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Why Work Sucks
Here's a quiz:
Do you like your job? Do you trust the people you work for? Do you feel needed and valued at work? Are you loyal to the company you work for? Is it loyal to you? When the time comes, do you count on your employer to take care of and protect you?
The most significant thing about this quiz, of course, is that most of the people reading it don't need to bother to take it.
An enormous shift is under way in the workplace, according to economists. There is a huge transfer of wealth from lower-skilled, middle-class American workers to the owners of capital, and to a new technological aristocracy.
This change is transforming the nature and character of work. And not for the better. The technological aristocracy is creating lean, mean, corporate machines. But for more and more people, work sucks.
The new techno-managers and their companies no longer care about individuals or their work or personal lives. They take over companies primarily to strip them down for re-sale, merger, or greater profitability. They've adopted a newly "flexible management style in which goals and structures constantly change, and older, more experienced workers are sometimes brutally abandoned; only younger presumably more malleable (read overworked) employees are favored, until they too are inevitably tossed over the side.
This chilling view of what technology is doing to work is unsparingly laid out in Richard Sennett's "The Corrosion of Character, The Personal Consequences of Work In the New Capitalism (Norton, $US 23.95). Sennett, who teaches sociology at the London School of Economics and New York University writes that the booming new economy teaches corporations to value flexibility over almost all other considerations.
Flexibility, he argues, has become the prime ideology, the golden rule of corporate life. Companies and executives place change and rapid-response above all other values. Notions like loyalty, security and character get chucked along with the expendable workers. Accordingly, large numbers of mostly younger people have no choice but to try a kind of extreme risk-taking, gambling that they will be among the survivors, the chosen few. In this increasingly cold-blooded scenario, those who succeed sweep the table of gains, like poker players after a winning hand; the mass of losers who remain divide the crumbs.
Instead of thinking of organizations as pyramids as they used to, says Sennett, management sees them as networks - network arrangements are faster, more efficient. This means that promotions and dismissals tend not to be based on clear, fixed rules, that tasks are never "crisply" defined. Instead the network is constantly refining its structure to remain efficient, competitive and profitable enough to satisfy stockholders and analysts, everybody's new bosses.
Drawing on interviews with dismissed IBM executives in New York, bakers in a high-tech Boston bakery, a barmaid turned advertising executive and a few others, Sennett argues that the new capitalism creates an environment where companies are continuously forced to down-size and re-organize.
Older employees are necessarily more resistant to continuous upheaval, saddled as they often are with mortgages and kids, and companies perceive them as difficult and more stubborn anyway. They're toast. Thus more and more workers are now must the most vulnerable precisely when they're the neediest.
This change is already so profound that American worklives are being dramatically shortened. The number of U.S. men aged 55 to 64 who work has dropped nearly 80 per cent in l970 to 65 per cent in l990. Statistics tell the same story - or worse - in France, and Germany. And much of this change has been involuntarily, prompting epidemic feelings of anger, guilt and uselessness rather than the chirpy contentment of early retirements portrayed in TV commercials.
That could accelerate: in America and Western Europe, sociologist Manuel Castells predicts, "the actual working lifetime could be shortened to about 30 years (from 24 to 54) out of a real lifetime span of about 75-80 years" - with older workers forced from the workplace long before they are physically or mentally unfit.
The image of corporate "deadwood" is so pervasive it has become a media cliché. Sennett quotes an advertising executive: "If you're in advertising, you're dead after thirty. Age is a killer." A Wall Street executive confirmed this view: "Employers think that if you are over forty you can't think anymore. Over fifty and they think you're burned out." Older computer programmers are rare enough to be stuffed in museums.
Recent flaps over age and hiring in television reveal that few TV writers are over 30; nor do many large Wall Street firms smile on bankers over 40.
That makes older workers instantly targetable during the ceaseless reingineerings, takeovers and mergers that characterize large corporations. The rate of involuntary dismissals for men in their 40's and early 50's, has doubled in the last twenty years.
But that thinking also puts considerable pressure on the young, sociologists argue. Experienced workers tend to be more judgmental about their superiors than novices, more likely to challenge unfair or arbitrary decisions. Younger workers are often forced to do a variety of jobs, whether they like them or not, and to be willing to move, whether they want to or not.
Sennett argues that the work values of the new technological elite threaten character, not only economic security.
"Who needs me?" is a question more and more workers are ask themselves. The new system radiates indifference. "Such practices obviously and brutally diminish the sense of mattering as a person," writes Sennett, "of being necessary to others."
Sennett's book is powerful documentation of what most people are learning the hard way: the great majority of those who toil in the "flexible" regimes are going to get left behind. One-sided, temporal relationships with employees are increasingly the only ones that make sense.
Technology has made corporations vastly more efficient, but at an enormous cost: they can no longer afford to be human.
Life in the technological workplace, toiling on behalf of the technocracy, is filled with ironies and contradictions - all that money and opportunity, hardly any loyalty, appreciation or safety.
Sooner or later, the elite and their corporations - connected to their workers only by money, by transitional and exploitive relationships - are bound to find themselves in serious conflict with the people they most depend on. You can email me at jonkatz@bellatlantic.net
Sennett is anything but Gen X. Maybe you should read the book!
I have no idea where this self-nihilistic crap gets started.
the average individual is far MORE empowered today than ever before.
the average individual has MORE ability to think of something grand and spread it to the outside world.
the average company is no MORE hardcore about not viewing their employees as interchangeable cogs. Skills / experience / etc. are MORE thoroughly rewarded now than ever before. Think about Henry Ford's assembly line vs. JIT production techniques.
We are far MORE in command of our salaries than ever before in history.
The same economists who talk about widening rich/poor gaps (which is NOT an intrinsicly bad thing) will also tell you about increasing "income mobility" -- e.g. it's far easier to move between income strata now than ever before. 30 years ago, if you were born poor, you likely stayed poor.
oh well, enough ranting.
i don't know abou this. skilled, long-term employees make IT companies very rich and profitable, and if they aren't taken care of, they leave.
i left my last companie because i had no say in the technical directions it was heading ("going microsoft"). i mean, they didn't care one bit what any of the engineers had to say about it. several of us left. i hope to convince my new management to install some linux clusters, and at least they are willing to listen and let me experiment.
for computer folks, at least for the time being, you can decide what you want and where you want to go. we don't really have anything to whine about. we've got it much better than most other americans, and really should be thankful.
anyone who is involved in IT and feels this bad either needs some psychiatric intervention (i'm not kidding -- computer-centric people have fairly high rates of depression) or they just need to sit down and make a list of what they really want and figure out how to get there.
Of course this crap is why work sucks. Why the hell do you think Dilbert is such a success? Talk about stating the obvious...
Or Canada, and hopefully it will change soon enough before everyone move out of this country.
The simple way to fix it is 1) make as much money as you can 2) retire as soon as possible. Duh. It's not a complicated situation. Nobody here works 90 hours a weekk and only has enough money to eat and pay rent, that was the 20's.
As true as this article is, Slashdot is the wrong forum to express it. Simply because Slashdot users consist of the younger, cheaper workers that Jon discusses. (As an aside, what do you think Slashdot's demographis are - I'll bet it's 90% young males between 18-30).
"A hundred years ago four year-old children worked to death in mines"? "Please Rob, I don't want to hear from this whining leftist any more"? These comments smack of young arrogance to me...tell me what happens after you're 30,40,50, and you have family, commitments, that mean that you can't dedicate 90% of your waking hours to work?
These are exciting times, but let's be honest - the fact that the companies that we work for have no loyalty to us affect us in a myraid of ways, none positive. It makes our lives more stressful, our health worse, our values suffer. I certainly won't, and think this article raises valid points about how people have to live their lives today.
Thanks for writing this article Jon. It put into focus what I've been feeling for some time.
I don't need some useless union extorting money out of me. If you don't like your job, QUIT and contract. Any dope can make a 6 figure salary in today's market. Unionization is reserved for industries where the labor market is EASY to replace. Unionize McDonalds, BurgerKing first, and then you can start worrying about white collar jobs. The average US income for a male is 27,000 a year. The median income is 24,000. You can check for yourself by contacting the Bureau of Labor and Statistics.
You whiney little twits have no clue how bad it can be and has been. We are hardly an 'opressed' group stuggling to make end's meat.
:those who succeed sweep the table of gains,like
:poker players after a winning hand; the mass of
:losers who remain divide the crumbs.
Hmmm... maybe I'm one of those winning poker players, but I've never considered myself in the elite or advantaged class. Yet, by virtue of a choice of vocations that I made sixteen years ago, I'm making fine money and I have lots of autonomy.
Job security? It's out there. Indeed, I work for a company that espouses corporate flexibility; at the same time the founder of my company would no sooner leave his people on the streets than saw off his leg.
As for the corporate attitude, in a capitalist economy almost *everything* is more important than the workers at a top-level view. If you don't want to be less important as an employee than shareholders are as investors, then don't work for a publicly held company. If you don't want to answer to "the man" and let him make money off of your work (vis-a-vis HIS INVESTMENT) then make your own damn capital investment, work for yourself, and shut up!
First off, I *love* my tech job.
Of course, I don't work for a tech company, I work for a news media company and therefore I don't make nearly as much as my friends in the Sillycon Valley, but that's also mute because my cost of living is far lower.
What's important to note however, is there is a very prevelent "up or out" mentality out there.
Face it, it's "normal" to work in McDonalds when you are 16 but a 32 year old asking for your order is a bit odd. The same is true for every onther field.
If you are a 20 year old programmer, you're a "whiz-kid" if you are a 40 year old programmer you're either washed up, or have no drive. At 40 you "should" have kids, a mortgage and be in manage ment. If you aren't then you have no drive, don't program all that well, and are basically lazy.
That may not be true, but that's the perception.
Where I work we just fired two IT so called Network Administrators because they were dangerously unqualified and didn't want to learn anything new that didn't say WindowsNT on it.
The first one wouldn't let Novell die. She had to have WindowsNT, because she couldn't do anything without a mouse. And then she went with Groupwise so that she could feel comfortable and we could just sit there and not use all the mail features seeing as how every other department had Sun systems.
The second was some punk who was *working on his MCSE*, enough said.
This is a government department that we were all working for here. So naturally these two were offered training in System V, Oracle, and just about anything they wanted. They decided they were too good for that. They even didn't want to learn HTML.
I was an intern building the website and now that I have learned Oracle. I have their jobs.
Yes, it seems cold to everyone else, but anyone going into a techi position knows that most of the information that they learn today will have to be updated in 6 months.
All it takes is some newsgroups, reading up on some documentation, and occasionally picking up a book.
If companies are trimming the fat due to lazy employees then all the more to them.
Common Knowledge: If you don't stay up to date. There will be someone younger, better educated, and willing to do the job for half the price.
You don't stop learning just because you graduated.
What do you mean we aren't on the same level as doctors and lawyers? Yay, maybe I'm not saving lives but, people depend on computer engineers more now a days then their doctor. Even your doctor depends on the tools computer engineers supply them.
As for Lawyers,.... what real good do they do anyone now a days. Linux gives its core (the Operating System) away for free. When was the last time you heard of a bunch of lawyers defending for free?
Obviously, because they are lazy, or so your post implies. My father has a network of friends in their fifties who are unable to find meaningful work. They all have to take jobs at UPS or K-mart just in a futile attempt to make ends meet. My parents were the picture of common sense financial dealings of their day and yet now they are having trouble paying their mortgage because neither can use their skills to earn what they are worth, in large part due to age discrimination.
Your father has had the good fortune to be in a field where retirement is usually not forced, but others should not be surprised when half of their $100,000 / year salary goes to getting their parents through tough financial troubles. Jon Katz is talking sense here and young people should be aware of the reality.
Go on believing you live in a meritocracy that places people exactly where they belong, but when the rules by which decisions are governed are capricious and out of your control, merit plays little role in some decisions and good people suffer. Be thankful for your luck and good choices, and sock away as much money as you can, because good pay won't last for you forever.
Every place I've worked, there have been people who have moved up (and usually out) and people who have stagnated. Are the ones who stagnate being exploited? No, the ones who stagnate are the ones who think better jobs should fall out of the sky on top of them.
Poeple who get out and take responsibility for themselves - whether it's simply looking for a new job or going to night school to get a certificate or a degree, or whatever - are the ones who succeed. It's as simple as that.
As soon as you buy into the mentality that the people who succeed are "privledged" you've pretty much guaranteed your own failure.
-Joe Merlino
but back in 'our parents generation' the average job was closer to "supermarket worker" and "burger flipper"
the average factory worker, farm worker, 'office worker' back then had a VERY boring, repetitive work life.
and, although we are more interdependant now, we are overall less vulnerable. The kinds of things that this generate refers to as "economic depressions" (e.g. early 90's, early 80's) were a PIECE OF CAKE compared to "economic depressions" i nthe 40's & 60's.
In 5 years, I will have put away $208,000 into my retirement account, will be 33, and that doesn't include interest. Who knows what's going to happen in 5 years and furthermore who cares?
If you want to bitch about something, bitch about something that is worth bitching about. It's not about 'slave labor' and 'poor us'. There are plenty of people who fare much worse than you we do. Fix the worst problems first then worry about the trivial details. The best way to make work equitable isn't to start with the upper class you dolt. Quit being such a greedy fucking bastard.
If an older worker is truly fired simply because of age, then that is clearly wrong. But in my experience older workers are often resistant to change simply because it means that they have to learn something new. This idea that the company should be paternalistic, and take care of the worker forever is socialist crap. Older workers get pissed off when they see younger people come in and work their asses off, because they are no longer willing to do so. The reluctance of older workers to continuously update their skills in the job market is not the problem of the company - it is the problem of the worker. The fact is, there are very few well-paying jobs out there now that do not require competition. If you aren't willing to compete, that doesn't make you a "victim of corporate oppression", it makes you lazy.
Once you understand the full implications of the newly fashionable "at will" clauses in these so-called permanent positions, you come to realize that you've got the best of both worlds.
You've got an indefinite term contract with bennies! Loyalty is obsolete, and "permanent" is a fiction. But there's always headhunters calling you up. Just keep those jobs skills current. A job is just a gig. It's the career that matters.
Normally I find Katz to be too long winded.. but this time I'll look past that because he IS right.
I'm 21 years old, I make 6 figures a year, and I have passed up people twice my age many, many times - who have spent years at their companies' because there is a age bias when it comes to techjobs.
employee's have become tools as skills are more important then experience.. lucky for me i am on the good side of this stick.. but this era is going to hurt alot of older people.
by the generally indignant and self-righteous tone of the responses. I live in Los Angeles, a very large city. Every morning on the way to my wonderful, high paying job, I see dozens of homeless people.
At my last job, where I went unappreciated for eight miserable years, I quizzed people who took nearly the same route that I did to work about how many homeless they saw on the way in. None of them ever saw any! I then asked them how many people they had ever seen die on the streets of Los Angeles -- none had ever seen any! (I have seen about 8, actually saw them meet a bloody end, as it happened...)
All of those people are still at that crappy job. They are also moderately happy there -- they are paid poorly and treated as non-entities, and that is what they want.
So perhaps the "normal" condition for man is to assume a libertarian disinterstedness in his fellows, and to want others to view him similarly, and to live out his life in enforced ignorance, without whining.
But you can whine like hell, and be concerned for and even help other folks, and still succeed very well.
Phil
Hell, both my parents retired before 60 (NYC teachers bought out with a sweetened package), and I am jealous _as hell_.. I'd love to chuck it all with a $45k pension and travel the world.. In fact, my dad starts getting ~$1k/mo in social security next month, so between that, his (very) part time mall job and the state pension, he's making more than his 30th year teaching!
;)
He pities me the current state of the job market (no 30 years same job anymore), but I am making more now at 26 than he did after 30 years, even adjusted for the change in the $, and he has a masters degree to my HS + 100 credits..
Still, I know this corp has zero loyalty to me and vice versa, but I am root and my boss is a smart decent and cool chap.. I just need to make sure I keep socking 10% away into that 401k and hope Y2k doesn't wipe it (and even if it does, I'm sure that when we rebuild we'll do so on unix, and they'll need even more unixslaves.. I hope..
Thanks,
- Otis (otis@unixslave.com)
work has sucked for some but not all ppl's for some time.
this is why
>>While the young might have energy and vitality
>>to do the grunt work, they need the experience
>>of the aged to lead them.
Um, I hardly look to the "aged" for direction. I look to books, the Net and occassionally colleagues whose egos haven't been so overinflated by years of work experience that they are still willing to help the little guy pick it up.
As far as leadership, the "aged" can hardly provide it. Lemmings might have a better chance. That's why there are technical architects -- people who have the skills to interpret the needs of obnoxious, technology-illiterate salespeople and executives into a solution that can be understood, digested and processed by programmers, administrators. Older workers in the tradition corporate hierarchy have assumed that with experience comes seniority. Alas, this is changing -- an exceptional college grad with the desire to learn and develop a multi-faced skillset can become more valuable than a person who's merely performed the same function for the company for years.
