[dropit_sphere]

>The world is bigger than our bank accounts (sad, I know).

Wait a minute, wait a minute. Why? I mean, seriously, why? Public companies exist to fatten shareholders' bank accounts. Privately owned companies exist to fatten their owners' bank accounts. I submit that the world is no bigger than our bank accounts.

Also regarding founders giving up large amounts of equity to VC's so they can afford developers: there is a very simple solution. Give employees more equity. Take out the middle man.

[potatolicious]

> "I submit that the world is no bigger than our bank accounts."

Sure, but even in that world view ever-increasing developer salaries is sacrificing your long-term interests for short-term ones.

A tightening of the ability for people to start new companies will mean fewer choices in employers down the line, and it will mean less diversity in work environments, cultures, types of work, etc. All of that works actively against you.

Increased investor influence means less authority for businesses to run themselves as they see fit. I'm sure I don't need to explain how that works against you.

An elimination of smaller businesses means consolidation of employment into fewer, larger employers, who now wield more and more power over you personally.

> "Also regarding founders giving up large amounts of equity to VC's so they can afford developers: there is a very simple solution. Give employees more equity."

Equity isn't magic. The amount of equity you have to give to make a $10K discount on salary make sense is a lot.

If you crunch the math you'll realize that even if the founders themselves are perfectly altruistic and literally take no equity, the size of team you can afford to hire with equity, at these current salaries, is very small.

And will continue to get smaller as compensation increases.

The effect is ultimately the same - categories of businesses, types of ideas, become uneconomical to explore because the cost of hiring - whether in hard cash or in equity - simply doesn't add up.

As is often the case, the common good is good for you because - surprise - you don't exist in a vacuum from the rest of society.

[dropit_sphere]

>A tightening of the ability for people to start new companies will mean fewer choices in employers down the line, and it will mean less diversity in work environments, cultures, types of work, etc. All of that works actively against you.

This is getting strange: employees have too much power, and so they will have less power? In this dark future, what is to stop Joe Dev and his four friends from starting a company while living on the piles of money they've stacked up?

Further, in said dark future where only the corporate moguls survive and have beaten-down developers shackled to their cubicles, why do the moguls continue paying through the nose? If they have so much power over developers, don't they as soon as possible cut developer salaries, allowing smaller companies to woo them away?

>Equity isn't magic. The amount of equity you have to give to make a $10K discount on salary make sense is a lot.

I can only conclude that either developers are being exploited or that we're in a bubble, then, because VC's make that exact money-for-equity trade.

>As is often the case, the common good is good for you because - surprise - you don't exist in a vacuum from the rest of society.

I would take this much more seriously if there were a Developers' Union that served to erect barriers to entry. But in fact, there's the exact opposite, with bootcamps, Khan Academy, open-source tools, blogs, and people getting jobs without degrees. I have a hard time conceiving of a less jealous profession.

[hkarthik]

> Also regarding founders giving up large amounts of equity to VC's so they can afford developers: there is a very simple solution. Give employees more equity. Take out the middle man.

That's been tried a lot and is often referred to as "sweat equity". Most people won't go for it when there's 5 jobs across the street that will offer cold hard cash which they have obtained by getting a premium on equity with a VC.

[sheepmullet]

"That's been tried a lot and is often referred to as "sweat equity". Most people won't go for it when there's 5 jobs across the street that will offer cold hard cash which they have obtained by getting a premium on equity with a VC."

How many startups offer the first few employees a reasonable amount of equity (>5%)? Most startups will offer 1% if you are lucky.

[dropit_sphere]

If, as a founder, you don't have the capital to execute your vision, it falls on you to convince people that it will be profitable for them to trade real resources for as-yet-valueless equity. Developers will take equity if they think it's worth something.

I don't understand why the natural response to "can't afford good developers" is "pay them less." Maybe the company just deserves to die.

Founders' fundraising problems are...not my problem.