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Ask HN: Are you a 40-year old software engineer without a job for > 1 year?

105 points by nextn 2y ago

Large numbers of skilled software engineers are unemployed for months. Many are unemployed for more than a year. Is this an arbitrage opportunity? What's the best way to harness this concentration of energy?

rvba 2y ago
New OS to beat Linux? Consulting for smaller companies to give them cheap software that helps them with their problems cheap? (And scales revenue with many subscribers) - I could write one example that comes to my mind but I dont want to soubd like a shill Probably some of them are good, but software recruiters have problems to identify who (this happens to many jobs, not only software). I could write a book how recruitment and assessments could be changed to identify real gems.
- markus_zhang 2y ago
  What new OS has the potential to have a foothold?
- thephyber 2y ago
  > I could write a book how recruitment and assessments could be changed to identify real gems. What if the companies people really want to work at have already solved this issue and the legacy companies won’t figure out how to change before they die off…
- sn9 2y ago
  Or maybe a new internet browser committed to privacy lol.
profsummergig 2y ago
Serious question: what's the definition of "skilled software engineer"?
- ninetyninenine 2y ago
  Someone you would consider skilled. Your own personal definition of this would suffice. I suspect though there isn't a lot of these people that are unemployed. There's more "mediocre" engineers that are in this zone.
  - ivewonyoung 2y ago
    Perhaps but it may also include people that were consciously or unconsciously passed on because of their age.
- austin-cheney 2y ago
  In the world of JavaScript its the person who uses the most tools, sometimes all of them simultaneously.
  - hackable_sand 2y ago
    The CSV CV strategy.
    - profsummergig 2y ago
      Elaborate please? I googled the term but didn't get anything certain.
      - austin-cheney 2y ago
        CSV is comma separated values data format. CV is short for curriculum vitae which is another term for resume. They are saying people spike up their resumes with a laundry list of nonsense because they won't get hired otherwise and also its the total capability of many developers as opposed to actual programming capabilities.
redcafe2 2y ago
[flagged]
- maddmann 2y ago
  There are still plenty of crud jobs.
- ninetyninenine 2y ago
  LLMs aren't doing anything truly beneficial to the economy. Nothing has really changed. Some tasks are a bit smoother and faster to do with LLM assistance, but as of right now the entire LLM industry is mostly just R&D and not generating any value.
- codegeek 2y ago
  You are not serious right ? Most jobs ultimately are CRUD and LLMs are just the shiny new thing that is hardly 2 years old. There are 1000s of companies/products that require CRUD jobs and are not going away just because of LLMs.
- slater 2y ago
  LLMs are just the shiny new thing. Look: - Most took the easy path, doing CRUD for decades for easy money. Now, with Flash, they struggle to specialize or stay relevant as they are not intelligent enough and never pushed themselves. - Most took the easy path, doing CRUD for decades for easy money. Now, with AJAX, they struggle to specialize or stay relevant as they are not intelligent enough and never pushed themselves. - Most took the easy path, doing CRUD for decades for easy money. Now, with blockchains, they struggle to specialize or stay relevant as they are not intelligent enough and never pushed themselves. etc. etc. etc. ad nauseam
- erulabs 2y ago
  at what point does short term thinking "for decades" become, you know, long term thinking?
  - alxjrvs 2y ago
    The same number closets you'd need to build before you've build a house.
mrcode007 2y ago
Multiple possibilities exist but everything depends on context and the skill set. One option is to start a consulting business with a group of engineers (essentially a market equivalent of a union but with more legal protections) and start charging very high market rates and nickel-and-dime the client hedge fund style with pass-through fees for everything. Use the knowledge of former jobs’ contracts and undercut on price. If the skill set is very niche and highly specialized you could even attempt cornering the market by recruiting people away that are still employed and sell back their services through the consulting gig (offer profit share as a sweetener, etc.)
- pinoy420 2y ago
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MasterScrat 2y ago
I suspect the largest opportunity right now is to leverage whichever industry you have experience in, and build vertical tooling that leverages LLM.
ninetyninenine 2y ago
Is it that bad?
- Josoephr 2y ago
  I wonder if this is further decimation of the middle class?
  - grahamg 2y ago
    [dead]
  - riehwvfbk 2y ago
    It's like the Matrix: they decimate it every few years and then build up a new version. The next one will be made up of people who think their "AI skills" make them gods.
dangrape123 2y ago
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irq-1 2y ago
The best way to harness this is to offer what companies don't: unlimited time off, no return-to-office, health insurance and savings plans that don't kick-back to the company, flat(ter) management, no all-hands meetings...