Older workers might be a great source of information, but they're no longer the lifeblood of the global economy. Multitasking and the willingness to keep abreast of the newest technology will make you a star -- sedentary workplace ethics won't. So thpppppt!
-a young, ambitious, employed programmer
I am 31 and work for a small multimedia firm in the southeast. My job rules:
We are discouraged from working more than forty hours a week, so as not to impact on our family time.
It is the company policy that no one gets screamed at by any one else. Courtesy and repect are paramount.
The salaries are well within the the national average for programmers/animators/artists.
Employees enjoy near total artistic freedom, with humorous creative content strongly encouraged.
"Management", such as it exists, wants our input as much as possible. Our suggestions are very often implemented too. We work with them, not for them. It's understood that the real capital goes home at five o'clock, and needs to be treated as such. Overall, a swell bunch of guys, ranging in age from 24 to 40.
I have worked for some real maniacs in the past, so this job feels like a karmic reward. Don't give up hope! It can happen to you!
This book sounds like the typical socialist rant:
"Capitalism is stomping on the workers; things are getting
worse; companies just care about making money; employees
are cogs in the machine, to be tossed aside when they
outlive their usefulness; etc., etc., etc."
I'm one of those "older" workers, in my 40's, and I sure can't
remember a time when things were better. My first software
job, in the 70's, paid ~$20K, at a time when houses near
work (in L.A.) were well over $100K, inflation was
running at 10%, and mortgage rates were around 12%.
Unemployment was also fairly high, and I found it extremely
difficult to find jobs back then.
Oh, and in the 60's, I remember having to compete to get
a $1.35/hour job at MacDonalds, a place that would fire
you if you let your hair get too long.
The U.S. economy is in much better shape these days, and
it looks to me like people are also generally happier with
their jobs.
This makes it rather difficult for the professional socialists
like the fellow who wrote the book. Since unemployment
and inflation aren't particularly high, they have to convince
us that the TRENDS are bad.
BTW, some of the things he complains about are, to some
extent, a good thing. "Company loyalty" often meant that
some workers were buddies with their bosses, and were
assured of a good, secure income regardless of their
performance.
Ever try to raise a family and still be a first class tech? its doable, but not easy, we get lazy in our jobs over time to give time to our family, a wife, a kid.. etc..
when that time comes for you and you dont want to spend 70 hours a week learning in front of a new pc.. you too will be upstaged..
then perhaps you wont be so smug.
For the record, I'm 27 and I'll never be a millionaire for as long as I live.
For the record, I am 27 and I will be a millionaire, when I'm 42, probably earlier unless the economy takes a dump - which I expect it will.
Oh well, I've never been a materialist.
...Guess I'm in the minority. Hook up with a big consulting firm. Good money, interesting work, lots of variety. What more could you want?
Since slashdot's people are those younger wolves killing the older animals off for their jobs due to their new k-rad k00l java skillz, I'd expect this place to respond to katz in such a hostile manor.
Case in point, my father. He's a programmer and has been programming for well over 20 years now. He is over 50 now (by a hair) and he's still programming. He started on old IBM mainframes, moved to other mainframes (Assembly), OS/2 (C), Windows NT (C++) and Java now. He's learning programming on Linux (C) as well.
There's nothing wrong with being old, just continue to update your skills.
I only make a 6 figures a year! And I work 40+ hours a week! And if I quit, it takes me 2 weeks to find another job! I need a union.
Sure, unemployment is 4%.
./ reader's SUVs everyday will make in his/her lifetime.
I'm sure you've heard the comeback (joke?) that goes "The economy created 200,000 new jobs last quarter!" Reply: "Yeah, I've got 4 of them."
People in IT may be constantly nervous about their futures, but people from the no-skill fields that are downsized are not, as a prior post alluded, buying computers and learning Java. They are screwed.
These IT "victims" described by Katz made more in their (shortened) career than the person who parks the typical
Don't like the corporate world? Don't be so greedy for pay and go work for a non-profit. "Leftist" IT workers in Silicon Valley don't carry much water for me.
- I work with and for people whom I admire
- The work is challenging and a creative outlet
- I make very good money
The secret is to find something you truly enjoy and then do it for a living. Doing anything else simply leads to dissatisfaction, bitterness, and ultimately whining on slashdot...
It's called We The Cattle. People notice it and just accept it.
If we have so many 21 year old millionaires then how many of you on
No one? Ah, I see. You're all SHEEP.
Its not clear he's stupid, but he is obviously not very saavy. Or maybe he would rather complain than switch jobs and make more money.
yeah.. I'm in the same boat..
But my plan is to make as much as I can for the next 10 years as I may need it to live the 10 after.. I do see much demand for people in their late 30s in the tech world.
It's hard to notice a slow erosion, like that which has taken place in (many/most) workplaces around the US, but it's there.
Granted, part of it is the "standard of living" crap that's been foisted on us. We've been conditioned to believe that we need that fancy car, big house, designer clothes, plus lots of incidentals and trinkets that assure us that we've "made it." Next thing you know, you're trapped by a big pile of debt and do whatever you can to keep up on the payments. Unfortunately, most of us don't learn anything from it, since we buy something else immediately upon paying off a couple of the initial loans.
Coupled with the de facto caste system that's currently in place, where managers are almost always hired from outside rather than promoted from within, it's tougher to "get ahead" than it used to be. Does Sennett discuss this (the new caste system) at all?
It seems to me that the only way out of the squirrel cage is to reset our value system and stop buying stuff. That means breaking lots of training, and it's doubly hard if you have a family since you have to deprogram them too.
I'd highly recommend reading "Your Money or Your Life," by Joe Dominguez and Vicki Robins. It outlines a way to ease yourself off the treadmill, just a little bit at a time (i.e. the same way you got on).
-- Dirt Road
I agree with "the older generation can also benefit from this newer model" -- age doesn't seem to be as much of a factor for contractors.
And there are ways of dealing with the tax end of things -- use an agency. The trick is finding a good one (in Atlanta, that would be Carson if getting bought out by Norrell hasn't messed 'em up). They get about 25% as overhead, in return they:
For many clients, especially in the US, using an agency is a requirement these days. Tax codes and all that.
I'm a regular employee these days, but have spent about 6 years as a contractor. In a few years, I should be able to support my family on a part-time income, at which point I may return to contracting.
-- Dirt Road
Replace it. We can find a college grad willing to work 12 hours, and whose personal needs are satisfied with an hour of Starcraft.
But, Overmind, THX-1138 has been a consistently productive worker, and has been a key coder on some of our most successful products!
Your recommendations are beginning to sound like socialist crap. TXH-1138 is clearly lazy. Eliminate it.
>Do you like your job?
Yes. I get to code Java all day. And when I have a project I want to work on, they let me.
>Do you trust the people you work for?
Yup. Known my boss for years, across several jobs.
>Do you feel needed and valued at work?
While walking with the team to the local poolhall, I heard a VP say that the team should walk around me in a circle to provide a human shield in case any cars came speeding around the corner.
>Are you loyal to the company you work for?
Yup. Recently turned down an interview with Microsoft. And I get several recruiter calls a week.
>Is it loyal to you? When the time comes, do you >count on your employer to take care of and >protect you?
I started the new year with a $5k bonus check, and a 13.5% raise. I'm happy. Fine, maybe I was underpaid - but they could have been real sh*ts and said "Hey, we're lucky we got him cheap." But they didn't, they saw what I was worth and paid me for it.
I guess I skew the curve. Sorry.
most economists agree real unemployment rate is significantly higher...dont believe every number you hear!
Re-read the paper closely before flaming. He's talking about *older* workers being laid off, while the 21-year olds are in demand.
if katz is an american, he obviously slept through too many of his civics classes. this country was not founded on the belief that all were entitled to jobs they'd love and would feel secure in. it was a bunch of scrappy bastards who believed in a concept many like to call 'rugged individualism'. look after yourself. don't rely on some cushy, secure, job. hustle. earn your keep.
a poster aways back said he'd never be a millionaire. my advice to him? fsck that. struggle. not till you're comfortable, once you get there, work a little harder. retire at 35 with $10mil in the bank. think that's impossible? well, then you're right. think you have a chance? then you do.
i'm not out of school yet, but if you figure my taken-care-of tuition into things, i make more than one of my parents, and almost as much as the other (both of are them doing quite well, i might add). when i finish (ms or phd- i have not decided, though i've been practically begged to stay for the phd), i'll easily double them up- to start.
do i think i am some sort of genious? of course not. i was the same guy who was almost thrown out of hs, then almost dropped out of college (drank myself through much of it). i'll admit it, i'm a big loser! a bigger one than you think you are.
people who do well are no different than you or me. ever talk to one of them? when i worked retail jobs in hs i was astounded by the type of people who would come in and drop thousands of dollars like it didn't matter. they were not "special" in any way, they just had the gumption to go get their share.
I do/am. So byte me.
[snip], you are all naive fools. You will most defenitely change your policy when you find out that Social Security isnt going to pay shit for you when you retire, when you find out that you're $5K in debt with credit cards, when your kids think you're some senile old fool, and when nobody wants to hire you because you've got wrinkles on your face and your hair is going gray. [snip]
are you joking? social security won't pay me jack! if it does, i'll consider it found money. if i'm a retard, and rack up massive debt i cannot repay, even with a job in this well-paying field, then i got what i deserve. same holds if my kids hate me- that means i've failed them. take some responsibility for yourself, already!
Ah, you're right. I inferred it. Its just something that touches me personally and I felt that the statistics were really an unimportant footnote to the gist of the article since I've seen up close (in many ways) how age discrimination does affect people now and will affect me in the not too distant future.
I don't think work sucks. I feel pretty lucky overall. But maybe I'm just kidding myself. Considering my education am I
:)
doing well? Or mediocre? Or not so well? Here's my career in a nutshell:
Age 10-17:
Learned BASIC and 6502 assembly on Apple II+ and IIe. BBS/AE SysOp.
Age 17-18:
Worked in a computer store repairing/upgrading 8088-80386 PC's and attended high school
Part time @ $6/hr
Age 18-19:
Built computers while attending tech school for electronics
Part time @ $6.50/hr
Age 19-21:
Night security guard while attending community college full time for Computer Info Systems
Full time @ $6.50/hr
Age 21-26:
Worked for a casino in Atlantic City.
Started as an AS/400 operator (shift work, print jobs, backups, troubleshooting)
Full time @ $7.50/hr
Promoted to Microcomputer Specialist after one year
~350 PC's, no other PC literate people on site
Full time @ $20k/year
Promoted to PC Programmer after another year
Minimal programming (C, C++, Rexx)
Mostly special PC related projects and communication between PC's and AS/400
DOS, Win 3.1, OS/2
Full time @ $28k/year
Age 26-27:
Worked for small and fast growing software company
Traveled constantly installing their software, phone support while in office
60+ hours/week -- no travel days
Hated it, fired one day short of 6 months
Full time @ $38k/year
Age 27:
Moved to Florida w/girlfriend for the hell of it
Hired as consultant. Worked at large financial company
Replaced 14" monitors with 17" monitors
Not very fulfilling, but good money and improved physique
Laid off of project after ~2 months (along with ~1000 other consultants and ~4000 employees)
Full time @ $25/hr (*150% OT)
Hired next day as a consultant. Started new job the day after.
Working for small company (~1000 employees)--Working at ~5th largest bank in US
6 month job with option to go permanent (my choice)
Helping with migration from OS/2 to NT Workstation in call centers
My employer is paying for my MSCE at request of the client.
Client is paying for my time in classes (I get out of work for classes)
Great work environment, great benefits, great companies.
Full time @ $43k/year
Well, that's where I'm at now. I never finished tech school or college. I'm sure if I were in school today I'd be diagnosed with ADD. I never did well in school, scored 1290 on my SAT's though. My computer has been my teacher. I am extremely happy with the way things are working out. Certain parts of work will always suck, but I feel lucky that I have been able to do as much as I have. Future plans? Work as consultant until I figure out how I'm going to make my first $10 million.
KN
"Work is what you make it."
By the way, the best articles I have read on Slashdot have been on this subject: it seems to bring out the best in the posters because it is something we all have some experience of (and is very close to our hearts :) )
I think there is more to it than that. I think many of the children that read Slashdot find this topic uninteresting so there is a more mature level of debate. No offense to the younger /.ers that don't behave like children.
KN
I've said it before on /. and I'll say it again,
And I will say 'no thanks' again.
we need to get organized.
If this means labor unions, then forget it. They bring nothing but corruption and organized crime. The few people I know who have worked in the computer industry in IT/DP type jobs that were unionized worked for much lower than industry salaries, saw their benefits bargained away by the union, dealt with the worst kind of arbitrary work rules. Bah. I can get a better deal for myself on my own.
If we accept the conditions do nothing, then we deserve what we get.
My salary has increased over 2.5 times since 1990 while inflation has been under 5% a year. If I had only gotten 5% a year, I'd have only increased by salary by about 1.6 times. From what I see, I doubt I am unusual. What are you complaining about? Furthermore, show me union workers who can match those numbers?
I read about a group of workers, at Microsoft of all places, that are forming a pseudo-union in Wired magazine. And cut the crap, we aren't "professionals"
Speak for yourself. Perhaps we don't work in an industry that requires professional licensing (at least not yet -- and I hope it doesn't come to that), but what we do is not radically different from architects, engineers, doctors, lawyers, etc. in many ways.
the way doctors and lawyers are professionals, they don't work 60 hours a week
I bet a lot of doctors do.
for $30,000.
Recent college grads are getting something close to $40k a year on average these days. I'd guess that almost all skilled, experienced programmers are making over that. If they aren't, they should be changing jobs, because there are plenty to be had.
We're workers, just like factory hands,
Factory hands need only limited skills and are thus simple to replace. This is very different from IT workers who are highly skilled and difficult to find.
and we need to face up to the problems that many in our field are going through.
I don't know of anyone around here that is going through this. Given the current job market, nobody should be. The official unemployment numbers around here are under 3%. Take out the unemployable (people with substance abuse problems, absenteeism, completely unskilled, etc), and the real rate is much lower.
Jesus Jon. This has been happening for 15 years. That it happens in the high tech industry is only more apparent within the last 3-5 years with the rise of its importance. The transfer of wealth in the US is a direct result of Reagan administration policies (Keynesian economics) coupled with the ability of capital to move anywhere in the world at tremendous speed (with great help from high technology). All the things you observed are merely symptoms of that fact.
I guess if you were a leftist saying this in the 80s you were a loony, but if you are in the high tech industry now and say it you're just aware. Work will always suck as long as we tolerate these conditions.
You don't have to be political to realize there *is* class conflict via disparities of wealth in employers and employees.
Good luck finding anyone who doesn't in some way fit this label. Most of the "great" thinkers of history have taken the ideas of a previous person and added to them, modified them, or simply regurgitated them. Same is true for authors of fiction, poems, music, and film. The number of truly unique ideas in the world is minimal.
You know, my father started working for the telephone company at 16 as a linesman and worked his way through school and up through management. That doesn't happen anymore. He spent 25 years with the phone company (before an untimely death) and they took care of him. Thats the point. I work for IBM, a company with a longstanding reputation of taking care of employees, but I am a programmer. I know that I will never get promoted into a management position. What I make now, I will likely make for years with nominal raises if I stay here. I know I have to move on shortly if I want to grow, so I try to develop my skills as much as possible on their dime in hopes of taking them elsewhere.
Its the Dilbert syndrome, and I know it. Katz pointed it out. But there is no other game in town right now, and Im not sure that this system is any better or any worse than the old... Its just diffrent.
I predict that in 5 years you will see a sitdown/walkout strike at a major software company due to overwork and unfair treatment of employees. That is bound to happen at the rate we're moving.
We don't need a union to do that either. Your prediction is pretty safe. It is also nearly meaningless. It doesn't necessarily mean that workers at other major software companies or at other IT related organizations won't be doing just fine.
The thing you have to realize is that record companies don't exist to make money for the musicians, and publishing houses don't exist to make many for writers. Their basic purpose is to keep all those people that work there employed, and make money for the stockholders; The artists are completely secondary and are only a product they are selling. These companies take 9/10 of the revenues, and 9/10 of the profits, but if they could get away with more, they would, believe it...
This depressing situation will hopefully be shaken up at least to some extent by the internet, which allows artists to get a lot close to their customers.
Agreed...
We only had it the way we did because, from WWII until the 70s/80s, the U.S. could coast and still grow. Businesses were fat, lethargic, and cushy for employees.
Businesses had to rediscover how to handle competition. As a result, capitalism has returned to the level of the individual; and individuals must look out for themselves first just as companies must.
