5 ms·

Why is it always about the payment, why not choose a job you love doing?

by GrumpyNl 4y ago

rexpop 4y ago
The Sheriff will evict me at gunpoint if I don't pay the exorbitant rents in regions with an active job market.
- Brian_K_White 4y ago
  - rexpop 4y ago
    > Did you think many people would not roll their eyes On the contrary, it's your cavalier viewpoint which is in the global minority. I'll engage with your dismissive, bad faith argument for the sake of earnestly inquisitive bystanders: no, we are not "forced to work" but we are compelled to do so under an economic systems which, at its leaf nodes, enforces noncompliance with violence. Try thinking through a few nth-order consequences of chronic unemployment. As for the "particular job" aspect, no it's not that one (1) "particular job" is the requisite, but to attain particular living standards, one can't realistically look outside categories of jobs that share particular aspects. So think of it not as "a particular job," but rather a particular category of jobs which pay enough, in the right regions, for the right qualifications. So, really, I am referring to a limited category and a structural eventuality, while you are referring to "a particular job at gunpoint." I think your extrapolations have imported greater histrionics than my original post.
    - Brian_K_White 4y ago
      I don't see a single invalidation of my ridicule.
      - Sinidir 4y ago
        Then you're blind.
        Brian_K_White 4y ago
        pbourke 4y ago
        I see someone taking a rhetorical device literally. The point the person that you responded to was making, obviously, is that the cost of living - and in particular of housing - is high and rising in many areas with strong tech job markets.
        rexpop 4y ago
        Do you think Sheriffs carry rhetorical guns, or do you not realize that they enforce evictions?
        Brian_K_White 4y ago
        I think the set of possible things is not limited to these two things you have arbitrarily presented for some reason. For instance, one of the infite things which are neither of those things, is that there are no evictions or sherrifs or guns that play any part in a software developer's housing arrangements, because they simply moved long before it gets to that point. There are people who get themselves into that position, but they are surely not the kind of smart lawyer coders who make valid arguments on HN right? If you're here, trying to argue something at all, then one presumes you think you're generally on top of things and not an idiot, right? Well, then does a smart rational person just sit there in a place they can't afford for the weeks or months it takes before serriffs come, and do so at gunpoint? You do realize they don't just start with that right? That there are many letters and notices, and mere pieces of paper over the course of several weeks to months before LE comes, and even when they do they don't actually point guns at you unless you barricade yourself in and resist or something. You can't invoke a STUPID hyperbolic image like that and at the same time lay any claim to have any sort of valid point to argue, considering this whole thread is about taking high paid developer jobs which they don't give out to idiots. But they do give them out to people who seem to think everyone else are idiots that don't know self serving hyperbole when they see it, and are such huge fragile babies they can not under any circumstances tolerate having this pointed out.
vegetablepotpie 4y ago
In my case I work for a defense contractor and make decent money. I could work for another company doing more meaningful work. But I almost certainly would make less money. This would cause me to fall behind my peers pay scale wise. This is not terrible, as I live well within my means, but this impacts my future pay, and the money I can set aside for investing. If I take that step now, I’d be leaving a lot of personal wealth on the table. But if I build up enough investment wealth to pay for my life in the future, I could take on more meaningful work in the future. If I leave for meaningful work now, I may be making money at that pay scale trajectory for the rest of my career, similar to how people who graduated in 2008 have never caught up to their peers wealth wise. I think it comes down to control about your financial options. Relinquishing income puts you at a disadvantage.
bagels 4y ago
I want to retire comfortably. I'm probably going to be alive for a long time after I'm no longer employable. Money can make this possible.
throwawaysleep 4y ago
The honest answer nobody will give. They like the idea of doing something good, but not enough to sacrifice much for it. I am the same way. I work on boring as heck ad tech and security stuff. I could do much more interesting work, but I would make less. Interesting and beneficial to the world is even less. I won’t even sacrifice pay for interesting. This is the same with climate change. Emergency? Many will say so. Enough of an emergency not to fly to Thailand this winter or not buy a monster house? Nope. I am the same way. I consider climate change a problem. But I’m also likely going to eat beef every day for the rest of my life in a meal or two.
- OrvalWintermute 4y ago
  >This is the same with climate change. Emergency? Many will say so. Enough of an emergency not to fly to Thailand this winter or not buy a monster house? Nope. I think many of us common folks have fairly low energy demands. But, the same set that goes to Davos, and is preaching to us about cutting our consumption, is the same that has the private jet, 3 mansions and a football field sized yacht. I'm so over the entitled elite telling us what to do.
GeneralMayhem 4y ago
It's about both, but the magnitudes matter. Would you do a job you love doing for free? Assuming the answer is no, then to paraphrase Churchill, we’ve established what kind of people we are; now we’re just haggling over the price. Am I willing to take a 10% pay cut to work on things that are good for society instead of selling ads? Sure. 25%? Probably. But those aren't the magnitudes we're talking about. Total comp for a senior-to-staff level engineer at FAANG (or anyone competing with them) will be, let's say, 500k/year, plus best-in-the-world benefits. Total comp for government or charity work rarely cracks 100k, and even tech companies that are focused on good rather than profit, maybe 200. And it's not like the FAANG jobs are bad - day-to-day, they're incredibly interesting. There's lots of fun stuff to build with smart people. The only problem is the background existential dread. It's also hard to argue that they're actively harming humanity in a lot of cases - maybe this line of reasoning works on potential Raytheon or Palantir employees, where the delta in morality is much greater, but convincing people to go from neutral-ish to good is harder than convincing them to go from bad to good. So the question you're asking is, are you willing to take a 60-80% pay cut to possibly do a less interesting job, in exchange for moral fulfillment and knowing that you're helping humanity? You might think the answer is yes, but I think it's hard to fault people for whom it isn't.
- kortilla 4y ago
  > maybe this line of reasoning works on potential Raytheon or Palantir employees The people who work at Raytheon or Palantir think they are less harmful than the people who work for Google/Facebook. Nobody who has decided to work there thinks they are just drone striking children.
  - twic 4y ago
    Some people who work at Lockheed Martin wrote the software for the missiles being fired by Ukrainian HIMARSs. They might even be quite proud of that.
    - thephyber 4y ago
      I bet they conveniently don’t care that Russia can use those HIMARS which remain after territory is take from Ukraine. Not enough people look at both sides of the ledger when it comes to the ethics and morals of their work.
nine_k 4y ago
My honest and obvious answer: because my family (wife, kids) need the money. It's always a balancing act though. I won't go to do a job I loathe, because I won't stick there for long enough. I choose jobs that I'm fine doing, and pass many jobs that I might love doing but which won't pay the bills. I was fortunate enough to have a job I outright loved, and which also paid well; it lasted 3.5 years. I'm immensely happy to have had such luck.