- schmookeeg 2y ago
  I'm overemployed as a 40+ but this would get a CV from me pretty quickly. Offer some part-time options and you'll get a custom-crafted cover letter professing my love and why I am a perfect fit as well. :)
  - DougN7 2y ago
    Part time sounds magical. I think there would be a ton of very talented people interested in only working (and being paid for) 20 hours/week.
    - glenneroo 2y ago
      I've been doing 20 hours/week with occasional "overtime" periods i.e. 30-40 hours during crunch for the last 15 years and can't imagine ever doing full-time again. The QoL improvements are truly unbeatable, granted I take a huge pay-cut but life is more important than money.
      - gallamine 2y ago
        Does your employer call you a part-time worker or are you a consultant for those hours?
        conductr 2y ago
        As an employer, expecting all the benefits listed in top of thread (unlimited time off, health benefits, etc) and part time status combined with what is likely a pay rate high enough to do well on part time income, etc. This type of expectation is exactly why you’re unemployed for >1 year. If you actually want work you can find it. You’re effectively being stubborn on trying to sell a $1m house that the market values at $500k. No one is going to force you to lower your prices but the market isn’t sad about your house being unsold for over a year either. The market is moving without you. I’m sure there’s various nuances to this and I’m assuming you are actively looking for work versus passively waiting for a perfect situation where a buyer loves your house enough to pay a premium but this actually sounds kinda disconnected from reality if that’s not the case.
nitwit005 2y ago
It sounds like you're proposing hiring people for less than they used to make. That can absolutely work. The problem tends to be that high unemployment tends to coincide with economic downturns. It's hard to get investment to start a business during such a downturn.
colesantiago 2y ago
> Is this an arbitrage opportunity? What's the best way to harness this concentration of energy? Here is a profitable idea. Make a group decision and choose a target profitable SaaS company or startup of your choice, replicate it with AI and race the target SaaS company to near zero in pricing and sell your services as the cheapest offering to SMEs and enterprises (assuming you guys have experience in this area) Keep it running or sell it to another business and the collective reaps the profits once the target SaaS company is dead or is unable to compete. Repeat for all or any companies or startups that you wish should not exist or that laid you off in the past
- jdlshore 2y ago
  You’re making the mistake of believing that people choose B2B SaaS purely on the basis of price and features. While those are a component, reputation, marketing, and an effective sales force are far more important.
  - colesantiago 2y ago
    And so do the collective people who worked on the competing SaaS have all of those skills as well to use to their advantage. Just say you've worked at Google, Microsoft, Intel, etc, 300 years of collective experience. S4 Capital famously won contracts away from WPP even though WPP had a long standing reputation and marketing prowess.
  - AznHisoka 2y ago
    This. It would take a lot for me to switch over to a cheaper provider especially if it was something mission critical. It’s way too risky. On the other hand, if it wasn’t mission critical (let’s say replacing my todo list tracker), then I wouldn’t even consider replacing it because it’s not critical, and it’s not expensive. Why should I waste my time replacing it with something a bit cheaper? So it’s a catch 22
    - colesantiago 2y ago
      Until your existing provider jacks up prices 20x because they know you won't move.
Hashex129542 2y ago
I too jobless for 3+ years.
nathanaldensr 2y ago
To answer the question directly: there isn't an obvious way that is economical. There's nothing intrinsically valuable about a group of 40+ technologists when most investments seem to be in the AI space or in other hype-driven spaces. I'm 43, about to turn 44, and I've been unemployed for three years. My former employer fired me for not vaxxing despite being a full-time remote employee as I refused to give in to their ridiculous requirement. I've been taking care of my aging parents since then as my dad has developed dementia. I'm interested in working in software again as tech has been my life since I was 13 years old. I've got tons of skills and experience, not just in tech but also leadership, but the prospect of insane hazing rituals known as "tech interviews" has me discouraged. I've been considering starting a tech services business but the economy is rough right now and I'm living in one of the most expensive states in the US. If anyone could use an experienced .NET dev/DevOps or team lead, look me up.
- AaronAPU 2y ago
  I’m 43 and in a town where there basically isn’t a tech industry. Worked remote for like 20 years but now remote is hated by employers because the hordes started doing it during COVID and ruined it for people like me. Started my own single person company a couple years ago and haven’t looked back. It does well enough to fund my modest lifestyle and I would frankly rather die than go back to interviewing and working for someone else. The tech industry sickens me in general. It’s done so much damage to our society. Feels way better interacting with customers directly and treating software like a craft/trade.
