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I feel like the industry has been actively trying to suppress tech workers wages for at least the last 15 years. I am hoping that this message coming from some

by dijit 3y ago

I feel like the industry has been actively trying to suppress tech workers wages for at least the last 15 years. I am hoping that this message coming from someone with as much Karma as I have will be a signal that I'm not trying to troll- though what I say next will definitely be controversial. The push for "everyone can code" and the large investment in coding bootcamps (especially focused on diversity to increase the pool as much as possible) and the rise of tools like leetcode (many backed directly and indirectly by big tech companies, especially google) creates a very wide funnel to create as many software engineers as the market will allow. A large demand can still be a comparatively low demand if your supply is larger. It's my firm belief that the needs of software engineers hasn't gone down at all; just that we have enough software engineers now that we're not "special" and thus we can be paid like normal administrative staff like project managers and other white collar work.

sshine 3y ago
I believe it is a valid perspective that the corporate economic benefit behind "everyone can code" is to use the widened supply of developers to push down salaries. But I think the origin of this movement is actually a grassroots movement that seeks better opportunities for the individual. If today comparatively more people can make the thing, maybe making the thing is only as important as planning to make the thing.
- hirako2000 3y ago
  The capital's endeavor is to identify relevant ideas, opportunities, phenomenons, and back them proportionally to their potential. The grassroot movement would have been 1% of what it has become in size, yet would have achieved far better results in pumping out great enginners. What have we seen instead? a massive injection of enginners, most of them not belonging to the tech industry altogether. Fooled into it for the compensation bait or to escape a field they probably loved that dried out in demand for labour. For the most part. At least for a significant part. For sure with a very impactful effect. A sad diagnosis we can make is, on one side a large number of poorly and insufficiently trained enginneers with hardly any chance to build the necessary foundations to grow, on another side a shrinking ratio of great enginners who are seriously starting to struggle carrying heavier weights, and on the opposite side high up management not even sure to notice spending marginally fewer dollar per head count but significantly more dollar for subpar outcomes. On a more people wellbeing note, of the many fooled into becoming a fullstack enginner in 12 weeks, not only did they believe it since many indeed got the job, they also got fooled into believing they actually liked that job. High comp doesn't turn people from zero to hero. Only love or at least genuine interest does.
hotpotamus 3y ago
Is there any time in history when capital has done anything other than try to suppress labor costs?
- Eddy_Viscosity2 3y ago
  Its different this time though because now they are trying to suppress my wages.
  - hotpotamus 3y ago
    I suppose it is quite a kick in the pants to find out that you aren't so special that your bosses are just thrilled to pay you half a million a year to create CRUD apps.
    - crowbahr 3y ago
      _All_ apps are CRUD apps.
      - meiraleal 3y ago
        Although I agree with the thought, not all apps are CRUD as there are many apps that are -R-- only.
        lylejantzi3rd 3y ago
        Yeah, but some -R-- is harder than others. Streaming video is much more difficult than a text-only blog.
crowbahr 3y ago
It doesn't seem like there are enough experienced software engineers, at least in certain fields. Native mobile seems to be a tight market. Getting your foot in the door is hard though. Nobody wants to hire a junior.
- lylejantzi3rd 3y ago
  Why don't they hire a react native developer and train them up on swift or kotlin?
  - haskellandchill 3y ago
    As far as hiring goes there's no such thing as a generalist who can learn the specifics, there are people like that but the industry refuses to recognize this for the most part. The current practice is to prove yourself first by doing open source or projects. A few very brilliant engineers are given leeway based on reputation.
tommiegannert 3y ago
I have learned from two different clients that it's easy to hire a "cheap" contractor to create a website/app. Getting value out of it is really difficult, though. If you're not technical, it's difficult to formulate the problem succinctly enough that priorities are obvious and non-negotiable to the contractor. Mind you, as long as they have other clients, they have no incentive to work on the most important things first; they'll bill the hours either way. In fact, the longer they can punt the final piece that makes you happy, the more they earn. So even if we replace my coding skills with HAL2000, I'll just continue up the ladder and help people build software development plans to feed ChatGPT, or its contractors. Writing code is easy; writing code with a purpose is hard.
lwhi 3y ago
I like your take, and it makes sense; but there ARE less jobs out there. Companies have less budget to spend on hires. Customers and clients have less to spend on digital.

