You get used to it. After a while if you become good at interviewing and going through the motions you are probably more secure than someone who has "job security", no matter how hard it is to fire someone a company can still go bankrupt.

If I got fired tomorrow it would result in a vacation, probably followed by a raise. When you get to that place it isn't scary at all.

I'm guessing you are American and under 35 because there's a whole generation of you that considers an 13-year tech bull run with massive stock appreciation as normal, and the hardest problem is passing leetcode interviews. It's a very different story looking for a job in a real downturn like 2000 or 2008.

If you keep looking for the same job as you get older, yes. I'm well above your age guess and starting a new job soon, but it's definitely not the same role or expectations as 20 years ago. I've found that if you work to differentiate yourself as an individual the substitution cost is very high, so you can find work even in the most challenging environments. I think this would be a much harder strategy in a heavily unionized environment.

Something to consider is pension lock. Your pension is tied to a specific employer, and leaving means losing everything. I hear this all the time from school teachers, but it also happened to my mom: Budget cuts were coming and while she had enough seniority to stay employed, she didn’t have enough juice for choice of location. She was going to have to accept a job that required an additional hour of commute that she couldn’t do for health reasons. So she had to leave 2 years shy of a pension. She got nothing, and she also doesn’t qualify for Social Security.

Thankfully we don't tend to get those scam pension traps in tech, instead we get 401k's which are your own money.

It is extremely stressful some of the times even. But it's the reality we live in. People don't change. Companies change extremely rarely. If you are smart enough to reverse-engineer software systems -- a necessary skill during onboarding -- then you are smart enough to see nobody will change things to a more positive environment, and hence you should leave.

I hate it with all my heart but if I have to, I'll do it 50 times more. I am never allowing myself be held hostage.

> I am never allowing myself be held hostage.

So, you navigate this quagmire begrudgingly, yet don't favour unionisation?

Unionization does not magically change poorly managed companies into well managed ones.

Of course it doesn't happen by magic, it takes dedication and hard work.

No, but unionization gives you a seat at the table to negotiate the rules of the game with upper management. Collectively you stand a better chance than individually to improve the working conditions.

> unionization gives you a seat at the table to negotiate the rules of the game with upper management

Hmm, but is this really the case?

I know it's how it's sold, but does it actually work like that?

Unionization can be hijacked by employers, history knows of such occurrences. Plus Amazon and Google have been caught up (in the recent times nonetheless) of hiring paid saboteurs to impede people from unionizing.

My job is not to do underground mafia wars. If the employers want to fight dirty I'll just move to someplace else. Eventually they'll be stuck with the people who are OK with being slaves -- but won't be creative or efficient.

I wish them luck. They are hurting themselves, not me or the other worthy programmers.

Unpopular opinion: unionization is like democracy: people think it works but in reality there are a lot of shady deals under the table and the system hasn't worked as it is supposed to, for a long long time.

Inquiry: does this apply to other well-paying unions, such as the actors guild and professional sport players? I’m genuinely asking, because as far as I know they are still in existence and regularly ensure better working conditions for their membership without limiting their mobility.

My wife had a client that went on to play in the walking dead. In order for my wife to be able to continue to do her client’s hair, she had to join the actor’s guild and be “licensed” by them and pay dues. So, I’d say they (at least the actors guild) def can reduce your mobility, even say which hair stylists you are and aren’t allowed to use.

Well, in order to do her hair for the role. She obviously could style her hair for events in her private life, right? A wedding or whatever?

It seems a stretch to say the union interfered with her 'mobility', any more than you can't do plumbing on a public building without having a license etc.

They have hairstylist on site for the role, as well as wigs. But even in her private life, she had to use guild sanctioned hair stylists.

I'd need a citation for that. Seems impossible to enforce, and a gross violation of privacy.

Contracts are amazing… and terrifying. Feel free to send them an email and ask.

Wait so like, your wife got up to do someone’s hair every single day because the person couldn’t brush their own hair according to their union??

We're talking like a normal every 6-weekish haircut. Nothing crazy.

I am not saying effective unions don't exist.

I am saying that when enough money are in danger [of having to be spent by big companies] that unionization gets under attack with very questionable and shady techniques.

I wasn't aware that I have to remind HN of the recent articles, published right on this forum, of evidence that Amazon sabotaged unionization efforts by hiring people who deliberately derail discourse and pump outrage. But alas, apparently people believe only what they want to believe.

It wouldn’t change anything about the job description. Even unionizing doesn’t mean that developers suddenly get more say in how uselessly their time is spent.

> Even unionizing doesn’t mean that developers suddenly get more say in how uselessly their time is spent.

I mean...yes, at the macro level, that's part of the point of unionizing.

The reality in which we live is one crafted by people, and if you don't have a seat at the table crafting the rules, then you are the one being taken for a ride.

Generally yes and that's the reason I've been reluctant to switch jobs for small gains. I stayed with my previous employer for 6 years (plus 2 calendar months because here you have to file in a letter of resignation 2 months in advance, that's by the law).

But software development can be stressful on its own: you have endless pointless meetings which serve no purpose but you have to attend them, you have mandatory corporate team-building shite which you must attend or you lose the "software engineer SENIOR" job title and you have to show leadership skills to HR people and your managers during pointless "funny" "games" during the team-buildings, you can't be involved in illegal activities (e.g. rage-type murder of your manager is a major no-no which can ruin your career for good). You also have to learn new things constantly in your free time because your employer is reluctant to pay for courses. The list goes on. My previous job was applied research and especially the university professors who did the actual research treated us like a piece of shite. I can't even count the number of times I heard something like "you can't understand anything because you have only Master's".

The stress-level of switching to a new job is generally comparable to normal activities. You need to grow some thick skin.