Ask HN: Amazon software engineers, how is the work culture now?
I interned at Amazon last year in the Alexa org (non-frontline team in ML).<p>My team was rarely in the office before 10:30 or after 6, even during crunch time (we launched our feature during my internship) but i did see code review responses at odd hours sometimes.<p>I enjoyed the project a bunch, and while my coworkers werent the most social bunch they were pretty smart and effective. I did pretty well and exceeded managers expectations for my project to get a return offer.<p>I shopped around a bunch after and interviewed at all the companies I could but got rejected by all of the top ones (FB after phone, Google after onsite, Airbnb and Cruise after coding challenge..) so I ultimately picked the return offer despite getting a 3 other offers in the fintech space because I liked the project and location at Amazon.<p>Does that mean I’m a happy camper? Fuck no. My total comp for the first year is only $145k out of undergrad with a base of $106k. My friends at places like Google, FB and Cruise are making more like $180k-$230k by comparison. Perks are also nonexistent.<p>The worst part, though, is knowing that i have become stuck in a company with a significantly lower hiring bar. Im honestly terrified that the value on the resume will decline over time and i will never be able to get into a more prestigious company. The idea of being relegated to a 2nd or third tier company has been eating at me, and comments on places like CSCQ, Blind and this AskHN nearly drove me to suicide before.