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Serious question: why does anyone work for Amazon? Everything I've heard is that it's a toxic work environment, with below-average pay and draconian employee a

by _bxg1 6y ago

Serious question: why does anyone work for Amazon? Everything I've heard is that it's a toxic work environment, with below-average pay and draconian employee agreements. And that's not even getting into the ethical issues. What in the world makes someone take a job there instead of pretty much any other tech company?

symlinkk 6y ago
You’re in a FAANG bubble if you think Amazon doesn’t pay well.
- _bxg1 6y ago
  Every tech job pays well compared to most of the economy. But the OP described Amazon's salaries as "frugal", in that context. My point is just that I don't see any shining positive that makes all the downsides worth it.
  - marcinzm 6y ago
    Amazon will pay more than anyone outside of other large established tech companies. Historically, accounting for stock increases, someone who has spent 4 years at amazon will probably have matched other large tech companies.
    - joshuamorton 6y ago
      I don't think that's true. When I started working, Amazon stock was at ~$750 a share. When I started working, Google stock was at about the same. Google would have granted 100-120K in stock, Amazon closer to 50K. Google gives annual refreshes of ~50K, while Amazon would not until the initial grant is mostly vested. So at the end of this year, when both vests would be coming to a close, a Googler who kept all their stock would have 160 shares from their initial grant, as well as 25-40 additional shares from their refresh grants. So that's ~180K in AMZN at today's prices vs. 230K in GOOG, plus another 40-60K in refresh grants. And the Google employee has a better salary and bonus structure. Facebook is equivalent or superior to Google in pretty much every aspect of this comparison (base pay, bonus, equity grant, equity growth, equity refresh).
scarface74 6y ago
You can spin any big tech company for having ethical issues. But for me personally, it’s simple. Big Tech salary and working fully remotely for AWS in a low cost of living area.
thoraway1010 6y ago
Poor pay? Amazon has created tons and tons of millionaires. If you work 15 years at your local retail job - you are lucky to own a house. If you worked 15 years at amazon as an engineer - you can retire in a very nice house. The stock performance has been very good over 15 years. "At Amazon, a Seattle operations engineer on an $840k salary had his/her renewal application denied in February." "a level III program manager in Seattle earning a salary of $1.3m" The article was mixing up compensation elements, but people are paid well above US average wage at Amazon. https://news.efinancialcareers.com/us-en/3003798/highest-paying-h1b-visa-salaries-denied https://news.efinancialcareers.com/us-en/3003798/highest-pay...
- _bxg1 6y ago
  I felt I made it clear, but by "average" I meant "average for equivalent roles in the tech industry".
  - marcinzm 6y ago
    Amazon pays more than everyone except the largest tech companies and some unicorn startups. You have a very distorted view of what the tech industry actually pays.
    - thoraway1010 6y ago
      Seriously, there are help desk techs and IT techs in ohio and idaho who would think $1.2 million per year was fine money. These are NOT poorly compensated folks. They may be badly treated though - I could believe that.
holdenk 6y ago
So serious answer: I worked for Amazon because they recruited from my University and it was my first after graduation job. I'd had some internships, but I didn't have a large network or a lot of options.
ketzo 6y ago
I've heard people on the more MBA side of tech refer to Amazon as an "executive factory." Dev managers at Amazon leave to be CTOs at startups. Senior engineers leave to be architects. It's one of the best possible resume items you could get, particularly if you're moving to another cloud company -- although, obviously, that in particular seems to be a bit of a dangerous move if you don't wanna get sued.
hodgesrm 6y ago
Amazon can't be that toxic. The innovation in areas like data services (S3, Dyanamo, RDS, Redshift, Aurora, etc.) has been astounding. It's clearly a productive environment for getting big ideas done.
- fgonzag 6y ago
  They put technologies that already existed in the cloud (most of them anyways). Astounding indeed. It's innovation from the business side of things more than the tech side of things.

by _bxg1 6y ago

symlinkk 6y ago

You’re in a FAANG bubble if you think Amazon doesn’t pay well.

_bxg1 6y ago
Every tech job pays well compared to most of the economy. But the OP described Amazon's salaries as "frugal", in that context. My point is just that I don't see any shining positive that makes all the downsides worth it.
- marcinzm 6y ago
  Amazon will pay more than anyone outside of other large established tech companies. Historically, accounting for stock increases, someone who has spent 4 years at amazon will probably have matched other large tech companies.
  - joshuamorton 6y ago
    I don't think that's true. When I started working, Amazon stock was at ~$750 a share. When I started working, Google stock was at about the same. Google would have granted 100-120K in stock, Amazon closer to 50K. Google gives annual refreshes of ~50K, while Amazon would not until the initial grant is mostly vested. So at the end of this year, when both vests would be coming to a close, a Googler who kept all their stock would have 160 shares from their initial grant, as well as 25-40 additional shares from their refresh grants. So that's ~180K in AMZN at today's prices vs. 230K in GOOG, plus another 40-60K in refresh grants. And the Google employee has a better salary and bonus structure. Facebook is equivalent or superior to Google in pretty much every aspect of this comparison (base pay, bonus, equity grant, equity growth, equity refresh).

scarface74 6y ago

You can spin any big tech company for having ethical issues. But for me personally, it’s simple. Big Tech salary and working fully remotely for AWS in a low cost of living area.

thoraway1010 6y ago

Poor pay? Amazon has created tons and tons of millionaires. If you work 15 years at your local retail job - you are lucky to own a house. If you worked 15 years at amazon as an engineer - you can retire in a very nice house. The stock performance has been very good over 15 years. "At Amazon, a Seattle operations engineer on an $840k salary had his/her renewal application denied in February." "a level III program manager in Seattle earning a salary of $1.3m" The article was mixing up compensation elements, but people are paid well above US average wage at Amazon. https://news.efinancialcareers.com/us-en/3003798/highest-paying-h1b-visa-salaries-denied https://news.efinancialcareers.com/us-en/3003798/highest-pay...

_bxg1 6y ago
I felt I made it clear, but by "average" I meant "average for equivalent roles in the tech industry".
- marcinzm 6y ago
  Amazon pays more than everyone except the largest tech companies and some unicorn startups. You have a very distorted view of what the tech industry actually pays.
  - thoraway1010 6y ago
    Seriously, there are help desk techs and IT techs in ohio and idaho who would think $1.2 million per year was fine money. These are NOT poorly compensated folks. They may be badly treated though - I could believe that.

holdenk 6y ago

So serious answer: I worked for Amazon because they recruited from my University and it was my first after graduation job. I'd had some internships, but I didn't have a large network or a lot of options.

ketzo 6y ago

I've heard people on the more MBA side of tech refer to Amazon as an "executive factory." Dev managers at Amazon leave to be CTOs at startups. Senior engineers leave to be architects. It's one of the best possible resume items you could get, particularly if you're moving to another cloud company -- although, obviously, that in particular seems to be a bit of a dangerous move if you don't wanna get sued.

hodgesrm 6y ago

Amazon can't be that toxic. The innovation in areas like data services (S3, Dyanamo, RDS, Redshift, Aurora, etc.) has been astounding. It's clearly a productive environment for getting big ideas done.

fgonzag 6y ago
They put technologies that already existed in the cloud (most of them anyways). Astounding indeed. It's innovation from the business side of things more than the tech side of things.