Don't get a job based on how impressive it sounds when you tell people about it at parties. You will spend far more time doing the job than you will talking about it at parties.
Also, there will always be higher status people around you. If you're a successful doctor, and move around in fancy doctor circles, you will know more accomplished doctors, directors of famous hospitals or whatever. You can always be bitter from envy if you're blinded by the status game. The struggle never ends, there's no "arriving". Software dev salaries (in the US) let you live way beyond material needs and allows tremendous luxuries (relative to other times and places).
It's a self inflicted mental suffering that people bring on themselves. Instead of enjoying that high wealth they fume about why they aren't as impressive as fancy lawyers, ceos, politicians and doctors...
This. How did you help people around you? Did you use your network to enhance theirs? Did you lift as you climbed? Is your institution or organization (if you are working for one) the better for having you?
Talking about your job at parties is way down the list of reasons social status matters. It's a fair point that people shouldn't make all their decisions with status in mind, but it is also wrong to belittle it as a consideration.
What are some of the other reasons? Suppose you could make $500k/year either by being a cardiologist or by cleaning out septic tanks. What advantages does the $500k from cardiology get you that the $500k from cleaning septic tanks does not? (Aside from impressing people at parties)
Higher status friends, marrying into a "better family" and so on. Your family (especially more distant) will respect you more.
Also, I think a major elephant in the room: some people just feel better about themselves and sleep better, knowing that they are a big dog and can feel justified in looking down on others.
There is a great quote from A defense lawyer in the HBO show “The Undoing”:
“You know, I should say up front that, in my experience, doctors tend to be assholes. The reason they tend to be assholes is because they get to be. They're doctors.”
I don't think that's as shallow as you make it sound. I'd rather have respect for being a successful adult who exercises a skill to create value, for doing something difficult and being good at it, than for my taste in music or something.
Taking the “more dates” comment with justification at face value and assuming it to be true, the additional dates are primarily attracted to your job, as stated.
It is reasonable to infer that these additional dates are actually interested in dating your job, and your essential self and body are just along for the ride. Your job goes, you go.
The problem is you will forget this at some point and start thinking a particular date actually cares about you personally.
Do yourself a favor to save your future self some pain. Take your CV, in paper form, roll it up into a cylinder, and dip it into latex. You should have a latex wand of about 8 inches in length. Wrap it with a few hundred dollar bills, gift this to your date and run away as fast as your feet will take you. You’re welcome...you’ve just saved yourself 10s to 100s of thousands of dollars and many hours of misery.
Details may vary depending on gender, economic status and the local currency.
I would wager that less than 10% of first dates are based on the "essential self" rather than some superficial quality. You don't get to know peoples' essential selves that quickly.
Those things are independent of status, though. You can be a successful plumber who exercises your skill to create value, but status-conscious types would still consider you low-status.
Hah. Nope. A career where you can make money and move up over time is not low status. Try being a blue collar member of the working poor, or someone deep in debt from a useless degree working a dead end service job. Software is a very cushy job compared with what more than half this country has.
I've done those things, and so has my husband. Not sure either of us would go back, but software has some uniquely frustrating aspects and tends to attract a certain type of oblivious, entitled asshole. You get real tired of fiddling with tiny complicated things for hours on end while some puffed up middle management bro breaths down your neck. I've thought more than once about going back to serving drinks at the bars, but I guess I have higher aspirations now. Sort of a blessing and a curse.
I think it may be on the lower end for a number of reasons which lead back to the low barrier to entry - there’s no need to pay your dues with a decade of schooling, in hundreds of thousands in tuition, and to professional associations, state boards of licensure, or both.
However, there are crappy doctors and architects - just like there are famous software engineers. Prestige - outside the ingroup - is a function of the accessibility, value, and quality of your work. Like the Taiwanese folks who built a mask availability tracker...
It’s fundamentally disrespected by people at a core level. I’ll prove my point with the one question they always ask us versus any other profession, ‘what is it that you actually do at the company?’.
