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Tech industry's persistent claim of worker shortage may be phony

131 points by veryluckyxyz 11y ago

gregrata 11y ago
... "may be phony" Oh LOL, isn't this well known? Are people really just now figuring out NOW that this is, and always has been, about lowering expenses for these big companies? I mean, they aren't really even trying to hide this! "our immigration system has failed to keep pace." The nation's outdated limits and "convoluted green-card process," she said, had left firms like hers "hampered in hiring the talent that they need."" ... "Only a few weeks after her June 2 talk, the San Diego company announced that it would cut its workforce, of whom two-thirds are engineers, by 15%, or nearly 5,000 people"
timbuckley 11y ago
> What Tornquist didn't mention was that Qualcomm may then have had more engineers than it needed: Only a few weeks after her June 2 talk, the San Diego company announced that it would cut its workforce, of whom two-thirds are engineers, by 15%, or nearly 5,000 people. How do we know that 15% isn't mostly coming out of the non-engineering 33%? And they may well still be hiring engineers massively.
ZoeZoeBee 11y ago
The very real issue is the use of H1-B visas to drive down the cost of labor across the board. Its not a coincidence that real wages in the US have declined since 1970 while the percentage of population immigrants represent have tripled from 4.7 to over 14%
- allworknoplay 11y ago
  You're using a real wages figure for the entire workforce, not engineers. Engineering salaries are extremely healthy, while the real minimum wage has also fallen. Unless you have data on inflation adjusted engineering wages, this is a totally misleading/inaccurate argument.
  - ZoeZoeBee 11y ago
    Not at all, as the entire work force has felt the effect of immigrants tripling as a percentage of the population, so to will Engineers with the increase of immigrants via H1-B visas
    - allworknoplay 11y ago
      Did you read/understand my comment? I didn't say you're abjectly wrong, I just asked for actual data about engineering wages. We know average real wages have slipped, but we also know the real minimum wage has fallen a lot, and also that our GINI coefficient is up. In the absence of better data, the logical supposition here is that real incomes amongst lower-income employees have fallen more than amongst higher income employees. Again: Unless you have data on inflation adjusted engineering wages, this is a totally misleading/inaccurate argument.
gkoberger 11y ago
So, I can't speak specifically to Qualcomm's case, however there's a weird paradox in Silicon Valley. There's both an excess of jobs and excess of employees. This is probably true in every industry (every Starbucks is hiring, yet everyone complains how hard it is to find a job), but it's especially true in tech. The problem is there's a shortage in qualified candidates. Salaries have gotten so high that even the most mediocre developers are demanding six figures. There's been a huge inflation of salaries in tech, and a decrease in craftsmanship and quality. So, companies are getting less done for more money. It's a gold rush, and we're getting to the point where "3 months experience [1]" is the norm. I've been trying to hire. I'm not worried about high salaries for someone good. However my inbox is full of people who know half a language and want a starting salary of $130k. That's crazy. [1] http://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/29/technology/code-academy-as-career-game-changer.html?smid=tw-nytimes http://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/29/technology/code-academy-as...
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  - hoodoof 11y ago
    "it's suppose to be a bonanza for everyone involved"...... errrr why?
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  - jsprogrammer 11y ago
    How can the owners get good ROI if much of the return is spent on salaries/benefits/bonuses?
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  - ChuckMcM 11y ago
    Not exactly. The complaint was people who want big money and don't create a lot of value. The ones who want $130K and you ask them why page loading is so slow and they tell you its because the bubble sort they run on every update takes forever. They create negative value.
fivedogit 11y ago
All arguments aside, there's one fundamental way to answer whether companies' talent shortage complaints are "phony" or not: pay. If there really were a shortage, pay would be rising dramatically. Average engineers would make 200k, 300k... Just like doctors do. But it isn't happening. These BigCos just want more supply so they can pay even less than they do now. Plain and simple. Edit: Doctors and lawyers make so much because of artificial governors on the supply. They're not absurdly more talented or educated than other people (e.g. engineers), there are simply fewer of them. In the case of doctors, med school is the limiting factor. The time and $ investment is nuts. For lawyers, it's the Bar exam. When there are too many lawyers, the Bar association makes the test harder. When there aren't enough, they make it easier. This makes me want a standardized programming test so a) talent level could be gagued more accurately than a cursory glance at someone's github account and b) the supply of engineers would be choked off.
