Remember when tech workers dreamed of working for a big company for a few years, before striking out on their own to start their own company that would knock that tech giant over?
Then that dream shrank to: work for a giant for a few years, quit, do a fake startup, get acqui-hired by your old employer, as a complicated way of getting a bonus and a promotion.
Then the dream shrank further: work for a tech giant for your whole life, get free kombucha and massages on Wednesdays.
And now, the dream is over. All that’s left is: work for a tech giant until they fire your ass, like those 12,000 Googlers who got fired six months after a stock buyback that would have paid their salaries for the next 27 years.
We deserve better than this. We can get it.
The ones who do make insane sums can pretty easily pivot to being an owner of stuff, if they so choose. We’re starting to see more of that now. A-Rod seems to be investing in businesses now, and was on Shark Tank as a Shark. More generally in entertainment, Ryan Reynolds has been cleaning up, and Kevin Hart is also starting a bunch of businesses. Ashton Kutcher is/was an pretty big in startup investing for a while. The you have Dr Dre with Beats (acquired by Apple), and Jay-Z with all kinds of stuff.
As long as they don’t blow all their money on drugs, women, jewelry, and cars, they don’t have to work for someone else for very long.
Of course, once you start a business you effectively work for the customers, or the board of directors. Everyone has a boss somewhere, unless their just living off dividends or royalties.