One aspect not mentioned: Tech really want to be a meritocracy. We don’t generally succeed, but we try. Engineers at least want to be unbiased, and the Bay Area

One aspect not mentioned: Tech really want to be a meritocracy. We don’t generally succeed, but we try. Engineers at least want to be unbiased, and the Bay Area cares about it culturally, generally speaking. So we fight against increased barriers to entry like credentials (but that Stanford/MIT degree is still a golden ticket into the interview). We try to give as objective an interview as possible, meaning it’s explicitly technical, rather than just talking about past projects open endedly and going with the feeling you get about the candidate. I’d bet if we collectively decided not to try to be a meritocracy, we could make tech interviewing a lot easier, but I wouldn’t like that. I came from a nontraditional background too. I only got in the door because whiteboard style interviews let me demonstrate what I knew despite my total lack of credentials. We suck at being a meritocracy, but I’m glad we try to keep the barriers low and unbiased. I bet we’re better than most other fields that pay this much.