> At least what I can tell from Germany and the Netherlands. to see a healthcare specialist, you wait 3-6months in some cases.
Same in France, it can take a while to get an appointment to see some specialists nowadays. There's a clear decline there.
But if you have something bad, they'll treat you in time. Actually, a relative of mine has been diagnosed with cancer a not long ago. She got several surgeries and all the treatments with no wait, and at not cost.
There's no reason why it shouldn't be sustainable.
I suspect China or Russia don't have higher salaries, they still manage to build their own alternatives. And Airbus builds better planes than Boeing with European salaries.
I'm sure that with a bit of protectionism, we would build our tech as well as anybody else.
Indeed, but cost of life is different as well. People usually compare US Bay area net salaries to Western EU salaries - but there are so many different things to consider as well(rent, insurances, taxes, etc) which imo spoils any constructive comparasion.
if so many people can afford to live alone, perhaps it means that housing situation isn't that bad? in cities like NYC where rents are high, it's very common to have roommates for instance.
How do you know if one candidate happened to see the problem on leetcode and memorized the solution versus one who struggled but figured it out slower?
It's very easy to tell, but it doesn't make much difference. The best candidates have seen the problems before and don't even try to hide it, they just propose their solution right away.
I try give positive feedback for candidates who didn't know the problem but could make good use of hints, or had the right approach. But unfortunately, it's difficult to pass a Leetcode interview if you haven't seen a similar problem to what is asked before. Most candidates I interview nowadays seem to know all questions.
That's what the company has decided so we have to go along. The positive side is that if you do your part, you have good chances of being hired, even if you disagree with the process.
It doesn’t matter. It’s about looking for candidates who have put in the time for your stupid hazing ritual. It signals on people who are willing to dedicate a lot of time to meaningless endeavors for the sake of employment.
This type of individual is more likely to follow orders and work hard - and most importantly - be like the other employees you hired.
It would take something like one week full time to work on this. It's not something you can do if you have a full-time job and apply to several other companies. I find it unreasonable to ask a candidate to spend that much time for an uncertain result.
It's true that being ready for leetcode takes practice, but at least it's standard so you can re-use the skills to other interviews. Optimizing some generated code is certainly fun, but it's as useless as leetcode for your average programmer.
As long as there are qualified candidates willing to do unreasonable tasks for the chance to work at a company, there's not much incentive for the company to change their system. Those people will also probably work unreasonably hard and make unreasonable sacrifices for the company.
> It's not something you can do if you have a full-time job
> I find it unreasonable to ask a candidate to spend that much time
And same for some reason does not apply to leetcode style interviews?
> It would take something like one week full time to work on this
I am not sure if this is satire or what? You need months of continuous preparation to be ready for the leetcode style interview.
> Optimizing some generated code is certainly fun, but it's as useless as leetcode for your average programmer.
No, it is not. This is specifically the type of job you would be doing tomorrow at Anthropic team if hired. And they are specifically hiring people who are already good enough at that very task. The same cannot be said for the leetcode, not even remotely comparable.
Thanks for noticing this. I got the same feeling when reading this. It may not sound like much, and it doesn't mean it's an insufferable place to work, but it's a hint it might be.
Rant: On a similar note, I recently saw a post on Linkedin from Mistral, where they were bragging to recruit candidates from very specific schools. That sounded very pretentious (and also an HR mistake on several levels IMHO).
> War with the US isn't a clear cut "good vs evil" situation as the EU vs russia would be
I don't think EU vs Russia would be a "good vs evil" situation. Russia/US seem pretty similar to me, dictatorship/propaganda with a majority of the population being regular people not in favor of any war, and 30% of indoctrinated people.
You seem to have very little contact to Russians living in Russia or Germany. Their version of "not in favor of any war" is a very strange one – it's more a stance of indifference than disfavor.
Thanks German brother :) I think our main issue in Europe is the lack of a common language. It makes it harder to build strong ties and realize how close our values are.
Agreed, there is always this little story to remind us of our unity - at least from the perspective of the draftees/workers back in ww1, where everyone was basically forced to fight each other by the elites
Only 4% or so approve of going to war to conquer Greenland, so if it gets that bad you might expect sentiment to keep turning. but his approval floor has been pretty steady at no lower than ~30 percent through every controversy so far.
I hope I'm wrong but I don't see American citizens rioting over international affairs unfortunately. Hopefully he'll be unpopular enough to lose senate, and his successor won't be as insane. That would be the best outcome.
Americans have a history of rioting over economic and social conditions, however. An attack on Greenland may open a Pandora’s box of consequences that will devastate America by us becoming a pariah state, which will lead to economic pain.
For the sake of the country, I hope that this is finally the red line that will get enough Republicans representatives to finally have the courage to rein in Trump, at least on this issue.
To add, this 56% is not evenly distributed politically. Protests in California, Minnesota, and New York (all blue states) are not likely to get red state representatives and senators to threaten Trump with removal. Blue state congresspeople are already on board with removing Trump, but removal can’t happen without 2/3rds of the Senate getting on board, which means this can’t happen today without some Republican support.
I’m a Californian. It’s one thing for me to write Alex Padilla or Adam Schiff; they’d vote to convict if they have the chance. But they won’t get a chance unless people like Ted Cruz and Lindsay Graham say “enough is enough,” but I don’t live in those states.
Same in France, it can take a while to get an appointment to see some specialists nowadays. There's a clear decline there.
But if you have something bad, they'll treat you in time. Actually, a relative of mine has been diagnosed with cancer a not long ago. She got several surgeries and all the treatments with no wait, and at not cost.
There's no reason why it shouldn't be sustainable.
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