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What world is this article living in? I got a job making $100k as a software engineer, right out of college (top-tier I guess). And then I realized that I was

by stale2001 13y ago

What world is this article living in? I got a job making $100k as a software engineer, right out of college (top-tier I guess). And then I realized that I was worth more than that, and 8 months later I'm now switching over to a job making $150k in total compensation. And TBH, I was middle of the road compared to my classmates.

acchow 13y ago
Software engineering is an exception in the science and engineering camp. FTA: "Because labor markets in science and engineering differ greatly across fields, industries, and time periods, it is easy to cherry-pick specific specialties that really are in short supply, at least in specific years and locations. But generalizing from these cases to the whole of U.S. science and engineering is perilous." But, surprise surprise, still higher unemployment than the guild-protected professions. FTA: "unemployment among scientists and engineers is higher than in other professions such as physicians, dentists, lawyers, and registered nurses" On a related note, a good read about guilds: http://nplusonemag.com/death-by-degrees http://nplusonemag.com/death-by-degrees
- ahomescu1 13y ago
  > FTA: "unemployment among scientists and engineers is higher than in other professions such as physicians, dentists, lawyers, and registered nurses" Which is counter-intuitive to me, considering how heavily regulated those other professions are (and their numbers restricted).
  - acchow 13y ago
    Curious, what do you think the employment rate among physicians is? I'd be surprised if it wasn't 100%. The issue is regulation - employment only takes a hit outside the protected professions. There are 13,605 taxi medallions in new york city. What do you think the employment rate among taxi drivers in NYC is?
    - ahomescu1 13y ago
      I'm also considering the people who would be in those careers, if not for the heavy regulations. For example, how many people in NYC would be taxi drivers if they could, but aren't allowed to be?
  - austinz 13y ago
    It actually makes sense, I think. The bottleneck (bar, qualifying exam) keeps the supply artificially low, so those who pass and qualify are always in high demand (low unemployment). Those who don't pass either try again, or after a while go into other fields and no longer consider themselves prospective doctors, lawyers, etc. It's sort of like the effect where, during a prolonged recession, unemployment numbers 'drop' because some people give up actively looking for a job, and are no longer counted.
    - ahomescu1 13y ago
      Sure, I should have specified that I'm also counting people who have the skills and training, but aren't allowed to practice (such as people who failed the medical or bar exam). It makes sense to me to consider those "prospectives" as unemployed in their profession (especially since those professions take years, in some cases as much as a decade, of specialized education, all before the exam itself).
- ethikal 13y ago
  Doesn't the article specifically point out that software engineering isn't encountering a shortage?... "It is true that high-skilled professional occupations almost always experience unemployment rates far lower than those for the rest of the U.S. workforce, but unemployment among scientists and engineers is higher than in other professions such as physicians, dentists, lawyers, and registered nurses, and surprisingly high unemployment rates prevail for recent graduates even in fields with alleged serious “shortages” such as engineering (7.0 percent), computer science (7.8 percent) and information systems (11.7 percent)."
hmsimha 13y ago
Good for you. I graduated from a college that was not top tier over a year ago, as a below-average student, and have yet to find any kind of development work that pays as much as I made delivering pizza while working my way through college. Not everyone has the same experience as you. Furthermore, this article is talking about the entire STEM domain.
- ranci 13y ago
  What major?
  - hmsimha 13y ago
    Computer Science
    - ranci 13y ago
      What are you doing now and where do you live? I'm just curious. I am studying CS right now.
      - hmsimha 13y ago
        I'm living in Portland, OR now, though I'm about to move to Canada. I graduated from a school in Memphis, TN. Right now I'm taking a little break, but for most of the last year I've been reading about different programming languages and frameworks, doing a part-time internship using Ruby on Rails, and basically developing my skill-set to (hopefully) make myself a more desirable candidate for entry-level positions. If you're reading hacker news, you're already probably doing better on that front than I was during my entire undergrad. I'd highly recommend getting an internship and building a personal project before you graduate too, as I believe my failure to do both of those things (in addition to a sub-3.0 GPA) were the factors that have prevented me from getting a job thus far.
