What a time for me to realize that my position in my job is no longer stable. I asked for a raise in return for getting certs they want me to have off the clock and suddenly my bosses aren’t cool anymore. Place got real shitty real fast when I was like, “Hey, I’ll do this shit you want off the clock if you pay me more during work hours”
They literally laughed in my face and now tensions are high between management and the employees that aren’t happy here. I’m going on medical leave for 4 weeks starting next Thursday and I’m terrified they’ll realize they can manage without me in that time and fire me for some bullshit when I come back
It hasn’t been this hard for Americans to find work since 2021
And before that, 2020, and before that, 2012, and before that, 2008, and before that. . . .
I suspect the system is designed this way, to put people in a near-permanent cutthroat burnout-hustle state of sheer desperation for anything even resembling stability.
It also keeps the working class as a whole scattered and inwardly conflicted, so they don’t mass up against their masters.
The rich didn’t design this, they merely exploit the design.
The rich do not create or design anything. They steal everything they have from the working class and rebrand some of it as their own.
Does this count as the third once in a lifetime recession in my lifetime or is this a continuation of the last one
Been feeling mine since 1998.
Job market is brutal, at least for tech. Every job gets 100s of applicants. There’s a lot of AI slop. Offered salaries are down. For some reason, management wants people to go into the office (which is among other problems a pay cut compared to WFH).
I’ve been unemployed since the winter. Had a handful of phone screens. Haven’t made it to a technical round yet.
My old job laid off all but one guy and a contractor.
Honestly, I kind of want to get out of tech but I don’t know what I can do that doesn’t require like a degree or is terrible.
Unemployment runs out soon. Not that the pittance the state gives is enough to live on. I asked what I should do when it runs out and they were like, awkward shrug.
Meanwhile there are billionaires living content lives of luxury.
A company I do work for sometimes recently had an open req, within 48 hours they had received over 400 applications.
Another 300 or so over the next few days following.
It then took a month to wade through them all (even with automated help) and do some preliminary phone screens.
Another couple few weeks to do legitimate interviews with prospects.
Another week to decide.
And then executive leadership claimed the company didn’t have the budget anymore and closed the req down.
Insane.
im not surprised, they dont want to waste too much resources on that many applicants. i suspect alot of job listings are like that, to give them an excuse for whatever reason they cant hire people.
What kind of tech do you work in specifically? You might be able to pivot to a different role instead of completely changing careers. I only say this cause I did it a few years ago to gtfo of security. Turns out that made a world of difference for my stress levels. Now feel like I’m doing something instead of asking people constantly to do basic security configs and to patch their shit that hasn’t been patched for 5 years.
Mostly backend for web development (django most recently), though I’m moderately proficient at react and JavaScript for frontend. Also testing and QA.
I’ve been applying to all of full stack, backend web dev, and test/QA. No bites. Learning more languages might help, but I feel like having 0 years experience in (say) Rust won’t get a lot of traction.
Maybe it’s imposter syndrome but I feel like I’ve always been a sort of middle of the road engineer. Good at some things , bad at others. It feels like with all the layoffs and AI, there’s less room for broadly competent people. There’s just going to be the top tier, fighting and getting paid less.
it was bad in 2016-2020, for biology/biotech too, im sure its worst now because of all the funding cuts, and layoffs. with bio, if your not in health, its a systemic problem, systemic as stemming all the way to undergrad.
also in job market, which is piss poor pre-pandemic, they love H1B visas holders, ive seen so many job listings for those, you know as soon as they are asking if you need visa help, they arnt going to choose anyone else. unless your already too qualified looking for a low-entry level position.
I’m going to become homeless before I get an interview. I have ten years experience. I’m trying to keep my head held high and do self training. Even posting my Udemy certs on LinkedIn (I know they’re worth less than toilet paper).
No one cares.
20 years experience. 58 years old laid off by a thinly veiled pac masquerading as a no. Profit
Can’t even get a damn interview. It’s been two years. I’ve quit looking for work and just started teaching guitar.
I will never make good money again.
Lucky for me I can’t play guitar either. The only passion I got is Aztec history and I’m not qualified to teach anyone.
What technologies did you work with?