Read the book "Die Broke" for a very good perspective on this. Essentially, you have to view yourself as self-employed no matter your employer.
Donnie
(will get an account when I'm at my preferred e-mail)
I worked for a GE business for a few
years, and there was one saying that went
around the tech staff--attributed to GE
chairman/CEO Jack Welch--which went:
"The employee who has loyalty
to the company is a fool, because
the company has no loyalty to
the employee."
I took this to heart, as I saw this implemented
several times with my own eyes (never to me,
luckily).
Older workers often have families to worry about and therefore they have less time for learning new things.
[insert violin music] If you choose to breed and have a life outside your industry -- you pay the price. Blaming it on "the man," "changing times," "mega-corp," or "Bozo the Clown" is a mere dodge of personal responsibility.
which means that they will have less time for their families.
Your breaking my heart. Get your priorities in order and dump the family.
It is not humane to expect people to "work their asses off" and have families at the same time.
That is tree-hugging hippy crap. That is a personal decision as you so aptly note:
The result is that more and more career persons decide to remain single or at least not to have children
And this must be the wisdom that we are supposed to gain???
Maybe you will have that much cash in 30 years.
He said he would have that much cash by the time he WAS 30, not in 30 years. If he is currently 23, that is 7 years.
. . but when are you planning on getting married,
Maybe he isn't. Maybe he is planning to marry someone who also has a job.
having children,
Maybe he isn't. I know for certain I never will (getting a vasectomy soon).
having responsibilities greater than just yourself? What happens when you want to work 8-5 and spend the evenings with your family? Will you get fired for not working the requisite 10-12 hour workday? Continuing education doesn't cut it when you won't work the absurd hours that Katz suggests are being asked of younger workers.
Nobody I know does, I think Katz's numbers are way off base.
Being a female computer science student I have serious trepadition about my future financial/familial stability.
It is understandable that getting married and having children is not only more on the mind of women than men, it more often has a detrimental effect on their career. You shouldn't assume that your concerns here are the same as what they are for men. Also as a student, what basis do you have to think you know what is really happening in the work world?
And believe it or not, I don't think I will WANT to retire at age 50.
Lots of luck even if you did want to. Social security will be gone before I retire, let alone someone who is still in school. The retirement age will be more like 75 by then.
Retirement is a very expensive thing-- you don't have the job that kept you busy making money so you end up spending it entertaining yourself. What happens when that huge wad of cash you had at age 50 is mostly gone by the time you are in your 70s and needing serious medical care?
People will still be working in their 70s. People are living longer and are more healthy at older ages. I haven't seen any evidence that older workers are being pushed out as the article suggests. If anything, at the moment, old COBOL programmers are a highly sought after commodity.
I wouldn't count on social security and medicare the way things are going now-- chances are there will be no such animal. I wouldn't call this article whining, I'd say it is something to keep an eye on closely.
I think the accurate way to describe the article is alarmist.
you don't think i know that there is poverty? my parents are doing "the best" (finacially speaking) of anyone on either side of my family tree. they pulled themselves up from living quite poorly, and into the middle class. i have relatives who've been in jail, been battered, been on welfare, you name it. somehow, in the past year or two, my parents managed to instill some drive and optimism in me.
and i hate to break it to you, but people with money are not (necessarily) evil. ambition is not "wrong". i wonder, for all the "self-deprivation" (or maybe self-limitation would be more correct) you'll submit to, and sypathy you have, for fear of stepping on "little people", what you might plan to do to help these poor souls.
one of the things i'd really love to do someday, when i can afford it, is work for $1 a year teaching high school. this is what my 10th/11th grade english teacher did. that guy taught me more about life than about literature, but it took me a few years to realize it. i'm not driven sheerly by greedy desires. i just want to get my cash so i can do what i want for the rest of my life.
you know, i'm not going to be the guy evicting old ladies from their homes, or something like that. i'm a programmer. i can get a good job. by your logic, should i go get a job at taco bell, instead?
wealth is not always simply "swindled" away from some sort of benevolent proletariat. wealth is not a "fixed resource"; it can be created, as well, with a net gain to society.
you know, that's really a sorry attitude to take. not doing anything about such things doesn't really seem justifiable, but your sheer indifference is appalling. i wonder how you
sleep at night.
you know, i was lucky that i was well fed as a child. i was lucky for a lot of opportunities i had- and i'm far from the luckiest guy i know. i intend to do well for myself.
you were apparently pretty lucky, too. except in the attitude department. your attitude
sucks.
Many lawyers are greedy and callous.
I'd personally say most.
Yet, I know many law students at my school who want nothing more than to work for indigent clients, civil rights organizations, or event the Peace Corp.
Probably a small percentage will follow through on that. Back in the 60's, all of the hippies wanted to change the world. Roll forward to the 80's and the hippies turned into yuppies. They changed the world into a greedier and more callous place.
In my practice, I plan to do quite a lot of pro bono criminal defense.
Well, I hope you follow through on your idealism. If you do, I suspect you will be one of the few.
If you ever get that day in jail for a DUI, you'll bless the lord for your public defender who knows the DA and can get a good deal.
How many IT people are going to get a public defender even if they ask for one?
Lawyer's are easy to bash, until you need one. Then, they are your best friends.
Of course if lawyers didn't control the system (almost all politicians are lawyers), the average guy wouldn't need lawyers nearly as often.
Unemployment is good.... 4 to 5 percent unemployments keeps inflation down and interest rates low. Try an economics class sometime.
KTRU??!! You have the hypocritical audacity to call them "heroes" of Houston's music? You think the other radio stations are "iron fists that dictate to the masses"? You think the DJs at Top 40 stations are pretentious?!! HA HA HA!!!
I've been involved with Rice Radio (KTRU) in one way or another for the past 8 years. I've had shows, friends have had shows, etc. About a year ago, I had my last incident there. They actually PUT A SIGN UP IN THE STUDIO saying WHAT YOU WERE NOT ALLOWED TO PLAY ON THE AIR. Based on the fact that it was "too popular". Trust me, the band in question (New Order) has a lot of hard-to-find material that you will NEVER hear on Top 40 or Alternative radio. A friend LOST HIS SHOW because he played music the staff deemed TOO POPULAR. (no, you can't check that this is factual with the KTRU staff, guess what, even private snobby outfits run spin control and lie.)
This place (KTRU) is SO PRETENTIOUS that the DJ's manual (you're tested before they let you have a show) that actually says things like, "Don't talk in an animated voice. Try to speak only in monotone. Popular radio already has plenty of radio personalities." _WHAT_THE_F*CK??!!_
Hey, dude, you can spend all the time you like thinking you're a better person because you know the difference between Tortoise, Negativland, Bitch Magnet, and Anthony Braxton; but you're going to have to come to grips with the fact that WHAT YOU LISTEN TO does not make you better than anyone else. The "indie sensability" turns to snobbishness and eventually simple, sad, prejudice.
I hope you come to grips with the fact that just because millions of listeners like it IT ISN'T BAD. And, thats right, most people listening to 104 in the mornings actually think Sam Malone is funny. Sorry you don't, it doesn't make you a better person.
There IS a station in Houston that plays all sorts of odd-ball stuff. Its called KPFT. Anyone can have a radio show there, but it isn't elite, cool, or snotty like KTRU... Check it out, kid.
-- lin_dze@yahoo.com
The fact that there *are* companies that treat people well (and that there used to be a lot more of them) demonstrates that capitalism is not the reason for mistreatment of workers. The reason for mistreatment of workers is immorality. If people were not so immoral, they would not treat their employees poorly.
Where I am we call agencies "Pimps"...
I agree, don't depend on loyalty to an agency; they're just another company. Go with whichever agency has the best job when you need one.
In the spirit of the Linux community, where if an individual sees a need, that individual meets it by writing the code.
Jon, if you don't like the current work environment, why don't you start your own company with your own idealistic work rules?
What you should do is write an ANSI compliant COBOL compiler for Linux, you'll make lots of money, and you'll have a touchie-feelie environment. Just like any other hard working Linux coder.
Ooooh, did I say hard working? That's so judgemental. Those who can't work, moralize.
Actually, it could be a lot worse. You could be a ten year old in China or Indonesia or Malaysia or Thailand working 16 hours a day, six days a week for a nickel an hour so you can sick on your lazy backside and feel sorry for yourself.
So there.
I agree 100 % with Lonny but that only touches the surface and barely addresses several issues in the original article.
What gets one into management in IT? Usually, it's golf and maximum ass-kissing. There is almost no relationship between knowledge and skill in this industry and advancement in one's career. More often than not the lowest character traits are amply rewarded, and the noble traits are punished.
To all you smug and self-satisfied slashdotters in your twenties or early thirties - wait until you're over 40 or over 50. Your job will not only be insecure, it wlll be gone, and your marketability will be nill. Maybe you don't care if you have enough socked away for those inevitabiities, but what the hell have you contributed to society by selling your soul? You can't take it with you. What goes around comes around, and it will certainly come around to you through additional lifeties of regret and suffering that could have been avoided by being a little more human and not selling what you were given for so little, really.
I'd rather be poor and keep my self respect, and work for the satisfaction of doing a good job. Of course, I'd also like to be wealthy. But. there are priorities in this life.
Sure, there are alternatives like consulting and starting one's own firm, but few programmers or other technical workers do this. Perhaps more should.
All you smug little people who think you are so cool because you can parrot the correct buzz words have a lot to learn and you WILL learn it, like it or not. Most programmers, regardless of age, are at best mediocre. Companies hire people in batches to work on teams, and typically only 2 or 3 people on a team have much to offer. However, advancement has little or nothing to do with that, but only with playing the corporate game.
So, please have a little more compassion for those with different values or who have learned something from life by living through it beyond age 35 with some goal in mind other than stuffing their bank accounts.
Children will be children, but it seems that many of you never have been children. How, then, can you mature into adults? I don't think you were even born - you were hatched. Maybe after a few thousands of lifetimes you will evolve into a huma being.
Do you really think that some children in the US are hungry because there is some shortage of food, and some thoughtless people are eating too much? Go get in touch with your own feelings and let the rest of us enjoy a meal in peace without listening to your absurd guilt trips.
Cheers,
ZicoKnows@hotmail.com
Thank you. I hope that you, also, will be over forty some day. Live long and prosper. With more people like you perhaps our social climate will change some day.
Over 40
I thought Katz would eventually come around. But he doesn't even begin to understand that the world is changing, but that's NOT a bad thing.
How many people here really want to do the same job all their lives? The job market is changing because people are changing.
I've got a good job doing something I enjoy. I'll probably be leaving within a few months. Why? Because the modern world is overflowing with opportunities and new experiences. I'm not concerned one bit about downsizing, rightsizing, or restructuring. If my job is gone tomorrow, I take a nice little vacation while I look around for a better job.
Any smart person with technical skills can do the same.
Everybody quit your bloody whining. Life is better than it's ever been. You will make more money than your parents did at your age if you work hard (and they made more than their folks).
Some of you are acting like a bunch of whining, snivelling, scared children.
Guess you better tell that to Nike factory workers in Southeast Asia. "Hey, you are in control of your life, just quit and get a better job." That's a laugh.
I wonder if skilled tradesmen at the previous turn of the century felt the same way as IT professionals do at the turn of this century? "We are empowered because there is a demand for our skills." Wonder how those same people felt when they were being replaced by machines?
"But so what", retorts the right wing? "Just adapt and survive..." Easy to say now, when you can go back to University and gain another skill, but what about when you are 40-50 and have a family to support?
"So who's fault is it? Corporations?" No, they're just reactions to the system. It's no one's fault, but maybe right wingers should rethink their libertarian, get rid of the government, "cradle to grave" rhetoric in light of what their really defending... greed. It's no one's fault when workers no longer fit into a system in which they have been replaced, but a civilized society will not leave them starving either. Capitalist society optimizes the means of production to what end? To overproduce for those who already have enough. How about providing for those who no longer have the ability to provide for themselves (ie. handicapped, seniors, displaced workers, etc.)? Individuals (ie. corporate interests) are rarely willingly do this, so could that possibly be what the government is for? Sure the government's backward on crypto laws and tax the ordinary citizen to death, but maybe there are more powerful alterior motives for weakening/eliminating government powers (like eliminating restrictions on free enterprise). But the real power behind the government is corporations anyways, so the average citizen just follows the general rhetoric because they don't feel very "endeared" to their government...
Could this possibly be where the individual truly is empowered? By actually having a say in what the government does with their money and how they are governed? By truly having control over their own lives and not just the facade of control offered by capitalist libertarians...
This would be the only point at which the individual truly is empowered in my books.
Some of you are old, cynical, weary, and worried.
Time waits for no one. Your employability is fading. Make hay while the sun is shining.
Do you think it's enough to keep your skills up to date? Do you think you'll be judged strictly on your merits, or according to employers' perceptions and attitudes?
These days, if you're an employee, you're treated like a whore. A whore that makes a thousand dollars a day is still a whore. Stop being an employee. Get off that street corner and get behind the wheel of your very own pimpmobile.
The company you're working for probably has an "exit strategy" (do an IPO, get acquired, etc). What's your personal "exit strategy"?
Lots of people are hoping to make a buck from the Internet. Right now, the only thing that's profitable is "adult" sites. So be it. Perhaps in the future, many other types of sites will be able to make a buck. If that ever happens, we'll see a massive brain drain from the corporations as anyone with a clue chooses to become "master of their own domain". And the pointy-haired bastard managers will be left behind, playing their circle-jerk bureaucratic games in the darkened hallways.
I to some degree agree with viewpoints that have been expressed here.
Today there are more uncertainties than ever before, companies are in essence ruthless in terms of the bottom line resulting in "downsizing, right sizing, restructuring, etc" Give me a buzzword and it probably has implications as to someones job....
Hell there wouldn't be a cult phenomenon of Dilbert if some of the points expressed were not true... Company loyalty to the worker is gone ( yet those same companies expect loyalty from you ) even in Japan - where the Idea of a company being loyal to a worker and visa versa is virtually a religous belief - companies are downsizing, rightsizing ( only burger joints do upsizing and it has nothing to do with jobs ) etc and the tradition of company loyalty to the worker is falling away causing very serious problems for many.
Yet as someone mentioned today the worker is probably more empowered today than ever before.. Sure, because many employers have been told by consultants -- like ratbert -- that by empowering employee's they are more productive, will be willing to work longer, less sick days ( I cant remeber how many times I have read or heard the statistic about how much the economy is losing in terms of lost production due to sick days -- its in the billions of DOLLARS ) and thus all of this will, say it with me people, IMPROVE THE BOTTOM LINE!!
But employees are more empowered today.... in now other time have there been so many people who have left the corporate world to become there own bosses and today it IS much easier than before... while the fear and uncertainty of such a prospect is no less than before, many realise that working for a corporation today is not much more secure. In fact I just heard that Canada has the highest number of female entreprenuers in the world ( please no comments slamming Canada or anthing like that ), something like 8.5% of the workforce.... Amazing. We are as the article said at one of those critical points in time where everything is changing, corporation are looking solely at the bottom line and are becoming soul-less, getting ride of some of the more intelligent people they have because they are older, deemed less malleable.. ( problem is what if one of them is the glue that keeps things together...maybe his production isn't really high but his being there makes all the other employee's happy? when he's gone then what? ). Yet people today individually are having a Thoreau like look at the world and realising that they dont need as much to be happy at lest in temrs of wealth ( not everyone but this is grassroots going on ), as well as the fact that people are rediscovering ( or discovering ) Spirituallity ( NOT RELIGON! )... pointers to this are Books like "Life Without God" -- Douglas Coupland or "Celestie Prophecy" -- James Redfield and its immense grassroots success. Furthermore the technological period in which we are living is changing.... no longer the industrial age but.... well you fill in your own blank.
So what the Hell does Adam Smith have to do with any of this? Simple Adam smith was/is if you dont know, the father of modern capitalism.... thats right he's the guy, blame him. But for anyone who has read smith's classic work upon which the modern economy is based they will that Smith said a lot more. Smith also commented that it is valueable on a societal level for corporations to have employee's who do not necessarily add a lot to the production value of a company. That is, that corporations cant always look at the bottom line to justify everything ( otherwise as he comment society and the economy itself will collapse ). Sometimes to benefit society it is good to have a few extra employee's who maybe do dont as much as other, or maybe keep those "old farts" around cause maybe in some suttle way that cant be measured on the bottom line, they add value to the company.. Foremost Smiths idea can be applied to something like the environment.... Many corporations are terrible at this aspect.... they say, well if well do it the environmentally friendly way, we hurt our bottom line ( what instead of making a billion in profits, you make 900 million ), which consequently has been shown to not be the case many times... just ask 3M or read "The ecology of Commerce" - Paul Hawking.
Adam Smith noted that without the soul in a corporation it is just greed and greed alone will destroy the economy and society itself ( probably the environment too ).