duochrome 13y ago
I think top-tier college graduate is the shortage.
Spooky23 13y ago
You're in a hot market in a hot locale. You probably pay an arm and a leg for housing. I'm in a second tier city with more limited options. I know folks who successfully start CS grads in the $50-60k range, mostly from state schools. Someone with a good track record is anywhere from $80-105. Sounds awful, but a 2000 ft^2 house can be found around $200k in a nice area. McMansions are $400-500k. I ended up moving back here from NYC, taking a big salary haircut in the process. My overall standard of living got a little better right off the bat, mostly due to reduced housing and commuting expenses.
- 31reasons 13y ago
  What place that be ?
- a8da6b0c91d 13y ago
  At many levels the national discussions are distorted by failure to understand regional costs of living and taxes and the matter of finding acceptable schools. People talk about the 1% without realizing that two $150K incomes supporting a few kids are at best "comfortable" by the standards of our grandparents in markets like NYC and SF. My grandfathers with skilled tradesman wages were able to support stay at home wives and send six kids down the street to a totally safe and high quality school, and at the same time take a month off every summer on nice quiet rental beach front property (not some hyper crowded vegas style resort bullshit, we're talking single family home on a large lot on a barrier island). People just don't seem to understand how little money $150K is relative to what a skilled and competent worker could get out of a remotely comparable sum 50 years ago. OK, you make $150K, can your four or five kids walk down the street to a quite good school? Is it essentially optional whether your wife works or not?
  - waterlesscloud 13y ago
    "two $150K incomes supporting a few kids are at best "comfortable" by the standards of our grandparents" No. This is a gross exaggeration and extremely out of touch with economic reality.
jonrimmer 13y ago
Why do you think all these silicon valley CEOs are throwing their weight behind schemes to get kids and adults learning how to code? It isn't because they really believe there's some social or personal value in being able to program, it's because they want to flood the job market with developers and so crash wages. What's sad is that many programmers are actually buying it, and volunteering their time to help support and evangelize these schemes.
- jkrems 13y ago
  CEOs who think just throwing more developers at a problem will solve it are what natural selection is for.
  - aviraldg 13y ago
    More developers might not solve a problem faster, but they will drive down wages (even for skilled developers)
    - ranci 13y ago
      There is a lot of crying and worrying about wages on here right now. If you are from CS or SE, you don't have the right to cry about a saturated job market driving down your wages. They are plenty high. If you want people with real problems, look at the graphic design industry. $10/hr can get you your pick of the litter among several applicants who have over 20 years experience in one of the biggest cities in the United States. Then imagine what it must be like for recent college graduates in the field.
      - collyw 13y ago
        Wages are plenty high in the States, or places like London. The rest of us are not on anything special.
- meddlepal 13y ago
  You speak the truth but I don't know how to prevent what is going on. I've also come to the conclusion most developers are too shortsighted to see their own career demise in 20 years.
enewc 13y ago
First of all your, viewpoint is restricted to EE/CS. Any of the other pure sciences: biology, chemistry, physics, etc. do not enjoy the same luxuries. Another important distinction to make is that there are almost no science (i.e. research) jobs any more. Most technology jobs are just run of the mill programming, not actually investing in research.
- unknownian 13y ago
  And yet everyone wants to equate the two. Personally I don't even think webdev should count as STEM at all.
firstOrder 13y ago
You said you went to a top-tier college. Most of them charge over $40k a year. So that $150k pays for less than your tuition costs. You are worth $150k a year (which means your boss is making $160k, $165k etc. off of you, they hire you to be profitable). So your four years of study were in a sense $600k down the drain in that. So it will be at least five years before you start to break even. Minus the housing and living costs over that five years. You spent over $150k and four years ($600k) worth of your time training for this job. Also remember the market is hot. In 2000/2001 air went out of the bubble. Also in 2008/2009. Right now is the peak of a go-go time like 1998/1999 was. It is not the norm.

