The company I worked for before my current one had a lot of money problems so being profitable (even marginally so) was a requirement for me. Other than that I

The company I worked for before my current one had a lot of money problems so being profitable (even marginally so) was a requirement for me. Other than that I was fortunate that the company I now work for found me on HN (Who wants to be hired monthly thread) and that in all the interviews I got nothing but good “vibes” and saw no red flags. Almost 3 years later that’s held true and I’ve helped get 3 friends/ex-coworkers hired (I’d never invite even acquaintances to what I though was a bad environment or a sinking ship). I liked my coworkers already and adding in 3 people I know I work well with has been an immense joy. I don’t know how you need to make to provide for your house but I live in a LCoL area and make on the lower end of CA wages (working for a CA company, <15 people). For me this works well as I have a good amount of headroom the grow (it’s already happened, I got around a 17% raise after a little over a year there and multiple bonuses) and I’m making way more than most jobs locally (aside from some really stuffy corporate jobs I’d never take). It’s a different story when you providing for a family but my approach has been to never assume my job is guaranteed (which it’s not, no matter how big the company) and to plan for if I’ll lose my job tomorrow. That sounds super stressful but I literally never think or worry about it because I’ve got 6-8+ months in my emergency fund (shout out to YNAB for changing my life w.r.t. budgeting). I won’t pretend what I’ve done/found was easy or that “anyone can do it” but it can be done. There are good small companies to work for that don’t suffer from the issues you mentioned (though I know exactly what you are talking about and have experienced that as well). Life is short and I’m so glad I found the company I currently work for. My work/life balance is amazing, I enjoy what I work on, my work makes a tangible difference, I get to help shape the company’s future, and I work with talented people who I like.