> And now, the strongest claim this blog can make is that some engineers in the US would disengage from recruiting?

The statement was specifically about top 1% engineers in Silicon Valley. That’s a very, very small subset of all engineers in the US.

The pointy end of the talent spectrum in SV is a very weird place because it has had a lot of engineers for whom work is life. Living at the office and having coworkers working 24/7 might be something they like.

I’m not condoning this or saying it’s common. It’s not common. However, once you narrow down to the extreme outliers in the long tail of talent distribution you will find a lot of people who are downright obsessive about their work. Their jobs also pay north of $1mm including equity, so spending a few years of their life 996ing on a topic they love with energized people isn’t exactly a bad deal for them.

In general, if a recruiter told an average engineer that 996 was expected that would be the end of that conversation. Average US engineers are not signing up for 996 for average compensation.

I am this person (not a genius or whatever) but work is absolutely life for me. I still absolutely resent the 996 culture and would never do that. I'd like to have agency when I want to abuse myself