Tech sector Salaries have fallen up to 15 per cent as fired talent floods market(afr.com)
afr.com
Tech sector Salaries have fallen up to 15 per cent as fired talent floods market
https://www.afr.com/technology/tech-workers-take-20-000-plus-pay-cuts-as-fired-talent-floods-market-20230824-p5dz4o
123 comments
Honestly I don't feel super bothered by this, not because I'm content with settling for sub-par comp, but because (in California at least) the housing market and average comp are correlated
At the end of the day, if the housing market is going to soak up the additional surplus value, why should I care?
At the end of the day, if the housing market is going to soak up the additional surplus value, why should I care?
I agree. I'm from way outside California where the salaries are far lower. I've always thought the over inflated salaries of the valley were kinda toxic. Friends who I graduated with who were C students were making double what I make. One time I asked a web dev friend of mine what he thought of Kubernetes and he didn't even know what it was. This was just a couple years ago. I was shocked at little he knew and how much he got paid. He also had saved very little money, as it was all going to taking Uber to and from work and eating out every meal. Just seemed like a broken culture. Meanwhile I ride a bike to and from work and spend a ton of time cooking and cleaning, ya know, normal stuff. His life was exciting but there just seems to be a void in there when your making so much money and spending it all on having people serve you. Like in your mind, you must think you deserve it. But in my mind, you don't.
I know it's controversial and all, but that's my honest belief. Silicon Valley is amazing and there are truly great people there. But does a C student web dev who kinda doesn't give a shit really deserve 150$k/year? I assure you, he does not. Not while there are far more qualified people all over the globe who will do that job for half. Sure, remote work is hard, and having the team located locally is valuable, but the wealth is simply too centralized in this one location. It's causing a morphed self image to the people there. An over inflated ego. A condescension to outsiders. A constant need to justify their position. The culture needs a humbling. The wealth needs to spread.
I know it's controversial and all, but that's my honest belief. Silicon Valley is amazing and there are truly great people there. But does a C student web dev who kinda doesn't give a shit really deserve 150$k/year? I assure you, he does not. Not while there are far more qualified people all over the globe who will do that job for half. Sure, remote work is hard, and having the team located locally is valuable, but the wealth is simply too centralized in this one location. It's causing a morphed self image to the people there. An over inflated ego. A condescension to outsiders. A constant need to justify their position. The culture needs a humbling. The wealth needs to spread.
I believe an engineer deserves whatever salary they can get. I try not to compare my salary with others; in the end we're all enabling huge salaries for upper management and CEO's, huge profits for shareholders. If someone makes $150K, $200K, that's awesome.
It's possible though, I found, to keep my midwest upbringing unspoilt in Silicon Valley. I ate out only once a week with the whole family, never took Uber, never owned a Tesla (owned a used minivan though).
After 26 years though I quit, sold the house, and moved with the wife (now empty nesters) back to the midwest.
Now I miss the excellent Asian food.
It's possible though, I found, to keep my midwest upbringing unspoilt in Silicon Valley. I ate out only once a week with the whole family, never took Uber, never owned a Tesla (owned a used minivan though).
After 26 years though I quit, sold the house, and moved with the wife (now empty nesters) back to the midwest.
Now I miss the excellent Asian food.
why did you move back? I'm also from midwest, the move here was already hard enough frankly I think I'm just going to stay put for some time
Well, I stayed put for 27 years. Raised a family and emptied the nest there. It made moving back to the midwest easier.
It was a pain, but it is part of my retirement strategy — downsize periodically. (Obviously moving from California to Nebraska was the biggest gain in that regard.)
It was a pain, but it is part of my retirement strategy — downsize periodically. (Obviously moving from California to Nebraska was the biggest gain in that regard.)
I know, the food is so good here and hard to give up. It's the biggest thing we notice when visiting home.
> One time I asked a web dev friend of mine what he thought of Kubernetes and he didn't even know what it was. This was just a couple years ago. I was shocked at little he knew and how much he got paid.
Not be a good heuristic. Maybe they're in a job where they don't have to use Kubernetes.
Like, I know compiler developers who have no need to bother with Kubernetes.
> But does a C student web dev who kinda doesn't give a shit really deserve 150$k/year?
In college they might have struggled; some people just don't work that well in a classroom environment. That doesn't necessarily mean they're idiots. Or maybe they improved afterwards.
Just because somebody got an A in classroom tests doesn't necessarily mean they should be the most-compensated.
The real world is complex.
Not be a good heuristic. Maybe they're in a job where they don't have to use Kubernetes.
Like, I know compiler developers who have no need to bother with Kubernetes.
> But does a C student web dev who kinda doesn't give a shit really deserve 150$k/year?
In college they might have struggled; some people just don't work that well in a classroom environment. That doesn't necessarily mean they're idiots. Or maybe they improved afterwards.
Just because somebody got an A in classroom tests doesn't necessarily mean they should be the most-compensated.
The real world is complex.
>But does a C student web dev who kinda doesn't give a shit really deserve 150$k/year? I assure you, he does not. Not while there are far more qualified people all over the globe who will do that job for half.
Buckle up, friend: there are individuals more qualified than you who will do your job for half what you get. They could probably make the exact same argument you've just made, about you. "Deserving wealth" is an idea we have right before the veil comes off and we realise this whole thing is a big joke. Forget "should", accept "is".
Buckle up, friend: there are individuals more qualified than you who will do your job for half what you get. They could probably make the exact same argument you've just made, about you. "Deserving wealth" is an idea we have right before the veil comes off and we realise this whole thing is a big joke. Forget "should", accept "is".
> Buckle up, friend: there are individuals more qualified than you who will do your job for half what you get.
I wouldn't be so sure. You have no idea what my job is, how competent I am, nor what I get paid.