20 years of experience and a degree and “Udemy” certs here. Took me 6 months and 250ish applications to find a crappy job in my field.
If you’re a developer, this isn’t the right time to be getting a job. I haven’t made this little since 2012. You’re better off finding a different path.
If you’re a developer
I am. The company I work for was recently bought. I’d been there 8 years so I got a couple of months they’re still keeping me on.
But the guy that had 1 idea 30+ years ago got $30,000,000 for all the risk he assumed in hiring other devs with money he already had to build his idea.
I don’t have any other options that don’t involve unskilled labor. I’m also not a young man anymore.
I hear you buddy. How many applications are you putting in per day? It sucks, I know, but you should be doing like 20 a day. Are you using the other sites like dice, indeed? Is there a specific technology that you have been using primarily for the last 10 years?
I was putting in about a dozen per day on LinkedIn and was getting nowhere. Then after a few weeks there weren’t a dozen places left to apply at. So now I do that about twice a week and look up posts created in a week’s time.
My main skills over the last 10 years have been HTML, CSS, JavaScript, and the React framework. I just got done cramming Python so I can learn Flask.
Dice and Indeed have traditionally only gotten me third party recruiters and that never ends well or is profitable.
Yeah, I stay away from recruiters these days. They seem to have one thing for me and if I don’t get it than they never consider me again. That’s not how recruiters are supposed to work lol.
Do you have a portfolio or GitHub with some work on it? I ended up having to put a bunch of random crap on GitHub. I don’t think anybody looks at it they just want to see something there.
Also, how is your resume looking? Have you gotten feedback on it? I recall there being a Reddit community specifically for resume help. And whenever you can, you should send a—cover letter—I just threw up a little. It all feels like such a waste of time…
Most of the places I interviewed with are looking to go full serverless, so that’s less interest in Flask—but I still saw a fair amount of Python gigs.
I got shot down a ton because my background isn’t really in serverless stuff. Sure I can do it, but it’s not what my work experience shows. I ended up just putting AWS, and all those others, on my resume even though I’ve not actually worked with it in production.
Right now I’m with a company who is using SvelteKit on Cloudflare, and it’s lovely. However, the Svelte market is really small and I’m not sure how well that will help me if this company fails.
I’m actually aiming for AWS certs so hopefully my stack will be applicable.
If you’re a developer and finally have a job you need to work on pushing what the industry has always needed. Start pushing to start a union.
Impossible with how developer jobs work outside of major corporations. I’m not saying I wouldn’t want it, but it’s wildly unrealistic.
Pretty sure trade unions don’t require everyone to work at the same shop. I paid union dues when I worked doing screen printing in a shop that was me, another dude, and the owner who did all the design. That was the entire business and we were still part of the local painters trade union.
That’s not what I mean.
So how would this work? Like SAG?
Amazon developers get treated like shit, and I work for a local place where I am not. Amazons wanna strike—do I have to? Fuck that. Fuck anyone who works for Amazon.
What’s the actual benefit for ME? Higher wages? Doubtful—my place can’t afford Amazon rates.
What’s the actual benefit for ME?
The anti-union propaganda is so deeply ingrained in you that you didn’t even pause when you typed they out.
Come on bud, sell me on how a trade union is gonna help all software developers, and not just those at abusive companies like Amazon, google, etc. I’m not anti-union at all, but I very much doubt it would work for my industry.
Found the ML, all insults and no solutions.
I know it sucks to take on something that either seems beneath you or will be contributing to preventing you from getting a job in your field but have you considered things like call center work? It absolutely sucks but it’s work and they accept almost anybody. Bonus is a lot of call center jobs are remote.
Another option I am nervous to suggest but has been helpful to me is gig work through something like DataAnnotation or Babel? They are both companies that work in the domain of training existing AIs to be smarter and give better answers. The pay isn’t top tier but its pretty okay for people with a background in programming (I think the programming work makes between $30 and $40 an hour, not great but not awful). I feel gross contributing to killing the jobs I could otherwise have but I try to remind myself that AI is still overrated for what it can actually do and that AI does have some beneficial aspects which are weighed down by a corporate class who only want to use it as a way to cut human workers out of the picture. I can also attest to these actually being real and having gotten paid for the work I did.
dataannotation.tech
babel.audioI hope this at least helps you get some meager income to stay off the streets my friend. I know they aren’t the best options but sometimes that is the nature of life. If nothing else it gives you a foothold to get better/more valuable certifications.