I swear, I’d never think to ask this of anyone, doctors, lawyers, teachers, nurses, cops, literally, I can’t think of one profession that gets asked this, I’ll try again, pilots, chemists, diplomats, translators, artists, mechanics, it’s endless.
What is it that you actually do?
How about fuck you, I’m not answering that anymore.
It tickles people the wrong way that you took software development into every possible industry you can imagine and not only started offering tech solutions, but business solutions too.
Incoming projection - I see it as the most passive aggressive low ball attack on one’s profession. It’s karma too, because we do the same to sales/product/people management elements within our industry. I know why I’ve done it, and it’s mostly insecurity, ‘oh those people aren’t smart, will soon be gone’.
^ Now imagine the whole of society looking at you like that.
Have you considered applying Hanlon's Razor to the question?
In my experience, most people (i.e. sans pathologies) ask this question because they are ignorant and curious.
They are trying to integrate the unknown (you and your craft) into the known, not trying to challenge your ego.
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A story that might be illustrative.
A close relative of mine came to his current country from another country, but is a citizen of his new country. At social gatherings over the years, a not-uncommon question, asked by immigrants and born-citizens alike, was "Where are you from?"
There was no quicker way to become his mortal enemy, and to ruin a party!
He thought people were trying to parade his otherness, with the intent of making him feel out of place, not welcome, lesser-than, etc.
From another perspective, each question was an opportunity to educate people on his heritage, and an objectively-fascinating component of his identity (that of "The Immigrant").
I think it’s what afflicted my relative, too, for what it’s worth. When you’re stung by people, it’s hard to see the value in continuing to remain open.
Regarding the accrual of knowledge and its hardening effects on the soul:
> with much wisdom comes much sorrow; the more knowledge, the more grief.
> The wise have eyes in their heads, while the fool walks in the darkness; but the same fate overtakes them both.
These quotes come from Ecclesiastes, which does not contain a much of a resolution.
> A person can do nothing better than to eat and drink and find satisfaction in their own toil.
Tao Te Ching makes a similar recommendation: empty hearts and fill bellies. In short, worry less of ideas, and more of literal substances that bind us together (food, drink, and toil).
People think digital artists just press buttons lazily and the computer does all the work. And everyone knows all mechanics will take advantage of your ignorance. And of course, why hire a photographer, all they do is press a button, and why won't they give me all the originals so I can run them through filters and ruin their reputation by crediting them with it on Facebook...
Now that I think of it, IT people and mechanics suffer from the exact same stereotype where people don't trust anything they say and assume they're just lording their knowledge over the poor, uninformed user for status/money.
I don't think I've ever been asked that by anyone other than my grandparents. Anyone under retirement age and reasonably well-educated knows what software development is or at least doesn't ask because they think it would make them look stupid not to know.
Any company where that is asked is a terrible software company and you should leave. They also almost certainly make shit software, and staying there is bad for your education and career.
What's your line for "white collar"? There are lots of office desk jobs involving computers that are lower paid and lower status. Testers, help desk, data entry, administrative helpers etc.
It is true though that its easier to climb the ladder via social/soft/people skills and selling/positioning yourself well and knowing who to associate with etc. compared to working real hard on technical stuff. If you want to impress general people, tell them about people related achievements, like how you led a big group to success, or how you resolved conflicts, big names you've worked with and know etc. Social capital is indeed more valuable in general and so managers and "soft" professionals like lawyers can seem higher status. But its more about the focus on people vs things. Rule of thumb: if you can be objectively wrong or make an objective mistake, you're on the lower end of status. If situations are more wishy washy and rhetoric can save you, you are higher up.
Even though formulating it bluntly is frowned upon: as a software engineer you dominate (rule over) computers and equipment (similar to blue collar work), but to get respect from non techies you need to dominate people. No way around it. That's why managers like to have many reports, even if they are useless and hurt the bottom line.
Are you Indian by any chance? I'm curious because - at least from Indian people I've seen and met - it (social status) seems to be hugely more important than what I see around me locally.