Question.... when is enough? Does a corporation need to grow forever? How big is big enough.... How much profits are enough.... when banks make billions in profits is that not enough especially when they're laying off employee's all the time?
Since the only thing on this planet that undergoes unrestrained growth is cancer... I hope continual growth isn't your answer.
I saw someone say something about henry ford's time and that employee's had it much worse... I'll just quote Ford... "You have to take care of your employee's and pay them well, otherwise..who's going to buy your products? "
As a side note since I mentioned the environment.... I heard just recently in a speech by Dr. David Suzuki, about something relating to this.... He commented that we are destoying nature and like I said, corporation talk about the cost of being environmentally friendly... Well it has been shown that the Natural world if things like trees, clean water etc... were to be replaced by man made device to replicate their functions the total annual cost would be 38 trillion dollars.... no to compare this he mentioned that the total cumulative value of all the world coutries GDP's is 18 trillion!
Jeff
jkay@irus.rri.on.ca
Give us an update about 13 years from now.
Read it, it explains why work sucks... what will become of "jobs" and what needs to be done!
Read it, it explains why work sucks... what will become of "jobs" and what needs to be done! http://www.newshare.com/Newshare/Common/News/manif esto.html
This is a/the problem - work weeks are getting shorter (see Western Europe for plenty of examples), and people are retiring earlier, for better or for worse. Yet, they are also living longer - hence, living longer in retirement. However, with people saving less and less (spending is up, debt is up, saving is way down), the older generation(s) being a larger percentage of the overall population, and Social Security being a not so viable option decades from now, there is clearly a problem. I don't know if I'd call the article alarmist, as you do, but alarmist or not, Katz (and the author he quotes/summarizes) has a point, and it's not "whining".
Duh all that hard work is for "Improving the economy"? I thought the economy was supposed to serve people?
Suckers. All believing that's wonderful and "Higher productivity will give consumers more choice at lower prices". Is that even a half decent goal of life?
Then the media brainwashes all of you so that you want, no NEED all those choices and useless products, which you don't have enough time to enjoy - coz you're too busy at work. If you don't have the stuff you're miserable. No wonder you're not having a good time whether at work or at home.
Wake up!
Well I guess it's too late and too far down the slope of Global Competition. Somewhere someone some how works a hard 60 hours a week, so "in order to be competitive" you have to work 70 hours a week to beat em. And you thought the nuke arms races was bad. Have fun with the global competitiveness race.
I don't want to play this stupid game. Do you? Get a life. It's a stupid game and it only makes a small bunch happy.
Heck I bet even aboriginal peoples have a better life than some of you guys, so what if they don't get decent medical benefits, and sometimes they go hungry. Hmmm still sounds like some of you! But I've seen them and they are usually quite a content and cheerful lot. Ah, but "they don't understand the benefits of the Global Economy", "They need development". Over here they "stand in the way of progress"- so there's a dept trying to assimilate them into "normal society". Someone calls it corrupting the innocent- coz there's no proof that our society is that great.
You don't get happy because you have more choices and stuff to buy at lower prices. That just cheers you up a little, and makes life easier. But if getting all "choice" makes life more difficult or unpleasant it defeats the whole purpose doesn't it?
Work will continue to suck as long as enough people are willing to put up with that for whatever reason.
Happy now? Just smile, it's hilarious what people call progress. I just like the cool toys and the better med tech.
It's not young==smart
It's:
young==fast
fast==smart (ok, at least for your boss)
I'm 29 and started the whole computer thing at 12. I'm in the biz for about 10y.
And, yes, I'm getting old and slow. Ok, I still learn, I still keep up with new stuff. But it's getting harder and harder and more and more I need my time for the "real world".
I'm having a great time, working on some very cool stuff.
This dood's ad a bit too much, what ? One over the eight I guess. Someone steal his car keys quick.
We're here to help you!
Are you surprised that the generation commonly known as "slackers" gets paid less money than their parents?
Even if you are making less I'm sure you're getting by with room to spare. Life _is_ good. You have access to a computer and time to bitch and complain on the internet. If you're in such bad shape you should be spending your time working instead of whining.
This shit is just unbelievable to me. Couples who make a combined income of 20k manage to get by. And they manage to do it without crying about it on the internet.
If you were stupid enough to paint yourself in a corner by taking out loans for your car, buying a house you can't easily dispense with, and getting behind in credit card bill then TS for you; you are an idiot that took the bait. As for me earning less than my parents, I make 250% more than they do, combined. People in high tech are far better off than liberal arts majors, english majors, teachers, and anybody else with a 4 year degree, and quite a few with a 5 or even 7 year degree.
and no, I'm not old, I'm 17
I'm 27 with 40K in the bank and nothing in credit card bills. Plan for your future, don't be stupid and think it will take care of itself. Be prepared to be screwed, because you will be. If you think you can get by trusting anybody think again. That's what business is all about.
When you've worked for a couple of years in a real job then you will be competent to comment upon the experience. I am far from knowing it all but I'm way ahead of you in knowlege.
e.g. it's far easier to move between income strata now than ever before. 30 years ago, if you were born poor, you likely stayed poor.
Perhaps, if you have pretty intelligent parents (not all that common if you're poor) or you're a very wise child who can understand the real value of an education... Other than that, most poor people don't get much of a chance.
Compare that to no chance, as it was in the past, and you'll see it's considerably better.
In business, there is continual fluctuation. Compared to the rest of history, this decade has been one of the best decades for employees, almost definitely in the top ten (sorry, can't say for certain, I wasn't alive that whole time, and history books start getting a little vague about conditions as you get further back.) Compared to the rest of this decade, 1998 was a bit of a down-turn.
However, we are still more in command, especially those in the technology sector. All we have to do is stand up for ourselves; virtually NO employer is going to stand up for us against themselves.
Hypothetical conversation:
Boss: "Excuse me, Anonymous, but I goofed, and didn't tell my boss about your slipping in schedule, and he's really expecting your project to be done on Monday. Would you mind working on it this weekend, and finishing it up?"
Me: "Sure thing boss."
Boss: "On second thought, I heard your girlfriend's comming in for the weekend. Go and have fun, and I'll do it for you."
Those of us who sit quietly and get rolled over don't help anyone, least of all ourselves.
While I'm on the subject, let me rant about customer contact people, like cashiers and receptionists, who don't feel that they can talk to their boss about comments or criticisms that customers make to them...
I also think that much of what is bad isn't so much systemic as it is a result of the fact that we're going through a period of change
It's not so much that we're going through a period of change; it's that corporations that are problems are getting temporarily ahead of the game. If people would refuse to put up with it, those companies would either change or go out of business. Either way, the system fixes itself. There may not be enough jobs for everyone competent to get jobs with good employers, but there are enough jobs to undermine those problem employers to the point where they have to change or go under; as they start going under, their competition will expand, and those jobs will become available.
I would predict, however, that at the same time as those companies are going under, the number of positions open to incompetent techs will also go down - when the employer has a reasonable relationship with the technical staff, it would logically follow that incompetence would become more apparent, especially at companies large enough for a comparison to be available. (Which is also a good thing.)
Greetings from Sweden, the socialistic country gradually falling behind its neighbours.
I have realized that this world will eventually be rough on the weak, so you better look ahed and brace yourself. I expect companies to treat me like dirt, but I will not give them the reason.
We were taught in school how wonderful socialism was. It turned out that the oligarchy owned all wealth in the country, and as the GenX-ers retire and the corporations leave the country we will face grave problems here.
I saw this coming and thus prepared to be strong at all times. I could have been a computer geek like every one else here today, working with my hobby, doing easy things for big money, living off peoples ignorance, cutting gold with a hacksaw. But i realized back in high-school how short-lived that career will be and became a design engineer instead. Older designers are considered the best, knowing all there is to know about producing all kinds of stuff. At least the kind that can wield a CAD-program. And when the going gets tough in Sweden soon, I will emigrate to USA or someplace where the winters are warmer. No kids, no loans, educated to a Masters degree for free.
So congratulations all you short sighted and narrow minded. Specifically you who specialized in something or the other. In some years you will be regarded as obsolete or the foundation for your services will be swept away with some new released version of an OS, program or piece of hardware. There will be nations where buses will be driven and burgers served by former C++ programmers and homepage editors. Pizzas will be delivered by Windows support personnel. Lawns will be mowed by sysadmins. Lets see who is laughing then.
This is the law of the jungle in this era:
Be good or be poor.
/Mike
So you've spent 40-60 hours a week at a job for 8 years or so now... Simple math tells me that you have effectively squandered 15,360 (conservativley calculated) hours of your life, that you were not spending with your family, and loved ones, or experiencing life to its fullest. And for what? Are you really happier than you could have been, with car payments, housing bills, taxes, road rage, dealing with the boss, working for someone else? You are the judge!
Think about it. Unions which take 2% of your $65,000 income, or bosses who pay you $45,000. Simple math for so many so-called intelligent people.
Think about it? What I see is unions taking 2% of your $45,000 income, then making you take nothing because they go on strike asking for $65,000. The math seems simple to me. The way to get $65,000 is not to pay the union 2%, its to vote with my feet and get the money for myself. I don't want to work in an industry where the only way to get a job is to be a union member. I don't want someone else telling me when I can work and when I can't.
I also find unions harrassment of "scabs" to be very offensive. If you walk off your job and someone else is happy to take it, then maybe they deserve it.
Guess you better tell that to Nike factory workers in Southeast Asia. "Hey, you are in control of your life, just quit and get a better job." That's a laugh.
but you miss the point. at the turn of the century, almost ALL of us had jobs more akin to Nike factory works.
and those Nike Factory workers today, at the turn of the century, lived from harvest from harvest and continually faced starvation.
They're all still there, just lower your threshold a notch or two (or click here to lower it to a rediculous level)
Seriously: young or old, I think Katz is right in bringing something like this to the attention of the readership. Those who are willing to listen, will listen. Those who aren't, will not.
Quite frankly, I like my job, but then again, I work for a State University and not a coporation. The attitudes and atmosphere between the two are worlds apart. I can see how folks who do work in a corporation might need a little heads up. Sure, it might not be happening to you now but don't discount later!
- Cliff
Most people with a full-time job make a choice between continuing to keep up and learning, and having any resemblance of a life. Add a family to the mix and suddenly your choices are tied to the welfare of other people. Let's see, neglect your family, or keep up with technology?
I make basically diddly working in tech support, but I'm working for/with a nifty Quaker boss, and we're gradually accumulating other techies who are actually clued. We do have future plans. The important thing is, we're basically flying in the face of the current job scene. We _care_, by choice, and it's a continuing choice- trust isn't easy, but we're all in the same boat.
The ruthless motif is doomed. Who the _hell_ wants to do business with untrustworthy, ruthless people? Who really _wants_ to be used up and thrown out, or to depend on someone or something that's only out for what they can get away with? This is a dead end, an extreme swing in attitude (which I think can be traced back to MS's eternal attitude), and it CAN'T LAST. Cooperation has _advantages_. Functioning in a society has _advantages_. Cutting both of those things away and leaving everyone from the temps to the company itself scrambling ruthlessly for the next profitable betrayal has _costs_ that are not being considered at all. LOOK at an example such as Intel, and the FACE Intel website, for a picture of what happens when you go fully 'modern' with this approach to work. Reading that website, does Intel sound like a place with a future? No, it sounds like it is fscking going down in _flames_, man, and the sick thing is that nobody cares or wants to help because Intel hasn't given anyone a reason to like them other than being the 800 lb gorilla- there's no cooperation or social awareness within the industry for them, it's all what they can get away with, and people are sick to death of playing that game.
People who seriously believe this ruthless attitude defines the future are deluded and uneducated. It's been tried many times in many contexts, and it _loses_. Your individuals end up so busy taking care of themselves that they WASTE TIME which could be spent providing some cooperative benefit, in doing things that other people could be helping them with, simply because they don't trust anybody and won't believe in a social interaction that can't be crushed by something ruthless coming along, so they won't even _try_ working with others and daring to risk contributing to a larger whole.
Isn't it kind of odd that the people ranting about how the new ruthlessness is the future, are doing so on a site which advocates open source cooperativeness and the abandonment of this ruthlessness regarding _code_? Why shouldn't 'open source' work just as well on the personal level- a _GPLish_ (not 'public domain') type, in which you trust only the trustworthy, but will go to the wall for them, and vice versa? If you think I'm going to trust any of these merry ruthless child posters, you're out of your fscking mind- but I _will_ find other people who wish to cooperate in something, and I _will_ go to any length to justify their faith in me. But you gotta earn that, you gotta earn it and talking ruthless does nothing to suggest you are honorable and trustworthy- it suggests you are unscrupulous and dishonest- and if you think that's gonna win in the long run, man, you're gonna be alone out there, and I'm not fool enough to give you a hand on your inevitable way down.
I will be busy giving a hand to the many people, including all Open Source programmers, who were willing to set aside ruthlessness and risk helping _ME_. And if you choose to scorn that I can only honor that choice... and let you die, free, proud, and trusted by no-one.
So, in conclusion: Katz is right- but what he's not telling you (and perhaps doesn't know himself) is that the behavior he's protesting is a losing game, and ironically the people he's writing to, the ones who love and hate and argue with him, are a fine example of one way to put that behavior aside and return to the more successful behaviors of trust and cooperation.
I hope he can see that. More than that, I hope enough Slashdot readers remember that, and remember the social ethic which underlies our open source licenses- and perhaps also the twist that defines the GPL itself- it's great to cooperate, but it's also damned useful to _demand_ it. If you can't play nice, maybe you oughta hit the road... I hear Intel is hiring, after a new round of layoffs >;)
Reading some of these replies is positively disturbing. ;P
I'm with the entrepreneur who said he was finding people with the same outlook and working with them, not with some corporate borg. I'm there- I'm trying to pick up a lot of knowledge, with very little formal training, because it interests me and because I have to- we don't have anyone else competent, so I have to spearhead the drive to understand Unix, and be part of the braintrust that's forming around a nifty (to us) concept.
I'm a $20 an hour mac tech in a little Vermont town. This is outlandish- but I'll tell you why it's me in that position.
It's because the person with the entrepreneurial dream, who is my boss, has a sense of honor, and I'm ready to gamble that he'll hang on to it adequately. I have bought shop equipment and paid him money when I was _owed_ by the shop- because we needed the financial liquidity- there was no Boss, no Employees, it was a question of paying rent on time or having Boss make excuses, and we don't _want_ to sleaze on the rent, dammit.
I realize many people are surprised, as their attitude is 'if you _can_ sleaze on the rent, then you haven't reached the real due date, keep your money'... dishonesty runs deep in the new ruthlessness... but if you think that, you're overlooking someone.
I'm cooperating with someone who isn't going to betray me.
He is cooperating with someone who isn't going to betray him.
If we, working together, can do better than we could do separately, then by God I'm gonna do that, and will sweat blood to make sure I don't let 'us' down... and I'm going to keep very, very aware of the inevitable people who blow through our field of vision who are faithless and would just sell us out in a nanosecond.
Yes: it's asinine to be loyal to a faithless cause. But it is my firm opinion that faithless causes are losers- that they are doomed to collapse, horribly inefficient: they are the 'proprietary software' of business interactions, and it won't be righteous moralism that crushes this wave of ruthlessness- it'll be the hard edge of reality slamming down, leaving individuals hosed with no futures and no friends or allies, leaving businesses hosed with no decent employees left and no money to buy quality mercenaries anymore.
It's just too damned easy to hurt the ruthless. You just survive, keep faith with those you can trust, and wait for a chink in the armor...
So I'm waiting, hanging in there with my boss and our fellow techs. We tend to ease out people who don't relate with the trust and honesty thing, and latch onto those with promise... it's purely self-defense, really. Taking the ruthless attitude within our little startup is poison. We've got people absolutely raving about us, mind you they don't always pay on time but our attitude _is_ noticed.
My only regret is how obscenely few of you Slashdotters, whom I'd think would be great matches for a neat idealistic startup involving Linux or at least Unix, would fit in here. But some of you would... probably the ones who contribute code and actually _do_ things to help open source.
Once more: where does Open Source fit with this ruthless motif? Why would anybody even care? Is it purely an auditing the code thing? I really don't think pragmatism was the only motivation for this stuff... it remains to be seen whether Open Source can survive in an atmosphere of total cynicism and ruthlessness of its own advocates. Wouldn't it be better to just get MCSEs, extort tons of money from some rich corporation, get rich and die?
Posted by modefan:
To everyone that prefers contracting to being an employee, I have a few words for ya:
1. I did it, I enjoyed it and I will do it again.
2. Making the better and better hours is something that no other field gives you.
3. You will become the most in-demand worker in your field.
However, being a perm does have more benefits other than money and that's why many people like it.
All in all, I hate working in general. I would much rather be retired and sitting on my DSL all day long =)
Posted by BikE_PUnX:
All right, settle down, kids, and listen to this tale I have for ye...
