4 ms·

What if you are one of the only few who know how to maintain a Cobol system for a bank? Aren't you very valuable?

Nextgrid 3y ago
There's nothing particularly difficult about Cobol, it can be learned, and with enough effort, all the undocumented existing code can be understood and reverse-engineered enough to be able to make changes. It's not pleasant work, but it's doable. If there was value in it, salaries/consulting rates would reflect it and people would be queuing up to learn it and make good money. That isn't happening, so it seems like Cobol devs aren't actually that valuable to these companies.
- andyjohnson0 3y ago
  There was a comment on HN a while back to the effect that the well-known stories of COBOL devs being dragged out of retirement to earn massive consulting payments was a myth. They were actually being paid good, but not extremely good, rates for their knowledge of the business logic embedded in old code-bases. The implementation language was largely irrelevant.
izacus 3y ago
You're valuable in a way where everyone really wants to get rid of you and is planning hard on how to do that.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
w4tty 3y ago
No. Because COBOL maintenance is outsourced to the third world.
- vanderZwan 3y ago
  Do you seriously suggest that banks outsource the maintenance of the mainframes that process their money transfers? If so I'd like to see a source, because the only articles I have read about on this topic (e.g. [0]) tell me the exact opposite: it's all in-house the risks are too high. For larger banks it's practically a national security risk. Maybe the software they use is from abroad (usually ancient IBM shit), but that's not the same. [0] https://ezali.substack.com/p/interviewing-my-mother-a-mainframe https://ezali.substack.com/p/interviewing-my-mother-a-mainfr...
  - nijave 3y ago
    They don't "out source", they in-source by opening technology hubs in cheaper locations.
    - vanderZwan 3y ago
      Again, I would like to see a source. I'm not saying you're wrong. Maybe you're talking about small banks in the US or something, of which I know basically nothing. I am thinking of examples like Nordea, the bank in the article I linked, which has a market share of around 20% in Sweden[0] and handles the government's bank accounts. Especially that last part makes me extremely skeptical that the Swedish government would be OK with handing over the keys to their economic kingdom to cheap digital labor abroad so a company might save some money. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nordea#History https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nordea#History
      - geodel 3y ago
        Well my brother worked in BNY Mellon India center. They have thousands of people and work core banking processing. BofA have their own India development center with thousands of employees. And this is outside of 10s of thousands outsourced to Tata, Infy etc. You think core banking process like transfers/ trading is some kinda crown jewel. It may be in terms of messaging but most of core IT part is just a cost center. Customer data and all need to be in their own secure data centers for legal reasons but all the processes can be designed, developed and executed from anywhere at lower cost.
lifestyleguru 3y ago
People get overly excited by some "last man standing" success stories of a COBOL developer based in US of A. My only encounter with COBOL developer was a freshly graduated girl based in post Communist country, her earnings were something around 25k EUR annually. I pointed out that her career might be something of a dead end but she was more like "a job is a job". Oh, and they were using some dinosaur version control as well.
- ponector 3y ago
  I've seen a post on local job board in Poland, IBM was looking for junior cobol engineer. Any student with some java knowledge will fit, they said. I'm sure they will not pay anything more than 25k eur anually. Also if there is some legacy cobol system, many managers are incentivised to gather a new team to write a replacement with some modern technology stack. Cobol is definitely a dead end for the career.
  - lifestyleguru 3y ago
    > legacy cobol system, many managers are incentivised to gather a new team to write a replacement with some modern technology stack. Absolutely not in outsourcing centers like this. You're not supposed to show any initiative or god forbid - design anything. You grunt the COBOL until budget for the project is zero.
- rgblambda 3y ago
  >her earnings were something around 25k EUR annually. That's a fairly good salary for a recent graduate in Eastern Europe. Although I admit it does illustrate your point that some legacy tech stacks are quite easy to pick up.
chasd00 3y ago
> What if you are one of the only few who know how to maintain a Cobol system for a bank? Aren't you very valuable? The bank would see the situation (only one person knows the Cobol system) an extreme risk and do whatever it takes to mitigate that risk. The short term answer is to keep you hired but the long term answer is to either find a steady supply of Cobol programmers or move away from Cobol to something where expertise is more available.

