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I have a serious question to anyone working at Meta and reading this: HOW can you still work at this company!? Why don't you quit this very toxic company, and

I have a serious question to anyone working at Meta and reading this: HOW can you still work at this company!? Why don't you quit this very toxic company, and start working at another place or even on your own? I genuinely don't understand... Let just Meta die!

georgeburdell 4mo ago
Maybe you should be asking that question on 1.3 acres and not here
SoftTalker 4mo ago
$$$,$$$
- baggachipz 4mo ago
  more like $,$$$,$$$.$$
  - JKCalhoun 4mo ago
    All the more reason to head out. A few years on a salary like that and you may find that you can live fairly comfortably for a long time… in a place where the cost of living and housing are inexpensive. I have an aunt who is quite old, who has been living for decades in a trailer in Eloy, Arizona. I suspect few people reading this will think that's any kind of an "escape plan", but I have been jealous of her seemingly contented and relaxed retirement for a long time now. Perhaps you have to weigh it against, "working in the industry you hate for an other decade or two." Could you enjoy yourself in your retirement in your trailer? Is there something more you need to enjoy your retirement?
    - deleted 4mo ago
      [deleted]
    - siren2026 4mo ago
      Most people at Meta (or other FAANGs) are caught up in the game. I have witnessed this first hand in the bay area. They forgot what the end-goal is. They are just on the hamster wheel waiting for the next vest or next promo so they can brag they were made "staff" or "director". Every other discussion was about artificial levels and other corporate BS that those companies put in front of you to keep you grinding. Meanwhile when you ask why not retire now that they saved 10M$. Most of them have no idea what they would spend their time doing. Their biggest achievement and satisfaction is to play that artificial money game. The mean became the end. Very sad.
  - SoftTalker 4mo ago
    You're saying the average dev at Meta is making 7 figures?
    - baggachipz 4mo ago
      I'm exaggerating for (poor) comedic effect, as Meta has to pay more to attract people. Every time they've ever tried to recruit me I've lol'd at them and said I would never work there under any circumstances.
    - Anon1096 4mo ago
      There are quite a few making that much yearly but not the average. Median swe at meta is almost surely >1MM net worth at least and maybe even 2.
    - seattle_spring 4mo ago
      I mean... their stock is up more than 1,000% since 2014. Anyone who has been there for a few years should have multiple refreshers that have grown significantly in value.
Alifatisk 4mo ago
> I genuinely don't understand... Really? Its quite obvious to me. They get astonishing resume and salary. That is until they get fired or burned.
- nicce 4mo ago
  > astonishing resume Not sure about that one.
new_account_104 4mo ago
You need to be more cruel if you actually want these people to quit. Make them fear for their professional and personal reputations. Make them embarassed to show their face or state their place of employment. We need to treat these people like Nazis.
- foobar_______ 4mo ago
  I am not sure about all your talk about Nazis and such - seems a bit much. But I do agree with the general premise. Instead of Meta being seen as a signal for being a high-quality engineer, I hope the signal being sent is more like: engineer who is so money hungry they are willing to abandon almost all sense of responsibility and reasonable character.
- __MatrixMan__ 4mo ago
  We need to make Nazis fear for their personal safety. We need to make engineers who work in surveillance or advertising ashamed enough to avoid putting that work on their resume. I think that's a pretty big difference.
- keybored 4mo ago
  Nazis or not, I’m pretty fed up with that glaze of a quote that goes something like the most brilliant minds of my generation are occupied with optimizing ads. There’s no condemnation, just a wistful yearning for the big brains to be unfettered from their big wage enslavement to save us. It speaks to a craven culture where intelligence is the only praiseworthy trait and character is not even a concept. You think people raised in such a culture will save you? More likely they’ll be hooked by the next moneybag or hoodwinked by some insane philosophy (Libertarianism, AI Singularity, Effective Altruism...).
fullshark 4mo ago
Money and/or visa sponsorship obviously. Some things are more important than internet cool points.
brk 4mo ago
Post some links to companies hiring at similar compensation levels. Or, are you suggesting that every Meta employee is in a position to just like off of any random job they can find, or even no income at all while they go off "on their own"?
- not_the_fda 4mo ago
  There is more to life than money. I've turned down FANG roles my entire career, especially Meta. There is lot of work out there.
  - mathisfun123 4mo ago
    Lol you've turned down offers or recruiter reach outs? Two very different things lololol.
    - AndrewKemendo 4mo ago
      I turned down a 285k/yr +MM RSU staff engr offer from Google in 2021. I’d probably still be in that job and would have a few million in the bank (instead of $10,000) if I had taken it, but I would have sold out my principles. So yes some of us live by principles
      - mathisfun123 4mo ago
        [flagged]
  - brk 4mo ago
    Of course there is more to life than money, but people still need some base amount of money to live safely, especially if you have a family. If you are working in SV then your "big" salary does not go very far, I know lots of developers making $350K and have very little savings cushion, and these are not people just blowing money. Most big enterprises get really good at paying you just enough to live comfortably, but not enough to give you financial autonomy. This makes the "why do you still work there" question land as naive most of the time.
crymeth0t 4mo ago
Have you tried finding a new job recently?
- LucidLynx 4mo ago
  Yes, and I found one. It pays enough for having a very stable life, and in a company with ethics! No reason to be that sarcastic, the job market is not dead (at least not in Europe).
  - vander_elst 4mo ago
