Infact I'd say it's their profession.
Recruiter is the high-risk equivalent.
So not only do you compete with a lot of people for the job, the pay structure does not depend on performance.
We effectively didn't have an HR department at my previous job, at a company of 500+ people. And they did when I first started, about a dozen people.
Sure, but it doesn’t mean some or all of them are not right, especially when the unequal distribution of wealth is well known and documented to evolve for the worst.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Distribution_of_wealth#Global_...
I mean, some are, yes, but … I'm not, and I know many SWEs who aren't.
> According to the 2018 Global Wealth Report from Credit Suisse Research Institute, you need a net worth of $871,320
(https://www.cnbc.com/2018/11/01/how-much-money-you-need-to-b...)
I miss that cutoff. But if you narrow to my country, the requirement for being in the top 1% jumps to $11M.
Even successful lawyers need to be senior partners to achieve that kind of wealth ($11M), and don't forget that for each such lawyer, there may be many people who end up as some clerk or generic legal representative in some organization, who may have salaries much closer to a SWE.
Either way, I'd think twice about putting HR managers as victims here when they are the main perpetrators of low raise budgets and high hiring budgets.
Whether its justified or not, varies with circumstances and what ethical system people have.
When black people in the 50's felt that way about white people and their privileges, most people today would see those concerns as justified.
When German people in 1922 became angry because most jews had enough money for food, while many Germans went hungry, and started believing in conspiracy theories, like the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, most people today would say they were not justified. (though there are still some who secrely believe those things)
And when Hutu's wanted to "cut down the tall trees" in 1994, most people in the west only read the headlines, and didn't care that much.
In the case of HR managers being unhappy that software developer make more than them, some will blame some generic "wage gap", others will explicitly believe in some kind of Patriarchy conspiracy theory. (And a lot of HR managers, of course, are simply fine with things as they are.)
Even if this were true, and it isn’t, people didn’t start believing in anti-Jewish propaganda because the Jews had more to eat than the average German. People always believed in crazy anti-Jewish propaganda since, at least, the first crusade.
Absolutely they did. However, even at that time, it seems (if wikipedia is to be trusted) that the Jew's roles as bankers was part of the reason for the massacres:
"Many crusaders had to go into debt in order to purchase weaponry and equipment for the expedition; as Western Catholicism strictly forbade usury, many crusaders inevitably found themselves indebted to Jewish moneylenders. Having armed themselves by assuming the debt, the crusaders rationalized the killing of Jews as an extension of their Catholic mission"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhineland_massacres
You are absolutely right that antisemmitism didn't suddenly pop up in 1922, or even with the creation of the "Protocols" conspiracy. But prior to 1922, antisemitism probably wasn't worse in Germany than most other western countries.
But as we consider the inflation we are seeing today, try to imagine how it would be if the inflation is not 5-10% but 29500%, as it was at the peak in 1923. In other words, it would take 3.7 days for your paycheck to go to half value. When you got your salary, you had to run to the bakery and buy as much bread as you could. Old poeple and people on a fixed salary would lose everything in an instant.
Even in the present age, especially after 2008, conspiracy theories involving the banking sector is everywhere, and there are still whispers implicating a Jewish conspiracy, if you listen. Now imagine standing at a corner in Munich on a day where the factory didn't need your work, too afraid to go home to your abusive wife who would beat and scorn you for not bringing food to the hungry family.
Imagine some small man with a mustache telling a very convincing story that comletely rationalizes your troubles. He reminds you about the Goldmann banker up the street, and the Ruben gem store at the corner. Their families are not hungry, yet they didnt "work" (meaning physically) a single day of their lives, they are simply collecting usury. Imagine being told this, while hungry, while worried about being beaten by your wife when you come home, in a world where anti-semmitism is still seen as acceptable, in a world where usury is still seen as a sin, in a country where the interest rates on loans have 5 digits.
What I'm saying is that those germans were just like us, just under different circumstances. To them, the jews were the socially accepted "bad guys", just as nazis and facists, and where people can label people as nazi or facist with not much more evidence than not liking that person.
The person that would say today, that "It's ok to punch a nazi." (meaning MAGA-republican), might very will be the person in 1923 thinking that "It's ok to punch a jew.". The reasoning is very similar. And it's not restricted to the left. People on the right are currently generating massive amounts of resentment against "the elites". And in some cases, the anti-semmitism is once again coming out into the open.
> But as we consider the inflation we are seeing today, try to imagine how it would be if the inflation is not 5-10% but 29500%
Hitler took power 10 years after the hyperinflation. People didn’t vote for the NSDAP because of hyperinflation, nor they started hating the Jews more than before because of it.
> You are absolutely right that antisemmitism didn't suddenly pop up in 1922, or even with the creation of the "Protocols" conspiracy. But prior to 1922, antisemitism probably wasn't worse in Germany than most other western countries.
Antisemitism was rampant everywhere in the West, the Germans only took it to its inevitable consequences and only after 1933. Of course, this doesn’t change the fact that nazis were criminals, but the Shoah has much deeper roots that the hyperinflation or some temporary unemployment.