I wouldn't be so sure. You have no idea what my job is, how competent I am, nor what I get paid.
In some sense I agree that the sort of life some people lead isn't appealing, and arguably vapid, particularly in Silicon Valley.
But, complaining about someone who didn't give a shit about grades ultimately succeeding is really kind of a caricature of "Straight A Student" mentality. "I deserve it more" they cry about people who never bothered spending more energy than they needed to on something nobody should care about at all, let alone after graduation. It seems like you're needlessly harbouring resentment based on pretty a pretty shallow and superficial view in one person's life, or perhaps unwillingness to adopt that sort of lifestyle and make a big jump.
In some ways I also wish I could bring in the big tech bucks, and I make decent money occasionally, but I'm not casting aspersions on people who do, I just recognize that they are either more clever than me, or chose a specific regimented path that I simply haven't and am unwilling to.
But, complaining about someone who didn't give a shit about grades ultimately succeeding is really kind of a caricature of "Straight A Student" mentality. "I deserve it more" they cry about people who never bothered spending more energy than they needed to on something nobody should care about at all, let alone after graduation. It seems like you're needlessly harbouring resentment based on pretty a pretty shallow and superficial view in one person's life, or perhaps unwillingness to adopt that sort of lifestyle and make a big jump.
In some ways I also wish I could bring in the big tech bucks, and I make decent money occasionally, but I'm not casting aspersions on people who do, I just recognize that they are either more clever than me, or chose a specific regimented path that I simply haven't and am unwilling to.
I'd add that the people who tend to jave the easiest jobs doing the best in school have stable family lives of academicly driven or relatively rich parents; not always, but often. I don't think those people deserve higher salaries than anyone else, and I don't think spontaneously becoming great at grades should be life's only equalizer.
Your paradigm of who is “deserving” of wealth and who isn’t is somewhat weird. I don’t think being a “C grade student” means that this individual cannot make contributions of value. Many people that don’t do very well in school find a lot of success outside of it.
Agreed. 'Deserving' a salary is internalised BS from corporations. The job market is: you sell your labour, companies buy it. Everything else exists to muddy the waters. Attempting to import moral judgements into the world of business is foolish.
The reality is that GP's C grade student friend has just done a better job of selling their labour than GP. GP could go do the same if they wished.
The reality is that GP's C grade student friend has just done a better job of selling their labour than GP. GP could go do the same if they wished.
such a shame that a focus must be placed on selling oneself. everyone has two responsibilities in that model. their job and their career.
those who think the work is more important than the selling will wind up questioning why others more willing to ignore the job for the career are advancing in the career without advancing in the job.
someone will rush in to defend the virtues of this system. go ahead, your third job starts below the line here.
those who think the work is more important than the selling will wind up questioning why others more willing to ignore the job for the career are advancing in the career without advancing in the job.
someone will rush in to defend the virtues of this system. go ahead, your third job starts below the line here.
It's called realism, something doesn't have to be virtuous to be true.
> He also had saved very little money, as it was all going to taking Uber to and from work and eating out every meal.
This is critical to understanding one’s pay. It’s a little bit like a london software worker thinking they earn more than an east european worker, just because on paper they earn more. While the london worker barely rents a flat the east european worker owns two.
Similarly the sillicon valley worker earning three times more than you, but pissing away their money on a uber and a rent, is actually earning far less than you. Many in software are financially illiterate and dont grasp the difference between pay on paper and pay factoring in the cost of living.
This is critical to understanding one’s pay. It’s a little bit like a london software worker thinking they earn more than an east european worker, just because on paper they earn more. While the london worker barely rents a flat the east european worker owns two.
Similarly the sillicon valley worker earning three times more than you, but pissing away their money on a uber and a rent, is actually earning far less than you. Many in software are financially illiterate and dont grasp the difference between pay on paper and pay factoring in the cost of living.
Sometimes I read nonsense in comment sections on places like teamblind where people say sv companies "hire the best and brightest", then I remember some PRs I reviewed the other day where the authors had no fucking clue what they were doing and I think to myself "best and brightest"
Sounds like your beef is with specialization, big tech companies don’t use k8s, don’t burden their web devs with devops and the aforementioned devs delegate food and transit to professionals who do it better than them.
I don’t think a web dev being unaware of Kubernetes is that rare, especially if we’re talking about a front end dev. Particularly in large companies jobs are very tightly segmented, the dev might just be given the URL for the backend API and not be expected to know much more about it than that.
> He also had saved very little money, as it was all going to taking Uber to and from work and eating out every meal.
Sounds like he did not earn that much if just Uber and eating out alone could consume significant amount.
Sounds like he did not earn that much if just Uber and eating out alone could consume significant amount.
> web dev friend of mine what he thought of Kubernetes and he didn't even know what it was
I bet they could ask you about foundational architecture and technologies for building user experiences and you won't know anything about it either
I bet they could ask you about foundational architecture and technologies for building user experiences and you won't know anything about it either
If I had to guess, they wouldn't be able to do that either haha. There's lots of folks in these companies who don't have too much skill apart from knowing how to play that company's system - which is a skill for sure, just not like the one you describe.
A friend called me the other day asking about someone I knew who had solid pedigree in this sense and I had to share that I never knew him to be good at anything but people change, could've matured and skilled up, but I don't remember that being his nature.
Well, my buddy had already scheduled the first interview and so we decided to see how it would go. Sure enough, it was exactly the disaster predicted. The poor engineer he sent to talk to this guy hahaha.
A friend called me the other day asking about someone I knew who had solid pedigree in this sense and I had to share that I never knew him to be good at anything but people change, could've matured and skilled up, but I don't remember that being his nature.
Well, my buddy had already scheduled the first interview and so we decided to see how it would go. Sure enough, it was exactly the disaster predicted. The poor engineer he sent to talk to this guy hahaha.
