It should be obvious by now that these massive tech layoffs have nothing to do with the broader economy, which by all indications is doing fine. For many tech companies like Google they don't actually need the cost savings from layoffs relative to their outrageous profits and cash in the bank. This is really about disciplining labor, specifically highly salaried tech labor. All of these companies use the same salary data and software and are therefore able to indirectly collude to suppress employee salaries. Firing large numbers of highly paid workers for no business reason is a semi-coordinated effort to reduce salaries across the board by flooding the labor market with talent. It has worked. If you look at offers for L5 today compared to 1-2 years ago median TC has come down by probably $50-100k. There also seems to be an increase in offshoring to markets where engineers are cheap(er) like Amsterdam and parts of South America. The layoffs are the result of large tech companies becoming saturated with MBAs and mid-level executives. Tech has undergone a cultural shift away from technical innovation and rigor towards business expertise. These people are useless overcompensated garbage who are generally charismatic talkers but lack the creativity or technical expertise to innovate. Instead all these bug eyed psychopaths know how to do is hire and fire (that's all you learn at Wharton and GSB). They contribute nothing. They build nothing. TL;DR tech executives are fucking you and lying about why they're doing it
Whatâs odd is the complete about face from last year, where it was about employee well-being, happiness, heck even DEI. To where we are today. Itâs happening because we allow such things. Such labor laws shouldnât exist. People should be on the streets like the French but đ€·đ»ââïž
They really were out here doing the most, best way to describe my feeling is the same as watching: https://youtu.be/zy9jaX9RAbA
DEI has nothing to do with it.
I mean⊠workers had a moment in the sun where they thought they had the power. Of course the overlords had to come down hard and crush that dream.
You're not wrong. Damn if only there were some way for tech workers to organize and leverage the value of their labor collectively. Oh well đ€·...
too bad companies are evil and know how to exploit H1B labor and offshore to cheaper countries
Found the MBA
Jump trading guy has a valid point. Blind is blindsided with high TCs and thinking of software industry as handful of big tech companies.
Oh wow please tell us more Mind telling us about some of the technical innovations you have personally done at Netflix? This is exactly why tech companies need MBAs we are headed to a recession, interest rates are high AF, consumer spending is dropping and you are saying thereâs no need to cut costs because the company is very profitable⊠Like you are literally saying you donât need business expertise all you need is innovation to run a company.
Could not agree more.
A lot of companies overhired at unprecedented rates, and then the economy hit a brick wall. I wouldn't give execs that much credit that it's some sinister orchestrated plan to lower tech wages across the industry, I just think they were incompetent and grossly miscalculated the forecast.
Low interest rates caused investors to dump money on shady investments, which resulted in massive hiring on frivolous projects. Now investors will punish anyone who's not making business sense hence the layoffs. I always felt tech was over-hyped, especially SWE. We should not be paid 2x-3x over other engineering jobs. The labor market is just correcting itself.
Got some tin foil to share? I need my hat.
Itâs GSB - Stanford.
It all started with Zucky realising his weird computer game is not going to work, but still doubling down. They were the first to pause and layoff and if they start hiring again, that's the best indicator things are going back to normal. One of the posts did say they're hiring E6s already so it does seem like a good signal.
It was all a total farce, they never stopped hiring IC6. Starting a coordinated consolidation of power from employees to companies was the real intent.
Yes Meta overpaid his techies, but he wasn't alone. They need to hire more leaders and fire the deadweight engineers who can't perform to expectations.