For instance, only in 1870 Roman Jews became full citizens, before then they couldn’t own property and, among other things, once a year they were forced to run naked during the Roman carnival. This was only 60 years before Hitler seized power.
You can find similar stories about all cities that had a large Jewish community.
> The person that would say today, that "It's ok to punch a nazi." (meaning MAGA-republican), might very will be the person in 1923 thinking that "It's ok to punch a jew.".
No, it’s not the same thing because no MAGA-republican has been punched and arrested and they even elected a president.
Oh, and about this part, I think you underestimate the hyperinflation in 22-23 in Germany. Over a period of about 2-3 years, people who had been comfortably part of the upper middle class would lose EVERYTHING, and in many cases end up starving to death. That's not "temporary unemployment".
Read this quote:
- One particularly arresting story is that of Maximilian Bern, a man of literary education exemplary of Germany’s formerly middle-class Bildungsbürgertum. In 1923, writes Taylor
- "[he] withdrew all his savings—100,000 marks, formerly sufficient to support a modestly comfortable retirement—and purchased all it would buy by that time: a subway ticket. The old gentleman took a last ride around the city, then went back to his apartment and locked himself in."
- If you are like me, you probably assumed the next sentence would conclude with suicide. No. “There he died of hunger.” I had to linger over that sentence to fully grasp the reality: starvation in a society that had recently been among the most technologically and commercially advanced of any on earth.
https://fee.org/articles/how-hyperinflation-shattered-german...
For the Germans, this left an impression that resembled the Shoah for the jews.
Imagine seeing former affluent tech workers starving to death in San Francisco in 2029, looking like the corpses of Bergen-Belson prisoners. What would that do to the survivors?
They say that, of all causes of death, hunger is the most horrible.
The upper middle class own non-monetary assets, they are probably the least affected by inflation.
> For the Germans, this left an impression that resembled the Shoah for the jews.
No, not really and not even close. At least because the Weimar hyperinflation hasn’t caused mass starvation. Second because losing your savings is not even close to being stripped naked and beaten once a week and then being put on a cattle wagon to be slaughtered 1000 kilometres from home.
> The upper middle class own non-monetary assets, they are probably the least affected by inflation.
First of all, don't confuse hyperinflation with regular inflation. Regular inflation is an indication of a rebalancing of an economy, with some mismanagement on top. Hyperinflation happens when the economic system collapses completely.
One difference is that during normal inflation, non-monetary assets often retain much of their value, while in hyperinflation only assets that help produce food and other essentials really matter (such as owning a farm, a factory, etc).
Middle class workers pre-inflation may have a house, a "save" job with a fixed income and some savings in the bank. When hyperinflation struck, they may have been able to sell the house, but the cash gained would be gone in a couple of weeks. The savings were also gone quickly, and many such jobs would either have salaries lagging behind inflation or people might get fired, unable to find similar work.
Meanwhile, workers in factories and on farms were more like "essential workers" during covid.
>> .... this left an impression ....
> No, not really and not even close.
If you read what you quoted, I was not referring to the effects on those that died, only those who remained. In other words, I was comparing the effect on the German people with the SURVIVORS of the holocaust, as well as on jews that were not directly affected.
These effects are primarily cultural. To this day, the German nation remains fiscally conservative due to the events of 2022-23, very reluctant to allow inflationary actions by the ECB, for instance (as experienced by Greece, 10 years ago).
You are right, of course, that the Holocaust was a larger event, even in terms of the cultural effects. But even if the wound of the hyperinflation was smaller, it was still many times greater than the scars after the 2008 crash in the West.
Maybe the number of actual deaths by starvation was limited, it did occur, especially with people unable to work a job (retired people). Also, even for those who did not die from lack of calories, many were left undernourished or malnourished, causing an uptick in deaths from infections, etc.
But as stated above, my main point is what effect it had on the survivors. Those who saw the previously affluent widdowed aunt fall from grace, having to beg her nephews and nieces for bread. Maybe having to refuse to giver her that bread, because your children were hungry, too.
Experiencing (either directly or through some newspaper) the humiliation when French soldiers entered Germany to confiscate assets when Germany could not (or would not) pay the reparations that was demanded, including seeing the Germans that were either shot or turned into refugees.
Seeing how rich were able to (and smart enough to) shifts their assets that would continue to be productive even during hyperinflation. While you, who were used to thinking that money in the Bank was the safest way to save, kept your money there.
And even if you did manage to secure just enough bread for your familiy to make it into 1924, you would hear stories or see pictures of those who did not, and feel the fear that something happened to you that would prevent you from showing up at the factory that, on most days, would pay you to work.
Such experiences leave deep mental scars, and will tend to harden a person and make them more tribal and aggressive. Make them perfect raw materials to be molded by demagoues like Hitler and Goebbels.
In the end, some did become evil monsters. Maybe some were even born that way. But to the extent that is was environmental, it was certainly not born from privilege. It was, just like in most other cases where the result is genocide, born from hardship and humiliation, combined with a strong feeling of resentment towards those who were seen as responsible.