    The salary gap in Europe is *huge*, at Meta and other big tech you can easily make 3x (after taxes) of what you'd earn in a European company for the very same position, same amount of actually worked hours. It might not be fair or might not be ethical, but in particular if you have dependants, such a gap *does* make a difference.
    - LucidLynx 4mo ago
      Thanks, but I don't need this 3x more. I just need ethics.
wombat-man 4mo ago
If you can hang, it pays great. I don't work there but I know some who do.
root-parent 4mo ago
Spy camera manufacturer workers complaining about office cameras....
nicce 4mo ago
In the end, most people choose money.
infraredshift 4mo ago
[dead]
u1hcw9nx 4mo ago
This seems like rhetorical question where you know the answer. Despite corporate propaganda, work is not self-fulfillment, moral quest, or meaning for most people. It's money and future. When you earn $191K-$4.36M+ and don't want to move your family to some cheaper neighborhood, you put your head down and keep working. Unless you are hardcore libertarian, these questions of workplace privacy are solved individual by individual. They are political questions. Improve labor laws, privacy laws etc.
matheusmoreira 4mo ago
Money. Even I would put up with this if they paid me enough.
- jjulius 4mo ago
  Ick.
- officehero 4mo ago
  I'd down vote this if I could.
  - matheusmoreira 4mo ago
    Why not sponsor my free software work instead of downvoting? I wouldn't have to choose between getting rich and doing the right thing if I was making 200kUSD/year on my AGPLv3 programming language work. I'm currently making around $24/year. https://github.com/sponsors/matheusmoreira https://github.com/sponsors/matheusmoreira
    - officehero 4mo ago
      Like others have pointed out, there are other options in life than work at Meta. Would you have worked at Krupp or Mitsubishi during WW2 if they paid enough, compared to say cleaning toilets?
yodsanklai 4mo ago
There are tons of good reasons to work for Meta. You can work on interesting projects, build your resume and network, work on interesting engineering problems, learn from other people, and of course, they pay very well. People do need to support their family, secure their retirement and so on... Is it perfect? certainly not. Is the company toxic? where do you draw the line? how much are you willing to compromise given the other advantages you get? Everybody has a different answer to these questions. Some people would tell you that even working in tech is wrong due to environmental concerns. Personally, I would happily work for Meta. Many people use their services and like them. Is it the greatest thing for society? probably not, but neither is Netflix or Amazon or Apple...
- yojo 4mo ago
  Meta is straight evil. It undermines the institutions of democracy and it negatively impacts its users mental health, all in service of selling your data to advertisers so they can better goad unnecessary consumption. If I learn you work at Meta, I will judge you as at best lacking a moral compass and treat you appropriately. Apple has problems, but is a lot closer to morally neutral. Ditto for Netflix. Amazon has hollowed out local retail/is also bad for society, though not on Meta’s scale. But you sell your soul more cheaply there.
  - rozal 4mo ago
    [dead]
  - deleted 4mo ago
    [deleted]
  - vanuatu 4mo ago
    not to defend zuck but its a common misconception that meta sells data advertisers dont see the personal data they buy for ad placement
    - jbuhbjlnjbn 4mo ago
      There is no misconception. Meta also sells data, next to selling advertising space.
cute_boi 4mo ago
Meta is still better than 80% of the companies. Other company spies on you, do micromanagement and still pay way less. Pick your poison.
- LucidLynx 4mo ago
  Then I would prefer the 20% that pay less, but do something good for humanity.
rybosworld 4mo ago
People always answer this question with money. But if we think of it as a version of the prisoner dilemma (Meta is one prisoner, the employee is the other), the right move is probably to work somewhere else for a lower salary. By working for Meta, they are defecting against you (openly screen recording you to train your AI replacement). Choosing to work somewhere else would be like you defecting against Meta. Extremely simplified example. Ignore inflation, raises, etc. Which choice is better? - $400k/yr for 5 years followed by a layoff, with the possibility that the thing you've helped Meta build rolls out everywhere, and there are next to no job opportunities - $200k/yr for the rest of your career, and employment opportunities don't dry up because you didn't help build the thing meant to replace you
- singron 4mo ago
  After 5 years, you'll have an extra $1M in savings, and you can safely pay yourself 4% or $40k each year in perpetuity without doing any work. This is also a really extreme version of the prisoners dilemma. In the standard formula, there are 2 prisoners, so it's somewhat practical to not defect, but there are hundreds of thousands of qualified candidates for working at Meta in these roles, so your personal decision to defect or not has likely no effect on the ultimate outcome. I.e. for the second option to work, you actually need to organize a unified labor movement with no defectors, which is probably impossible.
  - ProfessorLayton 4mo ago
    >After 5 years, you'll have an extra $1M in savings, and you can safely pay yourself 4% or $40k each year in perpetuity without doing any work. The only way this could be remotely true on a 400k salary is by saving +80% of take home pay. After taxes that's only 40k/yr to live on. In a HCOL area. This doesn't even touch on the fact that tenure at most tech places is well below 5y, especially at Meta.
- lbrito 4mo ago
  Those are easy choices, but unrealistic. Its also not like offer packages are a click away from showing into your email inbox, they are excruciating and highly random. More realistic choices are: - $400k/yr for 5 years followed by a layoff, with the possibility that the thing you've helped Meta build rolls out everywhere, and there are next to no job opportunities or - 150k/year for 3 years followed by being laid off due to runway ending, Meta out-competing your company, or whatever. Despite you not helping build the thing meant to replace you, it still got built.
jjulius 4mo ago
The number of people in these comments who would be happy to be "paid well" to contribute to what's inarguably a huge net negative worldwide is exactly how the company got to this point. It's astonishing how many people value a ton of money over doing something good. Everyone who talks about setting values aside for cash is the problem. Gross.
