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Comment by durnygbur | Hacker News Reader

Once you discover later on in your career that seniority and respect of your peers is not transferable between companies, that hopping to the next job from the job board is vicious circle of working on dull dead end projects under authocratic and dumb at times people (with long length of service at the company), you might change your mind. Also you’ll discover that life is more complicated than „just walk away or start your own business”, at times neither of these is possible or even both of these are straight suicidal.

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>seniority and respect of your peers is not transferable between companies, that hopping to the next job from the job board is vicious circle of working of dull dead end projects under authocratic and dumb at times people (with long length of service at the company)

I haven't found this to be the case at all. I know many people who jump companies every 3 years or so, make more money each time they change, get to work on a variety of projects that interest them, and are well respected by their peers regardless of what company they are with due to the work they have done and continue to do. It is relatively common advice that you are generally able to advance faster by moving between companies and negotiating for better pay and titles rather than trying to get promoted frequently while staying with the same company. If you decide to take a position where you will be doing dull, dead end work with "dumb" people that is your own fault.

Significant payrise on switching jobs is a thing in Europe only until mid-level perhaps, above that it's on pair with regular payrise and is absolutely not compensating the stress of adapting to the new working environment. The salary ceiling is disappointingly low. Don't even think about launching own business - unless one manages to chime in into the supply chains for DACH, Scandinavian, or French economies' supply chains (automotive!) and keeps the salaries of its employees low.

I think this is true in many places. The real payday is when they don't want you to leave.

Fair; my experience is limited to the US tech industry

It will plateau though. You can't get 10-20% bumps every time you switch in perpetuity. Most of us would be making over a million a year after 40 years if that were true.

Just as a counterexample, my job changes early in my career netted me raises of sometimes 50% but each subsequent one increased less on a percentage basis. My last job change (now have 20 years experience) was +0%, and I give even odds that it will turn negative soon as I get older.

Why do I care if the projects are a dead end of a check is appearing in my account twice a month? My job is just a way to have money in my account. I don’t look for “excitement” in my job. I’ve been working for over 20 years. I think I am “later in my career”.

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