6 ms·

When the labor market turns, 100% of employees will be doing 100% of what the CEO demands. Right now, labor has the upper hand.

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
bfostbfostbfost 5y ago
I’m not asking you to predict the future, though that would be awesome, but could you share some thoughts on when/how the labor market turning might unfold?
- rocgf 5y ago
  I'm not OP, though I see that he's among the few that shares this opinion of mine. Take what I'm saying with a gigantic grain of salt because I am not some economist. We have had 10 years+ of quantitative easing both in the US and in Europe, with it all peaking during the last 2 years due to Covid. This has delivered an aritificial stimulus to the economy in the form of basically free money. This has had a lot of consequences, including the craziness in the housing market & stock market, as well as a huge influx of money that went into other investments like startups, expansions and so on. Basically, in simpler terms, everybody could easily get money because money has been very cheap. We are now starting to see the side-effects (of an otherwise arguably good thing) in the form of inflation. So the greater powers are now at a fork in the road - they either allow inflation to wreck the working and middle class or they turn off the money tap. The problem is that after living for so long with 0% interest rates, any significant change to this might trigger a recession that will make 2008 look like the good times. I started my career after 2008, so I have only ever experienced an environment in which employeers were heavily competing for engineers (and generally workforce in all professions), so I'm afraid that anyone in a position similar to mine has simply no way of realizing the way things will look a few years from now. Unless I'm seriously missing something of substance, then I'm afraid that there will be quite a few years in which people will lose homes, jobs, sanity and us privileged developers are maybe in a better position than most, but make no mistake - we will all suffer.
  - rapind 5y ago
    Keep in mind that large populations suffering often have political implications. That’s why economic predictions are mostly shots in the dark. They are reasonable and logical until people say “Nope”. We’ll see what inflation is like this year, but it’s reasonable (due to Russia oil) to assume it’ll be just as bad as last year. This has a ton of economic and political implications. Some that can be predicted and some that will likely be surprising. So making statements about what the the labour market will look like in 2 years…
    - rocgf 5y ago
      > Keep in mind that large populations suffering often have political implications. Not sure this is as insightful as you think. Yes, obviously that is the case. So? If inflation and housing continue to be this bad, then we have to stop printing the money or maybe find a way to better allocate the wealth, which would mean even more turmoil than your regular economic crisis. > Some that can be predicted and some that will likely be surprising. So making statements about what the the labour market will look like in 2 years… Yes, which is why I'm not making predicitons about company X in Y months from now. If you think that continuing in this manner for another 2 years is sustainable, then it means that one of us is _seriously_ misunderstanding the macro-economic situation. We can't have house prices increase 20% every year and inflation edging towards 10% inflation and stagnating salaries. Something has got to give, and the point I'm making is simple. Things will get worse before they get better. If you think that is simply a coin flip or a matter of pure opinion, then I'm afraid, again, that one of us is really, really uninformed about the situation. Maybe it's me.
      - rapind 5y ago
        My point is you are drawing conclusions about the labour market when there are likely very large and potentially unpredictable changes in store. One (just one) question is whether anyone has the political will or clout to make things worse in the short term to potentially correct it in the long term. Interest rates should have been raised long before covid if you’re thinking long term and yet that never happened. Raising rates right now could be political suicide (albeit the most logical path). There are a lot of other hard to reason about factors. Economists a couple months ago were predicting lower inflation this year, like in the 4% range. Seems unlikely now. Any conclusion about the labour market is predicated on some pretty massive assumptions and therefore complete speculation.
- cj 5y ago
  Major tech companies (e.g. Netflix, Cloudflare, MongoDB, and nearly every other publicly listed high growth tech company) have seen their stock prices fall as much as 50% in the past few months. When the value of the entire tech industry shrinks that dramatically this quickly, companies are bound to become a bit more conservative in their operations, which cloud slow the pace of hiring in tech (and for some, layoffs) As for "when", the slow down has already started and will accelerate over the next few months (my prediction, no evidence).
coffeefirst 5y ago
Maybe, but it's also very difficult to enforce a policy that everyone around you, including all your candidates, consider stupid and retrograde.
- 0des 5y ago
  This is not reality. The guy signing the checks has leverage, end of story. It doesn't matter who is shouting louder, the pen won't move.
  - noasaservice 5y ago
    Labor creates. Always has, and always will. That capitalist check-writer? They can't do. That's why they hire.
    - willcipriano 5y ago
      It's never been easier to be a check writer, money printing with wreckless abandon, venture capital throwing money at anybody with a pulse. This is what a market with an oversupply of check writers looks like.
      - noasaservice 5y ago
        And more to the point, there will be a capitalist check-writer that *will* accept 100% remote work because it will get labor to sign up with them. Reminds me of a LinkedIn post from a CEO that said they watched the "Return to Work" notices being hated online from competitors, and he'd send recruiters to employees recruiting and using remote as a reason to jump. Worked really well too.
  - lozenge 5y ago
    Let's see if the CEO fires half his workforce then. If not, then he must have less leverage than you think.
    - 5y ago
rapind 5y ago
Unless their competitors who allow remote steal their best and brightest. Remote is a perk (like a cafeteria… or sleep pods I guess?) that can be used competitively.
- andrei_says_ 5y ago
  It is a cafeteria, home cooked food, yoga room, personal office with a great music sound system and a personalized cozy environment with everything one might need at hand - all in one. Along with the absence of driving through a potentially deadly obstacle course for two hours a day.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

bfostbfostbfost 5y ago

I’m not asking you to predict the future, though that would be awesome, but could you share some thoughts on when/how the labor market turning might unfold?