- pbh101 11y ago
  Pay in the field has indeed risen dramatically in the last decade. Maybe not uniformly or to the level we would like (or in a way we think will last, such as being accompanied by increases in status in contrast to doctors, to expand on your example), but it has notably risen.
  - _delirium 11y ago
    A pay-trend graph for some of these "established" companies, like Qualcomm, Texas Instruments, Seagate, IBM, Dell, HP, etc. would be interesting. My guess is pay has indeed been rising, but not as rapidly as the Silicon Valley boom would suggest. Unfortunately I don't think there is a good public data set.
- tdicola 11y ago
  Companies have been looking for other ways to keep wages from growing, see for example the poaching lawsuit Apple, Google, etc. lost: http://www.nbcnews.com/business/business-news/apple-google-intel-adobe-reach-new-deal-employee-poaching-suit-n287241 http://www.nbcnews.com/business/business-news/apple-google-i...
- 11y ago
nichochar 11y ago
Wow... as a VISA immigrant, who had a VERY hard time getting through the visa process, this kind of silly american opinion is quite irritating. When a company lays off 20,000 people, those are _not_ the same people as the ones coming in on visas. They are probably very low skill engineers. The people coming in on visa's (have you met any?) are usually way more skilled than their american counterparts. America is _winning_ by exercising this brain drain. >These are designed to serve high-skilled immigrants but often >enable the importing of Indian and Chinese guest workers to >replace an older, more experienced, but more expensive >domestic workforce Come on. Really? All the young indian and chinese talent I meet is way above average.
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- Joky 11y ago
  You seem to over-generalize your own experience here, did you miss the Disney story? You may also find comment like this one useful: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9370415 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9370415
- learc83 11y ago
  >this kind of silly american opinion is quite irritating. I'm not sure accusing the other side of holding silly opinions is the best way to start a debate >The people coming in on visa's (have you met any?) are usually way more skilled than their american counterparts. This may be your experience, but it hasn't been mine. Sure the ones working at Google are exceptional, but in my experience, companies outside of the top tier are using H-1Bs to recruit indentured servants who are tied to the company under penalty of deportation. >Come on. Really? All the young indian and chinese talent I meet is way above average. There are plenty of other anecdotes to refute this. I've worked with (and went to school with) many very talented and exceptional young indian and chinese programmers, but they weren't above average as a category.
- tsotha 11y ago
  >Come on. Really? All the young indian and chinese talent I meet is way above average. Not in my experience. Most of them are chair warmers. There are certainly exceptions, but "way above average" is far from the rule.
droopyEyelids 11y ago
Until the law is passed that releases all restrictions on visa-workers and simply grants them citizenship or an extremely permissive stay-while-looking-for-a-job situation, increasing the h1-b quota is simply a means to create a reduced-rights cheaper workforce. It really fills me with disgust to see influential people present this issue as a skills shortage, while hiring workers at reduced wages and burdening them with the threat of deportation.
- crdoconnor 11y ago
  That's the reason behind this too: http://www.forbes.com/sites/tomiogeron/2013/02/26/bill-gates-celebrities-support-education-for-computer-programming/ http://www.forbes.com/sites/tomiogeron/2013/02/26/bill-gates... Jack Dorsey, Bill Gates, Drew Houston, Tony Hsieh and Gabe Newell and Mark Zuckerberg aren't throwing their name and money at learn to code charities out of the goodness of their heart. They're very directly trying to lower the primary cost that their investments face - wages.
  - chetanahuja 11y ago
    "throwing money at learn to code charities out of the goodness of their heart. They're very directly trying to lower the primary cost that their investments face" Wow that's a unique level of cynicism even for this generally cynical forum. I'm speechless. So you see all these efforts to raise interest in computer science in younger generation of Americans and all you can think of is how all these new, enthusiastic programmers are going to compete with you?
    - rewqfdsa 11y ago
      Well, they are, aren't they? Cynicism isn't somehow automatically wrong.
