[zitterbewegung]

You are naive they just want to rehire positions at lower rates if you see in the article they are cutting 600 but are hiring for 350 to 400 people. It would immediately allow them to replace higher wages workers that have been with the company with entry level positions . Also it seems like an identification of long term trends and they figure they want to invest in automation.

[dakiol]

Well, that's what I said. They are doing it not because of "bad times" or "recession" or "post-covid era", they are doing it because that's what they wanted to do from the beginning. They couldn't do a massive layoff in the past because it would get them bad rep, but nowadays, it barely is a thing anymore (just look at this thread: people commenting "well, at least the severance is nice". What the hell? Massive layoffs shouldn't be seen as regular news)

[72f988bf]

> They couldn't do a massive layoff in the past because it would get them bad rep

Forget about "bad rep", it was a bad economic decision: why let go a slight underperformer (a now-known 0.8x engineer) that you hired in 2015 at pay X, if in exchange you hire a "expected normal 1.0x engineer", but at a price of 1.8*X in 2021 due to crazy escalation of SWE salaries in that period.

(Assuming you have a perfected/more picky hiring process that knows the median hire will be a 1.0x engineer)

Now in 2023, the situation is different: you can hire a "expected normal 1.0x engineer" but at pay 0.8*X (adjusted for inflation - ratios all made up)

[hamandcheese]

The roles fired and not the same as the roles hiring, for the most part.

[htkibar]

The way the article is written is a reorganisation almost, normally you are supposed to let your workers move into other roles, if they are willing. Not the same as reduction in force.

[hamandcheese]

I’d sure like it if everyone could just decide to be a software engineer over night, but I don’t think that’s realistic expectation.