I wonder what would happen if Tim Cook said they were no longer going to hire Facebook engineers as a matter of principle.
They could say something like, "if you're willing to sacrifice your ethics to work for a company that spies on people, you can't be trusted with our product."
Not a lifetime ban, but perhaps a 5 year ban from working at Apple after having had a tenure at Facebook. Maybe they could waive the ban for candidates that publicly renounced Facebook's practices.
It'll never happen, but if it did I imagine the effects on Facebook hiring and retention would be chilling.
But what of the chilling effects on Apple’s hiring? Do we really want to start turf wars where companies can essentially reenact anti-poaching laws and the associated depression in mobility but spin it as being principled?
I'd worry more about wages dropping due to WFH and creation of a "pay-adjusted" distributed workforce.
I'd also worry about the monopolistic behavior of the incumbents making it harder for challengers to succeed, creating less diversity in work or employment.
Principled stands won't happen. Profits matter, not morals or ethics. It's better for them to maximize the workforce pool and keep them fungible.
>Not a lifetime ban, but perhaps a 5 year ban from working at Apple after having had a tenure at Facebook.
Japan has something similar for Yakuza members who are defined as "anti social forces" with a cooling off period of 7 years. FWIW I find the idea when applied to Facebook rather appealing.
It really depends on where you live. If you want to own a home, Facebook and similar are really your only options for the Bay Area. Assuming you also want a nice commute, decent schools, etc. stuff that most professionals work towards.
And yet I get pilloried when I dare say that the Bay Area is a bad place to live. The median software dev salary for the US is under $110k. So half the people in the country make less than that, yet even in places with low salaries nationally software developers are well-paid and have no trouble affording housing and growing wealth.
You’re probably talking to a lot of rich dudes. That’s why they get on your case.
If you’re rich, it’s probably better than all those other places. But, again, need to be rich. And it takes a lot to get there for a person who grew up in a lower socioeconomic class. You’ll spend most of your life trying to get there and stay rather than enjoying the riches. (At least, that’s my experience so far!)
The reason commonly given for living in the Bay Area is all the jobs available but you're pointing out that's not actually the case because if you want to live well in the Bay Area then you have few employment options. Is that the reality?
Certainly is for me. The $170k/yr startup salary I get is certainly not enough to afford jack shit around here. Even an extra $50k/yr wouldn't do anything to alter my lifestyle. I couldn't get any kind of home around here with that and I'd still be very uncomfortable renting a home on that income - as it'd be more than a third of my take home pay (lose your job? You better have a very large emergency buffer - unemployment won't even pay a third of your monthly rent).
The engineers I know who stay around here are A) wealthy (bought home long before average price was past $1m or inherited one), B) rent, dual engineer income, and enjoy the renter lifestyle, C) Work at FAANG and/or have a spouse who does and make big fucking $$$$ D) Going to move away, no plans to stay permanently.
There are no young people (<35) moving here, working for no-name companies, and buying homes after saving for a down payment after a few years. Almost all young people I know who do such things have A) had a startup IPO or B) work at FAANG.
Certainly can't make it here on a single startup salary - not even in the faintest. I'm proof of that.
The reason people move here is because there's a chance (insert dumb and dumber reference) to strike rich. There's also way more jobs here than anywhere else in the country and that's why I moved here. I couldn't get a job anywhere else but I somehow managed to get one here four times in a row now.
I know plenty of people doing just fine in SF on much less than that 170k.
Yes, they rent. But "buying homes after saving for a down payment after a few years" is not a reality in any major metro area at the moment, unless you're fine with small, old, and far out in the suburbs.
I wonder if that is part of the reason for the high compensation numbers. I do not know how widespread "counter Facebook ethics" are among Engineers. I could imagine them being higher that elsewhere as it is a somewhat high-compensation segment, even outside of these monstrous FB-numbers.
How do we solve this problem? How do we prevent, or at least discourage, people from turning a blind eye to the ethical implications of working in a dystopia accelerator company like FB when job options elsewhere are plentiful?
They could say something like, "if you're willing to sacrifice your ethics to work for a company that spies on people, you can't be trusted with our product."
Not a lifetime ban, but perhaps a 5 year ban from working at Apple after having had a tenure at Facebook. Maybe they could waive the ban for candidates that publicly renounced Facebook's practices.
It'll never happen, but if it did I imagine the effects on Facebook hiring and retention would be chilling.
Sort of a reverse Brian Armstrong.