Not even throwing shade or joking, it's a literal free money fiesta right now, at least until interest rates go nonzero (which will be soon).

> Changing the world. Impacting millions of lives.

This sentence misses "for the better". Good payment and benefits are easy to achieve as an engineer, good problems/tech is also not hard if you look enough. Sorry if you had bad experiences, but it's not like there is a cruel world out there outside of FAANG, as your comment makes it seem. They may have more to give due to sheer scale, but after a limit, good goals are equally if not more important.

And it's at least doubious that the monopolistic, walled garden data-harvesting world that they build can provide those.

The term FAANG was created in 2013 which is not that long ago. FAANG didn't really become a super "hot" place to be until after the 2009-2011 recession. Looking back, everything is often crystal clear 20/20 vision.

"Difficult to see. Always in motion is the future." - Yoda.

Google was already the super hot place to be before the recession. And Apple was the media darling even before iPhone.

It’s all relative. These issues are clearly important to these people.

Why do you want to be a little cog in a huge machine?

Free food.

Helplessness Blues Fleet Foxes

I was raised up believing I was somehow unique Like a snowflake distinct among snowflakes, unique in each way you can see And now after some thinking, I'd say I'd rather be A functioning cog in some great machinery serving something beyond me

But I don't, I don't know what that will be I'll get back to you someday soon you will see

What's my name, what's my station? Oh, just tell me what I should do I don't need to be kind to the armies of night that would do such injustice to you Or bow down and be grateful and say, "Sure, take all that you see" To the men who move only in dimly-lit halls and determine my future for me

And I don't, I don't know who to believe I'll get back to you someday soon you will see

If I know only one thing, it's that everything that I see Of the world outside is so inconceivable often I barely can speak Yeah I'm tongue-tied and dizzy and I can't keep it to myself What good is it to sing helplessness blues, why should I wait for anyone else?

And I know, I know you will keep me on the shelf I'll come back to you someday soon myself

If I had an orchard, I'd work 'til I'm raw If I had an orchard, I'd work 'til I'm sore And you would wait tables and soon run the store

Gold hair in the sunlight, my light in the dawn If I had an orchard, I'd work 'til I'm sore If I had an orchard, I'd work 'til I'm sore Someday I'll be like the man on the screen

>Ungodly money.

Based on my own experience (albeit outside the US) the salaries don't differ much from their non-FAANG counterparts at the top of the market.

Are you really trying to make this argument?

But in the US, they do differ, by quite a huge margin. See levels.fyi if you really want to know the true US rates that big tech commands.