Hacker News Reader

Comment by johnfn | Hacker News Reader

I mean, if I heard you say that, I would probably think you had a "bad attitude" as well. Yes, getting paid is an important part of your job, but presumably you could get paid at many different places, and you choose the one you work at because it has additional benefits on top of a purely transactional relationship.

It's like telling your girlfriend you're dating her because she's really hot. I'm sure that factored in, but she might get annoyed if that's the only reason you can come up with.

View on HN

The company is not family, will never be family, and will chew you up and spit you out the moment it is better on net for them.

I have a friend who's a few years younger than me, and he was a coworker with me at a previous job. He was fresh out of his masters and this was his first job out of school. We became friends fairly quickly, and during lunch one day I mentioned the above "business transaction" stuff, and mentioning that corporations are not your family. It's fine if you like your job, that's a good thing, but just keep in mind that love you show the job will not be reciprocated.

He thought I was being extremely cynical (and I suppose I kind of was) and he disagreed with me.

About a year later, he felt screwed over by the company, and admitted that maybe I was right. I mentioned it is just a conclusion that nearly anyone comes to when working for the corporate world long enough.

And so will a SO if they're needs are not being met anymore. Family has to be family by definition if you're using blood lines. But families can often be MUCH worse than a company.

Try talking to a kid who used to be beat by their parents, at least the company is up front (usually).

I didn't say it was the only reason to take a job, and I clarified that even at the time. It's perfectly fine to factor in other benefits to the job, (e.g. how much you like the work, how much you like your coworkers, etc.). I actually quit that BigCo and took a paycut to work at a different company because it was soul-draining. When I say "we all do this for the money", I'm saying that this is a necessary component for the job, and ultimately if they stopped paying me then I would not work there anymore, even if I otherwise love the work and environment.

Again, to be clear, I said all this at the time.

I don't think the hot girlfriend analogy applies in this case; if I had a hot girlfriend and she stops being hot, if I liked her I probably wouldn't up and leave her. If a company stops paying, I will absolutely leave.

In your OP, your primary argument, as I read it, was that business is fundamentally a business transaction. When I pointed this out, you changed your argument to how there are other benefits to a job.

My point is that if you go around and tell everyone at work that you're doing it because of the money, you're... not coming off particularly well? A statement like that comes off a bit odd and socially tone-deaf? And yes, I understand that it's true that you would quit your job if they stopped paying you, but things can be true and still not a great idea to say out loud. It can be an objective fact that my manager is ugly; it's not a good idea to say this during a meeting.

I said “they give me money and benefits”, and I didn’t define what those benefits were. As I said, I hated working at that BigCo and took a pay cut to work with people I liked more to do work I thought would be more fun. To me the benefit was being able to do work I enjoyed more. I apologize if that wasn’t clear, obviously there are more categories to choosing a job than net pay; if there weren’t we wouldn’t have any teachers.

It wasn’t like I just blurted it out when people were deciding which database to use, it was relevant to the discussion. I can’t remember the exact conversation but IIRC we were having trouble hiring someone for a role and the topic of compensation came up. I felt my comment was relevant, and I genuinely didn’t even consider that people would have issue with it because I thought it was borderline tautological.

There are a few privileged folks that get to work a job for those other benefits. The majority take whatever they can get because they need to eat.

Let's not pretend that HN is full of blue collar workers. Most of us here are in software development and have options.

Would you have have chosen to work at your job if you were never going to get paid?

No? But there's a difference between knowing that (which is an obvious fact that anyone would agree with) and walking into your job one day and reminding them you're only there to get paid.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com