I do think about my literal social status (i.e. friends, sex, etc.) but I don't think thought along those lines has ever really influenced my decision making - beyond a vague desire to outdo people born better than me.
Upvoted though I disagree with you. I'm sure there is a wide variance of outcomes in software, but I think if you work at it, you can make a fulfilling career out of software. Don't give up, as it is possible your current job just isn't a right fit for you.
Counter anecdote: I know law and finance and business folks who wished they studied more computers.
In my experience that's because they think our work is easier and that we do less of it than they do, for more pay. But that actually goes to the parent's point; lazy entitled and overpaid is part of the low status perception.
How many software developers actually get a chance to “add to the world's treasures“? Building yet another CRUD web app doesn't meet the definition in my book. I'm not saying it's not possible, but you have to be rather lucky.
Yep, this whole thread is one big apples-to-oranges comparison. An average software engineer is lower status than a lawyer at a top law-firm with fierce competition for every position. Well, duh. Why don't we compare a senior FAANG engineer/manager to an average legal clerk or such then.
Sounds deep, you probably mean things like love and faith and kindness.
But it's misleading. Friendships and relationships aren't "free" in terms of effort and achievement. They take the same kind of work/luck/genetics/network combination as getting an interesting and fulfilling job does.
Sure, even the hobo on the street can have faith in Jesus and mental peace for free if you mean that sort of thing, but most things people want are scarce or at least aren't available by default, without either effort or connections.
I'd recommend talking with your friends, and asking them if they find their work fulfilling. If it falls short of their expectations, ask which dimensions contribute the most to the diff.
This might give you some perspective on what life would be like in another vertical. It probably isn't as rosy as you imagine, but you might have done this already.
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I would recommend to younger people, that they shouldn't make their career choice through the lens of prestige, because time has demonstrated that social standing is flimsy and unpredictable.
A profession's relative prestige varies regionally, temporally, socioeconomically, and in the eye of the beholder. These are mutable dimensions for the duration of a normal career.
It's kind of like the old advice: if you're interested in marrying someone for life, don't marry based on one dimension alone (looks, money, health, personality, family). Any of these can invert completely.
In finance terms, it's like betting your financial portfoilo on the 40-year performance of a single ETF: not outright stupid because some people will be successful, but it's not super wise.
If this doesn't help you feel better, maybe you should consider changing careers? As a SWE, you have enough intellectual capital, time and domain-specific education is the only thing standing in your way.
Software engineers in the USA get paid well enough on average that you can live a modest life, save up serious capital, and then bootstrap your own company or side hustle. That will get you more status.
You could try being a grad student in New Orleans. The James Earl Jones quote from Conan is apt here (my point being they will be thankful for what they have).
If it makes them feel better I have to teach the 99% of their high school they are talking about and they all seem pretty one track minded.
What are some higher status jobs where I can use my above average ability to work with computers and sheer tenacity to compensate for my woefully underdeveloped social skills?
Haha do 500 hours of leetcode and go work for FAANG. It's a totally different level of social status than regular engineers and the only qualifications needed is leetcode mediums in 20 mins
I work at a FAANG and the people that I work with aren't terribly different social status from the ones I worked with during my first internship, they're just ~20 years younger.
~$500k is what some Amazon L6's and most L7's make. Don't think you can hit that in most Finance positions until VP level, unless you're in Quant finance in hedge funds but then the SWEs make that much too.
Goldman banking associates do not make 500k lmao. you are smoking something
500 at Goldman is like VP with some tenure, which would be similar to E6 at Facebook
Hell Goldman sales and trading managing directors make 750-900k a year, which is what a good E7 at Facebook makes, both usually reached by age 33-35 by high achievers.
Yeah legit no one of importance cares. If you’re in good shape, look good, and have enough disposable income to do fun stuff when you want (any software engineer does)... anybody will find you interesting enough.
EDIT: I guess it was suspicious that 99% of my high school circle picked law or finance or business courses instead.