Why is it always about the payment, why not choose a job you love doing?

rexpop 4y ago

The Sheriff will evict me at gunpoint if I don't pay the exorbitant rents in regions with an active job market.

Brian_K_White 4y ago
- rexpop 4y ago
  > Did you think many people would not roll their eyes On the contrary, it's your cavalier viewpoint which is in the global minority. I'll engage with your dismissive, bad faith argument for the sake of earnestly inquisitive bystanders: no, we are not "forced to work" but we are compelled to do so under an economic systems which, at its leaf nodes, enforces noncompliance with violence. Try thinking through a few nth-order consequences of chronic unemployment. As for the "particular job" aspect, no it's not that one (1) "particular job" is the requisite, but to attain particular living standards, one can't realistically look outside categories of jobs that share particular aspects. So think of it not as "a particular job," but rather a particular category of jobs which pay enough, in the right regions, for the right qualifications. So, really, I am referring to a limited category and a structural eventuality, while you are referring to "a particular job at gunpoint." I think your extrapolations have imported greater histrionics than my original post.
  - Brian_K_White 4y ago
    I don't see a single invalidation of my ridicule.
    - Sinidir 4y ago
      Then you're blind.
      - Brian_K_White 4y ago
        pbourke 4y ago
        I see someone taking a rhetorical device literally. The point the person that you responded to was making, obviously, is that the cost of living - and in particular of housing - is high and rising in many areas with strong tech job markets.
        rexpop 4y ago
        Do you think Sheriffs carry rhetorical guns, or do you not realize that they enforce evictions?
        Brian_K_White 4y ago
        I think the set of possible things is not limited to these two things you have arbitrarily presented for some reason. For instance, one of the infite things which are neither of those things, is that there are no evictions or sherrifs or guns that play any part in a software developer's housing arrangements, because they simply moved long before it gets to that point. There are people who get themselves into that position, but they are surely not the kind of smart lawyer coders who make valid arguments on HN right? If you're here, trying to argue something at all, then one presumes you think you're generally on top of things and not an idiot, right? Well, then does a smart rational person just sit there in a place they can't afford for the weeks or months it takes before serriffs come, and do so at gunpoint? You do realize they don't just start with that right? That there are many letters and notices, and mere pieces of paper over the course of several weeks to months before LE comes, and even when they do they don't actually point guns at you unless you barricade yourself in and resist or something. You can't invoke a STUPID hyperbolic image like that and at the same time lay any claim to have any sort of valid point to argue, considering this whole thread is about taking high paid developer jobs which they don't give out to idiots. But they do give them out to people who seem to think everyone else are idiots that don't know self serving hyperbole when they see it, and are such huge fragile babies they can not under any circumstances tolerate having this pointed out.

