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I literally can't find a job in any kind of engineering. Applied for dozens of cleaning and production positions and couldn't get a job. You know what the medi

by bserge 5y ago

I literally can't find a job in any kind of engineering. Applied for dozens of cleaning and production positions and couldn't get a job. You know what the media has become? A cesspool of bullshit unworthy of any trust. No wonder so many people mistrust actual experts, it's hard to even tell who they are.

ChrisMarshallNY 5y ago
Hey, try being over 50. I just gave up, and retired early. Best decision I ever made. I'm working for free, with NPOs, and it's been a joy. The worst part, for me, has been the naked contempt and disrespect. I don't expect to be worshipped, but raw insults are beyond the pale. It's -literally- like a hazing ritual. With all the news about "frat boy culture," I think I see where it comes from. I don't think it's just us older folks. It seems as if the entire industry has gone down the bog. My guess is that younger folks are getting similar treatment, but are more willing to shrug it off, and power through.
- oblio 5y ago
  It will stop, at some point. IT is still growing but we're reaching the point where IT workers are a decent percentage of all workers, so they are starting to become representative of the population at large. Larger and larger cohorts of IT workers are aging and recent graduates will stop being enough even for the top companies. Also, salaries are lower in general but I get the impression Europe is better in this regard. I see older people in IT, at least in Western Europe (in Eastern Europe the field is too new).
  - ChrisMarshallNY 5y ago
    I could probably go to the Web sites of at least a dozen successful IT companies, and go to the "Meet the Team" page. They are invariably a large group of smiling -young- faces. There may be one or two greyhairs in the picture, but a quick shufti of the "Leadership" page often shows them to be C-suite or Board. Yeah, I'm a cynic.
    - cbushko 5y ago
      When you are old, everyone looks young. =) I see 35 year olds and think "that guy is just a kid"!
      - bumby 5y ago
        This made me chuckle as it reminded me of an older employee referring to another employee as “one of the good interns”. Except the guy he was talking about was in his late 30s and had been with the company for over 5 years :-)
    - detaro 5y ago
      I wonder if there's a corelation in the sense that the young-biased "startup-y" companies are more likely to even have something like a "meet the team" page. (I.e. you kind of need to be below a certain size, and even then plenty places don't have them)
      - robertlagrant 5y ago
        There's a fairly common ideal of what a team photo should look like, and so the people that contribute to that ideal will be in the photo.
    - pydry 5y ago
      This is certainly the case for newer VC funded companies. That isnt all of tech though.
  - ahartmetz 5y ago
    Yes, being older and working in software doesn't seem to be big problem in Europe. A previous (European) employer of mine with a very geopraphically distributed workforce even employed some older Americans.
    - Archelaos 5y ago
      With regard to Germany, I have the same impression. Mature companies, at least, seem to have a mature workforce. Have a look at a picture of the SAP big band: https://image.jimcdn.com/app/cms/image/transf/dimension=2060x10000:format=jpg/path/sff76450fe343ad49/image/icc2d37cca1416843/version/1552635921/image.jpg https://image.jimcdn.com/app/cms/image/transf/dimension=2060...
    - spaetzleesser 5y ago
      It’s not that much of a problem either in the US outside of Silicon Valley and venture backed companies. Plenty of older guys in the not so cool industries.
  - peakaboo 5y ago
    Salaries may be lower but work/life balance seems much higher in Europe.
    - the-dude 5y ago
      > work/life balance seems much higher That doesn't sound too great. You probably mean better.
      - peakaboo 5y ago
        Indeed. :)
    - GekkePrutser 5y ago
      It definitely is depending on the country!
    - info781 5y ago
      If you offer an American a choice between more money or more vacation, they will take the money, for the most part.
      - stripline 5y ago
        That's because American's can't afford vacations without more money.
        refurb 5y ago
        Money is typically not the issue with most US jobs compared to Europe.
        dcolkitt 5y ago
        Americans have far more disposable incomes than Europeans. It's not even close. Average household consumption in the US is 65% higher than Germany.[1] [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_household_final_consumption_expenditure_per_capita https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_household...
- paganel 5y ago
  > The worst part, for me, has been the naked contempt and disrespect. If you don’t mind and if it’s not sensitive do you mind to share some examples? I’ve just gone past the 40 year threshold myself and I think I’m starting to see/notice some of the same things you noticed, i.e. less “camaraderie” (for lack of a better word) and more “getting on top of the other”, a feeling I didn’t have when I entered this industry 15 years ago. Just yesterday I happened to sit in a coffee shop close to a table where an IT lead (or something like that) was interviewing (I think it was an interview) a younger potential hire (it was a woman, if it counts), and I found his tone and remarks and general demeanor quite off-putting, I was one step way of telling the guy “why the heck are you spewing such bullshit?”, but then again I didn’t want to ruin said young lady’s job interview.
  - peakaboo 5y ago
    I think tech attracts a certain type of person... People with high iq but very low scores in compassion and care.
    - royallineage 5y ago
      No, Chris Marshall NY is just nuts. Please dig more and look at this person's experience. Some day he and mz will have a kid and HN will cower in fear.
    - FooBarBizBazz 5y ago
      I dunno. I get the same vibe from medicine. MDs in particular. Less so the further down the food chain you go. (Part of that is culture. The bottom is composed of immigrants who still act like normal human beings.) I think it's something that's more broadly acculturated among the highly educated and high-achieving. Or just selected for whenever competition is fierce. I also did not get this feeling from other technology industries that weren't "Tech". Places full of PhDs, but disconnected from the SV culture. And frankly, less motivated by money and more by lifestyle. Maybe it all boils down to money. There's too much money in Tech. It attracts the worst, and brings out the worst.
