In Canada, the Ministry of Health pays colleges to teach kids COBOL and JCL. It’s a steady job, pension, good bennies. I know a handful of people who went that route, rather than the riskier private sector.
Would you happen to know how that compares to saying “Fuck it” and going with a Java career for the relative predictability? I’m not asking for any particular reasons, just curious.
I know some Java folks, but my sampling is biased because I meet them where I work - places that predominantly use the younger languages. Actually, I happen to know that the MoH in particular (and probably lots of other institutions) wrap their COBOL/JCL in a lot of Java, so that most devs never need to dive into the “real backend” if they want to just stay at the Java level.
Java people seem like family people. But from what I’ve observed, their job doesn’t seem any different. You can work in javascript, or python, and still insist on clocking out at 16, 1700. But I only work at startups or seat of your pants kinds of places, so I know about what I hear. 🤷
Doubtful, I was just joking about how it’s an older language that has become rare
Probably a few CS programs offer courses in it, if nothing else because it’s historically important. And I’m sure one could teach it to themself via books and documentation
I once applied for a “database admin” job at one of the big credit card companies. The job description was basically “run all our Oracle databases” and the salary was in the mid 2 millions USD, but I assumed that figure was typo’ed or something ( an extra 0 maybe?)
In the interview I learned that there was no typo and it was to be one of the seven people on the planet that run the databases for this credit card processor. They said “if the database goes down then we are losing billions of dollars a minute”.
Anyways I didn’t get the job, but they’re not all underpaid.
It really wouldn’t be all that bad. If they’re dropping $2m/y on a database admin, then their BCDR plan must be rock solid with crazy fault tolerances. I’d imagine outages are extremely rare.
But, if they’re dropping that kind of money, you’d have to be an expert in the field. Or know someone.
If you labor there’s only two ways you get paid your full worth: you own the means of your production or your boss is a chump. However much the job pays, you are going to have a larger impact than your salary (hopefully).
There is no relationship between what you earn and your skill level. If there were, theoretical physics would be a top paying field. The reason is, this is capitalism and we are horrible negotiators. If you want to earn top money in a technical field, the best you can do is insert yourself in a revenue stream. Roles that are critical to revenue like a billing system or associated with a intrinsically valuable commodity e.g. petrochemical, are more lucrative than other similarly skilled professions.
They’re not really blaming capitalism for anything though? They’re just explaining how it works, and they’re right. In a market driven economy, you are paid for having a skill or some knowledge based on the demand of that skill or knowledge and nothing else. In the same way as the quality of your house has little bearing on it’s value when compared to it’s location. Not a criticism of capitalism.
SIGH. Capitalism is a fringe conspiracy theory. Next you’ll be claiming that billionaires earn their money through “capital gains” instead of salary, or that every corporation answers to a shadowy cabal of “shareholders” who only care about profit.
Well you won’t fool me. Unlike you, I have educated myself by reading newspapers.
I think the mention of fintech in the text makes an implication of online store of some sort, where I could see it being profitable because it’s a lot more work to be able to generate listings and accept payment and shipping information.
That was never in question. Online payment portals are Fintech. You don’t have to work at IBM to be in Fintech, it includes the entire process built on top of their platform as well.
I’m saying that the mention of Fintech in the First Case would IMPLY that the WebDev also deals with Fintech. If both devs have comparable skillsets then it makes sense to compare their pay rates.
That’s crazy. If you have the skills don’t under value yourself. Don’t be afraid to walk away from an offer. Never tell a potential employer your current salary and never give them a number if they ask in interviews. Ask what their range is as a response and if that matches your number, proceed. Then negotiate for the max of their range. If you get to that point, they already want you, so you have the upper hand in negotiation.
I think the text should be combined into one sentence, which would be run-on but still give the impression that both images refer to one person, as it should be.
The first step to correction is understanding there is a problem in the first place. This is quite constructive, it may just not feel like it is because it’s framed combatively.
You’re doing it wrong is the phrase that lets teachers teach at one of the most basic levels.
The public is essentially a self teaching teacher, so this is just the process of public correction happening. It may look/feel like public shaming, and it may be if they’re going too far, but that is the mechanism that I think is playing out here.
Does that framing make it any more palatable to you or does it still seem unnecessarily disrespectful?
To me, constructive criticism means that the criticism doesn’t just point out failure, but that it then also shows how to correct that failure.
By itself, “you’re doing it wrong” is just destructive: it takes something apart, it destroys it. Without a subsequent “and here’s how you would do it right,” it doesn’t become constructive, it doesn’t help in putting things back together in the correct way.
Sure, as a first step, “you’re doing it wrong” is completely justified when something is actually wrong.
But without the second step - the constructive part - it just doesn’t constitute constructive criticism. By itself, it’s just criticism.
Ah I get that, like the frustration of a sociological paper pointing out a societal issue but offering no steps on how to solve it due to fixes being out of scope (utterly infuriating lol).
I still think the criticism is valid, but I do think I agree in that the criticism could be more constructive… But I still think laying the foundation of the argument, so to speak, is still constructive even though it may not go as far as one may need for it to cross the threshold back into polite…
I am still convinced this is a knee jerk feeling issue more than anything truly being amiss, but I have been wrong before. What do you think?
I agree it probably is a definitions thing, I’m very pedantic sometimes and it feels like my definition of constructive is much more optimistic/wider/encompassing than yours. That doesn’t mean that my definition is right or that your position is wrong though, that’s just what I think is going on here.
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