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because you can sell your house and leave california whenever you want, and keep the money!
land value tax would solve this
You realize one devs high salary raises the average (and therefore expected) salary for all devs, right?
Note: in australia
I think a similar effect is seen in the US. Perusing the (notably fewer) recruiter emails I’ve gotten lately, they’re almost all below my current pay. Contrasted with a year ago, probably 30-40% of cold recruiter outreach were for higher paying gigs than my current job.
I’m also seeing developers with killer resumes complaining in community slack channels about not even getting called back for follow-up interviews. These are people that I would’ve cleaned up in referral fees back when the market was hot. Times have definitely changed.
It’s clear that the tech industry and engineering pay flourished under low interest rates and free flowing VC money. Those days are clearly behind us, at least for now.
I’m also seeing developers with killer resumes complaining in community slack channels about not even getting called back for follow-up interviews. These are people that I would’ve cleaned up in referral fees back when the market was hot. Times have definitely changed.
It’s clear that the tech industry and engineering pay flourished under low interest rates and free flowing VC money. Those days are clearly behind us, at least for now.
Australia also relies on migration to keep wages down. This was paused during Covid, so there is more supply of people now.
This person will never be convinced, but for anyone else reading, Australia (and Canada, and America) uses migration to ward off a population time bomb [1] not to “keep wages low”.
[1] https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/AUS/australia/birth-ra...
EDIT: sorry didn’t meant to be dismissive of the person above, but usually this topic hits way too personal for people to change minds online (see: comments below). For any passers by genuinely curious exhaustive data reviews are available [2].
Tl;dr: Immigration does not depress wages.
[2] https://www.noahpinion.blog/p/repost-why-immigration-doesnt-...
[1] https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/AUS/australia/birth-ra...
EDIT: sorry didn’t meant to be dismissive of the person above, but usually this topic hits way too personal for people to change minds online (see: comments below). For any passers by genuinely curious exhaustive data reviews are available [2].
Tl;dr: Immigration does not depress wages.
[2] https://www.noahpinion.blog/p/repost-why-immigration-doesnt-...
Isn't this confusing cause and effect? Fewer people are having children because it is harder than ever to afford a family, not because the locals have decided passively not to continue on.
Immigration absolutely depresses wages - if you import more supply, what happens to the price? That doesn't require advanced economics to understand.
Immigration absolutely depresses wages - if you import more supply, what happens to the price? That doesn't require advanced economics to understand.
So in response to people being unable to afford kids, we depress wages to make it even harder to afford kids. Got it.
I assume Australia is not courting five year olds to apply for visas and are instead trying to plug a gap in a population older than that. Even if everyone started having kids tomorrow that gap would still exist.
They are the same thing ... wages are lower than they would be without migration.
Whether you count them as low or high, they are lower
Whether you count them as low or high, they are lower
I don't get it, what's the bomb?
Population decline. Which in itself may not be a problem but has all sorts of interesting economical consequences.
You get an aging population requiring care, with less people to both physically and financially/economically fund them.
You also move from always having to build new houses and infrastructure to suddenly having excess housing and infrastructure that isn't needed. Not only does that eliminate a whole bunch of jobs and related economic activity but also drives prices down, etc.
I am sure this is an absolutely terrible summary but you can google population bomb, population decline, etc, for much more informed takes. But basically for the last 100 years the entire world and economy has run on an ever-inflating path and that could change at both a country and world level.
You get an aging population requiring care, with less people to both physically and financially/economically fund them.
You also move from always having to build new houses and infrastructure to suddenly having excess housing and infrastructure that isn't needed. Not only does that eliminate a whole bunch of jobs and related economic activity but also drives prices down, etc.
I am sure this is an absolutely terrible summary but you can google population bomb, population decline, etc, for much more informed takes. But basically for the last 100 years the entire world and economy has run on an ever-inflating path and that could change at both a country and world level.
After a period of decline, it'll eventually fall off a cliff and weird economic after effects happen.
Try reading https://longnow.org/ideas/the-heresy-of-decline/
Try reading https://longnow.org/ideas/the-heresy-of-decline/
Fascinating website, thanks for the link.
A lot of work can be done by no-code and low-code tools so there is less need for software engineers in general. Linus at some point predicted that most of the web developer jobs would be going away because AI can do a lot of it. I think this trend will continue and the AI tools will continue moving down the stack until LLMs can be applied in basically every coding context with very little software engineering training.
People were saying AI tools will create more jobs but it's pretty clear that this time is different and what used to require 2 engineers can now be accomplished by 1 engineer + AI copilots in the relevant domains. I think this trend will continue and the expected outcome is going to be lower demand and lower salaries for software engineers in basically all domains except maybe for very low level work like firmware, kernel drivers, and compilers.
People were saying AI tools will create more jobs but it's pretty clear that this time is different and what used to require 2 engineers can now be accomplished by 1 engineer + AI copilots in the relevant domains. I think this trend will continue and the expected outcome is going to be lower demand and lower salaries for software engineers in basically all domains except maybe for very low level work like firmware, kernel drivers, and compilers.
Ahhhh yes, the classic “this time is different” screed.
I remember in the early 2000s after the first dot com bubble I was told “don’t go into computers, you’ll never have a job! That’s all going to be outsourced to India!”
Pessimists always find a way to convince themselves the sky is falling.
I remember in the early 2000s after the first dot com bubble I was told “don’t go into computers, you’ll never have a job! That’s all going to be outsourced to India!”
Pessimists always find a way to convince themselves the sky is falling.
Hahah, me too. That was one of my first blog posts in 2003: https://www.mooreds.com/wordpress/archives/47
Blog has a login prompt
In 2008, no one was going to put all their personal data.
In 2023, everyone puts their personal data in the cloud.
Reality is not fractal. Signal attenuation exists in a variety of forms.
