5 ms·

There is not a shortage of STEM graduates. However, from an employer's point of view, there is a shortage of cheap STEM graduates. Hence the recent tech company

by RachelF 10y ago

There is not a shortage of STEM graduates. However, from an employer's point of view, there is a shortage of cheap STEM graduates. Hence the recent tech company uproar over the skilled visa changes.

trendia 10y ago
The companies should just admit: "There is a shortage of STEM graduates at the price I want to pay."
swuecho 10y ago
no shortage of stem graduate, but shortage of CS graduates or people with programming skills. You can say there is not shortage of anything if you want to pay a good price. Then ignore what I said or remove the word 'shortage' for your world.
- dukeluke 10y ago
  You say there's a shortage, yet all software development jobs available require a Bachelor's degree plus 3-5 years of experience. That doesn't seem like much of a shortage to me.
  - swuecho 10y ago
    I get a MS degree in biology, which is STEM. I happen to know programming. I do not even seek job in biology, because i know the field is oversupplied. instead, get a decent software engineer job instead, without degree, without any real world experience. If the market is the same in biology and programming related jobs. I would get job related to my degree. It is obvious there is a shortage in people who have programming skills. I manage to get above average productivity compared to my coworkers. I realized that even more shortage for productive software engineer. sure, any adjective is relative.
    - grainsout 10y ago
      I have a friend who graduated with a PhD in Chemistry a few years ago. He went down the research path, but eventually didn't like the pay. He had a good amount of programming experience and was primarily building simulation frameworks for chemical-environment interactions. I told him he could triple his salary if he applied for non-research positions. He's now a research developer at a pharma company making three times as much. Many hard science STEM graduates don't realize that their programming skills (even if they're not totally honed) will make them more valuable on the market. If you can find a position that uses both your degree skills and programming, then you'll be a unicorn to that company.
      - swuecho 10y ago
        That is where I feel bad about people who are in basic science in term of salary. Their problem are hard, require more work and skills but pay less.
  - rcheu 10y ago
    This has not been true for me, or anyone else I know. Even friends from colleges I've never heard of with degrees in non-CS STEM majors found jobs paying 100k+ within months of graduation.
    - swuecho 10y ago
      I know it exists. I did not get 100K+ in the first year either, but I pass it in the second year.
      - swuecho 10y ago
        Interestingly, most of my coworkers do not have computer science degree or even related. They are very nice people and doing very well.
- d0mine 10y ago
  There is a shortage of hamburgers for $0.50 . There is no shortage for $5.00 There is a gap between cheap and the good price. Sometimes "cheap" is too cheap.
djsumdog 10y ago
And a lot of the proposed immigration changes won't actually reduce the price of these workers either. If anything, it's a power grab by large consulting companies and bigger software shops to be able to hire up the best talent, and just lay off the rest: http://fightthefuture.org/articles/hr-170-will-all-large-companies-to-consolidate-talent-in-the-tech-industry/ http://fightthefuture.org/articles/hr-170-will-all-large-com...
- vostok 10y ago
  > And a lot of the proposed immigration changes won't actually reduce the price of these workers either. If anything, it's a power grab by large consulting companies and bigger software shops to be able to hire up the best talent, and just lay off the rest Isn't it just the opposite? The large consulting companies are the ones paying these low wages. They submit a lot of applications and, because it's a pure lottery system, soak up a large portion of the available H1B visas. This means that small, struggling companies like my own cannot hire H1Bs to get the talent that we desperately need. A higher wage floor or an auction system would mean that we would actually stand a chance at getting an H1B visa approved for the 1 hire that we need.
  - djsumdog 10y ago
    Did you read the article in the link? That's pretty much what it says.
    - vostok 10y ago
      The article says the exact opposite. > However, I think what we’ll actually see are large companies in tech hubs like the bay area, Seattle, Chicago, New York and others, start to absorb the largest swatches of the immigrant talent pool, while shorting smaller companies and public sector jobs from the same access to skilled workers. I'm saying that, under the current system, large companies absorb the largest swatches of the immigrant talent pool. These large companies submit a huge number of visa applications for $60k and because of the lottery system, they get allocated on a pro-rata so many of their visas are approved. Under the proposed system, visas from small companies would have a much large chance of getting approved.
ecnal 10y ago
Those are the same thing. You may as well say that there is no shortage of food in Venezuela, just a shortage of cheap food. The reason companies can't get STEM grads at the prices they're willing to pay is because those STEM grads can simply work for a company willing to pay more. That's not a problem for the grads (you bet your ass I'm not complaining too much, haha), but it is for everyone who wants to hire them.
- st3v3r 10y ago
  It's a problem with a pretty clear and easy solution: Pay more.
- jquery 10y ago
  Interesting perspective, but when groceries in Venezuela are literally empty of food at any price, the analogy doesn't hold.
rnet85 10y ago
I've a genuine question here. So, what are the STEM graduates doing who didn't want to work for the cheap wages? Did they find something that pays better? If not, why didn't they take up the lower wage job since it's better than nothing?