  - em-bee 2y ago
    how do you find clients when you are remote? did you travel to meet people? i find looking for a job vs looking for clients as a freelancer is really no different, especially when working remotely without the ability to travel.
idearEngeen 2y ago
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jarsin 2y ago
I would say start an opensource project who's main mission is replacing a big tech app/platform. Bet you could get tons of laid off devs to eagerly contribute to something new and exciting that is taking on the empires.
- haael 2y ago
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dave333 2y ago
This happened to me during the dot com bust and I was what I call self-unemployed from 2001-2007. I tried various things to make a living. Developed some games/puzzles websites that still make several hundred bucks every month like clockwork. Tried buying and selling stuff especially dot com surplus stuff like docking stations and also books and music CDs. Bought in quantity at local auctions and on eBay and sold individually through a website or on Amazon. Eventually I studied to become a mortgage broker and passed the real estate exam but then the subprime crisis burst and there was very little demand for mortgage loans anymore. Eventually I landed a software job at a startup and rejoined the full time employed. Maybe create a software co-op where people meet and can give or get help with any projects they are working on. Meet anywhere convenient like local library or office after hours or even someones garage. Nobody gets paid unless by agreement and to make money people need to sell something (maybe just ads). There's a much bigger chance of success than if all the people work independently.
- devKnight 2y ago
  what was it like going back to tech after 5-6 years? Was it a new stack? Were you doing some personal projects along the way to keep skills up?
  - dave333 2y ago
    It was pretty rough at first - my background was doing UI in C/Xwindows/Motif, followed by Java/Swing UI which was by far the most glacially slow stack. Javascript was fast taking over the browser but I didn't know it. I remember failing a job interview because I had no idea what a closure was although I was familiar with C stack frame and Java variable scoping. Another time I got a trial job at a one-room startup mainly on the recomendation of my reference, who reported back to me that he advised not working for the startup's CEO. Sure enough I lasted there a week although to be fair I was not yet competent in javascript. I did some private projects to learn it - sudoku websites - and later landed another startup job (mostly because I got the brain-teaser style interview questions right) doing javascript UI where I had free choice of frameworks and chose ExtJS. Six months later I got headhunted by a large company that was using ExtJS for its internal web framework. But JS frameworks were coming thick and fast: ExtJS, Dojo, jQuery, Angular, React and each harder to learn than the last for someone in their late 50s. But I would have to say the relief of earning a full salary again was immense compared to scrimping and saving and juggling credit card balances.
fragmede 2y ago
There are two markets. One is this means that you can make software for cheaper. What software didn't exist because it was too expensive to create? Nevermind finding a team in India or Eastern Europe, you can now make a US team and pay them in equity until you get funding/revenue. What underserved niche does your mom/wife/girlfriend/boyfriend/dog currently not have software for, that they'd be worth a couple of bucks for? What niche, existing piece of software is out there that currently sucks? The other market is this cohort themselves. What will "40 year old software engineers without a job" pay for? Food, rent, gym membership, haircuts, Factorio. Figure out something they want/need (other than jobs) that they'll pay for, and make that.
- zeroc8 2y ago
  I think that's the main problem. The low hanging fruits have all been picked a long time ago. You can try to undercut existing software, but it's not easy.
sripathi 2y ago
How about a 50- year old Product Manager in Tech without a job for > 1.5 year?
pragmatic 2y ago
I feel bad for this age cohort. Those a little bit older who started during or right after the dot bomb fiasco knew (or should have known) that software might pay well or "is fun/interesting" but have a plan to get out by 40. I discussed this with same age or older colleagues and tried to impress upon younger colleagues the importance of saving and investing and lifestyle inflation etc. If you started in 2005 or later you could be forgiven for think you'd found the golden ticket and 6 future salaries, bonuses and stock were never going to end just bc you could npm a bunch of js together.