The difference between now and dot bomb is greatly improved computer, network performance, reliability, and many many more well trained people working on AI problems.
AI is generating rudimentary frontend code for me. I don’t need it to be Google scale. It may get complex logic wrong, but it can emit simple boxes and button code to cut-paste together just fine.
Horse and buggy makers did not vanish over night. The programmer signal of value to the economy is indeed attenuating.
In 2023, everyone puts their personal data in the cloud.
Reality is not fractal. Signal attenuation exists in a variety of forms.
The difference between now and dot bomb is greatly improved computer, network performance, reliability, and many many more well trained people working on AI problems.
AI is generating rudimentary frontend code for me. I don’t need it to be Google scale. It may get complex logic wrong, but it can emit simple boxes and button code to cut-paste together just fine.
Horse and buggy makers did not vanish over night. The programmer signal of value to the economy is indeed attenuating.
Ever use django in like I dont know 2005. Ya it generates all that boring front end stuff for ya. Still get recruiters reaching out to me for django jobs though. Guess all those mba's still couldn't figure it out.
Anecdotes like this are just as banal and repetitive to me as mine was to you. MBAs could but socio-political/economic focus on job creation.
I’m not talking about MBAs but younger people using AI at home now.
They won’t need you or Django in their future.
I’m booting a Linux from Scratch distro to an LLM and training it to normalize it’s initial code base and reboot itself. So far so good. Next steps are add a GPU rendered empty 3D viewport; think like a blank Blender project. Then add in NeRF libs and such to render my own content.
Constrained to a task and not used as a Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, AI as-is does some mesmerizing stuff.
Reread the Google “no moat” memo; they and OpenAI screwed up with big models, said small tunable models are the way to go.
You go ahead an reminisce about 2005 and how much smarter you are than everyone. I’m going to iterate on new ideas with my kids.
I’m not talking about MBAs but younger people using AI at home now.
They won’t need you or Django in their future.
I’m booting a Linux from Scratch distro to an LLM and training it to normalize it’s initial code base and reboot itself. So far so good. Next steps are add a GPU rendered empty 3D viewport; think like a blank Blender project. Then add in NeRF libs and such to render my own content.
Constrained to a task and not used as a Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, AI as-is does some mesmerizing stuff.
Reread the Google “no moat” memo; they and OpenAI screwed up with big models, said small tunable models are the way to go.
You go ahead an reminisce about 2005 and how much smarter you are than everyone. I’m going to iterate on new ideas with my kids.
I would like to read more about this AI loop you have going!
Yup, same people have been perma bears in tech stocks since then too.
I didn't think OP was bearish. In fact they seem very bullish on AI and their capabilities. If a software engineer can do something then there is no reason that an AI copilot can't do it. Most software jobs don't require much thinking and I expect that almost all work at the higher levels of the software stack will be automated similar to OP.
> I think this trend will continue and the expected outcome is going to be lower demand and lower salaries for software engineers
There’s already a huge range of efficiency with programmers (ex. The concept of a “10x” programmer), and it’s not tightly correlated with head count. In most organizations, managers just pile more work on people who get more stuff done.
Additionally, so much of the day to day of being a programmer isn’t even about writing code.
I can understand having GitHub copilot write a snippet of code that you then use or modify but if you don’t understand what it’s doing, it’s not tenable. Which means you can’t completely remove a human worker from the process. What if it doesn’t fit your specific requirements and you can’t figure out how to tweak the prompt to produce what you actually need? Is it really that different than copying and pasting something from Stack Overflow?
What happens when your service gets hacked and nobody understands the codebase enough to fix it? You hire an outside firm to put the fire out but you’ve lost a ton of money, customers and are perhaps now in a lot of legal/litigation trouble.
What happens when frameworks and language change, and LLMs can’t train on new data because scraping has been blocked?
Creating good software is incredibly difficult, even for teams that are appropriately staffed with a good headcount of skilled developers and other support roles.
I actually think the opposite is going to happen over the next 10 years: I think software development is going to continue to get more and more complex and less efficient and more abstraction layers will continue to be piled on.
There’s already a huge range of efficiency with programmers (ex. The concept of a “10x” programmer), and it’s not tightly correlated with head count. In most organizations, managers just pile more work on people who get more stuff done.
Additionally, so much of the day to day of being a programmer isn’t even about writing code.
I can understand having GitHub copilot write a snippet of code that you then use or modify but if you don’t understand what it’s doing, it’s not tenable. Which means you can’t completely remove a human worker from the process. What if it doesn’t fit your specific requirements and you can’t figure out how to tweak the prompt to produce what you actually need? Is it really that different than copying and pasting something from Stack Overflow?
What happens when your service gets hacked and nobody understands the codebase enough to fix it? You hire an outside firm to put the fire out but you’ve lost a ton of money, customers and are perhaps now in a lot of legal/litigation trouble.
What happens when frameworks and language change, and LLMs can’t train on new data because scraping has been blocked?
Creating good software is incredibly difficult, even for teams that are appropriately staffed with a good headcount of skilled developers and other support roles.
I actually think the opposite is going to happen over the next 10 years: I think software development is going to continue to get more and more complex and less efficient and more abstraction layers will continue to be piled on.
It will definitely get more complex, and the abstraction layers has been a red herring for a while.
Programmers crave more subjective control over the code. But programmers do not lift their tooling and thinking to the level required, over a long grueling process to make it happen.
So instead we substitute in house-of-cards style abstractions that temporarily satsify the requirements. Destined to collpase under their own weight.
Experienced programmers say 'don't build abstractions' and instead we should compress code down into reusable chunks. To dig ditches instead of stacking a house of cards.
Neither make any real change to the art of programming and continuing the status quo, will forever 'incentivize' abstractions, because there is no tooling for squeezing in the subjective structures required in every program.