      - 5y ago
- bottled_poe 5y ago
  That doesn’t sound liveable. How do you pay for rent?
  - ChrisMarshallNY 5y ago
    I worked for over 30 years, lived frugally, avoided debt, and saved a significant chunk of my salary. As a result, I reached the point, where I don't need to work, if I don't want to. I want to work. I love what I do. I don't need to make money at it. I also like to help people, so I found people that want to help people, and can't afford much. It really is a shame. I have a fairly significant set of skills and experience. Pretty much what a startup would need, to make a new product a reality. I know how to make very high-quality software that ships. I did it for my entire career. I also do quite well on teams, and have been a problem-solver, all my life. The folks I'm working with now, pinch themselves, every day.
    - DantesKite 5y ago
      Have you thought about building small projects that could earn you a little bit of income on the side? Doesn't necessarily have to be an overwhelming product, but just a way of practicing and exploring work.
      - ChrisMarshallNY 5y ago
        I prefer doing them for free. Most of the work I do, is self-education. I love to learn, and I have been maintaining my competency in shipping work for decades (Which often means that I am not right at the "bleeding edge." Shipping is usually a couple of steps back from that). If you check out my SO Story[0], you'll see a whole boatload of published modules. They are -each and every one- totally "ship-ready." I produce them as if they are to be commercial-grade products, with the appearance of a major-league brand -even the experimental projects. There are also complete source code bases for a number of published (and many, since, deprecated) apps on the Apple App Store. I've been shipping apps continuously, since 2012. I've provided full source code for all of them. I don't promote them at all. I don't really care. I have no idea if anyone uses them. I have a few stars, and a couple of forks, but I've not seen my stuff appear anywhere (It's MIT, so I assume I'd be noted in the README -HAH!). Many of these are 1-source-file development utilities, with dozens of files of testing code, wrapped around them. I like Quality. I'm my own best customer. I tend to be pretty skeptical of most of the available dependencies, out there, so I like to write my own. The project I'm working on now, is non-trivial. It's the kind of thing that normally takes a team of at least five engineers, running 24/7 on Red Bull, to do. I do well at these kinds of things. It's coming along nicely, and will be ready in a few months. I also wrote two of the servers I use. It is not (currently) open-source, but I may, sometimes, spin an open-source module out of it. I just did one, a couple of weeks ago (LGV_Cleantime). [0] https://stackoverflow.com/story/chrismarshall https://stackoverflow.com/story/chrismarshall
- hncurious 5y ago
  Tech was once not that respected, & mostly full of nerds who were just way into tech. But then tech rose in status & income, & was invaded by top school kids seeking such things, who took over the top slots. These new kids didn’t much respect older tech folks from wrong schools. https://twitter.com/robinhanson/status/1421212798881722368 https://twitter.com/robinhanson/status/1421212798881722368
  - FooBarBizBazz 5y ago
    The reduced standing (and compensation) of Finance post-2008 has something to do with it.
- bserge 5y ago
  I've observed this and it's just appalling. It doesn't matter that 50 year olds can do the same work just as well, no, management seems to want freaking Energizer bunnies on their team. Nevermind that they don't actually get more work done (and more importantly, better), it's just about being "passionate" about doing the same shit every day. Wtf.
  - ChrisMarshallNY 5y ago
    It's not just better. It's shipping. I've done that, since I was 24 years old. I literally have the manual that I wrote, accompanying the first professional engineering project that I did, after my first promotion to a salaried engineer, from a bench tech. When I read it, I am impressed, and it was done in 1987. It was an internal tool, that was used to test defense tech. I treated the project as if it was being delivered to the field, and lives depended on it. It was that much of an Honor for me to have the chance to do that work. I am a high school dropout. I got a GED, and had to fight for everything I got. That means that I valued everything, and never treated it as "my due." Every job that I have ever had, has been a Signal Honor. It has been a privilege, and a chance to learn more, and push my boundaries. Every team that I ever joined, was composed of people that were better than me, and had something to teach me. It was always an Honor to be admitted to their ranks. I understood, from my very first assignment, that I needed to ship. Shipping is what makes money. Shipping is what builds brands. Shipping is what the customer wants and needs. Everything else is just a low SNR. That's why I have always treated every single one of my projects as if it were a gift, given to me, and one that needs to be treated with Respect, Honor and Dignity. It needs to be done well, and it needs to be finished. I consider myself to be a craftsman, as well as an engineer. I won't design garbage, and I don’t want my work to be treated as garbage[0] (if I have any say in it -which has not always been the case). I know that attitude sounds over-dramatic, ridiculous, and anachronistic, but it's the one I have. I'm not looking for work. I don't really have an investment in what people think about that, anymore. The people that matter, know me, and they know my work. [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5rsZfcz3h1s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5rsZfcz3h1s
- foobiekr 5y ago
  How do you find NPOs that aren’t ego-driven sweatshops? I’ve been pondering doing this for a few years but the reality of many nonprofits is that they are quite exploitative of their employees and volunteers. I’d happily do net and server admin for a low overhead background task but not for a ceo ego org.
  - ChrisMarshallNY 5y ago