rocgf 5y ago
I'm not OP, though I see that he's among the few that shares this opinion of mine. Take what I'm saying with a gigantic grain of salt because I am not some economist. We have had 10 years+ of quantitative easing both in the US and in Europe, with it all peaking during the last 2 years due to Covid. This has delivered an aritificial stimulus to the economy in the form of basically free money. This has had a lot of consequences, including the craziness in the housing market & stock market, as well as a huge influx of money that went into other investments like startups, expansions and so on. Basically, in simpler terms, everybody could easily get money because money has been very cheap. We are now starting to see the side-effects (of an otherwise arguably good thing) in the form of inflation. So the greater powers are now at a fork in the road - they either allow inflation to wreck the working and middle class or they turn off the money tap. The problem is that after living for so long with 0% interest rates, any significant change to this might trigger a recession that will make 2008 look like the good times. I started my career after 2008, so I have only ever experienced an environment in which employeers were heavily competing for engineers (and generally workforce in all professions), so I'm afraid that anyone in a position similar to mine has simply no way of realizing the way things will look a few years from now. Unless I'm seriously missing something of substance, then I'm afraid that there will be quite a few years in which people will lose homes, jobs, sanity and us privileged developers are maybe in a better position than most, but make no mistake - we will all suffer.
- rapind 5y ago
  Keep in mind that large populations suffering often have political implications. That’s why economic predictions are mostly shots in the dark. They are reasonable and logical until people say “Nope”. We’ll see what inflation is like this year, but it’s reasonable (due to Russia oil) to assume it’ll be just as bad as last year. This has a ton of economic and political implications. Some that can be predicted and some that will likely be surprising. So making statements about what the the labour market will look like in 2 years…
  - rocgf 5y ago
    > Keep in mind that large populations suffering often have political implications. Not sure this is as insightful as you think. Yes, obviously that is the case. So? If inflation and housing continue to be this bad, then we have to stop printing the money or maybe find a way to better allocate the wealth, which would mean even more turmoil than your regular economic crisis. > Some that can be predicted and some that will likely be surprising. So making statements about what the the labour market will look like in 2 years… Yes, which is why I'm not making predicitons about company X in Y months from now. If you think that continuing in this manner for another 2 years is sustainable, then it means that one of us is _seriously_ misunderstanding the macro-economic situation. We can't have house prices increase 20% every year and inflation edging towards 10% inflation and stagnating salaries. Something has got to give, and the point I'm making is simple. Things will get worse before they get better. If you think that is simply a coin flip or a matter of pure opinion, then I'm afraid, again, that one of us is really, really uninformed about the situation. Maybe it's me.
    - rapind 5y ago
      My point is you are drawing conclusions about the labour market when there are likely very large and potentially unpredictable changes in store. One (just one) question is whether anyone has the political will or clout to make things worse in the short term to potentially correct it in the long term. Interest rates should have been raised long before covid if you’re thinking long term and yet that never happened. Raising rates right now could be political suicide (albeit the most logical path). There are a lot of other hard to reason about factors. Economists a couple months ago were predicting lower inflation this year, like in the 4% range. Seems unlikely now. Any conclusion about the labour market is predicated on some pretty massive assumptions and therefore complete speculation.
cj 5y ago
Major tech companies (e.g. Netflix, Cloudflare, MongoDB, and nearly every other publicly listed high growth tech company) have seen their stock prices fall as much as 50% in the past few months. When the value of the entire tech industry shrinks that dramatically this quickly, companies are bound to become a bit more conservative in their operations, which cloud slow the pace of hiring in tech (and for some, layoffs) As for "when", the slow down has already started and will accelerate over the next few months (my prediction, no evidence).

coffeefirst 5y ago

Maybe, but it's also very difficult to enforce a policy that everyone around you, including all your candidates, consider stupid and retrograde.

0des 5y ago
This is not reality. The guy signing the checks has leverage, end of story. It doesn't matter who is shouting louder, the pen won't move.
- noasaservice 5y ago
  Labor creates. Always has, and always will. That capitalist check-writer? They can't do. That's why they hire.
  - willcipriano 5y ago
    It's never been easier to be a check writer, money printing with wreckless abandon, venture capital throwing money at anybody with a pulse. This is what a market with an oversupply of check writers looks like.
    - noasaservice 5y ago
      And more to the point, there will be a capitalist check-writer that *will* accept 100% remote work because it will get labor to sign up with them. Reminds me of a LinkedIn post from a CEO that said they watched the "Return to Work" notices being hated online from competitors, and he'd send recruiters to employees recruiting and using remote as a reason to jump. Worked really well too.
- lozenge 5y ago
  Let's see if the CEO fires half his workforce then. If not, then he must have less leverage than you think.
  - 5y ago

rapind 5y ago

Unless their competitors who allow remote steal their best and brightest. Remote is a perk (like a cafeteria… or sleep pods I guess?) that can be used competitively.

andrei_says_ 5y ago
It is a cafeteria, home cooked food, yoga room, personal office with a great music sound system and a personalized cozy environment with everything one might need at hand - all in one. Along with the absence of driving through a potentially deadly obstacle course for two hours a day.