[gustavus]

Wow that's quite the high and mighty response. I have about 10 years experience across multiple domains and can program across a dozen languages. You know what my salary sits around 150k.

You're attitude reflects part of the problem. There are a bunch of still relatively new people or especially boot camp grads that were sold on the always unrealistic expectation of making $150k right out of the gate. That was always a bubble that wasn't sustainable, but now a bunch of tech workers feel entitled to it rather than being willing to adjust to reality and be grateful for the fact that most of us can make over $100k relatively quickly. Compared to most other jobs in the US tech is still one of the best places to get into, I have a friend who has her master's degree and has been teaching for close to 15 years who is estatic about recently getting a raise to $75k. I have another friend that works as a project and procurement manager in the construction field and after 4 years and with a degree he was still making < $80k.

When all that is considered some new "full stack developer" (which really means "I can do JS so I can do full stack if you're backend is mongo your app server is Node and your fronted is React, no I can't do jQuery that was never covered in our 2 weeks on frontend") acting insulted at $140k sounds spoiled, whiney and entitled.

[lokar]

These discussions are always the same, two sides of a bi-modal distribution talking past each other.

There is not just one “tech” industry that hire software engineers.

[lolinder]

Right, and the point of this whole thread is that one end of that bimodal distribution just got a lot smaller than it was 3 years ago, while the other end sits where it always has. There are a lot of people who the FAANG end of the spectrum doesn't have room for anymore who are disappointed to find themselves back on the more sustainable modality.

[lokar]

I agree a lot of people got pulled over into the right hand side during the weird boom and now things are adjusting. But neither side is more "sustainable" than the other (just some individuals expectations). The work is different, the skills are different, the expectations are different. FAANG are not wrong to pay what they pay.

[lolinder]

This whole thread serves as evidence that the upper modality wasn't sustainable at the levels it was operating at, while the lower modality is still going relatively strong. That strongly suggests that one is more sustainable than the other.

FAANG employees like to tell themselves that their salaries are/were well deserved and not merely the result of a bubble, but a lot of them are finding out the hard way that that isn't the case.

[lokar]

There were a lot of these jobs even pre covid. Google had like 40k engineers.

[scarface_74]

And there are 2.7 million software engineers in the US.

[lolinder]

I never said anything about COVID—the software bubble I'm talking about started in the early 2010s.

[and0]

The market is the market, for better or worse. I do think SWE are overvalued socially/monetarily, but I don't see why you're so emotional over someone saying they deserve what they can get. Or if they make more than you if they can swing it.

[jmye]

Accusing someone you disagree with of being “so emotional” is some bottom-of-the-barrel kindergarten crap.

[analognoise]

A lot of people are actually anti-worker but don't realize it explicitly as such; it's also the "Crab effect" (pull down those trying to escape the pot).

[fallat]

Thank you.