If these workers could get remote jobs, they would- but they can’t. Amazon knows this, and probably can’t wait for them to quit.
For now all they can do is complain about having to go to an office to be a spoiled, overpaid tech worker. If I had that job I would be keeping my mouth shut and enjoying the paycheck, but to each their own I suppose.
Most of them sadly can not get even a non remote job easily. Most of big tech, and Amazon specially, massively lowered their hiring floor to hire more over the years, and are full of extremely incompetent people who will find it hard to survive elsewhere. Orgs are more like fiefdoms and full of incompetent people. A lot of such incompetent people know they are incompetent and go to massive lengths to survive (getting credit for everything they can, acting as information gatekeepers whenever they can).
> Most of big tech, and Amazon specially, massively lowered their hiring floor to hire more over the years, and are full of extremely incompetent people
If that's true, it'd add insult to injury, for the people who were interested in the better FAANGs... but got turned off by the stack of months' worth of prep materials that FAANG in-house recruiters would send to candidates, for their kabuki theatre of interview processes.
One of my recent theories about the interview processes promoted by FAANGs is that they (by accident or design) tend to neuter students against becoming upstart competitors. Think of all those students in school who could have time for side projects, considering startups, developing skills that woudl be useful in startups... and instead FAANGs have trained students to conceive of the very skills as passing the FAANG interview rituals, and to spend their spare time practicing for those rituals. Not only are those students less likely to start a startup, but startups that happen still have to find the workers who are amenable to thinking like creative engineers, and working as a team focused on a shared goal, despite all the FAANG-like messaging to young developers that has infected CS departments and broader industry.
The interview process, despite all it's shortcomings, was a good filter. It has been massively neutered in the recent years and is gamed every which way now by the hiring team's leadership, which is the one of the main reasons responsible for massive dilution in median talent.
The interview process is flawed, but it did prevent totally incompetent candidates. Now instead of being replaced with an alternative which measures something else, it has just been watered down.
The thing is, the incompetents who are not experts in org politics get sidelined/moved out, and the ones who remain relevant are experts who keep rising with the singular goal of building their fiefdoms. They would sell the company for pennies if they could get 2 more promotions.
By now there are enough incompetent people at VP and director levels in most companies. There is no way to identify performers from the CEO level, and at VP and director levels the incentives are to find the people best for yourself, not for the company.
Believe it or not, there are other motivating factors for doing good work than money. Just because I'm fairly compensated doesn't mean I'm going to tolerate major inconveniences that impede my ability to work efficiently, productively, and with a positive attitude. Part of why I want to do my job well is because I find the work itself gratifying. Once that motivating factor vanishes, I'm going to complain or look elsewhere for work. It's in both parties' best interest for complaints to happen, to be heard, and to be addressed, so that workers can get back to being both content for themselves and productive for the company.
Medical doctors spend a lot of time and money in med school and residency. They have malpractice risk, and perform more essential work like saving lives and improving people’s health, your health. Working a hospital especially in the ED is stressful. No stock options, rsu grants.
Tech workers on the other hand, say engineers, can easily get a high paying FAANG job without a 4yr degree - just spending time grinding leetcode or a coding bootcamp. Not to mention the RSUs, office perks like free lunches, WFH, on site laundry and daycare, flexible time off, no set work hours… come on
> Tech workers on the other hand, say engineers, can easily get a high paying FAANG job without a 4yr degree
It is prima facie absurd to say that tech workers can "easily" get a job at FAANG; if it were that easy to work at FAANG surely the 50%[0] of Software Engineers who make less than $121k or 75%[0] of Software Engineers who make less than $152k would simply do so.
There are people who work at FAANG without a degree, but that's the absolute minority. Most people have spent years on a formal education, many of which have a master's or even PhDs.
After they force people back to office then what? It’s not like they won’t leave if they manage to get remote job elsewhere.
Frankly, I don’t get this drive to RTO. The only gain is face to face meetings might improve productivity (in some people). The downside is increased pollution due to commuting - even with EVs you are wearing out tires increase the amount of micro plastics in the environment, wearing out their batteries, and wasting electricity.
> It’s not like they won’t leave if they manage to get remote job elsewhere.
Even without RTO, people will still leave for other jobs if the grass is greener on the other side. If anything, WFH makes it easier for someone to go job hunting and do interviews.
If the environment is your downside to RTO - you’re reaching.
The loss in productivity when someone does 2 hours in traffic a day is probably a more compelling argument. Companies also have to stock their pantry, hire more office management, renew their office space leases.
It's not only the environment, RTO also clogs the road for those who are causally tied to a job location (doctors, nurses, baristas, chefs, waste management, etc.).
> 2 hours in traffic a day
I'm starting to wonder if demanding that commute being paid work time would be a reasonable tradeoff (that I wouldn't take myself). If being at the office is part of the job description, then commuting logically follows as a job function.
At the moment, employers are ripping into employees time at the monetary expense of employees. Should we just live closer? Sure! Let's talk about compensating employees for property prices and home security.
For most people the waste of time, energy, and money commuting is what they will care about but you can’t deny the environmental impact of millions of people commuting.
Objectively, people are seemingly being forced back to the office at least part time, and there are less WFH opportunities. Those in favour of WFH are losing the standoff.
My garden level apartment was destroyed by flooding on December 23 of 2020. Homeless in Seattle with a wife, a kid, and two dogs and two cats for Christmas.
To this day I have ptsd when it rains hard, particularly around Christmas. Now I live on the top of a very big hill…
I got flooded in a 1st floor apartment once. After that my apartments were alway 2nd floor and up. At least until i became a home owner and then I made sure my house was on well drained gentle sloping area. My real estate agent thought I was being overly picky, but fool me once...
Motivating yes, but possibly also allowing you to overdo it by checking out.
I say you’re both right. While building a habit, audiobooks help a lot. When trying to set goals, music is better (tempo) but for the mental health aspects, like nature bathing, touching grass, and meditation, eventually you want nothing in your ears more often than not.
But only after you’re confident you’ll actually show up for the exercise, distractions or no.
Audiobooks are a great way to get through books you feel you should have read but can’t seem to get into.
I get bored while walking/running, and can only do it while having music on (running) or have a podcast/audiobook (walking).
Music doesn't really mess with your mind going somewhere.
And you can discover connections and have other insights while listening to a podcast or an audiobook.
Try listening to an audiobook while sitting and doing nothing or doing chores versus listening to it while walking. You will gain more cognitively if you listen to it while walking. Speaking from personal experience.
I think in this case it will get subsumed under the more robust HN consensus of "the worst thing about covid is the consequences of the mitigation measures."
Regarding economics, the economist Paul Krugman was the first to say it, in an essay in 1994, when he suggested that the slowdown in Japan might reveal what was going to happen to all other advanced nations. It was an idea he then developed over several years, in a series of essays, and then finally when his predictions came true, he came out with a book on the subject:
> last stop before the planet Mars: In Japan, the world’s most technologically sophisticated society, the future has already happened, says Peter Popham
For now all they can do is complain about having to go to an office to be a spoiled, overpaid tech worker. If I had that job I would be keeping my mouth shut and enjoying the paycheck, but to each their own I suppose.