Thank you for this. Lawyers and bankers actually have a sharkish will to negotiate for themselves. They're good at what they do, they're powerful allies and fo

Thank you for this. Lawyers and bankers actually have a sharkish will to negotiate for themselves. They're good at what they do, they're powerful allies and formidable enemies, and they know it. People don't often try to take advantage of them, even when one is senior and the other's a greenhorn. They know better. In 7 years, that junior you tweaked is going to be partner-level somewhere and might end up surprising you how well he does. Most programmers work for old-style Theory-X companies where you have to be a manager to get a fair shake-- because we, as a group, suck at advocating for ourselves and get taken advantage of in a way that just wouldn't happen to most lawyers or bankers. The same is true of most of these Silicon Valley "startups". You gotta differentiate between companies that are small because they're elite niche operations (which are some of the best places to work) and companies that are small because they're shitty. Many of these "startups" are the latter.