Tech layoffs are all but a thing of the past | Hacker News Reader

Tech layoffs are all but a thing of the past

techcrunch.com

36 pointsmikece17 comments

I think the layoffs were a situation of "taking from one pocket and putting it into another".

The number of experienced engineers didn't increase; a lot of them dropped out of the system. Temporarily they created some fear and panic and got some suckers to accept RTO, lower pay, or worse conditions, but you can't outrun business fundamentals. Software is eating the world and all these new technologies (AI, etc.) aren't "reducing the need for people", they are actually increasing it.

My conspiracy theory is that this is a concerted effort for RTO - once everybody's experienced six months of unemployment, used up all their savings and moved back in with their parents, going back to a daily commute won't seem so bad.

I doubt many people who up and left to desperately save money will go rent a new apartment within commuting distance of an unreliable employer.

Perhaps there will be a total split in the job market as most look for remote jobs and relocation bonuses have to be perpetual to attract people in.

i believe rto is then a concerted effort to keep real estate up in cities.

> once everybody's experienced six months of unemployment, used up all their savings and moved back in with their parents, going back to a daily commute won't seem so bad.

If you move back in with your parents and your expenses decline, why go back to the commute? If anything, you can be much more picky about the job you can take as you have unlimited runaway as long as your parents let you stay (and something like 50% of Millennials and Gen Z are moving/living with parents).

https://archive.ph/fD4Bp | https://fortune.com/2023/09/26/millennials-gen-z-living-with... ("Moving back in with your parents is so common now that it’s nearly lost its stigma")

https://archive.ph/0E7r4 | https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-09-20/nearly-ha... ("Nearly Half of All Young Adults Live With Mom and Dad — and They Like It")

https://archive.ph/xt7PH | https://fortune.com/2022/10/24/gen-z-delays-homebuying-retir... ("Gen Zers don’t think they’ll ever own a home, and are buckling up for long-term financial instability")

Like the Chinese say, “lay flat.” If your life would've been "move out, work a few decades in a job you likely don't enjoy, eventually inherit parent's house at death", why not just skip the grind and live with them until they die, maximizing happiness in your best years if this is the environment these folks must operate in.

https://www.cnbc.com/2022/08/12/job-unhappiness-is-at-a-stag...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tang_ping

It's a mix. RTO is also used to hide layoffs.

Almost every major tech company laid off a significant fraction of their staff this year. Numbers show the wave has cooled off, but let's not be optimistic about next year, when CEOs make their annual "do something incredible for profits, or lay off a bunch of people to cut expenses, or why not both" decision to lock in next year's bonus.

> CEOs make their annual "do something incredible for profits, or lay off a bunch of people to cut expenses, or why not both" decision to lock in next year's bonus.

This is the reason why so much upper management appears so detached from actual work. They are under constant pressure to sell the next growth area (aka buzzword) to the CEO that cares about their own compensation not going down.

Layoffs are always a thing of the past until the next quarter comes around.

Read: more tech layoffs incoming

If they do these layoffs to increase stock value. Who is actually buying on them? Some automated systems? As by now any actual trader so know it shouldn't affect anything... Or is it just purely general sentiment that everyone is playing on?

Themselves. Literally a stock buy back. If you don’t have to pay employees, then you use that money to buy back stock instead. Thus the stock price goes up due to the denominator being smaller.

And then if the stock price goes astronomically high for some reason, they split it, double the amount available and then sell it back out, generating money out of thin air.

Not so fast, let's wait half a year and see what happens.

unfortunate timing on this one.

https://www.mercurynews.com/2023/09/28/tech-job-cut-layoff-c...

now we wait and see if the reduced employee count armed with LLMs can be do all the necessary work.

no need to wait to see that they can

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