The first entities to form in Europe that could be considered a type of union were the guilds. These guilds formed during the Renissance of western Europe. These guilds formed cheifly to protect their members from overcompetition, but also to ensure that the quality of goods was maintained. Also, these guilds would care for the families of members who had died or who were extremely ill. The guild members were professionals - doctores, lawyers, bakers, tailors, and so on.
Flash forward to the year 1825. A new way of life has gripped western Europe, and is beginning to spread east and across the Atlantic to America. The Industrial Revolution. For the first 50 years of this most extreme revolution, vast amounts of wealth were created, but this wealth was concentrated in the hands of an elite few. The masses who toiled at the bottom received little, and life was lived in the worst conditions ever known. Around this year, unions began to form. Once again, these were unions of skilled workers - team heads in steel mills, train engineers, master smiths - not the unskilled laborers. These skilled workers were in short supply, and as such, were in an advantageous situation to gain handsomely. Unions were formed, contracts were negotiated, strikes were struck.
Again, flash ahead. The year is now 1877. Unions have spread, gradually falling through the ranks of less and less skilled workers. In Pittsburgh, a railroad strike ends in violence when Andrew Carnegie orders his security forces to fire on protestors, most of whom are women and children. Dozens die. The strikers respond violently, killing a score of guards and burning three miles of railroad yard and cars. Carnegie barely makes it out of the city alive, literally fleeing an angry mob.
We go forward again, this time to 1900. Angry clashes like the Pittsburgh Railroad Strike are still in people's mind, both in America and in Europe. Workers at all skill levels have used the strike, walkouts, and slowdowns to gain better conditions for themselves, and better futures for their children. Skilled workers are slowly yet surely moving far ahead in income, to the point where they are making as much as many of the middle class.
This brief story is to remind some confused people here what unions have done historically. It was not the construction workers who first unionized; they could be easily replaced. It was the skilled workers, those persons whose expertise was needed to ensure the quality of the job. By ignoring history, we are dooming ourselves to return to the early days of the Industrial Revolution, where we are all replacable cogs before the eyes of an unfeeling capitalist machine.
We must protect ourselves, each other, and our children. The boss' goal is to extract as much work from us for as little pay as possible. Whether you like it or not, it is us versus them. Face this harsh reality, and think about it. There are strength in numbers. One voice screaming "No! I will not be exploited!" can be ignored. But a thousand voices, ten thousand voices, a hundred thousand voices... These shouts would deafen even the most protected corporate raiders.
Think about it. Unions which take 2% of your $65,000 income, or bosses who pay you $45,000. Simple math for so many so-called intelligent people.
Think about it.
Matt Singerman
---
"If you can't fix it with duct tape, it's fucked."
Posted by saintmae:
I like having a job. It gives me a reason to get up and out every day. I even actually like my job. I do tech support. I like people and I like fixing things, and I'm good at it.
However, I can't stand the policies and the attitudes of the company I work for. I work for a large outsourcer that provides technical and customer support for several hundred different projects in several different countries. My project alone probably employs over a thousand people - there are over three hundred people with the same job I have.
You would think this would make me a little more expendable and them a little more "flexible". In fact, this is not the case at all. Because of "coverage", I am denied time off requests the day before the time off was supposed to take effect - when I submitted the paperwork three weeks in advance, ample time for them to get back to me. Because of coverage, I got written up for being late three times in a month - twice only one minute late, and the third time because I had to fill out a police report.
If I were a child, I would still be in school. To have a job is to be assumed adult. I wish I were treated like an adult.
Posted by RAChiller:
Not with that attitude, you won't.
You don't really expect ego-nerds to understand sociology and/or statistics?
http://opencm3.net, http://www.nongnu.org/gm2/
Soylent Green is old programmers.
The "cue the foo posts in 3, 2, 1..." posts will commence with no subsequent foo posts in 3, 2, 1...
The elimination of the middle class, the widening of the gap between the lower and upper, is leading this country (hell, the whole WORLD) down the path of a Gibson novel.
Walk out on the streets and you're immediately swamped with technological "have-nots", and yet every company worth its salt has a web site. Why do they bother? Because the technological "haves" have the cash and everyone wants a piece of that as-yet-to-be-properly-exploited market.
The gov't is trying desperately to curb the flow of technology from its military and other R&D efforts into the hands of the people, hiding behind "national security". Strong encryption, while a pain in the ass to use, is an essential component of the new era of digital privacy that we have yet to see. Big Brother is watching you.
There's a war on. A war against the lower class. Don't let them get out of place. Don't let them rise up. Keep them down any way you can. If that means locking them up in jail, so be it. It's really easy, these days, to masquerade a new Mandatory Minimum Sentancing bill as "tough on crime", when all it is, really, is "tough on minorities".
Destroy the middle class at all costs, push them into places where they can be rounded up and branded "lower". Tax the hell out of property owners. Tax the hell out of the working stiffs. Make technology so difficult and expensive to acquire that the average person couldn't possibly start developing his own.
Take away the choices. Too many choices lead to unpredictable behavior. Empowering people leads to people holding the power. Can't have that bullshit, we have a country to run. We have lives to steamroller over. There's a war on!
The only choice you have these days is who you're going to let exploit you. Nah, you don't even have that choice. You can pick what industry is going to exploit you, and then you get to sell yourself out to a company in that industry. That is, if you're willing to lower yourself to the point of pissing in a cup first. What, you expect to be trusted? You expect to be valued on your own merits? Bullshit.
Once you've decided how you're going to be exploited, you get the supreme honor of handing over half or more of what you earn, to pay for something that's not guaranteed to be delivered on time or at all. Worse still, you pay the salaries of the very same people who created this mess.
Sorry... It's early in the morning, haven't had coffee yet...
--Threed
AC wrote: "These comments smack of young arrogance to me...tell me what happens after you're 30,40,50, and you have family, commitments, that mean that you can't dedicate 90% of your waking hours to work?"
Those who are spending 90% of their waking hours working in their 20s are getting into habits that won't change in later years, I think. Forget marrying later in life, these folks won't be marrying at all... if you spend 10+ years completely isolated from any kind of socialization, you're gonna have a hard time diving into it when the time is available.
"I'd like to make a promise and I'd like to make a vow, that when I've got something to say, sir, I'm gonna say it now
Some older men may not be working because they can't find a job. However, my parents retired at age 62 (my father is a professor emeritus, so in some sense he'll never truly retire) because they could, not because they were forced to. This statistic is meaningless without information about how many older workers were fired, how many are trying to find work but can't, etc.
Ooh, a sarcasm detector. Oh, that's a real useful invention.
Really. I've worked in a variety of settings - academic, public service (ugh), large corporate, small startup (not counting summer jobs, of course). And I've enjoyed working in the academic and small startup only. The positions I had in each were different - academic: ESL instructor/department head; public service: library drone; large corporate: library technical advisor; small startup: sysadmin.
One thing I've learned is that if you concentrate on what you can learn and how that turns around into what you can produce, the happier you'll be. The less you learn, the less you'll produce.
Basically the work that has sucked for me has been the work that has degenerated into routine. I'm not saying that the marketplace isn't hard, fast and cutthroat, but IMHO it's always been. In each of the work settings I've found myself, I have always taken it for granted that tomorrow may bring a reorg/cutback/loss of financing, etc. Fact of life, sorry but we have to let you go.
My point being: the more you know how to learn, the longer you stay marketable.
My $0.02.
"shop smart:shop s-mart" ash
the average individual is far MORE empowered today than ever before.
How so?
e.g. it's far easier to move between income strata now than ever before. 30 years ago, if you were born poor, you likely stayed poor.
Perhaps, if you have pretty intelligent parents (not all that common if you're poor) or you're a very wise child who can understand the real value of an education in order to work for the grades that may let you get a college education. Other than that, most poor people don't get much of a chance. If your family is fairly well off, then you don't have to live a perfect life. You can screw up a few times and still end up with a job and a decent future.
the average individual has MORE ability to think of something grand and spread it to the outside world.
So? We can say whatever we want.. sure, but if you think of something grand, you better have access to enough money to protect that idea, or the people who have all the money will make you wish you'd never thought of it.
the average company is no MORE hardcore about not viewing their employees as interchangeable cogs. Skills / experience / etc. are MORE thoroughly rewarded now than ever before.
I definitely disagree with this. Companies are hiring and firing like mad these days. You can't pick up a paper without reading 3 stories about companies laying off a bunch of people, or (though usually less publicised) hiring a bunch of people. One company falls and another rises in it's place. Unfortunately, the people who work for these companies have absolutely no security, especially as they get older.
We are far MORE in command of our salaries than ever before in history.
Once again, how so? You've made some pretty broad, sweeping statements and given no detail or support for them. It's pretty hard to draw any conclusions from this.
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
I've gotta agree with you. I noticed the same things about his post. He was free to just pick up and move across the company. That's great as long as you don't have a family to worry about. If you devote all your time to work and continuing education, you'll probably continue to do fairly well. Unfortunately that leave very little time for this thing called a life. I don't think we were all put on this planet to work until we die. What's the point? If we can't spend a reasonable amount of time with friends and family, then the great job doesn't do much for our lives overall. There is more to this whole issue than how much money you make. There's quality of life.. for you and for your family.
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
I started out working on a wheat farm, the family business...no thank you.
I went to the city (Portland Oregon) and learned computers. Now I have a kickin job. I work when I want, I am almost unreplacible and I have two Power Mac G3s sitting on my desk and Xeon powered Compaqs to play with.
The jobs are out there...at least in the United States. Workers make more than ever. Sure the cost of living is high and so are taxes...it doesn't bother me.
I am far more empowered than my Mother or Grandfather ever was. I was born middle class and I still am middle class. I have lost nothing.
Since when has Slashdot ever advocated a political position? We even have people around here who like Microsoft :-!
We have a lot of comments from people who are making over $100,000 and a lot from people making less than $50,000 with no-one in between. Very interesting.
Unemployment rates are calculated from measuring unemployed people in the labor force. The labor force inlcudes everybody with a job or looking for work. If people do not fall into either of these categories they are not included in the labor fore and, therefore, not included in either employment or unemployment statistics.
It's really not all that complicated or strange as you suggest.
It used to be that 'job security' meant that you would work at FoMoCo for all of your life putting that screw in that hole day after day. FoMoCo wouldn't lay you off..etc. But people didn't really have many skills either. Mechanics are a dime a dozen. So are IT people. The difference being, that almost every shop in town has a Network, and needs someone to provide TLC for it. So the shift is becoming that 'job security' means 'good skillset.' A good skillset and you will never have to look long to find a job, and you can constantly be asking for more and more money. Maybe you do get dumped by Xyz, Inc, but Xyzzy will pick you up.
One thing's for sure. This new-fangled internet thing surely won't just 'go away.'
okay. back to the crack pipe.
I'm 36, and I'm still slightly under the average age (I would guess) at my current workplace. Certainly on my programming team here in the flight operations area for a major US airline.
Why? Because the mainframe applications we've developed in-house here over the past 30 years are relatively complex, and it takes a tremendous amount of time to grasp the reasoning behind what is going on. Not in terms of the technology, but in terms of the operational business rules around which the applications were written.
These aren't stupid slow COBOL applications that generate reams financial reports for some pointy hair somewhere. These are the transaction-based Fortran applications that do our aircraft load balancing and optimal takeoff weight/thrust calculations and flight plan generation and real-time flight tracking. Zillions of real-time data feeds between systems. I've been in this position for seven years (first two as a contractor), and I'm only just beginning to get a handle on this stuff.
Even in other areas we tend to have a lot of older people who have been here for 10, 15, or 20 years. I don't know if it's because airlines were early adopters of computer technology and we've just kept people over time, or if it's because of the stability of the company or what. Or maybe it's just an interesting industry to work in.
--
-Rich (OS/2, Linux, Mac, NT, Solaris, FreeBSD, and OS2200 user in Bloomington MN)
Mainframe/UNIX Bit Twiddler and long time Windows/Linux Hobbyist.
The Theorem Theorem: If If, Then Then.
I used to be one of the best employees at my previous company, but I wasn't given wage rises for the following reasons:
;-)
- My hair wasn't as nice as Richards (OK, that's what it fealt like)
- I didn't want to go into management
- They couldn't, because they had to give everyone similar wages
So, I got sick of the BS and went contracting. Never regretted it yet, and earn more than the directors at the previous company.
Am I loyal to my employees? Yes - I employ myself!
Are my employees loyal to me? I hope so ("self - am I loyal to me?")
I think the older generation can also benefit from this newer model - they just have to face facts - the world is changing, you can no longer stay at the same job for the rest of your life. I think it's far more interesting this way.
Matt. Want XML + Apache + Stylesheets? Get AxKit.
OK, here's my rebuttal:
- taxes: I pay my accountant to do that. He does everything for me. Every quarter I send him my invoices (which are printed automatically each week by a StarOffice macro), my reciepts and anything else he needs. In return I get sent pre-paid envelopes which I just stick a cheque in. I actually save money by using an accountant because a) I can spend that time working, and b) he knows all the right forms to save me money.
- Unpredictability: 6 months is a huge over estimate. Perhaps you go for a long time between contracts, but I don't know any contractors (and I know a lot) that are broke, or go hand to mouth.
- Treatment: I just keep my head down, and give as good as I get (in a light hearted way). I actually prefer the treatment I get because I'm not surrounded by political BS.
Perhaps it's a lot different in the US though.
Matt. Want XML + Apache + Stylesheets? Get AxKit.
There is no question that corporate America is changing. It is no longer probable that you will spend your entire life working for one single company. The question is whether or not this is inherently a bad thing. Katz clearly assumes that no one would ever leave their current job except under duress, but (from my experience) much of the current job hopping is voluntary. The chances of getting fired are higher than they were 30 years ago, but there is also less of a stigma placed on those workers who have worked in several different companies.
In fact, in many cases the experience is seen as desirable by employers.
The fact of the matter is that it is hard to complain about the state of the job market (at least in the United States) with the current economy. This is especially true in the computer industry. We have some of the most sought after skills in the country. And it is really the skills that are valuable.
Even if Katz did have a point, what would he propose we do about this "dilemna." Our employers are plotting to screw us, are they? How is that different from how it has always been?
Actually I think it's the right forum. The young'uns are the ones that still have th energy to shake the world. And given how tightly corporations hold on it's going to take quite some shaking.
how to write, too.
The revolution will NOT be televised.
You go man! Completely agree here. My last employer tried to screw me.. so I got a another job.. albet 3000 miles cross the country.. but not only am I makeing a hell of a lot more, they actually treat me very well here. So all it takes is the self confidence and desire to do better and you can. No one is going to stop you.
Some people mentioned that in 20 years I could be out of luck because my field vanishes. Here's an answer for you... continuing education. No one is stoping you from keeping up to date.. or taking an evening class instead of watching monday night football.. in fact most employers encourage and pay for such classes. All it takes is some self motivation.
Anyone who doesn't even try to do better or learn more has no right to whine and complain that they lost their job because their expertise was no longer needed.
Hell I'm 23, I make 70K/year and if I cashed out all the stock I own I'd have $160,000 in cash laying around. So if I keep going at the rate I am.. and I have no plans to slow down.. I could easily have over a $1mil in assets by the time I hit 30. And the most interesting thing is that I'm not the smartest ape in the tree...
-Ex-Nt-User
Ok so I'm single right now and I'm NOT looking for a steady relationship, but I also work 8-5.
I very rarely work more then 9 hours a day. I've worked at my present employer for almost a year now.. and only once was I at work for more then 10 hours and only because it was a serious emergancy. If I finally come to settle down this job would not interfere at all.
Frankly I have never been told I have to work more then 8 hours. But I accept the fact that there will be circumstance under which I will. My previus employer also didn't require me to work more then 8 hours.. they did do something that I didn't appreciate and that's why I left.
The whole 10-12 hour days thing is rediculeous and no one seriously asks that of any employee. (the only people I know that work 12 hour days only work 4 days a week.) You can always leave and you always have the choice of where you work. IMHO the only people that complain about being "stuck" are the ones who don't do anything about it... except complain.
Ok, there is a 1/2 truth to the 10-12 hour thing.. if you work for a start up. (IE 1st 1-2 years) then yes the job will require 10-12 hour days.. but if sucessfull you will also be very rich in the end. That's a risk you must decide on your own.. obviously you don't have to take that particular job.
And truth be told even if I make 100million $$ before I hit 50 I will not just retire and sit around. I enjoy the challange that I get out of work. And frankly I go stirr crazy if I'm NOT working on something.. be it work related or not.
The point I was trying to make is that what Katz was describing is a fabrication. Sure there are companies that will abuse their employees.. but you always have a choice.. and infact in these days you have a SIGNIFIGANTLY better choices.
