I'm not arguing anything. There is nothing here to argue. Nor would I enter into an argument. I can think of nothing more boring.
> literally walking down the street and offering to help random businesses for $7.25 an hour is so far from HN hiring, or really any salaried tech hiring
Because the topic is price. Price exists specifically to guide allocation of scarce resources. The scarcer a resource, the higher the price, the more buyers pushed out of the market. Conversely, the more available the resource, the lower the price, the more buyers able to participate in the market. Just plain old supply and demand.
Like I said originally, things would have to change dramatically for things to end up where nobody would hire you even for minimum wage. Without some kind of fundamental shift, there is effectively no chance of developers not being able to find work. What is more realistic is someone not being able to find work at the price they'd like. If you're accustomed to making $200k per year, get laid off, and those hiring are only offering $120k that can be a hard pill to swallow. Many will hold out for a better offer. Eventually, though, hunger sets in and you may be forced to take the $120k job. If things are really bad, $120k might be more than you can hope for.
> I'm not sure why you bring it up
There was some confusion about the earlier comment and I found enjoyment in expanding upon it. Perhaps there still is confusion, but oh well.
We're talking about different ends of the market. You're talking about the high end where sought-after workers get multiple competitive offers and big raises from switching jobs frequently. In that case a hiring downturn means less offers, less switching and less raises. I'm talking about the low end where every employer has set a floor of let's say $120k for their developer positions, and if for some reason every employer decides that a job seeker is worth less than that, that job seeker won't be able to get a job as a developer. In that case the hard pill to swallow isn't accepting less money, it's leaving the field. It's possible for the floor to decrease over time to match the perceived value of that job seeker, but worker compensation is sticky so this would require a long downturn, during which time the job seeker will become even less valuable due to having been forced out of the field.
This all leads into the question of how rational and efficient the hiring market for developers is. I would say this is at least an open question, to put it mildly.
> We're talking about different ends of the market
I am quite specifically talking about price. Maybe you still carry confusion. Maybe you replied to the wrong thread. Maybe you're desperate for that argument you hoped I was engaging in. But whatever it is, we're not talking about that. That is certain.
In terms of price, I've been saying that parts of the developer market work like Veblen goods while I think you've been saying it's all ordinary goods. You started us down this road earlier, maybe unintentionally, by questioning my statement that employers are looking for luxury goods.
> by questioning my statement that employers are looking for luxury goods.
I explicitly acknowledged and agreed with your statement. What you said jives with what I said. Which stands to reason as there is nothing to argue here, as we covered earlier.
Indeed, you originally came at the subject from a different angle and I did point that out to orient ourselves on the same plane to make communication easier, but nothing about the subject changes as it relates to the angle of approach. The destination is the same no matter what direction you come from.
We can certainly work from different angles, but it will be more work. That said, I'm not sure what is left to work on. Your comment merely indicates that you also recognize that we're not coming at this from the same angle, which is something that we already established many comments ago. This suggests to me that the meat of discussion has already reached its natural end.
I'm not arguing anything. There is nothing here to argue. Nor would I enter into an argument. I can think of nothing more boring.
> literally walking down the street and offering to help random businesses for $7.25 an hour is so far from HN hiring, or really any salaried tech hiring
Because the topic is price. Price exists specifically to guide allocation of scarce resources. The scarcer a resource, the higher the price, the more buyers pushed out of the market. Conversely, the more available the resource, the lower the price, the more buyers able to participate in the market. Just plain old supply and demand.
Like I said originally, things would have to change dramatically for things to end up where nobody would hire you even for minimum wage. Without some kind of fundamental shift, there is effectively no chance of developers not being able to find work. What is more realistic is someone not being able to find work at the price they'd like. If you're accustomed to making $200k per year, get laid off, and those hiring are only offering $120k that can be a hard pill to swallow. Many will hold out for a better offer. Eventually, though, hunger sets in and you may be forced to take the $120k job. If things are really bad, $120k might be more than you can hope for.
> I'm not sure why you bring it up
There was some confusion about the earlier comment and I found enjoyment in expanding upon it. Perhaps there still is confusion, but oh well.