As I understand it, the "promotion through seniority" thing isn't always a huge issue. It's basically a way to create less risk and stress for employees. As lo

As I understand it, the "promotion through seniority" thing isn't always a huge issue. It's basically a way to create less risk and stress for employees. As long as they put in the work (and yeah, they're ALL expected to work) they get job security and get promoted in a predictable way. If they show that they're actually good at their jobs, they don't get more (or less!) promotions, they just get to work on the more interesting projects and are given more free reign. Of course, I expect this would only be true in the companies that are not sinking. And it's not like the USA doesn't have its share of former tech giants getting torn apart by more competent competitors (anyone remember Yahoo? HP? Is IBM on the upswing or downswing right now?).