Hitler started planning a coup in late 1922, during the hyperinflation. It was attempted in late 1923, around the time the hyperinflation was stopped. It failed, and he ended up in prison. In 1924, during his time in prison, he wrote Mein Kampf, which lays out the plan he followed (or tried to) thereafter.
Before 1922, NSDAP (aka Nazi party) was very tiny. During the hyperinflation, it grew to 20000, mostly in Munich. Still small on a national basis, but enough to give it a solid basis as an organization.
Between 1925 and 1929, it grew slowly, but exploded after 1929, as the Great Depression hit Germany hard.
As for the role of hyperinflation in this, it is relatively well documented. Here is one quote from wikipedia:
"The Nazis' strongest appeal was to the lower middle-classes—farmers, public servants, teachers and small businessmen—who had suffered most from the inflation of the 1920s, so who feared Bolshevism more than anything else."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nazi_Party
> Antisemitism was rampant everywhere in the West
At least very widespread. Still, the situation of jews in the West, including in Germany was much better at the time than it was for Blacks in the USA.
In Germany, there were many highly respected German leaders and intellectuals, such as Einstein, Freud and (less known today) Rudolf Hilferding. Hilferding is, quoting wikipedia again "almost universally recognized as the SPD's foremost theoretician of this (20th) century."
> the Germans only took it to its inevitable consequences and only after 1933.
I don't agree that it was inevitable. The Nazis were a marginal force up until 1929. By 1929, most Germans may have gotten over the terrors of 1922-23, but in 1929 the wounds were torn open, and the messages of the "little man with the funny mustache" didn't seem so crazy, after all.
It didn't help that Hilferding was Minister of Finance at the time the Depression started.
"Of course, this doesn’t change the fact that nazis were criminals, but the Shoah has much deeper roots that the hyperinflation or some temporary unemployment."
I'm not claiming that the hyperinflation was the root. I'm claiming it was one of the main sources of energy, and a great inspiration for Hitler himself, direcly before writing Mein Kampf. (Even though he was already an antisemite before 1922, I'm sure the things he saw during those two years reinforced his convitions. Hitler was known to tailor his speechest according to what ressonated with the audience.).
> You can find similar stories about all cities that had a large Jewish community.
Yes, I know. Being a minority comes with a lot of risks and problems. I fully understand why some jews prefer to have at least one state where they can be the majority. (Though it might have been better for world peace had they been given Köningsberg/East Preussia in 1945 instead of being supported in becoming the majority in Israel/Palestine).
There are, I would say, two main forms of racism. One is directed at those people see as inferior. Typically, that is right-wing racism. That one is created when some other group, on average, performs worse (or appears to do so) than the group the racist identifies with. Such a racist may see the hated group as sub-human. They may not feel threatened outright, but may be concerned if the population of that hated group grows too quickly.
The other group, is resentment racism (or sexism or other similar identity-group-ism), which is triggered when confronted with groups that do better than the group the racist person identifies with. This is more common on the left*. This kind of racist will see the hated group as outright evil. And if they feel sufficiently threatened by the hated group, may attempt outright genocide, since they may feel they are fighting for their life.
* Nazies were full of both kinds of racism. They saw Roma people as virmin, Slavic people as merely inferior, while they were accusing Jews of attempting to seek world domination. In other words, Roma and Slavic people were sub-human while Jews were seen as Evil, inferior only for moral reasons. And as we know, the hatred against to Jews was by far the strongest. Mein Kampf describes this in detail.
Maybe they even think that intelligence is a social construct invented by the Patriarchy for the purpose of oppressing people who are not "cis white males"?
Who knows, maybe for some, these ideas may even have been part of their education....
Have you ever interacted with HR? I'm pretty sure they are trained to be cold and uncaring, and to apply business rules without exception. Never heard an ounce of empathy from any of them, it always feels like interacting with an automaton that was somehow annoyed with you.
Plenty of times. Some that are really smart, some that are not. Some that are cold and "corporate", some that are getting way too personal. (As in a "metoo" moment.)
Politically, I've met at least one that was secretly a eugenicist and others that are pretty far left.
All of them individuals, but several of them collectivists.
> Maybe they even think that intelligence is a social construct invented by the Patriarchy for the purpose of oppressing people who are not "cis white males"?
Are you agreeing or disagreeing with the person you replied to?
HR is a bit like IT support. Some companies will have a lower standard when hiring for such roles, others will have as high or possibly higher standards when hiring SRE's than when hiring developers.
And even if it should be correct that SWE's score a few points higher, on average, than HR managers, I see no utility in making a fuss about that. To the extent that it has a market value, salaries will reflect that.
Now, should HR staff start to act unprofessionally themselves, things change. For instance, if individuals within HR start to advocate for lower wages to or other actions against individuals or groups they feel resentment against, then that is a problem.
For instance, I'm sure there are plenty of HR managers in various companies that are secretly furious about all the young young mostly males, mostly white or asian, still in their 20s, join the company and make more than they do.