My dad being in his late 40 is jumping from job to job.. not because he gets fired, but because every few months he gets a better and better offer from a different company. If he likes the oportunity he switches. And according to him he's seen a steady increase in such opportunities.
On a more personal note.. I too came from a computer science backdground (and I've only graduated 3 years ago). I've almost fallen into the "we'll try to hire him for much less then he's worth" trap. As pessemistic as it sounds it's the a companies job to hire you for as little as possible.. and it's your job to be well informed. A typical graduating CS student earns $45K right out of the gate. And there are also various publication that will tell you what you SHOULD be making and where the best opportunities are. The most important thing is to keep up to date and polish out your skills and knowledge as quickly and well as you can. Then find a company that will pay you what you think you deserve. It's not as hard as everyone makes it out to seem. Hell if I did it anyone with a little ambition can too. And that goes regardless of your sex, race or any other possible excuse.
Ex-Nt-User
I understand your concerns. The point is I'm 23! I want to establish myself before I decide to start a family. So my 1st concern is to get into a position where I would be glad to bring another life into this world. I think a lot of people are making the mistake of thinking that they can just get out of school, get a job, get married, and everything else will take care of itself.
Yes, it's harder if you have kids or have a significant other who works.. but the choice is still yours to make. And you CAN'T blame a company for not giving you more money just 'cause you want more. An it's not a companies job to take care of you till you die. Your life and how you live it is your responsibility.
And the other misconception is that a great job leaves no room for a life. I work 8-5. I go Mountain biking every day weather permitting. I go to bars with friends and co-workers alike, among many other things. This is the definition of a great job, getting paid well and having time to enjoy the other aspects of life. I never said that making a lot of money in exchange for not having a life is good; Quite the opposite.
Like I said before.. anyone can do it.. it's a matter of picking your sacrifices. Life isn't supposed to be easy.
Ex-Nt-User
companies are downsizing, governments are downsizing and the corporate work environment is getting desperate.
It's because they have to compete with me, and you. Hackers are the new source of wealth. New software and electronic products as well as the huge number of newly "software enhanced" products are generating a larger and larger percentage of the energy in the world economy.
And we can produce software in a living room for sale world-wide. I can set up a shop on Geocities with a credit card merchant account at Wells Fargo for a less than a $500.00. I can then translate my page into 5 languages at bablefish and sell world wide with no added transaction cost. If I weren't so lazy that is. The only thing that can stop us now is our own remotes. I could do all those things, but I sit here at work making somebody else's next million so I can be assured of a paycheck on the 15th and a convenient co-pay at the doctor's. All because making the money for myself would necessarily cut into my discworld time.
Speaking of which, I just mastered Pragi's Fiery Gaze and Endorphin's Floating Friend and became a 4th Level Wizard! Not to mention finding a way to use the soul commands to cast what appear to be free illusions!
Zircephate
Sages of the Unbroken Circle
Wizard's Guild
Ankh-Morpork
[-- Trust the Monkey --]
In this economy, with the current shortage of IT workers, there is no reason to make $30,000 for 60 hour weeks. As stated in the last issue of
--Gus
If anything, I found this article inspiring. Two years ago I decided to start a company rather than to bitch and complain about my previous employeer. I went from senior executive at a software firm to unemployment. And it feels great!
Since 1997 I managed to sign up some very big companies as my customers, I'm working with the coolest technology, my company is expanding, and the company income increased more than 5 times from 1997 to 1998.
The company is growing faster than I can control it now, and yes, I may employ people. I'd much rather hire contractors because their work ethics tend to be better than permanent employees' (out of self-defense; no performance = no $$). Other people who work with me come in as partners if we identify that our goals are similar. Then we all have a vested interest in making the company succeed.
If you have a chance, check out Ricardo Semler's book Maverick. He explains how to structure your company as an employee-less place in which everyone involved maximizes the benefits of self-interest and self-ownership.
E
http://eugeneciurana.com | http://ciurana.eu
It depends on the company. As hard as it may seem, there are still companies that care as much about thier employees as they do the bottom line. In fact some companies consider thier workers AS part of the bottom line. I for one enjoy my work most of the time (all jobs have thier bad days) and I know that My employer isn't going to chuck me to the wolves. At Least as long as I keep my skills current. Heck! With the boss PAYING for my continuing education and updates to my skills that's not really that much of a chore.
He does have a point though...There are far fewer of those kinds of companies than there should be.
-- Wiccan Army, 13th Airborne Division "We will not fly silently into the night"
I see we still haven't trained Jon to write proper HTML yet. Is it me or are all the closing double quotes not displaying on our browsers?
Other than that a good article, actually. I liked it.
Andrew Oakley - www.aoakley.com
Wow. Finally an article where Katz managed not to use the word "geek". There is hope! :)
Something I always wonder... there are so few older programmers. What does a programmer do when he gets 50? Work on a sheep farm?
You could convert your money to yen and be a millionaire :)
Yup, company loses its help.
Product stalls.
Customers need something more stable.
Switch to Free Software.
Yay.
We are now all effectively independent contractors. That means that one has to think; one can't just mindlessly show up for work and do what someone else tells one to do and expect to be secure in retirement. Just because the post-war generation was guaranteed a rising income despite never learning a single new skill past the age of 25 doesn't mean that such a state ought to persist forever.
Umm, no.
It's a bad idea. Why? Because if you're getting exploited ($30,000 for a 60 hour week? If you're getting $30K, you're a total newbie to the field and it's not worth making you work overtime, you
don't have enough to contribute yet), leave. Don't ask a union to do the job for you, vote with your feet and get another job. If you can't at least get a 5% raise after 6 months of looking around (read "Ask The HeadHunter" for tips on how to look), then maybe you're in the best situation you can find for now.
Still, 30K for 60 hours? Not worth it. At the very least, you should be getting overtime pay for that (making your real salary something more like $35K, which I wouldn't consider too bad to make in the first 1-2 years of an IT career).
My take on unions is that I prefer a system where my skills determine what I make, not the amount of whining me and 50 of my buddies do. I'm just not a union fan, and never will be.
It's a strange world -- let's keep it that way
I couldn't agree more. Look at what Rob is doing; he's out of school and already his own boss (way to go, Rob, wish I would have had the guts and energy back then).
Given that the days of the company being your nurturing parent are over (if they ever really existed except in 50s sitcoms), the next natural development is to band together in groups that *are* going to serve the interests of all involved. Small, tightly-focused collectives.
I think it starts with very small firms (5-10 people) who then band together in consortiums (I'm looking out for contracts, and when I don't want something, let me hand it off to your group instead).
It's becoming more and more of a model. I would totally encourage anyone who really, truly, is frustrated to examine that as an option. You *can* be your own boss, and it's much more healthy mentally than being a corp slave (and knowing it -- nothing saps the will like feeling like a drone).
It's a strange world -- let's keep it that way
Let me send out a disclaimer here: The following post contains vast generalizations, and there certainly are expections. I know this. But nevertheless, I think that what I'm about to say also has a great deal of validity.
:-)
While the book Katz reviews may or may not be an accurate summary of the corporate situation today, it does paint a picture of what could be before long, especially as we 20-somethings become 40-somethings.
When the computer was a new toy, 'techie' people were very special, because it took lots of ingenuity and know-how to make computers go. As a result, technie people were courted, schmoozed, and treated very well, because they were special. You couldn't just pull any guy off of the street to do a techie job.
Then the personal computer happened. With the advent of the personal computer, literally anyone with some spare time and determination could become a 'techie type.' This is a wonderful, empowering thing. The largest reason why I'm proficient with computers is that I was raised with a computer in my house.
But there is one side effect to this - because of the personal computer, more and more techie people are entering the job market, and this trend can only continue and increase. Indeed, by the time I'm 40, I fully expect hordes of young punks to enter the job market knowing more about computers than I will ever know (and that's with me keeping up to date).
And as more and more techno-minded people go out into the workforce, they'll become more and more replacable. Already, to some degree, you can pull someone [young] off of the street and give them a techie job. That saturation of techie people can only increase, and as they become more and more replacable, they'll have to endure harder and harder working conditions, and be treated less and less like people and more and more like cogs. Inevitably, people in techie position will suffer all of the worst parts of capitalism that 'replacable' factory workers have endured for years.
Call me a pinko commie, but under capitalism, as soon as someone is regarded as replacable, they repeatedly get bent over, because they are replacable. Sure, there are good companies that treat people well and don't exploit them, but there are also lots of bad ones.
I'm not so sure if such is the situation now, especially in light of the insanely high demand for techie people in the work force. However, I do see a situation like this evolving in no more than 20 years...maybe even 10. As future generations become more techno-saavy and enter the job market, technical positions will become more exploited and less secure.
Then again, I could be completely on crack, but I don't think so.
Troy
PS. Any typos are really artistic alternate representations of words and sentances.
You do raise some good points, and it could be that merely keeping up-to-date will make us less replacable than we may otherwise be, but I still have some reservations.
:-)
It's not necessarily that young = smart, but one has to admit that an 8-year-old will tend to acquire technical know-how faster than a 30-year-old. Young people just learn faster than older people do.
Well, as time goes on, you will have young people learning more and more advanced technology and a rate much faster than their older counterparts....if for no other reason than the older counterparts tend to have more home responsibilities and cannot devote every waking moment to computers. So, in 10 years, younger people will be entering the work force who could very well have a greater proficiency with a technology than their older counterparts, simply because they grew up with it and had more time to devote to it.
But I don't think it even has to be an issue of highly skilled young people entering the job market. I think that mere market saturation (ultimately because of the personal computer), without regard to proficiency, is enough to make techie people replacable.
Sure, 55-year-old Gill has been a good worker,and he's a smart guy, but we could pull a 23-year-old techno-saavy person off the street (will soon be possible, if not already possible), pay them half of Gill's salary and train them. Sure, experience is important, but not as important to every company as the bottom line.
Just some thoughts
Troy
My company employs around 40 engineers where the median age is 35-40. I am by far the youngest engineer at 24. Perhaps this is because I work on kernel level code or perhaps the average New England SE is older than the average SE on the west coast.
Waaaaay of topic.
Assume everything Jon Katz says is true. Then what? Go back to big hierarchical companies like IBM, Digital, and Wang? Have old farts that drive Buicks and have no clue as your boss? Have a quota of old farts on staff? And what are all these old farts doing clogging up the golf courses when the job market is so tight? Are careers improved by stability? Are "flight attendants" happier than stewardesses were, now that they can stay in theur jobs until they get old, bitter, and snippy about their job being a profession?
I wrote parts of this stuff
I also make a living from contract work and agree that it kicks sand in the face of regular employment. It's true that you lose some degree of predictability and certainty that its present in regular employment; but as Katz points out this security is shrinking and there comes a point where it is no longer rational to say 'no' to a doubling of salary for an increasingly slender comfort blanket
:) )
The short term nature of most contracts can actually work in your favour: if you are any good then your employer does not want to lose you. Once you have a record of quality you can say 'no' to toilet-cleaning work that often tries to piggyback on what was explicitly agreed because both you and your employer know you can always move on to something else.
By the way, the best articles I have read on Slashdot have been on this subject: it seems to bring out the best in the posters because it is something we all have some experience of (and is very close to our hearts
I agree with all your points. You basically have to incorporate (here in the UK, become a Limited Company) and regard yourself as a corporation that just happens to have one employee. Along with that goes all the grief of keeping receipts, issuing invoices, liasing with an accountant and so on. Goes with the territory.
On the unpredictability, I have been lucky and haven't hit any quiet patches; but you are right, you have to have money in the bank first because your paycheck can no longer be relied upon. This has downstream effects such as mortgage lenders raising an eyebrow: however, again in my experience, once you show them your accounts, and they see you make good money then they're all smiles.
On the NT invasion, I have been programming in C++ & MFC on NT for the last three years or so and only recently spent time with Linux, which was a revelation in several departments (mainly to do with how much of Win32 & NT itself MS had stolen from Unix, and yet munged up or made less capable). I have been looking at X programming recently (another revelation to run GUI processes on another box with all IO on the one you're sitting at) but I fear - and this is the point - that any new API I learn will be dust sooner rather than later. I see I could readily learn the X APIs, seeing as they are similar in intent to the Windows SDK APIs, but is it worth it? There's the tk way of doing things one could worship, too. But it occurred to me maybe we are entering a time of the Death of APIs where everything is written in Java and the rendering of the App - and which OS is being used - is a detail.
Seems to me that companies might rather hire contract work by independants than actually hire people and have to pay benefits, etc...
It's easy to deride this as 'socialist propaganda' when you're not likely to be affected by it. The pseudo-libertarians need to get over the idea that anytime a progressive mentions phrases like 'unequal distribution of wealth' we're secretly wishing for government thugs to come and take all the money from the rich and give it to us. The simple fact is that if your economic system is designed to move money toward the top, you DO end up with a class structure, and the division between the top and the bottom WILL get more pronounced. You don't need to be a "socialist" to see this, folks, you just need to do the math.
On this specific topic, it's easy to make fun of it if you're 20 or 21. When you're 31, it's not so funny. If you're 40, it could really be terrifying. This "ageism" phenomena has been reported pretty widely by the mainstream media, who are, on the whole, not screaming flower children. (Believing that the news divisions of General Electric, Westinghouse and Disney are markedly anti-corporate requires the aid of some pretty serious hallucinogens.) This is not something Jon Katz is just making up--and it's something that should probably concern this audience. The question shouldn't be "is he right" or "is Slashdot the right place for this," but "what can we do to change this?"
Beanie Babies, Furbies, $30K+ SUV. Gee, I wonder why nobody has any money. I guess I could complain about my income, but it is much better than the minimum wage I started at years ago. It is also better than the pay I earned while working an "undesirable" job while paying for and attending college. Hmmm. Maybe I was not content with my job or my income and did something about it?
I like my job. My techno boss gave me a week off with pay last September when my dad died. My last few employers would not have even considered it. That is why they are former employers.
I'm not rich. I may never be rich. But if I'm never rich, it is my own fault. (I don't save $$$ worth a damn.) I'm not gonna blame my employer, when I was the one who chose employment. Sometimes work is actually, well...work!
I have to disagree with you here -- if /. is only younger males then it *should* get this sort of thing.
A younger male myself (24), my reaction was "Yeah, there's probably some truth to that, but so what -- what's new?" Personaly, I don't think things are as bad as Katz is saying, and I also think that much of what is bad isn't so much systemic as it is a result of the fact that we're going through a period of change. I get frustrated sometimes, but I also got a relatively nice job (try carrying hod -- now there's an unpleasant job) by studying philosophy in college. That's quite a trick, if you want my opinion.
But I realize that my experience in the job market is limited, and if you have a different perspective, I'd like to hear it, and hear why you feel that way, don't just tell us we're being arrogant.
Only our previous assumptions ABOUT work are being destroyed.
Some get bowled over in the process, but this is true in ANY form of social change.
**>>BELCH
I think very few of us (20/30-something) have taken the idea of Social Security seriously for a long time. I pay my SS now soley in the hopes that it will benefit my parents someday, but with no illusions that it will ever help me directly. Today most folks are already acting around this issue, with 401k, self-employment, continuing education and other investments in their own futures.
Rather than the tired and oppressive trade union perspective (which starts out for the common good, but rapidly evolves into a purely self-seeking corporate entity) I think we'll see more a return of guilds (places where tradespeople can network, socialize and upgrade their skills) and co-operatives (healthcare, childcare, educational, etc.).
**>>BELCH
Ok... this article is not very well done and goes against some of the principles by which I live my life.
"Do you like your job?"
I wouldn't be here if I didn't.
"Do you trust the people you work for?"
I trust them to make decisions to make the business successful... That's there only job! If I'm no longer deemed "useful" then that's *their* loss, but it doesn't matter to me!
"Do you feel needed and valued at work?"
I'm not in it to feel "needed or valued". Just the satisfaction of *knowing* I've done a good job is good enough for me!
"Are you loyal to the company you work for?"
Loyalty has nothing to do with it. I feel that I'm doing pretty cool work right now. If I get sick of it, either my company will provide me a way to do other work, or I'll look elsewhere!
"Is it loyal to you?"
Don't care!
"When the time comes, do you count on your employer to take care of and protect you?"
I neither expect or want this! I have the freedom to leave the company any time I choose. This works the other way as well.... *If* I become "dead weight", I'd expect any decent company to dump me!
I cannot foresee a time in my life when I won't have passion for the job that I'm doing and, if that time comes, I'll look elsewhere to regain it!!!
I'll admit your points are "interesting", but they're not founded in the way things should work!
Cheers,
- Hawkeye
"...The smart and lazy ones I make my commanders." - Erwin Rommel
A lot of the posts here are form the technical elite. I include myself among those. The people who went out and got the technical education and have the skills that, due to demand, give us more power over our employers than most. We are the ones benefitting from the current situation.