acchow 13y ago

Software engineering is an exception in the science and engineering camp. FTA: "Because labor markets in science and engineering differ greatly across fields, industries, and time periods, it is easy to cherry-pick specific specialties that really are in short supply, at least in specific years and locations. But generalizing from these cases to the whole of U.S. science and engineering is perilous." But, surprise surprise, still higher unemployment than the guild-protected professions. FTA: "unemployment among scientists and engineers is higher than in other professions such as physicians, dentists, lawyers, and registered nurses" On a related note, a good read about guilds: http://nplusonemag.com/death-by-degrees http://nplusonemag.com/death-by-degrees

ahomescu1 13y ago
> FTA: "unemployment among scientists and engineers is higher than in other professions such as physicians, dentists, lawyers, and registered nurses" Which is counter-intuitive to me, considering how heavily regulated those other professions are (and their numbers restricted).
- acchow 13y ago
  Curious, what do you think the employment rate among physicians is? I'd be surprised if it wasn't 100%. The issue is regulation - employment only takes a hit outside the protected professions. There are 13,605 taxi medallions in new york city. What do you think the employment rate among taxi drivers in NYC is?
  - ahomescu1 13y ago
    I'm also considering the people who would be in those careers, if not for the heavy regulations. For example, how many people in NYC would be taxi drivers if they could, but aren't allowed to be?
- austinz 13y ago
  It actually makes sense, I think. The bottleneck (bar, qualifying exam) keeps the supply artificially low, so those who pass and qualify are always in high demand (low unemployment). Those who don't pass either try again, or after a while go into other fields and no longer consider themselves prospective doctors, lawyers, etc. It's sort of like the effect where, during a prolonged recession, unemployment numbers 'drop' because some people give up actively looking for a job, and are no longer counted.
  - ahomescu1 13y ago
    Sure, I should have specified that I'm also counting people who have the skills and training, but aren't allowed to practice (such as people who failed the medical or bar exam). It makes sense to me to consider those "prospectives" as unemployed in their profession (especially since those professions take years, in some cases as much as a decade, of specialized education, all before the exam itself).
ethikal 13y ago
Doesn't the article specifically point out that software engineering isn't encountering a shortage?... "It is true that high-skilled professional occupations almost always experience unemployment rates far lower than those for the rest of the U.S. workforce, but unemployment among scientists and engineers is higher than in other professions such as physicians, dentists, lawyers, and registered nurses, and surprisingly high unemployment rates prevail for recent graduates even in fields with alleged serious “shortages” such as engineering (7.0 percent), computer science (7.8 percent) and information systems (11.7 percent)."

hmsimha 13y ago

Good for you. I graduated from a college that was not top tier over a year ago, as a below-average student, and have yet to find any kind of development work that pays as much as I made delivering pizza while working my way through college. Not everyone has the same experience as you. Furthermore, this article is talking about the entire STEM domain.

ranci 13y ago
What major?
- hmsimha 13y ago
  Computer Science
  - ranci 13y ago
    What are you doing now and where do you live? I'm just curious. I am studying CS right now.
    - hmsimha 13y ago
      I'm living in Portland, OR now, though I'm about to move to Canada. I graduated from a school in Memphis, TN. Right now I'm taking a little break, but for most of the last year I've been reading about different programming languages and frameworks, doing a part-time internship using Ruby on Rails, and basically developing my skill-set to (hopefully) make myself a more desirable candidate for entry-level positions. If you're reading hacker news, you're already probably doing better on that front than I was during my entire undergrad. I'd highly recommend getting an internship and building a personal project before you graduate too, as I believe my failure to do both of those things (in addition to a sub-3.0 GPA) were the factors that have prevented me from getting a job thus far.

duochrome 13y ago

I think top-tier college graduate is the shortage.