There's nothing particularly difficult about Cobol, it can be learned, and with enough effort, all the undocumented existing code can be understood and reverse-engineered enough to be able to make changes. It's not pleasant work, but it's doable. If there was value in it, salaries/consulting rates would reflect it and people would be queuing up to learn it and make good money. That isn't happening, so it seems like Cobol devs aren't actually that valuable to these companies.

andyjohnson0 3y ago
There was a comment on HN a while back to the effect that the well-known stories of COBOL devs being dragged out of retirement to earn massive consulting payments was a myth. They were actually being paid good, but not extremely good, rates for their knowledge of the business logic embedded in old code-bases. The implementation language was largely irrelevant.

izacus 3y ago

You're valuable in a way where everyone really wants to get rid of you and is planning hard on how to do that.

deleted 3y ago
[deleted]

w4tty 3y ago

No. Because COBOL maintenance is outsourced to the third world.

vanderZwan 3y ago
Do you seriously suggest that banks outsource the maintenance of the mainframes that process their money transfers? If so I'd like to see a source, because the only articles I have read about on this topic (e.g. [0]) tell me the exact opposite: it's all in-house the risks are too high. For larger banks it's practically a national security risk. Maybe the software they use is from abroad (usually ancient IBM shit), but that's not the same. [0] https://ezali.substack.com/p/interviewing-my-mother-a-mainframe https://ezali.substack.com/p/interviewing-my-mother-a-mainfr...
- nijave 3y ago
  They don't "out source", they in-source by opening technology hubs in cheaper locations.
  - vanderZwan 3y ago
    Again, I would like to see a source. I'm not saying you're wrong. Maybe you're talking about small banks in the US or something, of which I know basically nothing. I am thinking of examples like Nordea, the bank in the article I linked, which has a market share of around 20% in Sweden[0] and handles the government's bank accounts. Especially that last part makes me extremely skeptical that the Swedish government would be OK with handing over the keys to their economic kingdom to cheap digital labor abroad so a company might save some money. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nordea#History https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nordea#History
    - geodel 3y ago
      Well my brother worked in BNY Mellon India center. They have thousands of people and work core banking processing. BofA have their own India development center with thousands of employees. And this is outside of 10s of thousands outsourced to Tata, Infy etc. You think core banking process like transfers/ trading is some kinda crown jewel. It may be in terms of messaging but most of core IT part is just a cost center. Customer data and all need to be in their own secure data centers for legal reasons but all the processes can be designed, developed and executed from anywhere at lower cost.

lifestyleguru 3y ago

People get overly excited by some "last man standing" success stories of a COBOL developer based in US of A. My only encounter with COBOL developer was a freshly graduated girl based in post Communist country, her earnings were something around 25k EUR annually. I pointed out that her career might be something of a dead end but she was more like "a job is a job". Oh, and they were using some dinosaur version control as well.

ponector 3y ago
I've seen a post on local job board in Poland, IBM was looking for junior cobol engineer. Any student with some java knowledge will fit, they said. I'm sure they will not pay anything more than 25k eur anually. Also if there is some legacy cobol system, many managers are incentivised to gather a new team to write a replacement with some modern technology stack. Cobol is definitely a dead end for the career.
- lifestyleguru 3y ago
  > legacy cobol system, many managers are incentivised to gather a new team to write a replacement with some modern technology stack. Absolutely not in outsourcing centers like this. You're not supposed to show any initiative or god forbid - design anything. You grunt the COBOL until budget for the project is zero.
rgblambda 3y ago
>her earnings were something around 25k EUR annually. That's a fairly good salary for a recent graduate in Eastern Europe. Although I admit it does illustrate your point that some legacy tech stacks are quite easy to pick up.

chasd00 3y ago

> What if you are one of the only few who know how to maintain a Cobol system for a bank? Aren't you very valuable? The bank would see the situation (only one person knows the Cobol system) an extreme risk and do whatever it takes to mitigate that risk. The short term answer is to keep you hired but the long term answer is to either find a steady supply of Cobol programmers or move away from Cobol to something where expertise is more available.