vegetablepotpie 4y ago

In my case I work for a defense contractor and make decent money. I could work for another company doing more meaningful work. But I almost certainly would make less money. This would cause me to fall behind my peers pay scale wise. This is not terrible, as I live well within my means, but this impacts my future pay, and the money I can set aside for investing. If I take that step now, I’d be leaving a lot of personal wealth on the table. But if I build up enough investment wealth to pay for my life in the future, I could take on more meaningful work in the future. If I leave for meaningful work now, I may be making money at that pay scale trajectory for the rest of my career, similar to how people who graduated in 2008 have never caught up to their peers wealth wise. I think it comes down to control about your financial options. Relinquishing income puts you at a disadvantage.

bagels 4y ago

I want to retire comfortably. I'm probably going to be alive for a long time after I'm no longer employable. Money can make this possible.

throwawaysleep 4y ago

The honest answer nobody will give. They like the idea of doing something good, but not enough to sacrifice much for it. I am the same way. I work on boring as heck ad tech and security stuff. I could do much more interesting work, but I would make less. Interesting and beneficial to the world is even less. I won’t even sacrifice pay for interesting. This is the same with climate change. Emergency? Many will say so. Enough of an emergency not to fly to Thailand this winter or not buy a monster house? Nope. I am the same way. I consider climate change a problem. But I’m also likely going to eat beef every day for the rest of my life in a meal or two.

OrvalWintermute 4y ago
>This is the same with climate change. Emergency? Many will say so. Enough of an emergency not to fly to Thailand this winter or not buy a monster house? Nope. I think many of us common folks have fairly low energy demands. But, the same set that goes to Davos, and is preaching to us about cutting our consumption, is the same that has the private jet, 3 mansions and a football field sized yacht. I'm so over the entitled elite telling us what to do.

GeneralMayhem 4y ago

It's about both, but the magnitudes matter. Would you do a job you love doing for free? Assuming the answer is no, then to paraphrase Churchill, we’ve established what kind of people we are; now we’re just haggling over the price. Am I willing to take a 10% pay cut to work on things that are good for society instead of selling ads? Sure. 25%? Probably. But those aren't the magnitudes we're talking about. Total comp for a senior-to-staff level engineer at FAANG (or anyone competing with them) will be, let's say, 500k/year, plus best-in-the-world benefits. Total comp for government or charity work rarely cracks 100k, and even tech companies that are focused on good rather than profit, maybe 200. And it's not like the FAANG jobs are bad - day-to-day, they're incredibly interesting. There's lots of fun stuff to build with smart people. The only problem is the background existential dread. It's also hard to argue that they're actively harming humanity in a lot of cases - maybe this line of reasoning works on potential Raytheon or Palantir employees, where the delta in morality is much greater, but convincing people to go from neutral-ish to good is harder than convincing them to go from bad to good. So the question you're asking is, are you willing to take a 60-80% pay cut to possibly do a less interesting job, in exchange for moral fulfillment and knowing that you're helping humanity? You might think the answer is yes, but I think it's hard to fault people for whom it isn't.

kortilla 4y ago
> maybe this line of reasoning works on potential Raytheon or Palantir employees The people who work at Raytheon or Palantir think they are less harmful than the people who work for Google/Facebook. Nobody who has decided to work there thinks they are just drone striking children.
- twic 4y ago
  Some people who work at Lockheed Martin wrote the software for the missiles being fired by Ukrainian HIMARSs. They might even be quite proud of that.
  - thephyber 4y ago
    I bet they conveniently don’t care that Russia can use those HIMARS which remain after territory is take from Ukraine. Not enough people look at both sides of the ledger when it comes to the ethics and morals of their work.

nine_k 4y ago

My honest and obvious answer: because my family (wife, kids) need the money. It's always a balancing act though. I won't go to do a job I loathe, because I won't stick there for long enough. I choose jobs that I'm fine doing, and pass many jobs that I might love doing but which won't pay the bills. I was fortunate enough to have a job I outright loved, and which also paid well; it lasted 3.5 years. I'm immensely happy to have had such luck.