- AndrewKemendo 4mo ago
  I used to think there was a solution to this but theres not: There is no limit to human greed
- yubblegum 4mo ago
  I have a dear friend who works at Meta. The conclusion that all meta workers are valuing money over "something good" is not reasonable. This fellow, who I know to be a good man of excellent character btw, for example has to support his family (which all together number 6), and be prepared to pay tuition for 4 kids starting in a decade and then one after another for the other 3! Is providing for your family and their future not "something good"? > The number of people in these comments who would be happy to be "paid well" to contribute to what's inarguably a huge net negative worldwide is exactly how the company got to this point. Sorry, have to call bullshit on this. As to the Meta products, who is forcing anyone to use it? They could have had armies of geeks working for them but if no one ever came, would Facebook cum Meta ever be this huge? I personally, from back when most people here would downvote you to oblivion when some of us pointed out the emergence of surveillance capitalism in "Web 2.0", recognized this company for what it is and have avoided every single product offering. Who is forcing people to use Facebook? And what was the role of websites like Hackernews in promoting the 'permissive' (irony alert) ethics of these 'ventures'?
  - jjulius 4mo ago
    There are many, many ways to provide for one's family, Meta is but one. And I say this as a father providing for mine. Additionally, putting the blame for using Meta products on the users in spite of all of what we know about how the company has strived to make the productive terribly addictive is a very wild take.
dfxm12 4mo ago
In the US, if you quit your job, you lose access to many benefits, including affordable health care. It might be hard to get a loan for a car, to find an apartment, etc. This is systemically set up this way, including making sure employment doesn't get too low, which would give more power to employees.
deleted 4mo ago
[deleted]
ryukoposting 4mo ago
One thing I have observed so far in SV (haven't been here long) is that folks who work in big tech but aren't from the US don't fully understand the difference in costs depending where you live in the US. I have to wonder if that informs the decision to stay in SV no matter what the work is. Like, intellectually they know that it costs less to live in Beaverton Michigan than it costs to live in Palo Alto. But the magnitude of that difference, and how that scales your income needs, they've never thought to do the math. It doesn't scale proportionally, and that's counterintuitive. This isn't a dig against anyone, and exceptions abound. But when I told my foreign-born SV-lifer colleagues how much my rent was in Wisconsin, you'd have thought I was the one from a foreign country!
- zeroonetwothree 4mo ago
  Apart from housing the costs aren’t that much more. You pay the same to travel. You pay the same to buy stuff online. Food is maybe slightly more but it’s not that significant. Once you get past being able to afford housing it’s insanely lucrative. It’s harder for entry level people of course.
  - siren2026 4mo ago
    I have had that discussion multiple times with people. They all seem to think you absolutely need to live in a 5 bedroom 5m$ house in Palo Alto (because how else are you going to live?). But if you rent a normal 2BR for 4000$ in the Bay area, and could potentially rent the same for 1500$ in a LCOL, that is a minimal saving compared to your income. Everything else stays mostly the same. An on top of that most companies will give you a paycut. But for some reason people think you are going to be a king just by moving to LCOL. I think it is the opposite Now, if you get bamboozled into buying a 5000 sqft house like the average american does, then yes, big savings in a LCOL.
    - ryukoposting 4mo ago
      This is exactly what I'm talking about. $1600 will get you a respectable 2-bedroom apartment in a decent neighborhood in Chicago, which most certainly isn't LCOL. If you want your 5-bedroom mcmansion in Northbrook or your artsy flat in Wicker Park, then yeah that'll cost more - see your point about houses in Palo Alto. A downright nice 2-bedroom apartment in the heart of Rochester MN will run you $1300/mo tops, and $1000/mo is well within reason. I had to do this math fairly recently. For me, moving from a relatively pricey part of the midwest, the number was 2.2x my income for SV to be viable. Now that I live here, I find that I actually undershot a little, and it's more like 2.4x to break even. I thought groceries and restaurants and such would be roughly the same. They aren't.
DonsDiscountGas 4mo ago
Median pay at Meta is $380k. Median. I'm sure it's high variance but I would put up with a lot for that kind of money
sidcool 4mo ago
I think this is a unrealistic point of view. If Meta really were as draconian and toxic as many people make it seem, most smart people would have left. Market is tough right now, but then there were other times when jobs were booming. And people still joined Meta. Money is one big aspect. I am not saying Meta is a paradise. I completely want Meta to face their reckoning for what they have done to the world, but painting it as like a prison camp is misplaced I feel.
- shimman 4mo ago
  How can you say the smart people haven't already left? The only people comfortable working at Meta are comfortable with a company that enabled then profited off a genocide, has mass teenage girl misery machines, invested in companies whose products caused users to kill themselves, worked on systems that helped erode democracy across the world. I'm sorry but if you're at meta it's not because you are smart, it's because you are a human that derives money from ruining lives. Thinking has very little to do with situation outside of deciding how much greed you're entitled to for the human misery you personally create by enabling such a system.
  - sidcool 4mo ago
    I understand your point of view. It's not possible to execute a high growth company like Meta without extremely smart, high IQ individuals. And they are OK with the harm Meta is doing. My point was that Meta is bad, but the perception that it routinely abuses employees is misplaced.
    - shimman 4mo ago
      I'm not saying that at all, I'm saying that people purposely choosing to work at Meta are evil individuals that deserve public scorn and mocking.
