How Working For Google, Amazon, And Microsoft Lost 'Dream Job' Status
Despite blockbuster earnings from giants such as Alphabet and Microsoft, layoffs continue to ripple through the tech industry.
Layoffs.fyi, a platform monitoring job cuts in the tech sector, recorded more 263,000 job losses in 2023 alone. As of April 2024, there have been more than 75,000 job losses in the industry so far.
“So instead of rewarding the growth that we saw them all pursue years ago, they’re now rewarding profit,” said Jeff Shulman, professor at the University of Washington’s Foster School of Business. “And so the layoffs have continued. People have become used to them. Regrettably and sadly, it seems that the layoffs are going to be the new normal.”
Even though mass tech layoffs continue to dominate headlines, the labor market still seems strong. The U.S. economy added 303,000 jobs in March, well above the Dow Jones estimate for a rise of 200,000, with the unemployment rate edged lower to 3.8%.
According to Handshake, a popular free job posting site for college students and graduates, the tech layoffs have prompted new workers to seek other opportunities. The share of job applications from tech majors submitted to internet and software companies dropped by more than 30% between November 2021 and September of 2023.
“Part of the reason why this is happening is because stability is such a major factor in students’ decisions around what types of jobs they apply to and what types of jobs they accept,” said Christine Cruzverga, chief education strategy officer at Handshake. “They’re looking at the headlines in the news and they’re paying attention to all of the layoffs that are happening in Big Tech, and that makes them feel unstable.”
Mass layoffs have eroded the shine of the tech industry, which is why workers are questioning whether getting a job in the tech industry should still be regarded as a ‘dream job.’
“For the people who are chasing like a tech dream job, I think keep your options open and be realistic,” said Eric Tolotti, senior partner engineer at Snowflake, who got laid off from Microsoft in 2023. “Don’t just focus on one company and feel like you have to get into that one company because it’s the dream.”
Watch the video to learn about tech workers’ sentiments, considerations for aspiring Big Tech employees, and more.
Chapters:
0:00-03:11 Cold Open
03:11-05:11 Chapter 1: The golden age of tech jobs
05:11-07:22 Chapter 2: Start of tech layoffs
07:22-10:21 Chapter 3: Is tech’s shiny image eroding?
10:21-12:00 Chapter 4: What’s next?
Produced by: Anuz Thapa
Edited by: Kevin Heinz
Narration by: Jordan Smith
Graphics by: Christina Locopo, Jason Reginato
Supervising Producer: Jeff Morganteen
Additional Footage: Getty Images
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How Working For Google, Amazon, And Microsoft Lost ‘Dream Job’ Status
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Why is a company funding “gender-affirming surgery” a good thing? This seems dystopian to me, they should pay for a psychologist instead
Hi, I am new and trying my best to understand it, still lost, when do I press up or down. Slow learner
Never once used the fooseball tables at Amazon, was so busy and had no time for that; it was a joke that we even had those things.
Most of these people that worked at these tech companies are already rehired somewhere else because they worked for these big companies it's people who worked for smaller companies who got laid off that are worried because the market is now filled with big company employees who will be picked over them just because they worked at a big company
Never work for Google, never, stop chasing these horrible companies
Not sure about Apple and lay off
Speak for Palestine 🇵🇸 humanity
Not-for-profit or government jobs all day. Do they pay less? Yes, of course. Will you actually have a work life balance and have a significant less chance of getting laid off? Yes, of course.
"dream job"….LOL
wow, companies cares about profiting? What a shock in this news report. I bet small business only worry about the happiness of their employees!