by RachelF 10y ago

There is not a shortage of STEM graduates. However, from an employer's point of view, there is a shortage of cheap STEM graduates. Hence the recent tech company uproar over the skilled visa changes.

trendia 10y ago

The companies should just admit: "There is a shortage of STEM graduates at the price I want to pay."

swuecho 10y ago

no shortage of stem graduate, but shortage of CS graduates or people with programming skills. You can say there is not shortage of anything if you want to pay a good price. Then ignore what I said or remove the word 'shortage' for your world.

dukeluke 10y ago
You say there's a shortage, yet all software development jobs available require a Bachelor's degree plus 3-5 years of experience. That doesn't seem like much of a shortage to me.
- swuecho 10y ago
  I get a MS degree in biology, which is STEM. I happen to know programming. I do not even seek job in biology, because i know the field is oversupplied. instead, get a decent software engineer job instead, without degree, without any real world experience. If the market is the same in biology and programming related jobs. I would get job related to my degree. It is obvious there is a shortage in people who have programming skills. I manage to get above average productivity compared to my coworkers. I realized that even more shortage for productive software engineer. sure, any adjective is relative.
  - grainsout 10y ago
    I have a friend who graduated with a PhD in Chemistry a few years ago. He went down the research path, but eventually didn't like the pay. He had a good amount of programming experience and was primarily building simulation frameworks for chemical-environment interactions. I told him he could triple his salary if he applied for non-research positions. He's now a research developer at a pharma company making three times as much. Many hard science STEM graduates don't realize that their programming skills (even if they're not totally honed) will make them more valuable on the market. If you can find a position that uses both your degree skills and programming, then you'll be a unicorn to that company.
    - swuecho 10y ago
      That is where I feel bad about people who are in basic science in term of salary. Their problem are hard, require more work and skills but pay less.
- rcheu 10y ago
  This has not been true for me, or anyone else I know. Even friends from colleges I've never heard of with degrees in non-CS STEM majors found jobs paying 100k+ within months of graduation.
  - swuecho 10y ago
    I know it exists. I did not get 100K+ in the first year either, but I pass it in the second year.
    - swuecho 10y ago
      Interestingly, most of my coworkers do not have computer science degree or even related. They are very nice people and doing very well.
d0mine 10y ago
There is a shortage of hamburgers for $0.50 . There is no shortage for $5.00 There is a gap between cheap and the good price. Sometimes "cheap" is too cheap.

djsumdog 10y ago

And a lot of the proposed immigration changes won't actually reduce the price of these workers either. If anything, it's a power grab by large consulting companies and bigger software shops to be able to hire up the best talent, and just lay off the rest: http://fightthefuture.org/articles/hr-170-will-all-large-companies-to-consolidate-talent-in-the-tech-industry/ http://fightthefuture.org/articles/hr-170-will-all-large-com...

vostok 10y ago
> And a lot of the proposed immigration changes won't actually reduce the price of these workers either. If anything, it's a power grab by large consulting companies and bigger software shops to be able to hire up the best talent, and just lay off the rest Isn't it just the opposite? The large consulting companies are the ones paying these low wages. They submit a lot of applications and, because it's a pure lottery system, soak up a large portion of the available H1B visas. This means that small, struggling companies like my own cannot hire H1Bs to get the talent that we desperately need. A higher wage floor or an auction system would mean that we would actually stand a chance at getting an H1B visa approved for the 1 hire that we need.
- djsumdog 10y ago
  Did you read the article in the link? That's pretty much what it says.
  - vostok 10y ago
    The article says the exact opposite. > However, I think what we’ll actually see are large companies in tech hubs like the bay area, Seattle, Chicago, New York and others, start to absorb the largest swatches of the immigrant talent pool, while shorting smaller companies and public sector jobs from the same access to skilled workers. I'm saying that, under the current system, large companies absorb the largest swatches of the immigrant talent pool. These large companies submit a huge number of visa applications for $60k and because of the lottery system, they get allocated on a pro-rata so many of their visas are approved. Under the proposed system, visas from small companies would have a much large chance of getting approved.

ecnal 10y ago

Those are the same thing. You may as well say that there is no shortage of food in Venezuela, just a shortage of cheap food. The reason companies can't get STEM grads at the prices they're willing to pay is because those STEM grads can simply work for a company willing to pay more. That's not a problem for the grads (you bet your ass I'm not complaining too much, haha), but it is for everyone who wants to hire them.

st3v3r 10y ago
It's a problem with a pretty clear and easy solution: Pay more.
jquery 10y ago
Interesting perspective, but when groceries in Venezuela are literally empty of food at any price, the analogy doesn't hold.

rnet85 10y ago

I've a genuine question here. So, what are the STEM graduates doing who didn't want to work for the cheap wages? Did they find something that pays better? If not, why didn't they take up the lower wage job since it's better than nothing?