To expand on why, what often happens after these is there now a round of "cost cutting" which on the surface may look like ok we just don't get as many, or any

To expand on why, what often happens after these is there now a round of "cost cutting" which on the surface may look like ok we just don't get as many, or any of the cool perks we used to- which will be true, and you will suddenly realize that work doesn't feel like it has a fun aspect to it anymore. But that's really nothing compared to the next step- when they start squeezing you- and everyone for more hours. And more hours may not be a direct request- anyone at the periphery of the dev process- in the past this was QA, now gets cut because devs can do it, SWE roles might have to start doing more ops work, etc... When I last left the financial industry, it was so bad, that VPs- and that was back when it least had some meaning- at least it did when I first got the title around 2010, started having to do mundane weekend work like checking out the system after network/firewall changes, etc. It can be death by a thousand cuts. Now the financial crisis was way worse because essentially everyone was hurting, and losing money- and interestingly I "got out" of that bad situation by going to tech. But that's just how these bad situations play out and deteriorate. That said, companies are still profitable. There was a LOT of overhiring in the past few years. I don't expect things to get so bad, at all.