    I've not encountered them. If I'm not getting paid, I can vote with my feet. If I take a job, and take money, then I am bound by Integrity and Personal Honor, to do all in my power to complete the contracted tasks; and to do so, well. If I am working on a volunteer basis, then, if they become douches, I pack my bags and leave. I don't give a rat's ass about prestige and todger-measuring contests. I do the work, because I find it personally fulfilling. I don't act like a prima donna, but I also don't brook nonsense. They figure that out, fairly quickly. But that hasn't happened. The sheer value of the Quality of the work I do -I am not exaggerating- is something most Fortune 500 companies don't get. I think that this gets past the egos. I've found that I'm actually treated with Respect, and I don't have to arm-wrestle insecure managers for every damn thing. Also, I have been working with NPOs for 40 years. It's only been the last 4, that it has been full-time.
ianai 5y ago
I think the shortage is in positions companies don’t want to pay much. At least anecdotally, I’ve seen and heard a lot about restaurants having cook shortages. This doesn’t negate your point. I’d say it just bolsters your point.
- randomdata 5y ago
  Someone who isn’t willing to pay enough does not qualify as demand, thus is not considered a participant in the market, and therefore would not impact a shortage situation. A shortage occurs when an external mechanism prevents price from rising. Choosing to not pay more is internal.
benou 5y ago
I'm sorry to hear that but keep in mind the job market is very different from one location to another and from one sector to another. The BBC is talking about truck drivers in the UK and it is hardly a surprise: UK used to rely heavily on eastern Europe workers in that area, and they vote (Brexit) to prevent exactly that. They got what they asked for. If anything, we can complain that the BBC article title is too general and not precise enough, but your particular experience does not necessarily match the experience elsewhere
- pydry 5y ago
  The BBC has for a long long time been more sensitive to the concerns of employers and investors rather than employees or the unemployed. This has mostly been as a result of aping the trends followed by the rest of the private media in the UK since the 1970s. They already had a business section and even rolled out a new capital section a few years ago. No word yet on when theyll get a section dedicated to worker news.
  - loopz 5y ago
    Why wouldn't they? Workers are generally not allowed to talk about specifics of work to media.
    - switch007 5y ago
      I think that’s a really poor excuse. People can discuss anonymously and about recent prior jobs (being slightly less bound by contractual gagging, or under less threat of being sued) Journalists can apply for jobs and do an exposé too.
      - loopz 5y ago
        The sources will be criticized for being anonymous or ousted. Some journalists cover workplace too. However, corporate tactics optimize away most of what is possible in that regard. All for a public who can't give a damn (gimme the cheapest).
- 5y ago
release-object 5y ago
Really sorry to hear that. My personal experience, of hiring software engineers in London, aligns with this article. We have seen a drop in supply this year. If you are looking in the South of England I would recommend finding a specialist tech recruitment agency.
- mattlondon 5y ago
  As a counter point in London, I've found supply to be pretty good. Multiple actually good and talented candidates to basically pick the best from, and not just dregs with "this person will do I guess - 50% is better than nothing" type sentiment.
- dbetteridge 5y ago
  Supply in London is fine, companies just need to raise their salaries tbh. I personally moved companies during covid and got a more flexible role and a 90% increase. Recruiters are going nuts on LinkedIn atm for anyone with skills and the salaries are rising from there.
- rossmohax 5y ago
  With IR35 reform in full swing, I'd expect quality supply to incease as contractors start to seek full time positions.
- gifnamething 5y ago
  I've turned down job offers in London because I can get the same salary with a 33% reduction in cost of living elsewhere or work in London for 200% of the salary doing software engineering for finance.
WJW 5y ago
> any kind of engineering > Applied for dozens of cleaning (...) positions Is this a common thing to do when applying for engineering jobs? What kind of qualifications do you even get where you 1. Are not specialized in a specific type of engineering (chemical, electrical, software, etc)? All these fields needs massive amounts of technical knowledge and I'm pretty sure I shouldn't be hired as a chemical engineer even though I know a lot about electronics design and software. 2. Want to get in as a cleaner rather than (say) a junior engineer? How much extra on-the-job experience that would be relevant to engineering do you hope to get from a position as a cleaner?
- atrettel 5y ago
  I'm a mechanical engineer and I believe I can answer your first question. My take is that many engineering employers value the ability of entry-level employees to learn new things rather than what they know (their expertise). They want blank slates many times, to be honest, to be molded into the kind of employee that they need at the moment. As long as you have the most basic relevant engineering knowledge and a degree you are good enough. For example, my first engineering job was actually in chemical engineering largely (chemical kinetics), and I got it despite knowing very little about chemical engineering. This is both good and bad for the employees in my view. It is good in the sense that you could (potentially) change subject matter easily, but it is bad in the sense that you are very much replaceable. That said, many employers do want and need specialized knowledge and experience even for entry-level engineering positions (not just for experienced positions), and any entry-level candidates with that specialized knowledge and experience will do better in the hiring process (as far as I know!). That said, my recent experience in the job market actually matches bserge's experience. There are far too few open positions in my observations, and I too had to apply to way too many jobs, and it took far too long to hear back [1]. That is of course just another anecdote but it has been my experience as an engineer. I'm gonna be fine and will start a new position soon, but I think the narrative that there is an employee shortage only applies to low wage and unskilled workers and not to engineering professionals. [1] I recently started collecting data on this from my own job applications. For example, the median number of days to a final decision for me was 55 days. The mean was 112 days. This appears to follow an exponential distribution. I only started looking into this data recently when I questioned why it took 4 months for an employer to request an interview with me.