- spacechild1 4mo ago
  OP is not talking about the working conditions but the negative effects on society.
sidcool 4mo ago
Gavin Belson: The Scene: Gavin’s development team complains that his new tech ("The Box") is antiquated. He fires back in frustration: "Why did you all take my money then, you entitled little pricks? You all think you’re John Lennon until someone waves a dollar in your face!"
josh_carterPDX 4mo ago
This is a tough one because I've been there. I have worked for orgs that don't align with my values, but when you're in there you aren't thinking that you are contributing to the absolutely horrible crap they're doing. You just keep telling yourself, "I just do this one little thing." And that's enough to convince yourself that it's ok. You're keeping your values and morals intact. Saying that, I'm sure if more of them had options they'd jump in a heartbeat.
- spacechild1 4mo ago
  > You just keep telling yourself, "I just do this one little thing." And that's enough to convince yourself that it's ok. This is how I would have imagined most of these people think (except for the true sociopaths who just don't care). > Saying that, I'm sure if more of them had options they'd jump in a heartbeat. Are you saying the people who have been working for Meta had no other options? That would be a ridiculous claim. The point is that there have been many, many options and yet they chose to interview for Meta and take the offer.
  - josh_carterPDX 4mo ago
    > Are you saying the people who have been working for Meta had no other options? That would be a ridiculous claim. The point is that there have been many, many options and yet they chose to interview for Meta and take the offer. Bold assumption.
    - spacechild1 4mo ago
      You can't tell me that someone took an offer from Meta because it was their only option. This is just absurd.
      - josh_carterPDX 4mo ago
        I guess it would depend on the role.
roncesvalles 4mo ago
Imposter syndrome is extremely common and a lot of people in high-paying tech jobs don't believe they can get something just like this elsewhere. Also, Meta interviews are generally not regarded as too difficult, which further fuels the imposter syndrome (everyone has a sense that they're overpaid considering how easy it is to get in). I almost suspect this is a deliberate strategy.
ergocoder 4mo ago
Company devices are always tracked 100% of the time. I don't understand why this is news.
vander_elst 4mo ago
The kind of issues that you might face if you have dependants could be something along the lines: well Timmy, we'll need to cut your leg instead of trying solution x that might save it, because I preferred not to accept a job that would have allowed to pay for that, due to the fact such a job didn't follow my ethical standards. This is of course a very extreme and hopefully rare case, but I think that there's a large range of cases where unfortunately money does make a difference I a significant way. Additionally, I think that it also does make a huge difference if you are the only one affected by you decisions or someone else is. I think when going for a decision for such a position, these and other points that consider the more practical implications might weight in.
tencentshill 4mo ago
I would take a fat raise to work on some dumb tracking feature that probably won't make it to production. It's a huge bureaucracy, most people probably coast (as shown in HBO's Silicon Valley) and do very little actual work.
metamate100000 4mo ago
I work at Meta, on a key system in one of the main products. I think when I went in, it was too interesting a system/opportunity to not do it. I was open to many roles and interviewing, and I just really wanted to understand how it works. I don't touch ads, I don't touch integrity, or any of the "dodgy" stuff. I used to hate Facebook (and then Meta), and not have accounts on any of their platforms (bar Whatsapp), until I joined. I care about doing good and making a positive impact in the world (don't think I'll do much at Meta though). I'm probably the closest to a 180 on this you can imagine. And... I don't have a good answer to why I still work there? It's an interesting anthropological exercise? My everyday is working with great people on a facet of a product that is entirely wholesome and inoffensive? When I came in, I found that my coworkers (locally, in my team/sister teams) were extremely talented, hard working, and cared a lot about the systems being good. Yes we are all pissed off by the recent changes, a couple people left (not mainly due to these changes though). I mean, the people just seem entirely normal? I don't imagine it's so different to working elsewhere. People are not obsessed with money or in any kind of dire situation, they are not grappling with hard moral questions about the value of money versus corrupting the world. I guess I just feel like I'm not contributing to the awful stuff? I think you tend to get used to your everyday life and see the stuff around you in your little bubble. I guess if my part of the product gets better, Meta sells more ads and then has an incentive to do bad stuff, I suppose? Anyway, yeah. Open to other convincing opinions about why I should feel awful for what I do and quit my job, and the right way to think about this (genuinely!).
- yoyohello13 4mo ago
  Even if you're not working on the 'bad part' you are still contributing to the success of the company as a whole. When you work for a company, it is tacit agreement with 'everything' the company does. If Meta is doing something you don't agree with, it behooves you to quit or try to change it. If you continue to work, head down then you are complicit in everything they do.
glaslong 4mo ago
Well I used to be pretty passionate about the work I was doing, and especially because I was learning from some incredible people. ....but both of those are gone to layoffs and restructuring, so it's basically just money, and I'm hanging on by an actively fraying thread of cowardice and burnout.
baddie_twoshoes 4mo ago
It's because it's a job that is known to pay very well, I don't know what's so difficult to understand about it? Like someone is just going to give up their $300K - $500K job over something like that; the kind of thing they'll put hand over heart and claim they'll do in posts like this one, but in practice people won't actually do, because the money is good.
OrangeMusic 4mo ago
Which non profit do _you_ work for?

