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I disagree with that assessment. Sophisticated open source, IaaS, and SaaS offerings greatly lower the barrier of entry in this industry and ought to have a neg

I disagree with that assessment. Sophisticated open source, IaaS, and SaaS offerings greatly lower the barrier of entry in this industry and ought to have a negative effect on wages as dictated by supply and demand. Your argument undermines itself by highlighting that a single open-source-equipped person can do the job of 3 grey beards of old. That automation of labor runs counter to rising wages. As another data point, some of the highest paid engineers in the industry - those manning in the private battlements of the FAANG citadels - are specialist steeped in closed source arcana. I myself have been such an acolyte for many years. My own take on the situation is that the distribution of skillets will further take on a bimodal distribution: the specialists and the generalists. For now both the supply of sophisticated tools and capable practitioners has not kept pace with the demand from modernizing business. When the demand is met and equilibrium reached, I expect salaries to normalize back to what other technical professionals command (e.g. aerospace and civil engineers).

danmaz74 7y ago
Automation usually reduces the number of jobs, but increases the pay of those jobs which remain.
titanomachy 7y ago
You argue that powerful open-source tools should lower the barrier to entry. That's probably true. But I think there is also some differentiation that happens: the best developers are able to learn more tools and squeeze out more productivity. So a highly motivated and somewhat clever engineer can do a passable job of ops/db/backend/frontend/design on their own, which makes them quite valuable to businesses. FAANGs are a bit of a different story, as you point out. But they also have a lot of infrastructure and culture in place that allows specialists to work efficiently.
deleted 7y ago
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root_axis 7y ago
> Sophisticated open source, IaaS, and SaaS offerings greatly lower the barrier of entry in this industry I would question this assumption. In my view, the existence of these tools actually increases the barrier to entry because they represent additional skills that developers are expected to posses in order to be competitive in the job market. This is actually a common complaint among developers whenever a new technology gains viral popularity (e.g. AWS, react, k8s). > That automation of labor runs counter to rising wages Well of course it does, except for the people who are paid very well to build the automated systems (i.e. programmers). Fortunately for programmers there still isn't enough supply to meet demand, so senior developers on the frontiers of popular technologies can command outsized salaries but still can't do enough work to eliminate the need for their less sophisticated colleagues (yet). > specialist steeped in closed source arcana Sure, that doesn't really contradict what I'm saying, but I'd also note that whatever closed source project one might be working on is almost certainly benefiting from a gigantic open-source force multiplier in some form or another. > When the demand is met and equilibrium reached, I expect salaries to normalize back to what other technical professionals command (e.g. aerospace and civil engineers). On this we agree. I tell developers all the time that they should enjoy it while it lasts because this definitely won't last forever. I'm pretty bearish on things like AI programmers, but I think open-source and commodity B2B software solutions are rapidly approaching the point where the costs associated with running an engineering department will appear much less imperative.

danmaz74 7y ago

Automation usually reduces the number of jobs, but increases the pay of those jobs which remain.

titanomachy 7y ago

You argue that powerful open-source tools should lower the barrier to entry. That's probably true. But I think there is also some differentiation that happens: the best developers are able to learn more tools and squeeze out more productivity. So a highly motivated and somewhat clever engineer can do a passable job of ops/db/backend/frontend/design on their own, which makes them quite valuable to businesses. FAANGs are a bit of a different story, as you point out. But they also have a lot of infrastructure and culture in place that allows specialists to work efficiently.

deleted 7y ago

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root_axis 7y ago

> Sophisticated open source, IaaS, and SaaS offerings greatly lower the barrier of entry in this industry I would question this assumption. In my view, the existence of these tools actually increases the barrier to entry because they represent additional skills that developers are expected to posses in order to be competitive in the job market. This is actually a common complaint among developers whenever a new technology gains viral popularity (e.g. AWS, react, k8s). > That automation of labor runs counter to rising wages Well of course it does, except for the people who are paid very well to build the automated systems (i.e. programmers). Fortunately for programmers there still isn't enough supply to meet demand, so senior developers on the frontiers of popular technologies can command outsized salaries but still can't do enough work to eliminate the need for their less sophisticated colleagues (yet). > specialist steeped in closed source arcana Sure, that doesn't really contradict what I'm saying, but I'd also note that whatever closed source project one might be working on is almost certainly benefiting from a gigantic open-source force multiplier in some form or another. > When the demand is met and equilibrium reached, I expect salaries to normalize back to what other technical professionals command (e.g. aerospace and civil engineers). On this we agree. I tell developers all the time that they should enjoy it while it lasts because this definitely won't last forever. I'm pretty bearish on things like AI programmers, but I think open-source and commodity B2B software solutions are rapidly approaching the point where the costs associated with running an engineering department will appear much less imperative.