We so dearly love the ideal of mathematical certainty in code, but it brings a limit to our views on programming.
Programmers crave more subjective control over the code. But programmers do not lift their tooling and thinking to the level required, over a long grueling process to make it happen.
So instead we substitute in house-of-cards style abstractions that temporarily satsify the requirements. Destined to collpase under their own weight.
Experienced programmers say 'don't build abstractions' and instead we should compress code down into reusable chunks. To dig ditches instead of stacking a house of cards.
Neither make any real change to the art of programming and continuing the status quo, will forever 'incentivize' abstractions, because there is no tooling for squeezing in the subjective structures required in every program.
We so dearly love the ideal of mathematical certainty in code, but it brings a limit to our views on programming.
I am not 100% following what you are saying, so I’ll just clarify my remarks.
An abstraction is just a layer of indirection: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indirection
Frameworks are also abstractions. It’s basically, hey we are handling X for you so you don’t “reinvent the wheel”
Low/no code platforms are just another layer (could even say multiple layers) of this.
The idea of using an LLM to write code for you is conceptually similar. You’re leveraging code you didn’t write. Does it fit the rest of your codebase in style? In approach? But it’s worse because at least a framework or platform is packaged and versioned and you can update it. If your codebase has a bunch of LLM generated code in it, you’re fully responsible for that code. And the bigger that surface is, the more trouble you could be in.
I think LLMs and the recent jumps in that area are really cool and I do think some successful products and companies will be built on helping people use it, but based on what I know about them, I feel like calling them “AI” is a misnomer. There’s no actual intelligence or sapience, it’s still just pattern matching.
And if this is just a building block - the equivalent to getting synapses firing in the brain and they are able to scale this up to a point where something resembling real cognition is happening, all jobs are in trouble. I don’t see how it’d be unique to software development.
An abstraction is just a layer of indirection: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indirection
Frameworks are also abstractions. It’s basically, hey we are handling X for you so you don’t “reinvent the wheel”
Low/no code platforms are just another layer (could even say multiple layers) of this.
The idea of using an LLM to write code for you is conceptually similar. You’re leveraging code you didn’t write. Does it fit the rest of your codebase in style? In approach? But it’s worse because at least a framework or platform is packaged and versioned and you can update it. If your codebase has a bunch of LLM generated code in it, you’re fully responsible for that code. And the bigger that surface is, the more trouble you could be in.
I think LLMs and the recent jumps in that area are really cool and I do think some successful products and companies will be built on helping people use it, but based on what I know about them, I feel like calling them “AI” is a misnomer. There’s no actual intelligence or sapience, it’s still just pattern matching.
And if this is just a building block - the equivalent to getting synapses firing in the brain and they are able to scale this up to a point where something resembling real cognition is happening, all jobs are in trouble. I don’t see how it’d be unique to software development.
AI as a 'nomer' really realy reminds me of what we used to call 'impressions'. It just gives you the impression of a result.
People use the word AI to refer to a picture, video or audio clip that (in effect) does an 'impression'. Like an actor doing an impersonation.
The abstraction thing is a big topic. An indirection, frameworks and LLMs are asbtractions that are 'flat' or expand outwards on the architectural blueprint of code(s). These are ideal, or semi-ideal code ideas that are understood objectively, built from a set of primitives that someone, somewhere chose.
The other 'abstraction' is the heirarchy of abstraction, from electricity, to binary, to machine code, to assembly, to C, to C++.
I think there is another "couple layers" of abstraction above programming languages as we have them. But there is a grueling No-Mans-Land of work to get to the 'next step up'.
If we can get above 'high level programming languages' then we can capture some subjectivity from the programmer.
I really struggle to think in flat abstractions or blueprints/maps of code, to my own detriment. But it does make sense as a concept.
People use the word AI to refer to a picture, video or audio clip that (in effect) does an 'impression'. Like an actor doing an impersonation.
The abstraction thing is a big topic. An indirection, frameworks and LLMs are asbtractions that are 'flat' or expand outwards on the architectural blueprint of code(s). These are ideal, or semi-ideal code ideas that are understood objectively, built from a set of primitives that someone, somewhere chose.
The other 'abstraction' is the heirarchy of abstraction, from electricity, to binary, to machine code, to assembly, to C, to C++.
I think there is another "couple layers" of abstraction above programming languages as we have them. But there is a grueling No-Mans-Land of work to get to the 'next step up'.
If we can get above 'high level programming languages' then we can capture some subjectivity from the programmer.
I really struggle to think in flat abstractions or blueprints/maps of code, to my own detriment. But it does make sense as a concept.
> A lot of work can be done by no-code and low-code tools so there is less need for software engineers in general.
You do realize that the complexity and necessary expertise doesn't go away just because some of the code does, right? Someone still has to untangle the human side of the requirements, specify what the software should do in technical terms, and configure it for the use case. Most software is concerned with its uniqueness and you can't train an AI to handle that part (where most of the time is spent). Seriously. Every single application that has ever been made is unique in ways that can never be reused and must be thrown away. Programming is creative and skilled labor, not mere routine tasks. By their very definition, statistical models cannot learn this. It doesn't exist in the training data and cannot be inferred. It requires reasoning skills from far outside the expected context. Humans use their lifetime of experiences in the real world to accomplish this. AI doesn't.
All that still requires a software engineer, and as soon as a project doesn't require code they'll immediately be occupied by another project that does. It's fascinating how clueless some people can be about the sheer amount and complexity of the work a software engineer does.
How can outsiders with little to no authority over anything within a business manage to get paid so well by that business? It's because there's no choice and the work is hard.