georgeburdell 4mo ago

Maybe you should be asking that question on 1.3 acres and not here

SoftTalker 4mo ago

$$$,$$$

baggachipz 4mo ago
more like $,$$$,$$$.$$
- JKCalhoun 4mo ago
  All the more reason to head out. A few years on a salary like that and you may find that you can live fairly comfortably for a long time… in a place where the cost of living and housing are inexpensive. I have an aunt who is quite old, who has been living for decades in a trailer in Eloy, Arizona. I suspect few people reading this will think that's any kind of an "escape plan", but I have been jealous of her seemingly contented and relaxed retirement for a long time now. Perhaps you have to weigh it against, "working in the industry you hate for an other decade or two." Could you enjoy yourself in your retirement in your trailer? Is there something more you need to enjoy your retirement?
  - deleted 4mo ago
    [deleted]
  - siren2026 4mo ago
    Most people at Meta (or other FAANGs) are caught up in the game. I have witnessed this first hand in the bay area. They forgot what the end-goal is. They are just on the hamster wheel waiting for the next vest or next promo so they can brag they were made "staff" or "director". Every other discussion was about artificial levels and other corporate BS that those companies put in front of you to keep you grinding. Meanwhile when you ask why not retire now that they saved 10M$. Most of them have no idea what they would spend their time doing. Their biggest achievement and satisfaction is to play that artificial money game. The mean became the end. Very sad.
- SoftTalker 4mo ago
  You're saying the average dev at Meta is making 7 figures?
  - baggachipz 4mo ago
    I'm exaggerating for (poor) comedic effect, as Meta has to pay more to attract people. Every time they've ever tried to recruit me I've lol'd at them and said I would never work there under any circumstances.
  - Anon1096 4mo ago
    There are quite a few making that much yearly but not the average. Median swe at meta is almost surely >1MM net worth at least and maybe even 2.
  - seattle_spring 4mo ago
    I mean... their stock is up more than 1,000% since 2014. Anyone who has been there for a few years should have multiple refreshers that have grown significantly in value.

Alifatisk 4mo ago

> I genuinely don't understand... Really? Its quite obvious to me. They get astonishing resume and salary. That is until they get fired or burned.

nicce 4mo ago
> astonishing resume Not sure about that one.

new_account_104 4mo ago

You need to be more cruel if you actually want these people to quit. Make them fear for their professional and personal reputations. Make them embarassed to show their face or state their place of employment. We need to treat these people like Nazis.

foobar_______ 4mo ago
I am not sure about all your talk about Nazis and such - seems a bit much. But I do agree with the general premise. Instead of Meta being seen as a signal for being a high-quality engineer, I hope the signal being sent is more like: engineer who is so money hungry they are willing to abandon almost all sense of responsibility and reasonable character.
__MatrixMan__ 4mo ago
We need to make Nazis fear for their personal safety. We need to make engineers who work in surveillance or advertising ashamed enough to avoid putting that work on their resume. I think that's a pretty big difference.
keybored 4mo ago
Nazis or not, I’m pretty fed up with that glaze of a quote that goes something like the most brilliant minds of my generation are occupied with optimizing ads. There’s no condemnation, just a wistful yearning for the big brains to be unfettered from their big wage enslavement to save us. It speaks to a craven culture where intelligence is the only praiseworthy trait and character is not even a concept. You think people raised in such a culture will save you? More likely they’ll be hooked by the next moneybag or hoodwinked by some insane philosophy (Libertarianism, AI Singularity, Effective Altruism...).

fullshark 4mo ago

Money and/or visa sponsorship obviously. Some things are more important than internet cool points.

brk 4mo ago

Post some links to companies hiring at similar compensation levels. Or, are you suggesting that every Meta employee is in a position to just like off of any random job they can find, or even no income at all while they go off "on their own"?

not_the_fda 4mo ago
There is more to life than money. I've turned down FANG roles my entire career, especially Meta. There is lot of work out there.
- mathisfun123 4mo ago
  Lol you've turned down offers or recruiter reach outs? Two very different things lololol.
  - AndrewKemendo 4mo ago
    I turned down a 285k/yr +MM RSU staff engr offer from Google in 2021. I’d probably still be in that job and would have a few million in the bank (instead of $10,000) if I had taken it, but I would have sold out my principles. So yes some of us live by principles
    - mathisfun123 4mo ago
      [flagged]
- brk 4mo ago
  Of course there is more to life than money, but people still need some base amount of money to live safely, especially if you have a family. If you are working in SV then your "big" salary does not go very far, I know lots of developers making $350K and have very little savings cushion, and these are not people just blowing money. Most big enterprises get really good at paying you just enough to live comfortably, but not enough to give you financial autonomy. This makes the "why do you still work there" question land as naive most of the time.

crymeth0t 4mo ago

Have you tried finding a new job recently?