Spooky23 13y ago

You're in a hot market in a hot locale. You probably pay an arm and a leg for housing. I'm in a second tier city with more limited options. I know folks who successfully start CS grads in the $50-60k range, mostly from state schools. Someone with a good track record is anywhere from $80-105. Sounds awful, but a 2000 ft^2 house can be found around $200k in a nice area. McMansions are $400-500k. I ended up moving back here from NYC, taking a big salary haircut in the process. My overall standard of living got a little better right off the bat, mostly due to reduced housing and commuting expenses.

31reasons 13y ago
What place that be ?
a8da6b0c91d 13y ago
At many levels the national discussions are distorted by failure to understand regional costs of living and taxes and the matter of finding acceptable schools. People talk about the 1% without realizing that two $150K incomes supporting a few kids are at best "comfortable" by the standards of our grandparents in markets like NYC and SF. My grandfathers with skilled tradesman wages were able to support stay at home wives and send six kids down the street to a totally safe and high quality school, and at the same time take a month off every summer on nice quiet rental beach front property (not some hyper crowded vegas style resort bullshit, we're talking single family home on a large lot on a barrier island). People just don't seem to understand how little money $150K is relative to what a skilled and competent worker could get out of a remotely comparable sum 50 years ago. OK, you make $150K, can your four or five kids walk down the street to a quite good school? Is it essentially optional whether your wife works or not?
- waterlesscloud 13y ago
  "two $150K incomes supporting a few kids are at best "comfortable" by the standards of our grandparents" No. This is a gross exaggeration and extremely out of touch with economic reality.

jonrimmer 13y ago

Why do you think all these silicon valley CEOs are throwing their weight behind schemes to get kids and adults learning how to code? It isn't because they really believe there's some social or personal value in being able to program, it's because they want to flood the job market with developers and so crash wages. What's sad is that many programmers are actually buying it, and volunteering their time to help support and evangelize these schemes.

jkrems 13y ago
CEOs who think just throwing more developers at a problem will solve it are what natural selection is for.
- aviraldg 13y ago
  More developers might not solve a problem faster, but they will drive down wages (even for skilled developers)
  - ranci 13y ago
    There is a lot of crying and worrying about wages on here right now. If you are from CS or SE, you don't have the right to cry about a saturated job market driving down your wages. They are plenty high. If you want people with real problems, look at the graphic design industry. $10/hr can get you your pick of the litter among several applicants who have over 20 years experience in one of the biggest cities in the United States. Then imagine what it must be like for recent college graduates in the field.
    - collyw 13y ago
      Wages are plenty high in the States, or places like London. The rest of us are not on anything special.
meddlepal 13y ago
You speak the truth but I don't know how to prevent what is going on. I've also come to the conclusion most developers are too shortsighted to see their own career demise in 20 years.

enewc 13y ago

First of all your, viewpoint is restricted to EE/CS. Any of the other pure sciences: biology, chemistry, physics, etc. do not enjoy the same luxuries. Another important distinction to make is that there are almost no science (i.e. research) jobs any more. Most technology jobs are just run of the mill programming, not actually investing in research.

unknownian 13y ago
And yet everyone wants to equate the two. Personally I don't even think webdev should count as STEM at all.

firstOrder 13y ago

You said you went to a top-tier college. Most of them charge over $40k a year. So that $150k pays for less than your tuition costs. You are worth $150k a year (which means your boss is making $160k, $165k etc. off of you, they hire you to be profitable). So your four years of study were in a sense $600k down the drain in that. So it will be at least five years before you start to break even. Minus the housing and living costs over that five years. You spent over $150k and four years ($600k) worth of your time training for this job. Also remember the market is hot. In 2000/2001 air went out of the bubble. Also in 2008/2009. Right now is the peak of a go-go time like 1998/1999 was. It is not the norm.