| > "So really the tl;dr is, companies want more talent at the same price." This is not unreasonable. I know around these parts we like to think that developers are the God-Kings of the universe, but there are real negative consequences to the seemingly infinite geometric growth of developer salaries (currently, in the NYC area anyways, clocking in at least 10% a year). And I say that as someone who is a huge, direct beneficiary of these insane salaries. We keep complaining around here about the influence of VCs on the industry, about how everything is oriented around landing the next round of funding. That we think about runways more than we think about creating useful things. We also complain about how founders are giving up increasingly large pieces of equity just for the capital to get off the ground, and that the dream of tech entrepreneurs changing the world is constantly compromised by all of the above. We also complain about the power large corporations have over small businesses and can muscle them around in the market. All of these come down to the price of developers. The more we get paid, the more capital founders will need to start companies, and the more power investors will have over entrepreneurs, their companies, and their employees. Huge paychecks for developers only plays into the hands of wealthy investors who now consume an ever-increasing influence, and who wind up owning more and more of the fruits of innovation. The more we get paid, the more it benefits large, established corporations, who have the mature, optimized business models to afford huge salaries, and the more we handicap small, starting businesses who do not yet have the revenue/employee to sustain high burn rates. The more we get paid the fewer true bootstrapped companies we will see, since there is now an increasingly insurmountable cliff between "founders in a garage" and "first hire". The more we get paid the more types of businesses will be categorically excluded from existing because they're not profitable enough to pay huge salaries. Just recently I turned down an offer from a company doing tremendous social good - the salary they offered would have been highly competitive a mere two years ago, but the market continues to inflate. I fear businesses that are highly positive to society, but not hugely profitable, will simply no longer exist in the future. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy being paid a shitload of money to do what I love, but understand that there is a point where increased developer compensation is a net negative for us all, and that we may already be past that point. The world is bigger than our bank accounts (sad, I know). |
I think you misread the complaints: to my ears, they are more about "how on earth is that useful" or "another company solving the problems of young upper middle class urbanites" (viz Breather [1], or the 5 (and growing!) laundry startups respectively) [2].
Finally, businesses need to reach a mutual agreement with their employees. Startups and small companies are amazingly stupid; the standard playbook for creating a business is do things big companies can't that you can because you're small, ie make your smallness a positive instead of a hindrance. Somehow, none of them are willing to do that with employees. So, for example, I'd love to work remotely. Virtually no companies are interested. I've also repeatedly offered to trade 10% of my salary for the ability to 4 weeks of vacation in a row, but no-one accepts the offer. If you choose to compete directly with {goog, fb, etc} then you're competing on their terms and will probably lose.
[1] http://techcrunch.com/2014/09/04/breather-series-a/
[2] I submit, w/o proof, laundry startups are a symptom of how shitty a city sf is. In a real city (ny) there are wash & folds near your apartment; you hand them a hamper and either pick up clean clothes or they drop them off at your apartment. No need for smartphones and deliveries and other bs.