Friend of mine had a heart attack in his early thirties working for AT&T in the nineties. I ended up in the ER with acute chest pains working for UBS.
These days, I’m generally able to weather the daily shit storms, but I’m mostly dead inside just waiting for the sweet, sweet relief of the real mortal deal.
I kinda wonder what the machine is going to have at its disposal to extract more out of me after I’ve left this mortal coil. Reanimated labor I suppose.
I got a pretty decent raise a couple weeks ago. As I usually do, I expressed my appreciation, but added the commentary that when a hundred percent of my time away from work is spent bedridden from exhaustion, what’s the difference between an $X thousand dollar raise and an $X million dollar raise.
devs are such babies. I went to school and got licensed as an a&p (9 part proctored exam with written, practical, and oral components) and was working in the weather for $16 an hour, working my way up and dodging layoffs (which dont make it in the news because blue collar) to 25 an hour after years and years.
This is working as an aircraft mechanic, at various levels. This is a high hazard environment filled with carcinogens (solvents like methyl ethyl ketone), fall hazards, operating heavy equipment.
I got qualifications like engine run and taxi qualifications that result in $0.25 raises.
Mandatory overtime, busting knuckles, freezing in the cold, boiling in the heat, standing on concrete all day.
Oh and if I fuck up, planes crash, people die, and I go to jail.
I got a job as a software developer in the same area working for a medium sized company no one has heard of (300 person engineering department) and I work 8 hours a week, with no deadlines, at home, and make 3 times the salary. The worst I have to do with is identity politics and stupid meetings, 🤷.
These jobs are absolutely dream jobs for people who have perspective on what bad jobs actually are.
As someone who has worked in fast food, warehouses, and woodworking: I know how privileged I am to be a software developer.
Ive seen kids right out of college get hired and make more than I did, despite my having 20+ more years of experience … just because I’m self taught with no college. And then they removed about how bad the job is.
I wasn’t attacking you, or even referring to you as a dev, though it would have been a fair assumption regardless given the topic at hand.
I also wasn’t claiming ‘hard labor’ is better or anything, just that there is a large discrepancy between the quality of life and work of the jobs the article is referring to and the jobs that the majority of people actually work.
Many software developers need perspective on the privilege they have, this is coming from someone who has worked a variety of jobs in different industries, attended trade school and university, and is currently a developer.
And it’s not from today, in the 90s a friend of mine was hired for IBM, imagine!!! I don’t think he made a year there, it was already horrible.
Friend of mine had a heart attack in his early thirties working for AT&T in the nineties. I ended up in the ER with acute chest pains working for UBS.
These days, I’m generally able to weather the daily shit storms, but I’m mostly dead inside just waiting for the sweet, sweet relief of the real mortal deal.
I kinda wonder what the machine is going to have at its disposal to extract more out of me after I’ve left this mortal coil. Reanimated labor I suppose.
I got a pretty decent raise a couple weeks ago. As I usually do, I expressed my appreciation, but added the commentary that when a hundred percent of my time away from work is spent bedridden from exhaustion, what’s the difference between an $X thousand dollar raise and an $X million dollar raise.
devs are such babies. I went to school and got licensed as an a&p (9 part proctored exam with written, practical, and oral components) and was working in the weather for $16 an hour, working my way up and dodging layoffs (which dont make it in the news because blue collar) to 25 an hour after years and years.
This is working as an aircraft mechanic, at various levels. This is a high hazard environment filled with carcinogens (solvents like methyl ethyl ketone), fall hazards, operating heavy equipment.
I got qualifications like engine run and taxi qualifications that result in $0.25 raises.
Mandatory overtime, busting knuckles, freezing in the cold, boiling in the heat, standing on concrete all day.
Oh and if I fuck up, planes crash, people die, and I go to jail.
I got a job as a software developer in the same area working for a medium sized company no one has heard of (300 person engineering department) and I work 8 hours a week, with no deadlines, at home, and make 3 times the salary. The worst I have to do with is identity politics and stupid meetings, 🤷.
These jobs are absolutely dream jobs for people who have perspective on what bad jobs actually are.
“I’ve had worse jobs, and my current job is unrealistically laid back for the field being talked about. Everyone else is a baby.”
This is what you sound like.
Here’s a thought: Different people have different experiences in similar jobs.
Here’s another: Different people experience things differently, because they are different people.
As someone who has worked in fast food, warehouses, and woodworking: I know how privileged I am to be a software developer.
Ive seen kids right out of college get hired and make more than I did, despite my having 20+ more years of experience … just because I’m self taught with no college. And then they removed about how bad the job is.
Insane.
There’s also the little detail that I’m not a dev. But let the guy have his moment I guess.
I am so much NOT a dev, that it took me a minute to even register what you were trying to say. I thought of a college classmate whose name is Dev.
I too have had my time in hard physical labor.
But you do you. Enjoy your Internet sanctimony.
I wasn’t attacking you, or even referring to you as a dev, though it would have been a fair assumption regardless given the topic at hand.
I also wasn’t claiming ‘hard labor’ is better or anything, just that there is a large discrepancy between the quality of life and work of the jobs the article is referring to and the jobs that the majority of people actually work.
Many software developers need perspective on the privilege they have, this is coming from someone who has worked a variety of jobs in different industries, attended trade school and university, and is currently a developer.
Fwiw I was generally agreeing with you.