- Ancapistani 2y ago
  I’m 41, so I fall right into this. I never had any illusion that things would last forever as they were - for that matter, things have changes significantly over the past 20 years anyhow. I’ve always felt like I’m “riding a wave”, and the work I’m doing in AI these days leads me to believe this particular wave is ending. My plan is to jump onto the coming “AI wave”. I see it as taller (there’s more short-term earning potential there) but much faster moving (it’ll be over sooner). If I can get to the top of this oncoming wave hopefully I can make enough to retire comfortably. If not, then I’ll keep doing what I’ve been doing: looking for that next wave and jumping onto it before there’s sand under my feet :)
xavor 2y ago
I'm in. WFH, a decent chair, very flexible times especially part-time, which would lead to more time actually worked.
aqueueaqueue 2y ago
You need new companies to employ them. So maybe online or city based meetups to collaborate the get the new companies started. They don't have to be startups. They can be consultancies.
omarfigueroa_10 2y ago
Hi everyone – I know this might not be the right thread, but I’m a cofounder of an MIT-founded startup looking for an experienced backend developer. If you’re interested in connecting, please reply to this message. Looking forward to chatting!
- em-bee 2y ago
  you should post on the monthly whoishiring thread: https://news.ycombinator.com/submitted?id=whoishiring https://news.ycombinator.com/submitted?id=whoishiring this month is https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43243024 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43243024 if remote work is ok, please contact me. email is in my profile.

em-bee 2y ago
in germany that's actually the law (except for the unlimited time off). you can't hire a contractor on a permanent part-time basis unless that contractor has other clients at the same time. and the rest of the argument makes no sense. even as a contractor you'll have to pay enough to make up for the benefits they'd otherwise be getting (pro-rated of course. half the work time means half the value of benefits included). the average contracting rate is twice as high as the average salary for a reason.
- conductr 2y ago
  Does the law require hiring German talent? I wasn’t really trying to make a global statement. The audience here skews a certain way and My assumption is this attitude is the US Bay Area tech workers, or other exFAANG, used to making >$300k USD and would be glad to make make half part time, probably living in another locale where that translates to megabucks and they still get all the other benefits. It just doesn’t exist for a reason here.
  - em-bee 2y ago
    ok, with those assumptions, i agree of course. it doesn't make sense to expect bay area pay for remote work. full or part-time. but i don't see that expectation in the thread, which is why your response seemed a bit odd. for myself i'd be happy with $50k USD remote part-time. is that more realistic?
    - conductr 2y ago
      I'm talking in generalizations of course. Although I did a quick google search and it seems you are asking roughly 1.5-2x going rates in Germany even for experienced devs. I'm sure your more aware of market rates in your locale than me but it feels like I'm paying a premium at this price. For me, it would have to match up with some specialized skills or some 'reason' to justify it. The larger view I hold, that many don't agree with, is a) if I've already decided to go remote and b) my budget is $50k then c) I could hire a small team in India/Asia. I've personally never had problems sourcing talent in those locales with my types of workloads; which I admit are rather basic (web apps, ios, devops, etc). I'm not sure if that would be the case if I was building something hard like a new database or something.
      - em-bee 2y ago
        i was looking at the US market. and i am talking about the upper bound of the range that i think i can ask for. for germany my expectations are lower. since so many applications ask for a salary expectations (some requiring a number to be filled in to even be able to submit the application), it matters to pick a good number. it shouldn't be to low, nor to high.
        conductr 2y ago
        Definitely your choice to make in terms of what salary you'd accept however I don't really understand the strategy of yours. I, or any US company, could just hire in the US if I was paying higher US rates. I could avoid the timezone issues, potential language issues, would be easier to get together in person if ever needed, etc. and I don't have to learn/concern myself with German employment laws. All things equal, skills and such, I think it would be fairly easy to find a US based candidate at this price for part-time work. So why would I bother hiring from another country unless it saves me money?
        em-bee 2y ago
        there is no strategy. i see a job that is not limited to US only, that fits my qualifications and i apply. if there is a question about salary, i try to guess what i should put there. i am afraid if i don't put enough it is also a negative selection criteria. so that is what i am trying to figure out now. for jobs that don't even ask for a salary it's a moot point. I don't have to learn/concern myself with German employment laws if you don't have a subsidiary in the EU or some kind of employer of record through which you hire someone one from the EU, then the employment laws would not be relevant to you. it would just be a contractor relationship. why would I bother hiring from another country unless it saves me money? good point. definitely something to consider. thank you.