You do realize that the complexity and necessary expertise doesn't go away just because some of the code does, right? Someone still has to untangle the human side of the requirements, specify what the software should do in technical terms, and configure it for the use case. Most software is concerned with its uniqueness and you can't train an AI to handle that part (where most of the time is spent). Seriously. Every single application that has ever been made is unique in ways that can never be reused and must be thrown away. Programming is creative and skilled labor, not mere routine tasks. By their very definition, statistical models cannot learn this. It doesn't exist in the training data and cannot be inferred. It requires reasoning skills from far outside the expected context. Humans use their lifetime of experiences in the real world to accomplish this. AI doesn't.
All that still requires a software engineer, and as soon as a project doesn't require code they'll immediately be occupied by another project that does. It's fascinating how clueless some people can be about the sheer amount and complexity of the work a software engineer does.
How can outsiders with little to no authority over anything within a business manage to get paid so well by that business? It's because there's no choice and the work is hard.
Sure, but how many software engineers (per project size unit) will it really take in the end?
If an average software engineer spends 10-20% of their day doing creative work and 80% wrestling various build tools, writing semi-repetitive code etc., it’s not hard to imagine a world in which aggregate demand for these services still goes down.
If an average software engineer spends 10-20% of their day doing creative work and 80% wrestling various build tools, writing semi-repetitive code etc., it’s not hard to imagine a world in which aggregate demand for these services still goes down.
The junior engineers are spending 80% of their time wrestling with tools. The senior engineers are spending their 80% of the day stuck in meetings and group chats and ultimately doing the heavy lifting, often squeezing in this coding after business hours are over for everyone else.
We can get rid of junior engineers, but then there's no one to replace the senior engineers, not even the precious AI.
As it is, most businesses would love to hire more software engineers, not fewer. There's a shortage of money and talent, not work.
We can get rid of junior engineers, but then there's no one to replace the senior engineers, not even the precious AI.
As it is, most businesses would love to hire more software engineers, not fewer. There's a shortage of money and talent, not work.
But how do junior engineers become senior engineers?
Who will be willing to pay junior engineers to learn the ropes when AI can do that part almost as well, with only a bit of senior engineer oversight?
Who will be willing to pay junior engineers to learn the ropes when AI can do that part almost as well, with only a bit of senior engineer oversight?
Eventually it will all be managed by a collection of specialized AIs with a single person orchestrating their activity. Software engineering as it is now probably won't exist in a few years (assuming AI capabilities keep improving as they have we can expect an exponential increase in their capabilities).
There will always be companies who hire juniors due to cost
I'm trying to fight the schadenfreude, but after years as an operations person in tech companies, being told "just learn to code!" in the most condescending way possible, by people who couldn't fathom that I was actually contentedly living on a third of their annual salary, there's something about this that feels like karma.
The computers can learn to do your job too, as it turns out, which kinda makes a funny sort of sense if you think about it. After all, what should computers be more familiar with than computer code?
The computers can learn to do your job too, as it turns out, which kinda makes a funny sort of sense if you think about it. After all, what should computers be more familiar with than computer code?
> After all, what should computers be more familiar with than computer code?
Computers aren't really "familiar" with computer code. (Or anything, but, pedantry aside). Computers don't "speak" code, or at least not at the level that most engineers are writing it. There's a whole Rube Goldberg machine of layers upon layers between a file with JavaScript in it and what the machine actually does.
I don't think GPT is taking the job of any engineer worth their salt anytime soon. I've used it plenty, but it's just not currently at a level that could replace what I do. Sure, it can write a test, boilerplate, or a function, but it just doesn't have the necessary abilities to build a whole "system" at this point.
That said, engineers who refuse to learn its capabilities might well fall behind. I think it's a big step but I don't really fear for my livelihood yet.
Computers aren't really "familiar" with computer code. (Or anything, but, pedantry aside). Computers don't "speak" code, or at least not at the level that most engineers are writing it. There's a whole Rube Goldberg machine of layers upon layers between a file with JavaScript in it and what the machine actually does.
I don't think GPT is taking the job of any engineer worth their salt anytime soon. I've used it plenty, but it's just not currently at a level that could replace what I do. Sure, it can write a test, boilerplate, or a function, but it just doesn't have the necessary abilities to build a whole "system" at this point.
That said, engineers who refuse to learn its capabilities might well fall behind. I think it's a big step but I don't really fear for my livelihood yet.
> engineers who refuse to learn its capabilities might well fall behind
Disagree because the answers and code snippets from humans are still vastly superior to AI and most questions have answers readily found on the first page of a search engine. A helpful human on the internet is more likely to rewrite all your code faster than you'd be able to cobble together some crap from a chat bot.
Disagree because the answers and code snippets from humans are still vastly superior to AI and most questions have answers readily found on the first page of a search engine. A helpful human on the internet is more likely to rewrite all your code faster than you'd be able to cobble together some crap from a chat bot.
True, but software engineering sure seems to be more threatened by AI as a profession than, say, nursing or cutting hair, simply because it already happens in information space – no complicated and messy adapters required.
> I don't think GPT is taking the job of any engineer worth their salt anytime soon.
That probably depends entirely on their experience. As somebody fresh out of a bootcamp or a newgrad I‘d be somewhat concerned, especially if the company doesn’t want to invest in building up in-house talent because they know they probably won’t have enough retention to justify it.
> I don't think GPT is taking the job of any engineer worth their salt anytime soon.
That probably depends entirely on their experience. As somebody fresh out of a bootcamp or a newgrad I‘d be somewhat concerned, especially if the company doesn’t want to invest in building up in-house talent because they know they probably won’t have enough retention to justify it.
I agree it makes a tough road for juniors, since it can do a lot of the things they can do. But even for them, it could just as well be a tool for learning the basics more quickly.
I disagree that software engineering "happens in information space". I understand your point, and it makes sense, but coding just isn't the hard part of the job. It's dealing with people and requirements, and people who can do that are going to remain valuable for a long time (at least, until AI can just do it all without intervention from pesky humans).