Edit: also for anyone looking for work in Washington state try Ecology Litter Corps through the Washington Department of Ecology. Pays decent and you help make the state look nice by picking up trash.
https://ecology.wa.gov/waste-toxics/solid-waste-litter/litter/ecology-youth-corps
EDIT II: @fayaz@lemmy.world suggests Mercor and says they have better rates than DataAnnotation: https://mercor.com/
I’ve been working for Mercor for the past 3 months. I think their rates are far better than what you mentioned.
I could be wrong about the pay, of course, I don’t have enough programming knowledge to apply for that. Mercor seems like another good option though for people looking for something like that. Thanks for including the suggestion for others here! I have added it to my original comment.
If you don’t mind me asking, what’s your field?
Web Development and UI/UX Design. In practice a React Developer that used Figma for planning. Basically I would draw the site, then build all the visual elements, implement all the behaviors, and then hook it up to a backend built by someone else. I’m cramming Udemy courses to become a Full Stack Web Developer.
I barely made it through the great recession.
At one point, I was down to my last $500 USD which didn’t even cover the rent coming up due in days, most of my calories were coming from fruits and veggies I was literally collecting from the wild, looking at eviction, and with no job prospects when I was so desperate that I begrudgingly accepted the worst job of my entire life (so far).
I fought my way into a better job and career over the years, but continued to live like a dude who was only a month or two away from homelessness. I did not take extravagant vacations, wear high end clothes, drive a flashy car, own an expensive home, eat fancy meals, buy lots of “toys”. Aside from electronics, almost everything I owned was second hand or gifted to me. People constantly made judgemental comments about my lifestyle, clothes, car, and so on.
By the end of 2024, I was almost at the point of feeling financially secure in life, considering making some big upgrades to my lifestyle.
Then in 2025, I got laid off after more than a decade from a company that religiously referred to its employees as family. No warning. In fact, up until that point, all we were hearing was lies (ex: we’re doing okay financially, we planned for this sort of thing, etc). I had 10 years of top scores on evaluations, 10 years of impeccable project work, 10 years of raving reviews from my peers. And yet, when the least little bit of financial difficulty reared its ugly head, I was cut in the first round of layoffs.
Fortunately for me, I sacrificed and lived quite frugally over the years, so I just don’t give a shit about the job market right now. I’d love to have a job, I feel like I’m basically living off of money that could be my retirement, but at the end of the day fuck Trump and the flailing Trump economy. If I have to go 10 years without a job, it’s going to suck, but I’ve got this.
On the other hand, I feel horrified for many of my coworkers who got laid off at the same time, and for the majority of people in general who have lost their jobs because of Trump and his sycophants. Most of them either didn’t get a chance to prepare or didn’t have the foresight to prepare the way I was privileged enough to do.
I ditched the IT world for production and manufacturing. CNC machining has a surprising amount of skill crossover and even more so in inspection. If you’re physically capable and have programming experience, it’s worth looking into.
Could you share some more information about this if you don’t mind?
tl;dr working with your hands can be better than working with a keyboard at times
Aside from the physical labor involved (there’s really no way around it), the actual things to keep in mind are very similar to the troubleshooting process on a computer. It’s ultimately about identifying there’s a problem and digging until you remove it. You’ll have to learn how to get better at filtering parts, debugging machine code (reading machine code is easy if you’re a programmer, and you have a good CAD programmer above you), maintaining the machine itself, keeping track of tools and orders…
And if you have an IT skillset, you’ll likely be one of the few that knows how to work a desktop well and can be the helping hand around the shop for that sort of thing, if you want. There’s lots of flexibility because there’s a lot less concern about public image. That being said, you might have to look around, because a lot of these places can get lax with safety and quality.
The machines are generally pleasant to work with as well. Instead of software made by companies that actively hate their customers, you get to work with massive machines that have hundreds of millions of dollars poured into development and another few hundred thousand in manufacturing. On top of that, most well-run shops will have you stick to your task. They won’t expect you to randomly cross-train on things because it can actually be really dangerous if you’re not well trained.