mercy_dude 5y ago
> You know what the media has become? A cesspool of bullshit unworthy of any trust. I wouldn’t label all media outlets under the same but mainstream media (think of what we grew up watching - CNN, NYT, BBC etc) is increasingly becoming what you described, opinion driven activism fueled journalism rather than reporting facts. It’s a sad state of affairs but across the world it is the same norm, journalists have turned into crowd pleasing (many have their own tweeter world where they are not shy to be an ideologue) click rate seeking media professional rather. My sense is that this type of journalism and their wide coverage under libel protection for example in US only polarizes further the people and as you mentioned make people mistrust _all_ experts. Which is not a good place to be for a society. Good news is more and more independent journalism (ones not behind under mainstream umbrella or with brands of their own) are doing works in real journalism. People such as Glenn Greenwald are using platforms such as substack which is far better imo than any news you read these days to cover and report a nuanced topic.
- bserge 5y ago
  Sorry, I'm pretty emotional these days on account of not getting any help from a healthcare system I'm paying into. My medication is right there on the shelves, alas there are no doctors available to prescribe it. Even though I am literally forced to pay for it. Would anyone be interested in me documenting this, btw? It just seems like there's a whole lot of people that are ignored or shafted by universal healthcare and yet everyone seems to be singing praises about it.
stevewodil 5y ago
In having a similarly hard time finding something. It seems like every job I apply to has 50-100 other candidates that also applied. I'm not sure how many of them are actually qualified, but based on how many times I've been passed up, some of them clearly are. This is also compounded by the fact that a lot of the jobs are remote now, so anyone across the country can apply. My friend who is a recruiter says it's a talent driven market right now. So, I'm not sure what to make of any of it. It certainly depends on the specific type of work you're looking for.
White_Wolf 5y ago
"Any kind of engineering" is a bit broad. Loation matters a lot with available jobs. Take a look at London and a 30 mile radius around it(or so). You can't find enough skilled (not talking about diplomas here) electricians, PLC/automation controller programmers, Security system engineers, Maintenance engineers and I could go on with the list. I would suggest going straight to companies(managers and such) with your CV. Most(if not all) recruitment agencies have staff that are not exactly qualified to assess skill sets. If it's not a 1:1 match on at least 50-75% of the requirements for the role they won't put you forward.
- wildrhythms 5y ago
  I work at a massive, well-known tech company, nearly 5 year tenure, and I apply to jobs on LinkedIn, directly through the company website, to government jobs (via USAJOBS), about 5 per week. I live in a major U.S. city. I'm willing to relocate anywhere, or work remote. Full-stack developer. I never get contacted back. Am I just not good enough? I know the discourse is around London, but I think this is an issue happening in many places, and seeing the "where are the workers?" articles is really troubling for me.
  - dehrmann 5y ago
    There's something weird about this. You should be getting recruiters on Linkedin reaching out. What's your job title at the well-known tech company? I assume it's more like FAANG than a consulting firm? How many years of experience do you have? Have you reached out to people you've worked with in the past to see if their current employer is hiring? Are you in a major tech city or a major city with no tech presence?
  - White_Wolf 5y ago
    Maybe you need to rework your CV/profile a bit. It's about keywords these days and only after keyworks comes the real deal. As a side-note: My current boss told me straight up he hired me because my cv was shit but he looked at my hobbies. THat is what made him give me a call to get a feel for the "dumb ass" that is that bad at selling himself.
golergka 5y ago
I have just been on remote job hunt this past month, and have ended up with a lot of offers and maybe-offers (refused before getting the final letter, but things have been going this way) from US and Europe. And I'm not a native speaker, live in Eastern Europe and don't even have a degree, just work experience. Engineering labour market is extremely skewed towards the job seeker right now.
- bserge 5y ago
  Yeah, I should probably move back there.
DethNinja 5y ago
Mechanical Engineering is a very saturated field and it is very hard to open your own company. If you want to become self employed in that field then you need good connections more than talent. I would recommend switching to software engineering. Not that software engineering is much better but at least self employment will be a bit easier.
- lightning19 5y ago
  Agreed, I'm a mech engineer by education. Saw the writing on the wall half way through my degree and learnt how to code in my spare time. I'm an SWE now, it has literally changed the course of my life, had I stuck with engineering my household would not have an income worthy enough to pay for basic needs + internet. Some of my friends from university are still unemployed, it's so bad that I know someone with a MSc in Engineering working in a mall as a salesman.
yhoneycomb 5y ago
The worst is when they say "experts say" and then just say whatever their own opinion was. Sure, you can find "experts" to say anything. I'm more interested in who exactly you're talking about, or what data you're referring to. "Experts say" is just such a lazy and often misleading statement. I've seen way too more articles that claimed "experts said" something which was NOT at all the consensus opinion.

