Ask HN: Developers who survived dot com crash/ 2008, your advice? tips? for 2023

I survived the 2000 bust by going from a failing multimedia/direct marketing company (multiple rounds of layoffs) back to enterprise logistics. Not sexy, no stock options, but I didn't suffer any unemployment.

The 2008 crash wiped out the educational software company I worked at. I started freelancing then and found plenty of work, again not sexy work, no foosball or free lunches, but steady and sometimes interesting work.

Probably too late now with layoffs well underway, but I advise learning business domains (logistics, marketing, etc.) and getting expert with relational databases, which sit at the core of most business/enterprise systems. My Oracle and SQL Server background saved me from unemployment more than once. I have also found that my background in system administration, now mostly in the cloud, can keep me going.

These periodic busts always hit startups and unprofitable companies hardest. And they hit developers who have limited and/or narrow experience because those developers will have the most competition.

The underlying causes are different in those three situations. Perhaps the consistent tips are to reduce your debt (interest costs will rise), spend far less than you earn and be realistic about future employment situation. The number of lay-offs are rising by the day. I dread the job situation in 2023/2024.

Pre-owned computer hardware will become increasingly cheap, so I plan to cut my reliance on cloud hosted servers, etc. The internet is likely to become less reliable due to technical and political issues.

I don't think 2023 is that bad. The economy is fine for us as businesses are moving to the web still. In 5 years when that saturates the economy will need an injection.