conductr 2y ago

A lot of naysayers on this idea but there’s plenty of low hanging fruit that companies would love to find a cheaper option for. It would of course take time to gain traction without a sales force but also this very community of people that would band together could effectively evangelize a better solution with just their existing network. Tech people are often the early adopters and word spread via Twitter, etc. I’m in non-tech industries in finance/accounting and during budget conversations a few things over the past few years consistently pop up as this costs too damn much; smartsheets, zoom, slack, etc. I actually implement a specific Oracle product that costs most companies 6 figures a year that could easily be self service SAAS product with a much better solution. Financial analysts skew mildly technical and could implement it themselves and be targeted fairly easily. Competition exists but they always bloat the product to charge almost as much or more than Oracle does. But end users only care about a few small features and I think some one could execute those much better than what exists on the market. All competitors require an enterprise software sales process to even see/demo their software. If the analysts could login, connect to their data, and set some custom configurations (possibly llm assisted?), and worry about monetizing the relationship until the value prop has been realized- then I think this would spread on its own, people in the industry talk, change jobs frequently and take their tooling preferences with them. Best of all, this group of people usually report to a cfo and can offer their department a significant cost savings by doing this, saving the company money is literally their job already. That’s my business idea without giving it away entirely lol. Comment here if you’re actually interested in this, I would love to join a group like this working on something as a group. I can code but never done so professionally or as part of a team.

em-bee 2y ago
this does sound interesting, but the challenge is still funding the start. bootstrapping is great (and i prefer it over having investors) but i still need to feed my kids. so the question is, how do we get to ramen-profitability (make enough so we can feed ourselves, even if it's only ramen noodles)
- conductr 2y ago
  I get it but don’t have a direct solution for that, it’s a process and includes many unknowns and has no guarantees but isn’t the premise here to use our unproductive time while unemployed to create something that hopefully is worth something one day? It’s odd to me that while unemployed people are all individually working on side projects, learning the latest stacks, etc and do it all as throwaway code that will never see the light of day-and that’s seen as acceptable, as is contributing to open source, etc. But doing those same activities as a cooperative and paid in equity is where people draw a line. There’s definitely a lot of details to work out if this were to take shape. How much equity do people earn, what happens when they get a job and their availability declines, etc. But it wouldn’t take much effort to think through those kinds of things and make something reasonable/fair.
  - em-bee 2y ago
    i get your point, but it doesn't match my reality. all my time is spent on searching for and applying to jobs. i tend to have more time for side projects while i am actually earning money. in part it's the anxiety of not spending enough time on searching for work, which makes it difficult to focus on something else. i can't even spend much time with my children without feeling guilty that i should be spending more time on jobhunting. it would help if i still had some savings like a year ago, but those are almost used up by now.
    - conductr 2y ago
      Makes sense. After initial period, I only see enough jobs to keep me busy ~10 hours a week. It's how I spend my first ~2 hours a day so we do just have differing realities in that regard

em-bee 2y ago
not having an up-to-date experience is a real problem. i am struggling with that too. most jobs demand experience with current tools. it's really hard to find jobs where the company believes in the potential of learning new tools based on the experience with other comparable tools. i'd like to learn react and go, but i am already overwhelmed with writing job applications and taking care of my family.
- dave333 2y ago
  Doing a personal project or contributing to an existing open source project can help you to get up to speed on new tools/frameworks. Maybe even reimplement an existing proj you are familiar with in a new framework. As for time make learning new stuff the priority. Job applications are worthless without the chops to pass the interview.
  - em-bee 2y ago
    you are right of course. in part what i am struggling with is prioritization. apart from needing time to take care of my children i find it hard to focus on any side project when the constant inability to find work is looming over me. this is exacerbated by the fact that a recent theft while traveling caused a rather large financial loss, cutting my savings in half, so that i now only have a few months left before i am broke, living as an expat without social security support. if i run out of money i'd have to go back to where i am from, and disrupt not only my own network of friends and relationships that i have been able to develop, but even worse that of my children who not only will have to switch school but also do so in a new language that they only have a passive understanding of. what i am trying to say is that life will not only be hard, as that would be bearable. i am used to hard times. but the effect would be a very dramatic upheaval, and that is paralyzing. a few months is barely enough time to learn something new just to help me find work. (and i only identified go and react as prominent skills in job descriptions very recently too. a few months ago would not even have known what is worth learning). if i focus on learning now i am almost certain to fail to find work by the time money runs out. i do have plenty of experience, if i could only find an employer or customer who can recognize that. (ps: this comment may sound defensive, but it isn't. i am trying to elaborate and clarify and i do invite readers here to find the flaws in my argumentation and point out alternatives. i am commenting here so i can learn and improve)
    - dave333 2y ago
      One small point is that AI tools like cursor can greatly speed up any project and will also be required and are probably even higher priority than any new underlying framework. I can see software moving to where the human oversees the business logic/aesthetics and AI does all the framework-specific code.