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Why is getting better benefits and perks deemed worthy of derision rather than an admission that most employees in the world are treated like garbage? They are

Why is getting better benefits and perks deemed worthy of derision rather than an admission that most employees in the world are treated like garbage? They aren't being completely exploited by their companies so they deserve to be taken down a peg to the sorry state you're in?

sseagull 4y ago
For me, it's not necessarily derision, but lack of sympathy is natural. If someone in my community (say a teacher) is making 45k a year, and they get laid off through no fault of their own, I will feel sympathy. They were contributing to the community as best they could, they were important, and now they are possibly struggling financially. A developer making $300k? Working for an ad company? Not too much sympathy - they will probably be okay. People here usually brag about how much they make and how easy it is to find a job, anyway. On top of that, there is this perception (not necessarily reality, but there is a kernel of truth) that California in particular has an outsized influence on the rest of the country, and does not really respect the beliefs of large swaths of our culture. You have corporations making unfathomable amounts of money dictating communications, interactions, etc, all from the silicon tower in California. That is a recipe for derision, whether it's logical or not.
- kcplate 4y ago
  > A developer making $300k? Working for an ad company? Not too much sympathy I have no sympathy for the person laid off or the survivor if they are in a role commanding that level of wage. If you are pushing $300k in salary, you should be able to financially handle a layoff or if you survive the cut— just buck it up, put your head down, and power your way through a leaner operation. Honestly, I feel like anyone complaining about being a tech layoff survivor must have never worked outside of tech before. I worked in an industrial laundry in college, I can assure you the very worst day I had sitting at a desk typing code into a keyboard for a fat salary was exponentially better than the very best day I had loading dirty shop rags and diapers into a washing machine for minimum wage.
yobbo 4y ago
I think he's making the point that SV layoffs are not worthy of more sympathy than other layoffs, but maybe less.
- Firmwarrior 4y ago
  If this were a Reddit thread or a Facebook thread I'd agree with him, but it's a thread on a site for those SV engineers to hang out. So I don't think every article and comment here should be required to kowtow to Overtonwindow and the Reddit/Twitter/Tumblr users' demands to apologize for our success Getting laid off or being in a company with layoffs sucks even if you're making a lot of money. Especially for younger engineers where this is their introduction to this particular harsh reality
mmmpop 4y ago
Yeah but for whatever elite Stanford rich kid CS grad strawman you have invented for this uh... person experiencing laidoffness, have you considered that this imaginary person probably kept their job and the try-hards like basically all of the rest of us got the shaft? These are unlikely the spoiled brats you're envisioning.
AtlasBarfed 4y ago
The current generation has been comprehensively screwed by the baby boomer generation, to perverse degrees. There should be rabid riots in the street over it, there sure as hell are ones in other parts of the world. But I don't shed tears for silicon valley workers that didn't ferret away money in the boom. These are not the people that got screwed by the modern American wealth distribution. You're allegedly the smartest people in the world, and you can't read the history of your industry going back even 20 years to the dot Bomb?
- djohnston 4y ago
  > You're allegedly the smartest people in the world, and you can't read the history of your industry going back even 20 years to the dot Bomb? Even the most intelligent person can't consistently predict the market. Even if you could, and you knew the market was going to pop, what are you going to do? Leave one of these behemoths for a smaller company that's less likely to survive a recession? Or are you suggesting they caused the current downtown?

sseagull 4y ago

For me, it's not necessarily derision, but lack of sympathy is natural. If someone in my community (say a teacher) is making 45k a year, and they get laid off through no fault of their own, I will feel sympathy. They were contributing to the community as best they could, they were important, and now they are possibly struggling financially. A developer making $300k? Working for an ad company? Not too much sympathy - they will probably be okay. People here usually brag about how much they make and how easy it is to find a job, anyway. On top of that, there is this perception (not necessarily reality, but there is a kernel of truth) that California in particular has an outsized influence on the rest of the country, and does not really respect the beliefs of large swaths of our culture. You have corporations making unfathomable amounts of money dictating communications, interactions, etc, all from the silicon tower in California. That is a recipe for derision, whether it's logical or not.

kcplate 4y ago
> A developer making $300k? Working for an ad company? Not too much sympathy I have no sympathy for the person laid off or the survivor if they are in a role commanding that level of wage. If you are pushing $300k in salary, you should be able to financially handle a layoff or if you survive the cut— just buck it up, put your head down, and power your way through a leaner operation. Honestly, I feel like anyone complaining about being a tech layoff survivor must have never worked outside of tech before. I worked in an industrial laundry in college, I can assure you the very worst day I had sitting at a desk typing code into a keyboard for a fat salary was exponentially better than the very best day I had loading dirty shop rags and diapers into a washing machine for minimum wage.

yobbo 4y ago

I think he's making the point that SV layoffs are not worthy of more sympathy than other layoffs, but maybe less.

Firmwarrior 4y ago
If this were a Reddit thread or a Facebook thread I'd agree with him, but it's a thread on a site for those SV engineers to hang out. So I don't think every article and comment here should be required to kowtow to Overtonwindow and the Reddit/Twitter/Tumblr users' demands to apologize for our success Getting laid off or being in a company with layoffs sucks even if you're making a lot of money. Especially for younger engineers where this is their introduction to this particular harsh reality

mmmpop 4y ago

Yeah but for whatever elite Stanford rich kid CS grad strawman you have invented for this uh... person experiencing laidoffness, have you considered that this imaginary person probably kept their job and the try-hards like basically all of the rest of us got the shaft? These are unlikely the spoiled brats you're envisioning.

AtlasBarfed 4y ago

The current generation has been comprehensively screwed by the baby boomer generation, to perverse degrees. There should be rabid riots in the street over it, there sure as hell are ones in other parts of the world. But I don't shed tears for silicon valley workers that didn't ferret away money in the boom. These are not the people that got screwed by the modern American wealth distribution. You're allegedly the smartest people in the world, and you can't read the history of your industry going back even 20 years to the dot Bomb?

djohnston 4y ago
> You're allegedly the smartest people in the world, and you can't read the history of your industry going back even 20 years to the dot Bomb? Even the most intelligent person can't consistently predict the market. Even if you could, and you knew the market was going to pop, what are you going to do? Leave one of these behemoths for a smaller company that's less likely to survive a recession? Or are you suggesting they caused the current downtown?