LucidLynx 4mo ago
Yes, and I found one. It pays enough for having a very stable life, and in a company with ethics! No reason to be that sarcastic, the job market is not dead (at least not in Europe).
- vander_elst 4mo ago
  The salary gap in Europe is *huge*, at Meta and other big tech you can easily make 3x (after taxes) of what you'd earn in a European company for the very same position, same amount of actually worked hours. It might not be fair or might not be ethical, but in particular if you have dependants, such a gap *does* make a difference.
  - LucidLynx 4mo ago
    Thanks, but I don't need this 3x more. I just need ethics.

wombat-man 4mo ago

If you can hang, it pays great. I don't work there but I know some who do.

root-parent 4mo ago

Spy camera manufacturer workers complaining about office cameras....

nicce 4mo ago

In the end, most people choose money.

infraredshift 4mo ago

[dead]

u1hcw9nx 4mo ago

This seems like rhetorical question where you know the answer. Despite corporate propaganda, work is not self-fulfillment, moral quest, or meaning for most people. It's money and future. When you earn $191K-$4.36M+ and don't want to move your family to some cheaper neighborhood, you put your head down and keep working. Unless you are hardcore libertarian, these questions of workplace privacy are solved individual by individual. They are political questions. Improve labor laws, privacy laws etc.

matheusmoreira 4mo ago

Money. Even I would put up with this if they paid me enough.

jjulius 4mo ago
Ick.
officehero 4mo ago
I'd down vote this if I could.
- matheusmoreira 4mo ago
  Why not sponsor my free software work instead of downvoting? I wouldn't have to choose between getting rich and doing the right thing if I was making 200kUSD/year on my AGPLv3 programming language work. I'm currently making around $24/year. https://github.com/sponsors/matheusmoreira https://github.com/sponsors/matheusmoreira
  - officehero 4mo ago
    Like others have pointed out, there are other options in life than work at Meta. Would you have worked at Krupp or Mitsubishi during WW2 if they paid enough, compared to say cleaning toilets?

yodsanklai 4mo ago

There are tons of good reasons to work for Meta. You can work on interesting projects, build your resume and network, work on interesting engineering problems, learn from other people, and of course, they pay very well. People do need to support their family, secure their retirement and so on... Is it perfect? certainly not. Is the company toxic? where do you draw the line? how much are you willing to compromise given the other advantages you get? Everybody has a different answer to these questions. Some people would tell you that even working in tech is wrong due to environmental concerns. Personally, I would happily work for Meta. Many people use their services and like them. Is it the greatest thing for society? probably not, but neither is Netflix or Amazon or Apple...

yojo 4mo ago
Meta is straight evil. It undermines the institutions of democracy and it negatively impacts its users mental health, all in service of selling your data to advertisers so they can better goad unnecessary consumption. If I learn you work at Meta, I will judge you as at best lacking a moral compass and treat you appropriately. Apple has problems, but is a lot closer to morally neutral. Ditto for Netflix. Amazon has hollowed out local retail/is also bad for society, though not on Meta’s scale. But you sell your soul more cheaply there.
- rozal 4mo ago
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- deleted 4mo ago
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- vanuatu 4mo ago
  not to defend zuck but its a common misconception that meta sells data advertisers dont see the personal data they buy for ad placement
  - jbuhbjlnjbn 4mo ago
    There is no misconception. Meta also sells data, next to selling advertising space.

cute_boi 4mo ago

Meta is still better than 80% of the companies. Other company spies on you, do micromanagement and still pay way less. Pick your poison.

LucidLynx 4mo ago
Then I would prefer the 20% that pay less, but do something good for humanity.

rybosworld 4mo ago

People always answer this question with money. But if we think of it as a version of the prisoner dilemma (Meta is one prisoner, the employee is the other), the right move is probably to work somewhere else for a lower salary. By working for Meta, they are defecting against you (openly screen recording you to train your AI replacement). Choosing to work somewhere else would be like you defecting against Meta. Extremely simplified example. Ignore inflation, raises, etc. Which choice is better? - $400k/yr for 5 years followed by a layoff, with the possibility that the thing you've helped Meta build rolls out everywhere, and there are next to no job opportunities - $200k/yr for the rest of your career, and employment opportunities don't dry up because you didn't help build the thing meant to replace you

singron 4mo ago
After 5 years, you'll have an extra $1M in savings, and you can safely pay yourself 4% or $40k each year in perpetuity without doing any work. This is also a really extreme version of the prisoners dilemma. In the standard formula, there are 2 prisoners, so it's somewhat practical to not defect, but there are hundreds of thousands of qualified candidates for working at Meta in these roles, so your personal decision to defect or not has likely no effect on the ultimate outcome. I.e. for the second option to work, you actually need to organize a unified labor movement with no defectors, which is probably impossible.
- ProfessorLayton 4mo ago
  >After 5 years, you'll have an extra $1M in savings, and you can safely pay yourself 4% or $40k each year in perpetuity without doing any work. The only way this could be remotely true on a 400k salary is by saving +80% of take home pay. After taxes that's only 40k/yr to live on. In a HCOL area. This doesn't even touch on the fact that tenure at most tech places is well below 5y, especially at Meta.
lbrito 4mo ago
Those are easy choices, but unrealistic. Its also not like offer packages are a click away from showing into your email inbox, they are excruciating and highly random. More realistic choices are: - $400k/yr for 5 years followed by a layoff, with the possibility that the thing you've helped Meta build rolls out everywhere, and there are next to no job opportunities or - 150k/year for 3 years followed by being laid off due to runway ending, Meta out-competing your company, or whatever. Despite you not helping build the thing meant to replace you, it still got built.

jjulius 4mo ago

The number of people in these comments who would be happy to be "paid well" to contribute to what's inarguably a huge net negative worldwide is exactly how the company got to this point. It's astonishing how many people value a ton of money over doing something good. Everyone who talks about setting values aside for cash is the problem. Gross.

