freyir
Joined 10 years ago
Joined 10 years ago
You face the opportunity cost of not working for a company whose stock will rise fast, making it worth much more in years 2-3+ than it was initially priced at.
None of us have a crystal ball though, so it’s all speculation.
FB is not cool, TikTok is eating Instagram’s lunch causing IG to pivot more to video, so it comes down to the Metaverse.
This was compiled in 2020 and Meta might move up the list in 2021.
It’s worth noting that Netflix does not have RSUs, and Stripe keeps appreciation of RSU value for itself. So if you expect Meta stock price to go up over the next few years (a big if), compensation at Meta could be higher in the long run.
“I want to stress the importance of being young and technical … Young people are just smarter. Why are most chess masters under 30?" he asked. "I don't know… Young people just have simpler lives. We may not own a car. We may not have family."
Of course, he said this in his twenties and he may have changed his tune. As far as I know, he hasn’t handed the reigns of Meta over to a twenty-something just yet.
I ended up taking a job with a FANG company that skews slightly older than most startups, but even here I’m on the wrong side of the Bell curve. I can run circles around most of my younger coworkers so I never feel like my job is in jeopardy. But I’m often the oldest individual contributor on any given project and I have to wonder, where have all the older software engineers in Silicon Valley gone? Did they retire early, and was it their own choice? Will I be served up as Soylent Green in the cafeteria next year?
I moved into software engineering from a different engineering discipline where most of my coworkers were in their forties and fifties, and some were older than that. I doubled my pay, but now I work on the SF peninsula where I can’t afford a house, and I probably cut my remaining working years in half. All in all, it seems like it may have been a questionable choice in the long run.
Engineers working in programming-adjacent industries (rather than Silicon Valley web tech) such as telecommunications, defense, aerospace/satellites, medical technology, etc., tend to earn less but have much longer careers in my experience (and often work on more interesting problems IMO). You may be able to leverage your medical degree, after your residency, to work in an area with more specialization and less churn.
Interest ebbs and flows. Korea is perhaps eclipsing Japan in general interest these days. But their cultural export is pop music and boy bands, and their main Western demographic seems to be teenage girls.