by bserge 5y ago

ChrisMarshallNY 5y ago

Hey, try being over 50. I just gave up, and retired early. Best decision I ever made. I'm working for free, with NPOs, and it's been a joy. The worst part, for me, has been the naked contempt and disrespect. I don't expect to be worshipped, but raw insults are beyond the pale. It's -literally- like a hazing ritual. With all the news about "frat boy culture," I think I see where it comes from. I don't think it's just us older folks. It seems as if the entire industry has gone down the bog. My guess is that younger folks are getting similar treatment, but are more willing to shrug it off, and power through.

oblio 5y ago
It will stop, at some point. IT is still growing but we're reaching the point where IT workers are a decent percentage of all workers, so they are starting to become representative of the population at large. Larger and larger cohorts of IT workers are aging and recent graduates will stop being enough even for the top companies. Also, salaries are lower in general but I get the impression Europe is better in this regard. I see older people in IT, at least in Western Europe (in Eastern Europe the field is too new).
- ChrisMarshallNY 5y ago
  I could probably go to the Web sites of at least a dozen successful IT companies, and go to the "Meet the Team" page. They are invariably a large group of smiling -young- faces. There may be one or two greyhairs in the picture, but a quick shufti of the "Leadership" page often shows them to be C-suite or Board. Yeah, I'm a cynic.
  - cbushko 5y ago
    When you are old, everyone looks young. =) I see 35 year olds and think "that guy is just a kid"!
    - bumby 5y ago
      This made me chuckle as it reminded me of an older employee referring to another employee as “one of the good interns”. Except the guy he was talking about was in his late 30s and had been with the company for over 5 years :-)
  - detaro 5y ago
    I wonder if there's a corelation in the sense that the young-biased "startup-y" companies are more likely to even have something like a "meet the team" page. (I.e. you kind of need to be below a certain size, and even then plenty places don't have them)
    - robertlagrant 5y ago
      There's a fairly common ideal of what a team photo should look like, and so the people that contribute to that ideal will be in the photo.
  - pydry 5y ago
    This is certainly the case for newer VC funded companies. That isnt all of tech though.
- ahartmetz 5y ago
  Yes, being older and working in software doesn't seem to be big problem in Europe. A previous (European) employer of mine with a very geopraphically distributed workforce even employed some older Americans.
  - Archelaos 5y ago
    With regard to Germany, I have the same impression. Mature companies, at least, seem to have a mature workforce. Have a look at a picture of the SAP big band: https://image.jimcdn.com/app/cms/image/transf/dimension=2060x10000:format=jpg/path/sff76450fe343ad49/image/icc2d37cca1416843/version/1552635921/image.jpg https://image.jimcdn.com/app/cms/image/transf/dimension=2060...
  - spaetzleesser 5y ago
    It’s not that much of a problem either in the US outside of Silicon Valley and venture backed companies. Plenty of older guys in the not so cool industries.
- peakaboo 5y ago
  Salaries may be lower but work/life balance seems much higher in Europe.
  - the-dude 5y ago
    > work/life balance seems much higher That doesn't sound too great. You probably mean better.
    - peakaboo 5y ago
      Indeed. :)
  - GekkePrutser 5y ago
    It definitely is depending on the country!
  - info781 5y ago
    If you offer an American a choice between more money or more vacation, they will take the money, for the most part.
    - stripline 5y ago
      That's because American's can't afford vacations without more money.
      - refurb 5y ago
        Money is typically not the issue with most US jobs compared to Europe.
      - dcolkitt 5y ago
        Americans have far more disposable incomes than Europeans. It's not even close. Average household consumption in the US is 65% higher than Germany.[1] [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_household_final_consumption_expenditure_per_capita https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_household...
paganel 5y ago
> The worst part, for me, has been the naked contempt and disrespect. If you don’t mind and if it’s not sensitive do you mind to share some examples? I’ve just gone past the 40 year threshold myself and I think I’m starting to see/notice some of the same things you noticed, i.e. less “camaraderie” (for lack of a better word) and more “getting on top of the other”, a feeling I didn’t have when I entered this industry 15 years ago. Just yesterday I happened to sit in a coffee shop close to a table where an IT lead (or something like that) was interviewing (I think it was an interview) a younger potential hire (it was a woman, if it counts), and I found his tone and remarks and general demeanor quite off-putting, I was one step way of telling the guy “why the heck are you spewing such bullshit?”, but then again I didn’t want to ruin said young lady’s job interview.
- peakaboo 5y ago
  I think tech attracts a certain type of person... People with high iq but very low scores in compassion and care.
  - royallineage 5y ago
    No, Chris Marshall NY is just nuts. Please dig more and look at this person's experience. Some day he and mz will have a kid and HN will cower in fear.
  - FooBarBizBazz 5y ago
    I dunno. I get the same vibe from medicine. MDs in particular. Less so the further down the food chain you go. (Part of that is culture. The bottom is composed of immigrants who still act like normal human beings.) I think it's something that's more broadly acculturated among the highly educated and high-achieving. Or just selected for whenever competition is fierce. I also did not get this feeling from other technology industries that weren't "Tech". Places full of PhDs, but disconnected from the SV culture. And frankly, less motivated by money and more by lifestyle. Maybe it all boils down to money. There's too much money in Tech. It attracts the worst, and brings out the worst.
    - 5y ago
bottled_poe 5y ago
That doesn’t sound liveable. How do you pay for rent?
- ChrisMarshallNY 5y ago