Should we feel guilty about that? Hell no.
Should we be aware of what is happening to those not as fortunate to be where we are? Hell yes.
That could be us someday. Corporations realize we have them by the short and hairies right now. Why do you think there is this pursuit of increasing the Visas for technical workers? Why do corporations want more technically trained people out of colleges. Yes, they can't fill jobs, but on top of that they have to pay too much in order to fill them. If there were 1.2 people for every job, do you think they would be paying 23 year olds $70K per year. The highly skilled technical worker should never take his good fortune for granted. It can be taken away before you know it.
We happen to have a passion for an area of expertise that is greatly in demand right now. As far as I can tell, I can lie down on a street corner right now with a sign that says "Java" on my chest, and people would be rushing to offer me 75K a year jobs.
Lets look at my girlfriend now, who has just as much education as I do, at a better school. I also think she is the smarter of the two of us. Unfortunately, her passion and talent is for illustration (and she's quite good at it). She has to scrape and scrabble to make a third of what I do. Fair?
I supposed the Randites might suggest that it is her own damn fault for choosing a career in a more glutted, less (currently) valued field. But how many of us chose our field for the money it pays? Surely not the average Slashdot reader, who has a real passion for the technology with which they work and play.
Let's remember the folks who are getting chewed up and spat out of the gears of the "New Economy" today, or whose gonna be there for us when the great wheel turns?
one more datapoint: some men aren't working because women in their positions get paid less.
several years ago i heard a report on npr about companies that were laying off older men (high pay) and promoting women to fill their place (lower pay).
i'm male, and supporting equal pay for equal work suddenly seem like it's in my own self interest, doesn't it? amazing how many things that "aren't in my self interest" actually are...
US Citizen living abroad? Register to vote!
I've said it before on /. and I'll say it again, we need to get organized. If we accept the conditions do nothing, then we deserve what we get. I read about a group of workers, at Microsoft of all places, that are forming a pseudo-union in Wired magazine.
And cut the crap, we aren't "professionals" the way doctors and lawyers are professionals, they don't work 60 hours a week for $30,000. We're workers, just like factory hands, and we need to face up to the problems that many in our field are going through.
-Ben
bensmith@biz1.net
Katz actually wrote something short, non-repetitious, and good. Maybe the wacko's are right about the world coming to an end.
I see even classic Slashdot is now pretty much unusable on dial up anymore.
How old is Mr. Katz? Do you KNOW he's a Gen X'er? Do you know the author of this book is a Gen X'er? How many 21 year olds do you know who are millionaires? Do you usually typecast people like that, or were you just cranky this morning.
For the record, I'm 27 and I'll never be a millionaire for as long as I live.
Christopher B. Wright
Eviscerati.Org: All Hail the Eviscerati
So, how's the Linux install coming along, eh Jon?
;)
An article on how much "work sucks" targeted at a demo making a lot of money doing something they love? Uh, work doesn't suck for me, dude.
However, I do understand the plight of older folks and hack journalists. But, still - does work suck? No way - and even for the old folks life in the '90s could (and has been) a hell of a lot worse. We live in affluent times. People on welfare have color TVs and VCRs, for crying out loud. Homeless people are obviously an exception, but we're not discussing them.
Even if work does suck, it's not supposed to be easy. That's why it's called "work". If you can't hack it, move to a different job, start your own business, or learn some new skills.
I know it can be tough. My wife does marketing for tv shows and was the victim of layoffs a couple of times because of age and seniority. After fruitlessly searching for a few months she decided to change careers. And lo and behold, her job prospects increased immediately. Sure, the thrashing around sucked, but once you realize that your current career is a dead end you have to do something about it.
People throughout the ages endlessly complain about things getting worse. Our morals are worse, crime is worse, kids these days, the music they play...blah blah blah. I admit that things are going particularly well for me so I am biased (although I'm not going to be a millionaire any time soon) but one way or the other LIFE/WORK IS NOT GETTING WORSE. If you think it is GET OFF YOUR ASS AND DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT. There are plenty of ways to make money if you're smart and ambitious, no matter what your age. Even if you're a blithering idiot you can make the big time if you're ambitious. One look at the average manager/executive/pr hack should confirm this for you.
Whining about the system changes nothing. You have wasted time and energy better spent job hunting.
Yeah, dude, like me and some friends back in the sixties, man, we used to get high and talk about the pigs man, like it was all clear that capitalism was dying, the socialist utopia was just ahead in the seventies dude, I like sold all my possessions and stuff. Now I got married and some kids and stuff and I got a job working for the pigs, but like soon capitalism really will die man, like it's the millennium and stuff, fight the power dude! keep on smoking!!!
We need a better name... UITW doesn't exactly roll off the tounge. ;)
However, I think something like this is going to be required.. we should learn from the unions though and avoid the problems they caused for themselves if you want to make it work well.
Travis
As far as I know, there is no global shortage of food. If I manage to get more food than the average person, it's at no one's expense.
logan
Managers take over companies in order to obtain greater profitability? Gee, that's a surprise. I would hope that my employer is in the business for the money, else where do I expect my paycheck to come from? Why are you so upset that corporations are becoming faster, more efficient, and better at survival?
If anything the "fault" lies with younger workers that are more willing to work harder. If they think they are unappreciated by their employers, perhaps they shouldn't continue to work for them. Certainly one can find better pay and more security with a company that finds his or her skills necessary rather than working where one's skills aren't necessary. If you're miserable at work, quit. You can find a job you'll excel at and enjoy while others that excel at and enjoy your former job can take your place. If everyone is complaining about younger workers being too malleable and thus overworkable, why not take your own advice, stop whining about how your job sucks and quit. Or demand higher wages, or whatever it is that would make your job suck at a level acceptable for the amount of money you receive and time and effort you spend.
logan
You read, huh? Show me where. Call me "heartless." I don't care. Why? Several reasons.
- I'm not stealing food from anyone
- I could never eat enough food to cause anyone to starve due to a shortage of food
- I've never gone out of my way to try to hold back any society from developing to the point where it can supply itself
- I've never had any children I was incapable of feeding
I doubt you could give me a single compelling reason why I should care. Why do people insist on piling guilt upon those that dream of or achieve success? Because of their own failures? I guess that's just one of those mysteries it's not worth wasting your time thinking about.logan
Keerist on a keerutch. What is your attention span? Go to any Detroit worker nowadyas OR 10, 20,50 years ago -- think they enjoyed their jobs?
Fun is what you make it. Work is what you make it. I could double my salary by working in Silicon Valley but I choose not to.
And Katz -- do you enjoy this job you have, of writing silly articles devoid of meaning?
This article is about as useful as edible underwear that's been worn for 3 months straight.
--
Infuriate left and right
I think anachronistic, chic and cliched drivel is better than sophomoric drivel. It's something to strive for.
jonkatz@slashdot.org
The number of posts here and my e-mail already undermines the idea that this is the wrong forum. Work affects the young as well as the old, as do all of the issues mentioned above. Aging is only one of the things Sennett writes about..he writes about the nature of work as well.
I also think it's patronizing to people on
jonkatz@slashdot.org
>Hi Jon -- :-)
>
>It's me, Derek from fray. Hi!
>
>I just wanted to let me know how much I liked your piece in slashdot about
>work. It's nice to still see you out there in the trenches.
>
>fwiw, here are a few web resources on the subject:
>
>http://fray.com/work/
>collected writings about work fron the fray
>
>http://kvetch.com/work/
>user posted complaints about work
>
>http://www.unamerican.com/core/fuckwork/
>srini is giving away 5 million "fuck work" stickers
>
>http://www.fucker.com/fuckers/we_work_for/
>fucker.com presents boss horror stories
>
>Keep in making trouble!
>
>-- Derek
>
>
jonkatz@slashdot.org
I've read articles with the same basic thrust several times in the last few months. Maybe I've just been lucky, but my experience has been quite the opposite.
I'm 43, and I have never felt more in demand. The company I work for seems to value me pretty highly---I make more in a month than my father ever did in a year. We're not only not laying anyone off, but working very hard to hire people faster. (There's a $5000 reward for a referral that pans out---send me resumes!) If times do get hard, I will probably talk to one of the head hunters who call me about once a week with "great opportunities." My management cares about my happiness. I don't have any illusion that this is pure altruism, but turnover is expensive and they know it. My only real concern with work is that there is a steady pressure to move from project leader into management, and I'm not quite ready to make that move.
Several of the statistics given by Katz---e.g., the drop in number of men aged 55-64 who work---can be interpreted in several ways. It may be that a lot more men aged 55 can afford to retire than in the past. Personally, I plan to be on-line, wirelessly, from a sailboat in the Caribbean before I get that old.
I think there is a nugget of truth in Katz's article, though. The lesson to take away is, Don't Become Inflexible. In particular, make sure you don't spend a decade working on something that has no future. Especially an internal, proprietary technology. Eventually, your company is going to wake up and realize that it has to go, and you will be in trouble.
A hundred years ago? It's quite likely that some overworked child, or maybe a political prisoner in China, made at least some of the clothes you are wearing. We are reverting to the 19th century and the sweatshop conditions that prevailed then.
"21 year-olds are becoming millionaires"? Yeah, right, about 0.0001% of 21-year-olds.
If you have good marketable skills, good for you. Have you given any thought to how you will be doing twenty years from now? Or do you think that you'll become a millionaire and retire?
Think you're going to make a lot of money as a programmer? Why, when there are millions of skilled programmers in India or Russia that'll work for $10K a year and a network infrastructure that makes it easy to move the work there?
I'm doing very well, thank you very much. But I'm not so self-centered or arrogant as to think that there is no reason for concern.
You're talking a deadend job that any normal person can pick up within a week and master within a few months. Is it going to be a career? Of course not! How can you ask for continued raises when you max out what you can do within the first year?
The kinds of positions you're talking about are unstable because the standards are so low.
The solution is to find a job that challenges you and uses all of your abilities! You'll be far better paid, and HAPPIER as well!
Jon
All opinions expressed herein are my own, and not those of my employers, who are appalled.
Pro Bono work = work that lawyers are willing to do for free because it's in a good cause.
Find a lawyer to work for you pro bono might be hard, though, depending on your circumstances. It helps to be an obvious charity, and poor besides.
Jon
All opinions expressed herein are my own, and not those of my employers, who are appalled.
Translation: "You know, the problem with the workplace today is that I'M not in charge!"
I see any attempt to form a union in my work field as a threat to my freedom to find a job for myself and succeed on my own talents and merits.
I don't want anything to do with a union, and I will vigorously oppose any attempts to unionize my workplace. Count me in as your loyal opposition.
All opinions expressed herein are my own, and not those of my employers, who are appalled.
The lamer who wrote the book Jon is obsessing about is attached to the London School of Economics, well-known not for clear thinking about economics but for recycling tired socialist bullshit attacks on capitalism. What these idiots always overlook is that if things were as bad as they say they are the market would take corrective action; and the implicit subtext is always that society (read government) should do something about the disgusting state the world is in. When was the last time the government did something that made people's lives better? (as opposed to politician's lives better)
Typical Gen X whining. A hundred years ago four year-old children worked to death in mines. Today 21 year-olds are becoming millionaires. Quit whining and admit it that you're just projecting your own failure.
Even if you wanted to pour out the leftist workers-are-getting-screwed drivel, it was chic two years ago (a la William Greider and others). Now its just cliched.
wow, impressive use of the boldface tag.
by saying it was cliched, i wasn't implying that it was wrong, but more to the point, we should recognize that Katz essentially is a hack. i haven't seen one really noteworthy piece of writing by him in this forum. he tends to basically rewrite others' ideas and try to look insightful in the process.
> Do you really think this is accurate?
:)
Not to be too blunt, but you don't have a family to support and relate with, do you? If you did, you wouldn't be asking this question. It takes quite a bit of time and effort...I'm just lucky I get to learn everything I want at work.
WORK RULES!
Sure, we can't count on the warm fuzzies from
our employers. No loss. Build your own support network of old friends and inexpensive pasttimes. Work less. Enjoy life!
The workplace never should have been "home" in the first place. More accurately, if we can get our souls fulfilled there, fine; but if not, just look somewhere else. There's plenty going on in this life beyond work and technology.
"If you're not passionate about your operating system, you're married to the wrong one."
I agree. If you have a marketable skill, market it. If you have an idea, plan, design, implement, market, sell. Simple in theory, difficult in practice. So let's all get to work... for our selves.
These are like unions only better because they have all the benefits of a union, plus enormously strong lobbies. The real power of a professional organization is collecting dues and lobbying congress for the mutual interests of the group. If you don't form such a thing, you will be stuck with MS doing all the lobbying... American Bar Association and American Medical Association are the two most powerful lobbies following only by tabacco. There are many more IT professionals and many make comparable salaries to many doctors or lawyers. Benefits include insurance, accreditation of schools, and standardization of skill level through examination. Collect dues, and the lobby power will come. Why do you think Y2K suits don't have a maximum damages bar? ABA lobbied against it and it died. Cryptography restrictions could be next if there were such a lobby. Imagine the services that could be sold if the US let up on that?
While a little over obvious in content, and rambling within normal expectations this article is not NEWS.
Put it on the editorial page.
Sheesh... isn't anything you post news?
..
. * Did aliens forget to remove your anal probe?
Not all jobs are doomed to that future. I prefer working at small companies precisely becuase of the greater appreciation and autonomity I find there. (among other reasons)
Also, the lean and mean sword cuts both ways. Nowadays most corprate drones wouldn;t think twice before jumping ship to a nicer opportunity if the chance came along. Employees are also much less inclined by loyalty to stay at a job.
Leftists, oh what a nasty word to call a person. What is going on is scary. It's true that the vast majority of people think that old people cant work as well as young people, and the new culture that is arising in US is favouring those 20-somethings that are willing to give up their social life, rather than the 35+ who have stayed the course and have experience, with problem solving, and life in general.
The new Culture's disrespect for Aged people for their vastly superiour experience is appalling. Being old is supposed to signify senility, being old-fashioned, conservative. The ageing in this country today desparately try to look and act young (plastic surgery, hair growth pills, viagra, etc.). While the young might have energy and vitality to do the grunt work, they need the experience of the aged to lead them.
FOr those of you who tell katz to "go back to russia you leftist", you are all naive fools. You will most defenitely change your policy when you find out that Social Security isnt going to pay shit for you when you retire, when you find out that you're $5K in debt with credit cards, when your kids think you're some senile old fool, and when nobody wants to hire you because you've got wrinkles on your face and your hair is going gray. You cant be young computer techies forever, what are you going to be? I can tell you that right now, you'll be a "has-been".
"He used to be a programmer"
-"What is he now?"
"Who the hell gives a shit? he's old"
You smug self-satisfied techies will eat your words.
Katz is cool.
and no, I'm not old, I'm 17
-Laxitive
Just a thought:
Development of UNIX began during what the article refers to as the golden age. Over time it became the rock-solid operating system which served as the conceptual basis for Linux. UNIX (and by derivation, Linux)are products of that earlier mentality. Everything I've heard about Microsoft leads me to believe it is representative of the current system as described in the article.
It takes patience and time to work the bugs out of a system. Knowing that you may still be working on the same product 5-10 years from now gives you a longer time-horizon and makes you more willing to do a thorough job, even on a big project. Patience, focus and attention to detail are as necessary to the development equation as are vision and drive. Nobody starts out with all of these qualities. It takes time to fill in the gaps. There's an awful lot of software out there that would be great if it actually did what it was intended to do, but was never finished because people were called on to the next project.
Leftists have been saying this crap since the Industrial Revolution. They have always told us that workers are "alienated" from their jobs, that we are pawns of the "super-rich," that corporations are "inhuman" and so forth.
This article is the result of a monolithic view of the American workplace, what Drew Carey calls the "Shiity Jobs" phenomenon. There's all this nostalgia for the fifties, when `everyone had 9-5 jobs pushing papers from the right side of their desks to the left.
It is particularily ludicrous to bemoan early retirement as some kind of inhumane punishment. If a corporation lays you off, you are free to seek another job. If you cannot get one, perhaps you should go back to school, and develop your skills. Companies in today's economy cannot afford to pass up skilled workers, no matter what their skills. This gives skilled workers an enourmous amount of freedom.
Even the poor can move up in the world faster than they ever could before. For 1000 bucks, one can buy a computer and some books, and learn Java, html, or whatever, and get a job doing IT stuff. Never before has knowledge been so cheap and readily accessable.
Most of that 4% is what is called "structural unemployment:" people who are between jobs, seasonal employment, people who just graduated, etc. If you look at the number of people who are looking for jobs and actually can't find them, that number is much lower.
I still don't see why the college kid has an unfair advantage, or what should be done about it. It may be true that college kids are willing to work for less money, but it seems to me that that simply means that the older worker is overpaid. Now I can sypathize with him, and I'm sure his family is important, but his company pays him because he does valuable work, not because he has a family to support. So although it is certainly tragic when the older worker is laid off, it would be equally unfair to force the college kid not to enter the field, or to subsidize him, or just about any other remedy I can think of.