AndrewKemendo 4mo ago
I used to think there was a solution to this but theres not: There is no limit to human greed
yubblegum 4mo ago
I have a dear friend who works at Meta. The conclusion that all meta workers are valuing money over "something good" is not reasonable. This fellow, who I know to be a good man of excellent character btw, for example has to support his family (which all together number 6), and be prepared to pay tuition for 4 kids starting in a decade and then one after another for the other 3! Is providing for your family and their future not "something good"? > The number of people in these comments who would be happy to be "paid well" to contribute to what's inarguably a huge net negative worldwide is exactly how the company got to this point. Sorry, have to call bullshit on this. As to the Meta products, who is forcing anyone to use it? They could have had armies of geeks working for them but if no one ever came, would Facebook cum Meta ever be this huge? I personally, from back when most people here would downvote you to oblivion when some of us pointed out the emergence of surveillance capitalism in "Web 2.0", recognized this company for what it is and have avoided every single product offering. Who is forcing people to use Facebook? And what was the role of websites like Hackernews in promoting the 'permissive' (irony alert) ethics of these 'ventures'?
- jjulius 4mo ago
  There are many, many ways to provide for one's family, Meta is but one. And I say this as a father providing for mine. Additionally, putting the blame for using Meta products on the users in spite of all of what we know about how the company has strived to make the productive terribly addictive is a very wild take.

dfxm12 4mo ago

In the US, if you quit your job, you lose access to many benefits, including affordable health care. It might be hard to get a loan for a car, to find an apartment, etc. This is systemically set up this way, including making sure employment doesn't get too low, which would give more power to employees.

deleted 4mo ago

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ryukoposting 4mo ago

One thing I have observed so far in SV (haven't been here long) is that folks who work in big tech but aren't from the US don't fully understand the difference in costs depending where you live in the US. I have to wonder if that informs the decision to stay in SV no matter what the work is. Like, intellectually they know that it costs less to live in Beaverton Michigan than it costs to live in Palo Alto. But the magnitude of that difference, and how that scales your income needs, they've never thought to do the math. It doesn't scale proportionally, and that's counterintuitive. This isn't a dig against anyone, and exceptions abound. But when I told my foreign-born SV-lifer colleagues how much my rent was in Wisconsin, you'd have thought I was the one from a foreign country!

zeroonetwothree 4mo ago
Apart from housing the costs aren’t that much more. You pay the same to travel. You pay the same to buy stuff online. Food is maybe slightly more but it’s not that significant. Once you get past being able to afford housing it’s insanely lucrative. It’s harder for entry level people of course.
- siren2026 4mo ago
  I have had that discussion multiple times with people. They all seem to think you absolutely need to live in a 5 bedroom 5m$ house in Palo Alto (because how else are you going to live?). But if you rent a normal 2BR for 4000$ in the Bay area, and could potentially rent the same for 1500$ in a LCOL, that is a minimal saving compared to your income. Everything else stays mostly the same. An on top of that most companies will give you a paycut. But for some reason people think you are going to be a king just by moving to LCOL. I think it is the opposite Now, if you get bamboozled into buying a 5000 sqft house like the average american does, then yes, big savings in a LCOL.
  - ryukoposting 4mo ago
    This is exactly what I'm talking about. $1600 will get you a respectable 2-bedroom apartment in a decent neighborhood in Chicago, which most certainly isn't LCOL. If you want your 5-bedroom mcmansion in Northbrook or your artsy flat in Wicker Park, then yeah that'll cost more - see your point about houses in Palo Alto. A downright nice 2-bedroom apartment in the heart of Rochester MN will run you $1300/mo tops, and $1000/mo is well within reason. I had to do this math fairly recently. For me, moving from a relatively pricey part of the midwest, the number was 2.2x my income for SV to be viable. Now that I live here, I find that I actually undershot a little, and it's more like 2.4x to break even. I thought groceries and restaurants and such would be roughly the same. They aren't.

DonsDiscountGas 4mo ago

Median pay at Meta is $380k. Median. I'm sure it's high variance but I would put up with a lot for that kind of money

sidcool 4mo ago

I think this is a unrealistic point of view. If Meta really were as draconian and toxic as many people make it seem, most smart people would have left. Market is tough right now, but then there were other times when jobs were booming. And people still joined Meta. Money is one big aspect. I am not saying Meta is a paradise. I completely want Meta to face their reckoning for what they have done to the world, but painting it as like a prison camp is misplaced I feel.

shimman 4mo ago
How can you say the smart people haven't already left? The only people comfortable working at Meta are comfortable with a company that enabled then profited off a genocide, has mass teenage girl misery machines, invested in companies whose products caused users to kill themselves, worked on systems that helped erode democracy across the world. I'm sorry but if you're at meta it's not because you are smart, it's because you are a human that derives money from ruining lives. Thinking has very little to do with situation outside of deciding how much greed you're entitled to for the human misery you personally create by enabling such a system.
- sidcool 4mo ago
  I understand your point of view. It's not possible to execute a high growth company like Meta without extremely smart, high IQ individuals. And they are OK with the harm Meta is doing. My point was that Meta is bad, but the perception that it routinely abuses employees is misplaced.
  - shimman 4mo ago
    I'm not saying that at all, I'm saying that people purposely choosing to work at Meta are evil individuals that deserve public scorn and mocking.
spacechild1 4mo ago
OP is not talking about the working conditions but the negative effects on society.