  I worked for over 30 years, lived frugally, avoided debt, and saved a significant chunk of my salary. As a result, I reached the point, where I don't need to work, if I don't want to. I want to work. I love what I do. I don't need to make money at it. I also like to help people, so I found people that want to help people, and can't afford much. It really is a shame. I have a fairly significant set of skills and experience. Pretty much what a startup would need, to make a new product a reality. I know how to make very high-quality software that ships. I did it for my entire career. I also do quite well on teams, and have been a problem-solver, all my life. The folks I'm working with now, pinch themselves, every day.
  - DantesKite 5y ago
    Have you thought about building small projects that could earn you a little bit of income on the side? Doesn't necessarily have to be an overwhelming product, but just a way of practicing and exploring work.
    - ChrisMarshallNY 5y ago
      I prefer doing them for free. Most of the work I do, is self-education. I love to learn, and I have been maintaining my competency in shipping work for decades (Which often means that I am not right at the "bleeding edge." Shipping is usually a couple of steps back from that). If you check out my SO Story[0], you'll see a whole boatload of published modules. They are -each and every one- totally "ship-ready." I produce them as if they are to be commercial-grade products, with the appearance of a major-league brand -even the experimental projects. There are also complete source code bases for a number of published (and many, since, deprecated) apps on the Apple App Store. I've been shipping apps continuously, since 2012. I've provided full source code for all of them. I don't promote them at all. I don't really care. I have no idea if anyone uses them. I have a few stars, and a couple of forks, but I've not seen my stuff appear anywhere (It's MIT, so I assume I'd be noted in the README -HAH!). Many of these are 1-source-file development utilities, with dozens of files of testing code, wrapped around them. I like Quality. I'm my own best customer. I tend to be pretty skeptical of most of the available dependencies, out there, so I like to write my own. The project I'm working on now, is non-trivial. It's the kind of thing that normally takes a team of at least five engineers, running 24/7 on Red Bull, to do. I do well at these kinds of things. It's coming along nicely, and will be ready in a few months. I also wrote two of the servers I use. It is not (currently) open-source, but I may, sometimes, spin an open-source module out of it. I just did one, a couple of weeks ago (LGV_Cleantime). [0] https://stackoverflow.com/story/chrismarshall https://stackoverflow.com/story/chrismarshall
hncurious 5y ago
Tech was once not that respected, & mostly full of nerds who were just way into tech. But then tech rose in status & income, & was invaded by top school kids seeking such things, who took over the top slots. These new kids didn’t much respect older tech folks from wrong schools. https://twitter.com/robinhanson/status/1421212798881722368 https://twitter.com/robinhanson/status/1421212798881722368
- FooBarBizBazz 5y ago
  The reduced standing (and compensation) of Finance post-2008 has something to do with it.
bserge 5y ago
I've observed this and it's just appalling. It doesn't matter that 50 year olds can do the same work just as well, no, management seems to want freaking Energizer bunnies on their team. Nevermind that they don't actually get more work done (and more importantly, better), it's just about being "passionate" about doing the same shit every day. Wtf.
- ChrisMarshallNY 5y ago
  It's not just better. It's shipping. I've done that, since I was 24 years old. I literally have the manual that I wrote, accompanying the first professional engineering project that I did, after my first promotion to a salaried engineer, from a bench tech. When I read it, I am impressed, and it was done in 1987. It was an internal tool, that was used to test defense tech. I treated the project as if it was being delivered to the field, and lives depended on it. It was that much of an Honor for me to have the chance to do that work. I am a high school dropout. I got a GED, and had to fight for everything I got. That means that I valued everything, and never treated it as "my due." Every job that I have ever had, has been a Signal Honor. It has been a privilege, and a chance to learn more, and push my boundaries. Every team that I ever joined, was composed of people that were better than me, and had something to teach me. It was always an Honor to be admitted to their ranks. I understood, from my very first assignment, that I needed to ship. Shipping is what makes money. Shipping is what builds brands. Shipping is what the customer wants and needs. Everything else is just a low SNR. That's why I have always treated every single one of my projects as if it were a gift, given to me, and one that needs to be treated with Respect, Honor and Dignity. It needs to be done well, and it needs to be finished. I consider myself to be a craftsman, as well as an engineer. I won't design garbage, and I don’t want my work to be treated as garbage[0] (if I have any say in it -which has not always been the case). I know that attitude sounds over-dramatic, ridiculous, and anachronistic, but it's the one I have. I'm not looking for work. I don't really have an investment in what people think about that, anymore. The people that matter, know me, and they know my work. [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5rsZfcz3h1s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5rsZfcz3h1s
foobiekr 5y ago
How do you find NPOs that aren’t ego-driven sweatshops? I’ve been pondering doing this for a few years but the reality of many nonprofits is that they are quite exploitative of their employees and volunteers. I’d happily do net and server admin for a low overhead background task but not for a ceo ego org.
- ChrisMarshallNY 5y ago
  I've not encountered them. If I'm not getting paid, I can vote with my feet. If I take a job, and take money, then I am bound by Integrity and Personal Honor, to do all in my power to complete the contracted tasks; and to do so, well. If I am working on a volunteer basis, then, if they become douches, I pack my bags and leave. I don't give a rat's ass about prestige and todger-measuring contests. I do the work, because I find it personally fulfilling. I don't act like a prima donna, but I also don't brook nonsense. They figure that out, fairly quickly. But that hasn't happened. The sheer value of the Quality of the work I do -I am not exaggerating- is something most Fortune 500 companies don't get. I think that this gets past the egos. I've found that I'm actually treated with Respect, and I don't have to arm-wrestle insecure managers for every damn thing. Also, I have been working with NPOs for 40 years. It's only been the last 4, that it has been full-time.

