For what it's worth, you may have a heavily skewed view of what's extraordinary "these days." There are lots of tech companies that are mature enough to not flog their people to death. Companies with strong engineering cultures that also highly value seasoned developers tend to be this way. Where I work, the office is (well, was pre-covid) pretty empty by 5:30.

There are two sides to this coin; sometimes some late hours are unavoidable -- I don't blame my employer for it, they're not forcing me to work these hours at all, but I think if you're a professional you can't avoid such circumstances sometimes and that's why we get $megabucks right?

The right mix for me is working like a daemon about 9 months a year then having 3 months off, but YMMV..

> they're not forcing me to work these hours at all, but I think if you're a professional you can't avoid such circumstances sometimes and that's why we get $megabucks right?

No, you could make the exact opposite statement and it would sound just as valid. Watch:

"they're not forcing me to work these hours at all, and if you're a professional who does get the megabucks, you can avoid such circumstances."

I find most people working those long hours to save the day could have designed a better solution up front and not needed those late hours at the last minute. Not always, but often they should have known and fixed the problem long before then.

I think it sometimes comes down to a matter of choice in working styles. Some people thrive on killing themselves at times. I've been there. I will still occasionally pull a late-nighter because I get in "the zone" and am actually enjoying the productivity and I still get the condescending comments about how if you planned properly, that wouldn't be necessary, but I think that some people just don't get that working like that can actually be very gratifying. I'm getting a bit old for doing it more than about once a quarter, though, whereas I used to do it a couple times a week.