I disagree that software engineering "happens in information space". I understand your point, and it makes sense, but coding just isn't the hard part of the job. It's dealing with people and requirements, and people who can do that are going to remain valuable for a long time (at least, until AI can just do it all without intervention from pesky humans).
The true end game always has been being an overseer of the technology. Sysadmins and sysops are one area that will never go away as there will always be another system to manage. It doesn't matter if that system is human, computer, or both.
One of my friends works as an admin. His group is shrinking fast as people retire and are not replaced. They are forced to automate everything they can as quickly as they can just to keep things going. Seems like pressure to reduce overhead is combining with sophisticate tools to put a squeeze on admins.
there is really no reason to keep doing things manually, when automation can do that.
Imagine horse carriage drivers refusing to learn how to drive a car - this is them.
sysadmins refusing to automate are dying breed that will be replaced by smarter newgrads who are willing to grind and learn.
free market mechanisms and competition doing its work.
Imagine horse carriage drivers refusing to learn how to drive a car - this is them.
sysadmins refusing to automate are dying breed that will be replaced by smarter newgrads who are willing to grind and learn.
free market mechanisms and competition doing its work.
Fully agreed. These people have put millions to billions of people out of a job over the last few decades across the entire spectrum from office work to physical labor of all kinds. They deserve no job security of their own.
We need people in the trades, learn how to plumb is what I say.
We need people in the trades, learn how to plumb is what I say.
Also in mice
there has been an uptick of Australian job market news on hn recently
> He said salary and contractor rates have fallen by an average of 10 per cent to 15 per cent compared to 12 months ago. “The high salaries that occurred in the post-pandemic boom of tech for permanent and contract employees were not sustainable and employers are now looking to reduce costs,” Mr Munson said.
Lol, so it went up 10-15%, almost matching 2 years inflation, and then it dropped. And that was unsustainable?
Lol, so it went up 10-15%, almost matching 2 years inflation, and then it dropped. And that was unsustainable?
You can tell the bias of the article by reading the first sentence. It's funny when you read complaints of big employers of other countries, they are usually the same as your own but the numbers are different. I guess that's why I don't for canadian companies even as a contractor, can't make too good of a salary as a dev that would "crazy", "indecent".
This article is about Australia. Is it better or worse in the US?
Our hourly rate keeps going up. Note: in Ohio
What is your hourly rate? I currently bill at $58/hour.
Bill more! That's too low imo. If you're competent you should be able to bill at least double that. More if you're more than competent.
Consider that a full time employee at 100k/year probably costs their company at least 150k yearly (and probably closer to 200) after insurance and benefits.
58/hr for 2000 yearly hours comes out to less than 120k and that company isn't paying any benefits or taking on any of the risk of an FTE. You should set your rates accordingly.
Consider that a full time employee at 100k/year probably costs their company at least 150k yearly (and probably closer to 200) after insurance and benefits.
58/hr for 2000 yearly hours comes out to less than 120k and that company isn't paying any benefits or taking on any of the risk of an FTE. You should set your rates accordingly.
Yeah, I used to hire contractors at GE. Only a few body shops that slaved H1Bs were under $100. The typical was $100-120 pre-pandemic. GE would agree to pay all holidays for contractors.
Low! Double your price!
Not OP, but for GA clients, I bill at $130/hr.
$120-175/hr CAD for me, specializing in on prem infrastructure and DBA, clients coast to coast but mostly Ontario. The rate is more determined if I am going through a middleman (usually a MSP) vs direct rather then supply and demand.
This hasn't changed through inflation though. Those rates are the same rates for the last 10 years or so.
This hasn't changed through inflation though. Those rates are the same rates for the last 10 years or so.
Which middle man do you use? What is their cut?
$150/hr as a bay area software engineer
$150
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All those layoffs were so they wouldn't have to do 20-40% pay increases.
Should have unionized while we had the chance. At least a trade guild to protect ourselves.
Oh well. It was fun while it lasted.
Should have unionized while we had the chance. At least a trade guild to protect ourselves.
Oh well. It was fun while it lasted.
IT workers have a union in Australia.
https://www.professionalsaustralia.org.au/
https://www.professionalsaustralia.org.au/
(meta) I’m getting tired of seeing paywalled content on HN.
I wonder if we could tag links as such and have an option to hide paywalled links. Or just outright ban them.
I wonder if we could tag links as such and have an option to hide paywalled links. Or just outright ban them.
Maybe HN could automatically link to the Internet Archive version of the story once someone posts it as a comment like often happens...
archive.today (archive.ph and archive.is) is not The Internet Archive. It's a separate archival service which seems to be optimized to bypass paywalls (though there's very little information about the motivations for running it, where the funding is coming from, the country of origin, or techniques they're using to bypass said paywalls).
I believe it's discouraged (maybe even against HN policies) to make a submission with such a link, because it makes it impossible to tell what the original source of the article is without clicking it.
I believe it's discouraged (maybe even against HN policies) to make a submission with such a link, because it makes it impossible to tell what the original source of the article is without clicking it.
This was discussed recently: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37009598
I only read HN comments on more than 90% of posts. Though I do always read the article if I'm commenting on content which is in the article (as opposed to content within a comment.) This last point brings up a good angle. If you're against breaking paywalls, and you don't have access to the content, then maybe you don't add a valuable comment with a unique perspective.
I understand your frustration but complaining about paywalls is not only off-topic and repetitive it's also explicitly called out as something we should try and avoid when commenting on HN - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10178989
It's off-topic based on current rules, but if people completely stop complaining about it, the rules will never change. And maybe they should. See this is a form of civil disobedience!