ianai 5y ago

I think the shortage is in positions companies don’t want to pay much. At least anecdotally, I’ve seen and heard a lot about restaurants having cook shortages. This doesn’t negate your point. I’d say it just bolsters your point.

randomdata 5y ago
Someone who isn’t willing to pay enough does not qualify as demand, thus is not considered a participant in the market, and therefore would not impact a shortage situation. A shortage occurs when an external mechanism prevents price from rising. Choosing to not pay more is internal.

benou 5y ago

I'm sorry to hear that but keep in mind the job market is very different from one location to another and from one sector to another. The BBC is talking about truck drivers in the UK and it is hardly a surprise: UK used to rely heavily on eastern Europe workers in that area, and they vote (Brexit) to prevent exactly that. They got what they asked for. If anything, we can complain that the BBC article title is too general and not precise enough, but your particular experience does not necessarily match the experience elsewhere

pydry 5y ago
The BBC has for a long long time been more sensitive to the concerns of employers and investors rather than employees or the unemployed. This has mostly been as a result of aping the trends followed by the rest of the private media in the UK since the 1970s. They already had a business section and even rolled out a new capital section a few years ago. No word yet on when theyll get a section dedicated to worker news.
- loopz 5y ago
  Why wouldn't they? Workers are generally not allowed to talk about specifics of work to media.
  - switch007 5y ago
    I think that’s a really poor excuse. People can discuss anonymously and about recent prior jobs (being slightly less bound by contractual gagging, or under less threat of being sued) Journalists can apply for jobs and do an exposé too.
    - loopz 5y ago
      The sources will be criticized for being anonymous or ousted. Some journalists cover workplace too. However, corporate tactics optimize away most of what is possible in that regard. All for a public who can't give a damn (gimme the cheapest).
5y ago

release-object 5y ago

Really sorry to hear that. My personal experience, of hiring software engineers in London, aligns with this article. We have seen a drop in supply this year. If you are looking in the South of England I would recommend finding a specialist tech recruitment agency.

mattlondon 5y ago
As a counter point in London, I've found supply to be pretty good. Multiple actually good and talented candidates to basically pick the best from, and not just dregs with "this person will do I guess - 50% is better than nothing" type sentiment.
dbetteridge 5y ago
Supply in London is fine, companies just need to raise their salaries tbh. I personally moved companies during covid and got a more flexible role and a 90% increase. Recruiters are going nuts on LinkedIn atm for anyone with skills and the salaries are rising from there.
rossmohax 5y ago
With IR35 reform in full swing, I'd expect quality supply to incease as contractors start to seek full time positions.
gifnamething 5y ago
I've turned down job offers in London because I can get the same salary with a 33% reduction in cost of living elsewhere or work in London for 200% of the salary doing software engineering for finance.

WJW 5y ago

> any kind of engineering > Applied for dozens of cleaning (...) positions Is this a common thing to do when applying for engineering jobs? What kind of qualifications do you even get where you 1. Are not specialized in a specific type of engineering (chemical, electrical, software, etc)? All these fields needs massive amounts of technical knowledge and I'm pretty sure I shouldn't be hired as a chemical engineer even though I know a lot about electronics design and software. 2. Want to get in as a cleaner rather than (say) a junior engineer? How much extra on-the-job experience that would be relevant to engineering do you hope to get from a position as a cleaner?

atrettel 5y ago
I'm a mechanical engineer and I believe I can answer your first question. My take is that many engineering employers value the ability of entry-level employees to learn new things rather than what they know (their expertise). They want blank slates many times, to be honest, to be molded into the kind of employee that they need at the moment. As long as you have the most basic relevant engineering knowledge and a degree you are good enough. For example, my first engineering job was actually in chemical engineering largely (chemical kinetics), and I got it despite knowing very little about chemical engineering. This is both good and bad for the employees in my view. It is good in the sense that you could (potentially) change subject matter easily, but it is bad in the sense that you are very much replaceable. That said, many employers do want and need specialized knowledge and experience even for entry-level engineering positions (not just for experienced positions), and any entry-level candidates with that specialized knowledge and experience will do better in the hiring process (as far as I know!). That said, my recent experience in the job market actually matches bserge's experience. There are far too few open positions in my observations, and I too had to apply to way too many jobs, and it took far too long to hear back [1]. That is of course just another anecdote but it has been my experience as an engineer. I'm gonna be fine and will start a new position soon, but I think the narrative that there is an employee shortage only applies to low wage and unskilled workers and not to engineering professionals. [1] I recently started collecting data on this from my own job applications. For example, the median number of days to a final decision for me was 55 days. The mean was 112 days. This appears to follow an exponential distribution. I only started looking into this data recently when I questioned why it took 4 months for an employer to request an interview with me.

