IT work dwells in non-human abstractions. The problems being solved rarely consider human relevancy. Management tracks with metrics detached from quality. Policies keep workers in compliance yet fail to bring about good results.

Removing humanity from daily life creates a challenging dynamic, like an astronaut transported into outer space far from family, home, and everything good you’ve ever known. You subsist artificially over a detached interface without only memories of natural life experienced in the past. Until you maybe rejoin normalcy, you have many tasks to complete in this strange environment. Any people trapped with you are under similar pressures, and talk revolves around the sterile mechanical environment.

Strange personalities and traits are the norm for IT work. Working with machines and solving irrelevant complex problems attracts bizarre people.

Hazard pay tries to compensate for the mental grind and humanity given up to live in that world. There are casualties also, not only ruined posture and atrocious physiques, but psychological damage.