sidcool 4mo ago

Gavin Belson: The Scene: Gavin’s development team complains that his new tech ("The Box") is antiquated. He fires back in frustration: "Why did you all take my money then, you entitled little pricks? You all think you’re John Lennon until someone waves a dollar in your face!"

josh_carterPDX 4mo ago

This is a tough one because I've been there. I have worked for orgs that don't align with my values, but when you're in there you aren't thinking that you are contributing to the absolutely horrible crap they're doing. You just keep telling yourself, "I just do this one little thing." And that's enough to convince yourself that it's ok. You're keeping your values and morals intact. Saying that, I'm sure if more of them had options they'd jump in a heartbeat.

spacechild1 4mo ago
> You just keep telling yourself, "I just do this one little thing." And that's enough to convince yourself that it's ok. This is how I would have imagined most of these people think (except for the true sociopaths who just don't care). > Saying that, I'm sure if more of them had options they'd jump in a heartbeat. Are you saying the people who have been working for Meta had no other options? That would be a ridiculous claim. The point is that there have been many, many options and yet they chose to interview for Meta and take the offer.
- josh_carterPDX 4mo ago
  > Are you saying the people who have been working for Meta had no other options? That would be a ridiculous claim. The point is that there have been many, many options and yet they chose to interview for Meta and take the offer. Bold assumption.
  - spacechild1 4mo ago
    You can't tell me that someone took an offer from Meta because it was their only option. This is just absurd.
    - josh_carterPDX 4mo ago
      I guess it would depend on the role.

roncesvalles 4mo ago

Imposter syndrome is extremely common and a lot of people in high-paying tech jobs don't believe they can get something just like this elsewhere. Also, Meta interviews are generally not regarded as too difficult, which further fuels the imposter syndrome (everyone has a sense that they're overpaid considering how easy it is to get in). I almost suspect this is a deliberate strategy.

ergocoder 4mo ago

Company devices are always tracked 100% of the time. I don't understand why this is news.

vander_elst 4mo ago

The kind of issues that you might face if you have dependants could be something along the lines: well Timmy, we'll need to cut your leg instead of trying solution x that might save it, because I preferred not to accept a job that would have allowed to pay for that, due to the fact such a job didn't follow my ethical standards. This is of course a very extreme and hopefully rare case, but I think that there's a large range of cases where unfortunately money does make a difference I a significant way. Additionally, I think that it also does make a huge difference if you are the only one affected by you decisions or someone else is. I think when going for a decision for such a position, these and other points that consider the more practical implications might weight in.

tencentshill 4mo ago

I would take a fat raise to work on some dumb tracking feature that probably won't make it to production. It's a huge bureaucracy, most people probably coast (as shown in HBO's Silicon Valley) and do very little actual work.

metamate100000 4mo ago

I work at Meta, on a key system in one of the main products. I think when I went in, it was too interesting a system/opportunity to not do it. I was open to many roles and interviewing, and I just really wanted to understand how it works. I don't touch ads, I don't touch integrity, or any of the "dodgy" stuff. I used to hate Facebook (and then Meta), and not have accounts on any of their platforms (bar Whatsapp), until I joined. I care about doing good and making a positive impact in the world (don't think I'll do much at Meta though). I'm probably the closest to a 180 on this you can imagine. And... I don't have a good answer to why I still work there? It's an interesting anthropological exercise? My everyday is working with great people on a facet of a product that is entirely wholesome and inoffensive? When I came in, I found that my coworkers (locally, in my team/sister teams) were extremely talented, hard working, and cared a lot about the systems being good. Yes we are all pissed off by the recent changes, a couple people left (not mainly due to these changes though). I mean, the people just seem entirely normal? I don't imagine it's so different to working elsewhere. People are not obsessed with money or in any kind of dire situation, they are not grappling with hard moral questions about the value of money versus corrupting the world. I guess I just feel like I'm not contributing to the awful stuff? I think you tend to get used to your everyday life and see the stuff around you in your little bubble. I guess if my part of the product gets better, Meta sells more ads and then has an incentive to do bad stuff, I suppose? Anyway, yeah. Open to other convincing opinions about why I should feel awful for what I do and quit my job, and the right way to think about this (genuinely!).

yoyohello13 4mo ago
Even if you're not working on the 'bad part' you are still contributing to the success of the company as a whole. When you work for a company, it is tacit agreement with 'everything' the company does. If Meta is doing something you don't agree with, it behooves you to quit or try to change it. If you continue to work, head down then you are complicit in everything they do.

glaslong 4mo ago

Well I used to be pretty passionate about the work I was doing, and especially because I was learning from some incredible people. ....but both of those are gone to layoffs and restructuring, so it's basically just money, and I'm hanging on by an actively fraying thread of cowardice and burnout.

baddie_twoshoes 4mo ago

It's because it's a job that is known to pay very well, I don't know what's so difficult to understand about it? Like someone is just going to give up their $300K - $500K job over something like that; the kind of thing they'll put hand over heart and claim they'll do in posts like this one, but in practice people won't actually do, because the money is good.

OrangeMusic 4mo ago

Which non profit do _you_ work for?