If you had to work Helpdesk, you no longer have to work with customer directly at all. You get to talk to other machinists, many of which have been doing it since they were teenagers or younger. It’s also a job where you get to constantly hone your craft and see the physical result. There’s something really satisfying about holding a finishing part in your hand.
I got lucky with a job offer, but you can often take a few-month fast-track course through a community college. It will run a few thousand dollars, but the course that my job offered taught me a ton.
I’ve since moved to screen printing due to poor management at the shop I previously worked, but the principles are all still there. If you’re good at working with your hands and enjoy seeing a finished product, try some local manufacturing places. A lot of them do offer training to get you in since skilled tradespeople are getting harder and harder to find these days.
I’m honest in saying that anyone who doesn’t want to do a decent amount of manual labor on top of having to use their full talent set (i.e. not tedious/mindless labor) is not a good fit and more importantly, it will probably pay less getting started than the IT industry, but if you get into something like programming or inspection, you can quickly be making double entry level rates in a couple of years. Just depends on where your skillset lies.
Hope my rambling gives you a decent idea of why I enjoy it compared to working at a desk all day. I get to interact with the world a lot more and when I look at the finished result, I know I played a significant part in that.
At the end of 2023 I got a job working for the state in a government office. It’s awesome. Unions and people tend to stay until they retire. I would heavily recommend for anyone who can. Heads up that it takes a really long time to get hired.
Is this not especially tough to stomach knowing it as a fact in conjunction with it also being so hard to keep a job despite that element remaining outside one’s control
Only 4 years ago. That’s a bad sign.
Unfortunately it’s only going to get worse for the next three and a half years.
Bold to assume this nightmare is still tied to 4 year election cycles anymore. He’s never leaving office alive, and after him there’s a gaggle of oligarchs who will be looking for new strategies of pillaging.
Honestly if he survives until the end of his term I think his own party will be dragging that child out of the White House.
Absolutely not. They were systematically shaped into cowardly yesmen before Trump reascended to the presidency. It’s why he drove out Kevin McCarthy out despite his loyalty, and why he chose JD Vance as his VP. It’s why billionaires and capitalists feel “politically homeless” right now; Trump is the party and no independent power is allowed. If they seriously threaten him, he has the full violence of a dictator with his own personal police force. He’s burning through America’s imperial power to solidify his own position, and that well is far too deep to soon run dry.
Assassination or more likely death from old age are the only way this nightmare ends.
Glad I abandoned dev work and hopped into a trade during COVID. Technically minded folks who can keep a lot of details in their head and have a good sense of order of operations are sought after in construction. The work can be hard at times but the reality is between unions, OSHA, and available equipment the amount of physical exertion required for many trades these days is fairly minimal. I build labs as a finish carpenter nowadays, get to see some pretty cool operations and get paid well (as long as there is work).
It hasn’t been this bad since a few years ago?
Edit: never mind, just remembered Covid, I forgot Covid…
If we know this trend is only going to continue to get worse, what are we looking at as the obvious breaking point?
There’s clearly nothing within the system that will self-correct it, so what will be the point of failure and I’m even more interested if you can guess how we get around the dilemma?so what will the point of failure
Historically it has been when a significant amount of the public cannot afford to feed themselves or their families. During the Great Depression there was a lot of land to be worked and to grow food, which allowed many to still survive despite the troubling economics of the time. Now, that’s not quite the case anymore, and you’ll have more people struggling to make ends meet. When people say “bread and circuses” most people focus on the “circuses” but the reality is the bread is the more important bit.
and I’m even more interested if you can guess how we get around the dilemma?
Historically, a lot of strife, violence, blood, and vengeance. Most will suffer and die. Dark times ahead.
Pessimism is almost always correct, though I’m curious to know your non-historical thoughts as well if you have any. I don’t trust history too much; “Only thing we’ve ever learned from history is that we never learn from history”
I’m expecting it to happen when the AI bubble pops.
so what will be the point of failure
It feels like a lot of the maga hats will die cheering and waving trump flags. I don’t know if that’s historically precedented.
It’s going to be hard to make any fixes when like 30-50% of the country wants hell on earth.