mercy_dude 5y ago

> You know what the media has become? A cesspool of bullshit unworthy of any trust. I wouldn’t label all media outlets under the same but mainstream media (think of what we grew up watching - CNN, NYT, BBC etc) is increasingly becoming what you described, opinion driven activism fueled journalism rather than reporting facts. It’s a sad state of affairs but across the world it is the same norm, journalists have turned into crowd pleasing (many have their own tweeter world where they are not shy to be an ideologue) click rate seeking media professional rather. My sense is that this type of journalism and their wide coverage under libel protection for example in US only polarizes further the people and as you mentioned make people mistrust _all_ experts. Which is not a good place to be for a society. Good news is more and more independent journalism (ones not behind under mainstream umbrella or with brands of their own) are doing works in real journalism. People such as Glenn Greenwald are using platforms such as substack which is far better imo than any news you read these days to cover and report a nuanced topic.

bserge 5y ago
Sorry, I'm pretty emotional these days on account of not getting any help from a healthcare system I'm paying into. My medication is right there on the shelves, alas there are no doctors available to prescribe it. Even though I am literally forced to pay for it. Would anyone be interested in me documenting this, btw? It just seems like there's a whole lot of people that are ignored or shafted by universal healthcare and yet everyone seems to be singing praises about it.

stevewodil 5y ago

In having a similarly hard time finding something. It seems like every job I apply to has 50-100 other candidates that also applied. I'm not sure how many of them are actually qualified, but based on how many times I've been passed up, some of them clearly are. This is also compounded by the fact that a lot of the jobs are remote now, so anyone across the country can apply. My friend who is a recruiter says it's a talent driven market right now. So, I'm not sure what to make of any of it. It certainly depends on the specific type of work you're looking for.

White_Wolf 5y ago

"Any kind of engineering" is a bit broad. Loation matters a lot with available jobs. Take a look at London and a 30 mile radius around it(or so). You can't find enough skilled (not talking about diplomas here) electricians, PLC/automation controller programmers, Security system engineers, Maintenance engineers and I could go on with the list. I would suggest going straight to companies(managers and such) with your CV. Most(if not all) recruitment agencies have staff that are not exactly qualified to assess skill sets. If it's not a 1:1 match on at least 50-75% of the requirements for the role they won't put you forward.

wildrhythms 5y ago
I work at a massive, well-known tech company, nearly 5 year tenure, and I apply to jobs on LinkedIn, directly through the company website, to government jobs (via USAJOBS), about 5 per week. I live in a major U.S. city. I'm willing to relocate anywhere, or work remote. Full-stack developer. I never get contacted back. Am I just not good enough? I know the discourse is around London, but I think this is an issue happening in many places, and seeing the "where are the workers?" articles is really troubling for me.
- dehrmann 5y ago
  There's something weird about this. You should be getting recruiters on Linkedin reaching out. What's your job title at the well-known tech company? I assume it's more like FAANG than a consulting firm? How many years of experience do you have? Have you reached out to people you've worked with in the past to see if their current employer is hiring? Are you in a major tech city or a major city with no tech presence?
- White_Wolf 5y ago
  Maybe you need to rework your CV/profile a bit. It's about keywords these days and only after keyworks comes the real deal. As a side-note: My current boss told me straight up he hired me because my cv was shit but he looked at my hobbies. THat is what made him give me a call to get a feel for the "dumb ass" that is that bad at selling himself.

golergka 5y ago

I have just been on remote job hunt this past month, and have ended up with a lot of offers and maybe-offers (refused before getting the final letter, but things have been going this way) from US and Europe. And I'm not a native speaker, live in Eastern Europe and don't even have a degree, just work experience. Engineering labour market is extremely skewed towards the job seeker right now.

bserge 5y ago
Yeah, I should probably move back there.

DethNinja 5y ago

Mechanical Engineering is a very saturated field and it is very hard to open your own company. If you want to become self employed in that field then you need good connections more than talent. I would recommend switching to software engineering. Not that software engineering is much better but at least self employment will be a bit easier.

lightning19 5y ago
Agreed, I'm a mech engineer by education. Saw the writing on the wall half way through my degree and learnt how to code in my spare time. I'm an SWE now, it has literally changed the course of my life, had I stuck with engineering my household would not have an income worthy enough to pay for basic needs + internet. Some of my friends from university are still unemployed, it's so bad that I know someone with a MSc in Engineering working in a mall as a salesman.

yhoneycomb 5y ago

The worst is when they say "experts say" and then just say whatever their own opinion was. Sure, you can find "experts" to say anything. I'm more interested in who exactly you're talking about, or what data you're referring to. "Experts say" is just such a lazy and often misleading statement. I've seen way too more articles that claimed "experts said" something which was NOT at all the consensus opinion.