Amazon a dream company? 😂 nothing but pip and 🍌 s
Okay just jesting but these FAANG companies are 100% still dream companies. Changed my life completely and helped my family who fell on hard times. Most of my friends in big tech are 1st gen like myself and we definitely see these companies as a blessing. I still can't believe it sometimes. That 300 algorithm grind came to good use tbh 😌 glad I started coding in 2015 when it wasn't as popular.
dream jobs lol you mean useless jobs where ppl record them selfs how there job makes them alot of money and dont do anything
If someone beloved they were part of a family and didn’t realize they could be fired…. Like that’s on them lol. I’ve always taken a job and been aware it might end, if it happened I’d just go find another one, I’ve switched sectors even. Like some of these people really sound painfully oblivious to life
Big company are the worst. You are just a nut in the machine.
gone are those days
Lol. Muricans learning what it actually means to be murican and working in murica. Turbo-Capitalism, Hire and Fire, yayyy. Y U No Happy ?🤣🤣🤣
Cycle as old as these industries. Everyone who had a union job back in the day or who worked for Ford also thought they were secure as they watched their jobs move overseas. All these things run in cycles. No job or industry can continue growing forever. Best thing anyone can do is to maintain a lifestyle with as little debt as possible and some savings because its not a matter of if, but when a company will let you go. Payroll is the biggest expense for a business so thats the first place they will look to cut costs.
The major problem is these companies went public and now are accountable to outside investors. This causes the company to lean towards company focused decisions verses employee focused decisions.
If the company had a valuable product, they would have been financially stable while being a privately held company. Greed from management and doubt in their products is what led to them becoming “like every other company”. Let’s not act like this was always the plan or inevitable.
All wrong: Tech started turning around when Biden started reversing the damage to the economy when inflation spiked >10% that affected the markets broadly, and the Green effort started busting. Elon Musk started the layoff revolution at the beginning of 2023 by firing 80% of Twitter's staff and proving that Tech was overly fat with Woke staff that actually damage these companies. Meta immediately followed and the others. In 2024 we see the Revenge of Conservatives against the woke establishment the reversal of DEI globally, and the backlash futher caused in various segments that have affected tech – as the cancer of this problem are in these tech companies eating free food for years and basically doing nothing. Google in 2024 admitted that this rubbish was affecting their business when they appear to have lost their AI lead.
why using the past sentences like "tech companies WERE growing".
Am I living in a different world or them? By proudly speaking as if people have stopped using technology trends and are going backwards to the traditional values? (Most of them are teachers that probably haven't had a real engineering job experience)
Worked at Apple, silicon valley and it was just a job and not a dream but a loooot of work
Zucc dream is to become mcdonalds boy
if your new product doesn't offer new benefit to the previous year's product, noone is gonna buy it
deserved lol
Any employer will boot you to the curb without hesitation. Don’t believe the, “we’re a family.” crap.
Space Force's recruitment is gonna go BOOM
If you're mentally stable, not a pot guzler, and have no criminal record or a detrimental medical history.
Hey now heey now don't dream, it's over.
I work for a sprinkler company, and it's a dream job. I'm my own boss. No one bothers me. I get lunch if I want to or take 1 hour and half if I want to as well. As long as I get my job done, everything is OK. Most says I get home at 3 pm and still get my 8 hours. It's a truly amazing job. But if I told you what you need to do, you'll most likely not do it.
So basically capitalism lied. Again.
Please remember that these lay-offs aren't solely because these corporations are soulless money sinks for the elites @ the top.
Most of these lay-offs are because of the "consolidation" or purchasing of a smaller company by a larger one, ie purging "redundant positions."
So, monopolism & oligopolism are and always have been one of the main hurdles to a fulfilling & stable work economy. Regardless of how big these companies are, they only need so many sla- I mean employees.
If only there was a bureaucratic system that could hold these corporations accountable & see that no monopolies are formed. You know, a collective of some idk representatives of the people who have their best intentions at heart & not willing to take bribes to look the other way while the poor grow porrer & the rich grow richer.
Mhhhh, anyone know of something like this? Someone should get on this!
With every passing day, I become more and more convinced people will reverse back to the conventional manual labor works and services. We humans can't live with those artificial myths for too long and we will naturally revert back to where we were where we were.
Unisys laid a lot of people off in 2023 and 2024. It's amazing to me that they are more silent about this then the past.