Are you against Userscripts to "fix" this? https://github.com/MostlyEmre/hn-anti-paywall I have this setup on my iPhone and iPad, and it works fine to see paywalls and get links to archive so I can view them.
archive.is my dude
I assume that a paywalled article without an archive link in the thread is going to be a discussion in which almost nobody has actually read the thing they're talking about.
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Job hopping doesn't work out long term
What does this have to do with job hopping?
A lot of these companies over hired the past 3 years in a mini arms/labor race. People were hopping jobs and getting 25%+ increases in comp. No one could hire fast enough or enough people. But now that the economy is cooling, there isnt any free money, and some of the labor hired isn't doing work to the level they are being paid at, companies are looking for ways to trim fat. This is an easy way to do it. Everyone that moved, or that the company feels is being lazy, or not contributing to the level they want will be the first to go. Im not arguing the validity of their thoughts and if remote work is good or bad, or etc.... It's just an easy way to save a lot of money, and keep better tabs on your workforce.
You're making two assumptions that stick out to me:
- job hoppers perform worse (as opposed to better) than people who stay put
- layoffs are based on contribution level
Two things that if believed in aggregate will make it easier for companies to short and manipulate employees into overworking and staying. I don't buy it personally
- job hoppers perform worse (as opposed to better) than people who stay put
- layoffs are based on contribution level
Two things that if believed in aggregate will make it easier for companies to short and manipulate employees into overworking and staying. I don't buy it personally
Not all job hoppers, Im saying we just went through a period of time where companies were hiring as fast as they could and the salaries were high because of the arms race, our of proportion to what they normally were for the given experience level. Many of the job hoppers were not at the skill level they should have been, but what does it matter a person stays around for a year or less to take another 25% increase and move down the road.
Not all layoffs are based on contribution level, but once a company realized they have over hired, and are paying more than they should it is very easy to start chopping heads. And an easy legal way to do it is to force an in-office schedule.
I dont think they care if they over work or not, I think they want the comp expenditure back, and want to be able to keep their thumb more closely on 'productivity'
Not all layoffs are based on contribution level, but once a company realized they have over hired, and are paying more than they should it is very easy to start chopping heads. And an easy legal way to do it is to force an in-office schedule.
I dont think they care if they over work or not, I think they want the comp expenditure back, and want to be able to keep their thumb more closely on 'productivity'
Most tech talent isn't worth anything. A few are worth an insane amount. Companies can't tell which are which until they're in the door. The laid off workers are in the mediocre and lower bucket. This is a viewpoint I've been told by HR at multiple top quant funds
LOL, just no. SOP for poorly run companies is to lay off the most expensive employees, regardless of how much value they bring to the table. That principal engineer making $250K? “Why are we paying him twice as much as 2 juniors?”
I’ve seen that happen way more often than companies laying off actual lower-value employees.
I’ve seen that happen way more often than companies laying off actual lower-value employees.
250k is entry level for the type of firm I'm talking about
Yes, I’m familiar with fintech. Also, with its tendency to see staff as fungible when optimizing for costs. After all, all those eng types are the same, right?
They’re not talking about fintech.. Quant shops write algorithms to trade the stock market and the salaries are more akin to Wall St. Very different than a company like Robinhood
Quant jobs shouldn't even be considered tech jobs. They are more like mathematicians, with a side of wizard.
Useless in any discussion about the tech industry as they are an extreme outlier
Useless in any discussion about the tech industry as they are an extreme outlier
> SOP for poorly run companies is to lay off the most expensive employees
This is assuming companies are being "poorly run" as opposed to being pushed out of market by monopolistic (or duo, etc) practices and economies of scale. The largest companies have been acting predatory (like 90s MSFT) for some time now.
In tech, I have seen a reliable pattern. Most of the contractors go first, then the highly paid middle management, then the highly compensated tech talent.
This is assuming companies are being "poorly run" as opposed to being pushed out of market by monopolistic (or duo, etc) practices and economies of scale. The largest companies have been acting predatory (like 90s MSFT) for some time now.
In tech, I have seen a reliable pattern. Most of the contractors go first, then the highly paid middle management, then the highly compensated tech talent.
Back when I was contracting the pattern was to fire their own staff first, particularly those with domain knowledge. Then they would offer the contractors full time jobs at half their contract rates. I didn't do many contracts where I wasn't offered a job by the end of the contract.
The ones firing their most senior FTEs first are certainly the poorly run ones.
> The laid off workers are in the mediocre and lower bucket.
Disagree. I've seen some extremely talented people RIF'd. When it comes down to dollars and cents, the company is keeping the people who it thinks can still get the basics done and aren't in the upper cost brackets. Often the most talented folks, the ones the company paid an arm and a leg to recruit and retain, are the first to go.
Disagree. I've seen some extremely talented people RIF'd. When it comes down to dollars and cents, the company is keeping the people who it thinks can still get the basics done and aren't in the upper cost brackets. Often the most talented folks, the ones the company paid an arm and a leg to recruit and retain, are the first to go.
Of course they are going to say that. These are folks that will literally say anything if it means they get to keep more money. And what better way to keep money than to shit on tech workers edging in on their fat salaries?
But quant funds are really a winner-takes-all situation, so it's a bit like saying 'The top tennis players are worth millions, everyone else, not so much'.
In most other businesses, the reward for being 0.1% better is far less pronounced, maybe even just 0.1%.
In most other businesses, the reward for being 0.1% better is far less pronounced, maybe even just 0.1%.
Top quant funds have always said elitist things.
If you spend time talking to tech workers on visas in Australia, you'll find a common story, most will be working for a large contracting company, on a contract signed in their home country. Regardless of how Australian law should apply, this leaves many workers feeling vulnerable in their negotiations with their employers.
this is absolutely used as a lever to drive down tech wages in Australia, and it takes very nuanced communication skills to point out how damaging it is to our society to bring people into work but denying them access to full democratic rights and standing to negotiate their working conditions.