by dijit 3y ago

sshine 3y ago

I believe it is a valid perspective that the corporate economic benefit behind "everyone can code" is to use the widened supply of developers to push down salaries. But I think the origin of this movement is actually a grassroots movement that seeks better opportunities for the individual. If today comparatively more people can make the thing, maybe making the thing is only as important as planning to make the thing.

hirako2000 3y ago
The capital's endeavor is to identify relevant ideas, opportunities, phenomenons, and back them proportionally to their potential. The grassroot movement would have been 1% of what it has become in size, yet would have achieved far better results in pumping out great enginners. What have we seen instead? a massive injection of enginners, most of them not belonging to the tech industry altogether. Fooled into it for the compensation bait or to escape a field they probably loved that dried out in demand for labour. For the most part. At least for a significant part. For sure with a very impactful effect. A sad diagnosis we can make is, on one side a large number of poorly and insufficiently trained enginneers with hardly any chance to build the necessary foundations to grow, on another side a shrinking ratio of great enginners who are seriously starting to struggle carrying heavier weights, and on the opposite side high up management not even sure to notice spending marginally fewer dollar per head count but significantly more dollar for subpar outcomes. On a more people wellbeing note, of the many fooled into becoming a fullstack enginner in 12 weeks, not only did they believe it since many indeed got the job, they also got fooled into believing they actually liked that job. High comp doesn't turn people from zero to hero. Only love or at least genuine interest does.

hotpotamus 3y ago

Is there any time in history when capital has done anything other than try to suppress labor costs?

Eddy_Viscosity2 3y ago
Its different this time though because now they are trying to suppress my wages.
- hotpotamus 3y ago
  I suppose it is quite a kick in the pants to find out that you aren't so special that your bosses are just thrilled to pay you half a million a year to create CRUD apps.
  - crowbahr 3y ago
    _All_ apps are CRUD apps.
    - meiraleal 3y ago
      Although I agree with the thought, not all apps are CRUD as there are many apps that are -R-- only.
      - lylejantzi3rd 3y ago
        Yeah, but some -R-- is harder than others. Streaming video is much more difficult than a text-only blog.

crowbahr 3y ago

It doesn't seem like there are enough experienced software engineers, at least in certain fields. Native mobile seems to be a tight market. Getting your foot in the door is hard though. Nobody wants to hire a junior.

lylejantzi3rd 3y ago
Why don't they hire a react native developer and train them up on swift or kotlin?
- haskellandchill 3y ago
  As far as hiring goes there's no such thing as a generalist who can learn the specifics, there are people like that but the industry refuses to recognize this for the most part. The current practice is to prove yourself first by doing open source or projects. A few very brilliant engineers are given leeway based on reputation.

tommiegannert 3y ago

I have learned from two different clients that it's easy to hire a "cheap" contractor to create a website/app. Getting value out of it is really difficult, though. If you're not technical, it's difficult to formulate the problem succinctly enough that priorities are obvious and non-negotiable to the contractor. Mind you, as long as they have other clients, they have no incentive to work on the most important things first; they'll bill the hours either way. In fact, the longer they can punt the final piece that makes you happy, the more they earn. So even if we replace my coding skills with HAL2000, I'll just continue up the ladder and help people build software development plans to feed ChatGPT, or its contractors. Writing code is easy; writing code with a purpose is hard.

lwhi 3y ago

I like your take, and it makes sense; but there ARE less jobs out there. Companies have less budget to spend on hires. Customers and clients have less to spend on digital.