.edu address & get in the real world, your perspective will change."
About going back to school, there are lots of options besides going back to a full-time, four year college. There are night classes, there are self-taught programs, there are web sites, tutorials, textbooks, and so forth. And probably the best way to keep your skills up to date is to make sure that you are doing something that is new and interesting. That way you are learning new skills and getting payed for it.
I guess my point is that life has problems, but the world is not coming to an end, and our families are not all about to starve. Making living takes more than showing up for work 8 hours a day. It means making sure that you are earning your paycheck, and that therefore your employer will not want to lay you off. If that includes putting in an extra few hours to learn new skills or changing jobs to keep your skills fresh, so be it. How you manage to support yourself and your family is and should be your responsibility. No one else should be forced to do it for you.
About the poor worker, I am maybe a bit naive about how hard it is to move up in the world. But I have barely more than a high school deploma, and I can already get a job for $8/hour without too much trouble. For a single person working 60 hours a week, that is $25k/year, which is plenty to support oneself on. So you can easily save $1000 over the course of a year or two.
Obviously, once you have a family, $25k is not so much money, but even then you often have both parents working, in which case you can still save some. And a couple who has trouble making ends meet should maybe work on getting a better job before having kids. Obviously that doesn't happen sometimes, but still, I think it is true that many poor people have the opportunity to improve their conditions if they work at it.
As for using skills once one has them, it is certainly true that no one is going to get a high-paying IT job on the strength of having read a Java book, but, for example, they can set up a web site to show off their skills, and/or get a simple data-entry job or something. The point is that with a little perseverence one can get a job in the IT field without a 4-year degree.
"Once you loose that
I realize that it might. I hope it doesn't.
I am all for freedom of speach and all that crap, but I'd rather have /. trim all the fat and pointless comments. If not, all /. will become is a another usenet disaster.
Workers of the work unite!
The lumber industry will someday run out of trees
I bloody well hope not! Trees are what is known as a *renewable* resource. You might even say they grow on trees.
I'm sick of scarcity economics. Software doesn't cost a *thing* to replicate, and since tree-genes are self-replicating too, all you need is soil, air, sunlight & water to make more trees.
The reason 3rd-world economies do not belong to the citizens of 3rd-world nations is twofold:
One, the capitalists and governments of wealthier nations made it that way by military force and the drug trade, and kept it that way by military force and the drug trade, and protectionist duties, boycotts, capital flight and by appropriating resources with "hard currency".
Two, capitalists and capitalist governments never quite got the point of capitalist economic analysis, that freedom helps *people*, not just capitalists, to create wealth. Poor people are discriminated against on the grounds that they are poor, which is what keeps them that way. Some, in the more "free" countries, with insight and industry and good luck, can get rich. Most continue to live hand-to-mouth for generations.
Banks have traditionally treated poor people as a bad risk. But, if a bank chooses to work *with* its debtors, it can (at some cost) help even the poorest of them to make money -- to break the poverty cycle. Credit is a bridge to the other side of the world -- the end of poverty.
Many, many westerners donate money to charity without expecting anything (except their tax) back in exchange. Since charities are not the government and don't force you to pay them, this is seen as a "free market" deal. But charity is often worse than welfare when it comes to creating dependents. Responsible investment, OTOH, can lead to empowerment of millions of individuals, and you can expect to reap modest financial rewards as well as to feel good.
The biggest revelation to me since I have discovered microcredit is that it has been the segregation of the world's economy into countries which has kept markets non-free for so long. While globalisation is usually seen by environmentalists and socialists as a negative change for the world, it is the most important precondition for income equalisation between countries -- for as long as smug wealthy people can congratulate themselves for living in a free market, they can continue to blame other people's misery on other people's governments, instead of helping to fix it.
Regulation and/or taxation of international capital movements by the UN (or equivalent body) would end the nightmare of capital flight which compels 3rd-world governments to toe the capitalist line (i.e., permit the rape of their own countries) on pain of instant depression; uniform currency would end currency speculation.
However as long as the US remains in the hands of Democrats and Republicans with their big guns, big dicks and oil stocks, minerals will be more important than people and the profits from stealing them will be more important than the profits from allowing individuals to make their own way in the world.
Corporations are faced with tough choices to stay alive sometimes. Sometimes downsizing is the only way to stay competive; if you don't stay competitive, everyone loses their job.
if(!company) !job;
Given such a tough choice, offering early retirement to the older folks seems to be a far friendlier option than firing across the board.
I also think that concerns over the older generations unwillingness or inability to adapt and grow is legitimate. However, I don't believe this trend will continue into our old age, because it's not about age, it's about the era those folks grew up in. Let's face it, there is a large group of people who don't want to, or can't, change and develop themselves (and are sometimes downright lazy) not because they are old, but because that's the way the world once was.
IMHO
----
"Oh, bother," said Pooh, as he hid Piglet's mangled corpse.
How can drivel like this (Richard Sennet) still get published here in the USA where unemployment is less than 4 percent last I heard -- the lowest ever?
----
"Oh, bother," said Pooh, as he hid Piglet's mangled corpse.
I was expecting this reply. I don't want anyone to be unemployed either. My point is that the artical and the book compare today's circumstances to sometime when they were apparently better. As someone said in an earlier post: "when was this Golden Age?"
keel
----
"Oh, bother," said Pooh, as he hid Piglet's mangled corpse.
If you're doing what you really want to do in life, you will want to excell at it.
People who are unhappy with their choices are quick to blame others for their unhappiness.
----
"Oh, bother," said Pooh, as he hid Piglet's mangled corpse.
I tend to disagree, although I haven't been in the contracting realm for long. Certainly you have taxes to worry about, but that's one of the reasons for having an accountant. If you so choose, he/she can handle all of that stuff. You just end up paying a bit more for the service. Certainly if you don't feel you have time to take care of it, get the accountant to. It is, after all, what they're trained for :)
:)
The other thing is, one of the reasons I got into contracting is because I was tired of living hand-to-mouth - I want to be able to live comfortably and buy a new toy every so often. Doubling my effective income will certainly help with that.
I'd say do it if you can - job security these days is only marginally better if you're a permanent employee, and you get substantially less remuneration for your efforts.
One thing I'd add, though, is to have someone around who knows the ins and outs of the whole thing - my father's been contracting for over a decade now, and so I have someone to get the handy hints from
Simes.
--
Don't imitate. Enervate.
I've come through several extemely large IS shops, and I have to agree with the author. Companies care very little for the welfare of the employees. The 'dilbertizing' of the workplace seems to be especially rampant at larger companies with lots of fat in management. As a DBA, I'm almost always among the higher paid folks in most departments, but anyone who doesn't see the end of the line is blind. If they didn't need me, I'd be kicked to the side in favor of the good ole boy network. And sure, you can leave one pit for another, but there goes retirement, benefits, and any hope of long term job satisfaction. The 'I can leave if I want' attitude adopted by some of the younger programmers has caused a whole new type of slack which reflects in our (collectively) software and companies. Ya'll claim to loath Microsoft so much, but a big reason for its flaws are in the people who work in the industry and in Redmond. Consultants are great, but become part of the problem when they're underqualified and overpaid. There is no easy solution, but the problem is definitely growing...
What's sad is what happens when the shinyness wears off. The would be overachievers learn the basics of Oracle or other sophisticated systems and then sell themselves as true professionals. Then, one day, the system locks and the golden boy can't unf*ck it, leaving the company in a real rut. I watched many a cocky freak get led to his car by security guards after finding out what his boss's feelings towards him REALLY were. A thing to remember is that if you are aggressive and 'get other people's jobs', your boss is almost always going to make sure that you're never going to be a threat to him ;)
why in the world would you want to form such a union. look around, a union would only restrict who you work for and where you work and for how much. most unions eventually endup in bed with the employers anyhow - and the union heads end up making a career out of sucking money from your paycheck (you must pay union dues). not only do the union leaders make a living off of you, but they also dictate which political causes will be supported and give those causes YOUR money regardless of your opinion. And after all that you must put into it, the union will do very little for you, except make you go on strike and give you 50lbs of rice and beans every two weeks when you're on strike (do you really want the possibility of a strike?!). I have 3 personal freinds that belong to 3 different unions, all three have shared the same story above. The last thing the tech industry needs is a union, it would be bad for both the worker and the industry. I can promise you, if such a union where ever created, you would have to take their training and you would have very little vertical or horizontal mobility and the only voice you would have would be that of the union leaders. NO THANKS...I would rather control my own life. If you aren't capable enough to defend your self from your employeer (which may mean leaving), then maybe you should get a job in any number of the other non-professional fields that have unions.
\forall code \in C, \frac{\Delta readability(code)}{\Delta t} < 0
I think Jon has some valid points here. Points that I can't really understand as I am nowhere near his new "retirement" age of 55.
/. would show why so many of these posters don't understand what he's talking about.
I think a poll of the average age around
Frank
I'm not complaining.
After reading some of the posts here, I think that those who are bashing Katz' work are missing his point about the lowering of the retirement age because we are all at least 10 - 15 years away from retirement and we think we'll be rich by the time we're 50 anyway. A stance that is very short sighted.
Keynesian economics were successful up until the Vietnam War/Nixon era. Since then the wonderful Republican Party has basically fucked our country.
Well if companies were using Linux instead of NT then the older employees could continue to use their existing Unix skills without any problem! Unfortunately it is all about pretty pictures and shiny boxes, so NT is going to keep owning us for quite some time.
*waits for the objectivists and libertarian party members to flame him*
"Some ignorant oaf made a comment...This has now mysteriously disappeared"
It's not censorship; the replies are still there. There's no mystery - the only thing that's been done is filtering. The replies in question were deemed to have no useful content and their score was reduced to -1. *You* have decided to only view articles with a score of at least 0, thus if anybody is censoring articles, it's *you*.
Try clicking on the " Down One" at the bottom of the article or pages.
When was this golden age that the present day keeps getting compared to?
As far as I know there was only about a generation after WWII that enjoyed life-long employment and insanely bloated benefits.
Yes, compared to this generation our workplace is dishearteningly cutt-throat. But that generation rode an unsustainable bubble. Compared to the rest of recorded history we today are much better off in our working lives.
The pendulum will swing the other way. There are inneficiencies and inequities in the current workplace. These provide opportunities for entrepreneurs.
Start a company Jon. Hire all those perfectly good, displaced, middle aged workers, and if they are as good as you say they are, you'll be eating those dirty old capitalist's lunch.
-josh
pro bono dont happen that often, my dad is a lawyer [i respect the profession] and i dont think my dad does pro bono work. lawyers work for money and thats why they make their clients pay them. which of all of you program for a primary job and do it for free? you need to feed your family.
"Are you satisfied with fucking?" - Dave Matthews from "Halloween"
I don't know if it's all a matter of time though. I think it's also a matter of geography. Now that we are involved in a new "global economy", we might have history repeating itself all over again. These "symptoms" Katz observerves are probably a result of an immature global economy. Now that shoe companies have foreign workers (instead of domestic) slaving away in factories for pennies because it's the most efficient way to operate. It'll only be time before those workers form something like a Union.
Well the situation is barely the same in france...
Every business is pushing hard on the governement to forget about wellfare system and go to a full market society... (good or not?)
Well the position of the technical worker is the same as explained in the editorial. More over bosses tend to forget that techies make their companies prosper and consider them as "maleable workers".
I'm not it to judge it but the wellfare system in france is going away...
Well all this raises another problem, do you really want to give up some of your life (personnal, familly and so on) for a better paid job ? i think that wage and quality of a job are linked... As there is jobs now in the tech business we should not bother too much about being oppressed :)
:))) As there is employment "we" can all make this kind of choices...
FYI: i'm considering leaving an oppressing (but well paid) job do program the linux apps i want and play music
I'm 32 years old, born 1966 in Canada (GenX by official demographic lingo in Canada means being born between 1960-1966), and just had my first kid. Before then I actually had all kinds of time to learn new languages, screw around with hardware and operating systems. Now, more and more I have less time to keep up to date, and must spend more time making money (and not studying) to pay for all those bills (kids cost $$$$). The result of this after 20 years will almost certainly be either:
1. I seem to be smart, but I'm divorced.
2. I seem to be out-of-date, but I'm happy.
I plan on being #2. I hope to be experienced enough to manage projects and not be worried about the little details; or to be rich enough to retire.
As for the entire degradation-of-the-workplace issue: It has gone downhill. Whatever may be said about how bad it was 50-100 years ago, I like to think that we should be striving to improve our lives, and not make them worse in the name of efficiency. Indeed, there's a lot of evidence sugggesting that the new employer work ethic works contrary to efficiency. Certainly my personal experiences back that. My last job (hopefully my last - I'm self-employed) was straight out of Dilbert. I was paid poorly, lied to, coerced to work 10-30 (sometimes 40) extra, unpaid hours each week, and then labelled as disloyal for job hunting - despite being called 'one of the best' etc...
A large study I happened a few years ago found that 4 out 5 companies that attempt to become lean and mean only to end up thin and neurotic, staffed by employees who are hungry and angry.
Problem is, it's a trend of apparent necessity. Since Company A does it, so must company B, and so on. My way out was to leave, and to name MY price.
Basically, in a free market economy, it's every person/organization for themselves. I'm sure you know this. However, if you are tired of companies putting the bottom line ahead of everything else, then you should ask yourself a question: do you put the bottom line above everything else? Most people would immediately quit a job if they had to take a large pay cut, and simply find another. Even if the company had been flexible about work hours, given them advances, or even given a few extra days off, most people would not consider staying with the company to help it through a time of need. Nearly everyone has their own "bottom line," and will do what they have to do to make sure that they don't go broke. That's why work will always suck.
i think the hours vary quite a bit, but on the whole programmers work more hours. i think it is expected that you put in more hours than just 40. i don't agree with a lot of what the article says, but i do agree that flexibility is a big focus these days, and due to rapid change, work load increases.
you say 'you can always leave and you always have the choice of were to work'. that's true to some extent in our field, but i don't think that's true of people in general. a lot of people work in jobs they don't like, and without tooling up extensively for a different career, finding one they like isn't that easy, even if the economy makes job hopping easier these days..
Everything this is saying was laed out in Kurt Vonnegut's first novel, player piano. A dark future where effeciency is more important than happiness. Hopefully we don't fall into this fate, but this is where I see us headed
There are 168 hours in a week. I can't believe it takes all of them just for eating, sleeping, working, and keeping up with technology.
When you consider that almost half of your available waking hours are consumed by work, its not all that surprising that it can be. I find that I have at most 4-5 hours available on the average work day for my personal life. Work and the mechanics of life consume the rest. Increasingly I find myself using that time for a break from the frenetic pace at the office.
I'm still learning this stuff, so I may be naive, but my impression is that an hour or two a day is all it really takes to maintain your skillset.
That may be the case, but that hour or two can come at a heavy price when weighed against time with family and friends. The question is do we work to live or live to work?
"J is for James who took lye by mistake."
What I don't get is why companies mistakingly
thing that experience isn't necessary in an
organisation.
From my own experience, I have left jobs because
there weren't enough experienced (read old) people
around to learn from. It's not always obvious what
the know and have to teach but that doesn't mean
that they don't have something to show us.
_.. .
The history of civilization up to this point has been those in power making those without power do their work. To that extent, work has *always* sucked, whether it be sweat shops, or kids working in mines, or union-busting hired guns, or the braindrain monotony of an office job -- no matter what, the worker will spend most of their life working to make money for someone else while barely being able to pay their own bills.
The new generation of IT/network kids like us can't complain about the money issue. I personally sell what I know from my hobby (no school) and so I've just lucked out.
Personally, I think the whining Dilberts of the world should quit crying and realize that their complacent, obedient cubicle-dwelling selves provide the main stability for a corporate structure that is just annoying and boring and mind-numbing to them: meanwhile, the janitor, or person working in the shop, or the person shovelling the sidewalks can't afford to pay their bills, or get medical insurance, or anything. In other words, what is annoying to Dilbert is near life-threatening for everyone "under" him.
Want to end this shit? Me too. I want an open source world where voluntary associations replace the boss-worker scheme, where whoever chips in gets an equal share back.
Ah, but the hell with that. 1999 is the year for open source start-ups, I hear.
Please, freedom of speech means freedom even for idiots. Katz has a right to say what he wants, and ACs have right to disagree, although I do wish they would be more polite out about it, and stick to reasoning debate instead of emotion, personal attacks, and name-calling.
"Freedom means freedom for everybody" -- Dick Cheney
Sorry, my mistake. Ratings != censorship. Now if somebody would please delete or downgrade my above post...
"Freedom means freedom for everybody" -- Dick Cheney
well said!