      - chetanahuja 11y ago
        Well it's not "wrong" in the sense of being factually incorrect but wrong in the sense of being just pathetic for a professional to be thinking such thoughts. Honestly, if you see a younger generation of students taking interest in your field, and instead of encouraging and teaching them, all you see is a threat to your livelihood... well... the profession will probably benefit if you found yourself something else, less competitive, to do.
asuffield 11y ago
This article makes the persistent assumption that any graduate is the same as any other engineer. Having worked for a whole bunch of companies over the past few years, one thing is a constant in the tech industry: there is a limitless supply of candidates for any given job, all of which are bad. It is a huge, challenging problem to find the small number of people you want to hire. I'm not sold that "10x developers" really exist, but I know that "0x developers" are plentiful: these candidates aren't just a "poor fit", they are entirely unable to do the job they're applying for. I've seen far too many graduates who are entirely unable to solve the most basic screening questions, and just don't seem able to write code. In a similar vein, it is entirely reasonable for a company to be simultaneously cutting jobs and hiring, if they are cutting persistent underperformers and trying to hire more promising replacements. (Some legal fiction is necessary to do this in the current regulatory environment)
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  - umanwizard 11y ago
    Downvoted this for being snotty and egotistical. Regardless of whether it's true, it's annoying.
    - angersock 11y ago
      It's the truth, and it didn't strike me as particularly egotistical. If you're having trouble hiring, maybe you need to wise up to the idea that some of these "snotty and egotistical" developers are worth every penny.
- jedmeyers 11y ago
  If only those bad developers were "0x developers", it would have been the problem of spending money on their salaries. In reality there are many "-10x developers" which may increase the costs for maintaining the software, or cause a lot of performance problems with the results of their work.
- 11y ago
SomeCallMeTim 11y ago
This is a difficult problem to discuss, in large part because not all developers are created equal. There is a reasonable supply of entry-level and low-skill developers. I refer to them as commodity developers: Developers who have a very basic skill set, who can do only a few specific things, none of them with extreme skill, but some of them reasonably competently. They typically do web front-end work, but sometimes work in Java on server back-ends. Typical pay ranges from $80-$120k, the same as it has been for 10 years or more. There also is a shortage of high-skill developers. Compensation north of $250k-$500k is becoming standard in some areas for such developers. [1] That pretty much could only happen if there were a shortage, since real wages have remained flat in general since the mid 1970's. [2] The problem is when companies ask for more H-1B employees, citing the fact that they can't hire developers for their highest skill positions (or claiming that they can't hire mid-skill developers at "market rates", because even the mid-skill tier is asking for more money now), but then import commodity developers. By importing such workers, it unfairly keeps those developers' wages down by creating an artificial surplus of employees at that level. The idea of an H-1B worker is that they are not supposed to be paid less than the "prevailing standard" for a worker of equivalent skill in the local market [3]. But if by hiring H-1B workers you're holding down the "prevailing standard" in pay, that hardly seems like companies are following the spirit, or even the letter, of the law. [1] My own compensation was in that range when I took a job working from remote full time, and I know several other developers at top companies whose compensation is well within that range. [2] http://www.thestreet.com/story/11480568/1/us-standard-of-living-has-fallen-more-than-50-opinion.html http://www.thestreet.com/story/11480568/1/us-standard-of-liv... and many other such charts and reports. [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H-1B_visa#Employer_attestations https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H-1B_visa#Employer_attestation...
- ForHackernews 11y ago
  > Compensation north of $250k-$500k is becoming standard in some areas for such developers. Do you have any more data on this? What skills in which areas are routinely worth north of $250k?
  - rewqfdsa 11y ago
Apreche 11y ago
Another factor is that even though there may be plenty of graduates with STEM degrees, they may not have the exact skills a company wants. Just about every job posting is looking for someone with very specific knowledge of languages, frameworks, tools, platforms. etc. How many people with a CS degree already know the technologies that your company is using? By expanding the employee search to the entire world, companies are more able to find someone who has the specific skills they need. Yes, they are very likely trying to hire H1-B to pay less salary. But they are also hiring H1-B to save money by not having to pay for training. Even companies that work with very obscure proprietary technologies that almost nobody knows seem to insist on hiring people who have experience with that technology rather than hiring an otherwise skilled candidate and letting them learn on the job.
shahryc 11y ago
I think the idea that “Tech industry's persistent claim of worker shortage may be phony” seriously misses the point. First, since it usually takes a considerable amount of time to specialize in high skill labor markets (ex. Doctor, lawyer, engineer, etc.) ---- there is a gap in the signal (present vs. future). So, today there may not be enough workers that are familiar with designing chips for wearables (subset of hardware engineers). Then, because of limited supply --- prices go up. Other people see this, and are incentivized to train for the role (takes time, investment, etc.). Then, what usually down the road that causes such layoffs --- the industry changes and there’s more labor in that market because of the previous signal. This gap in the signal is a basic feature of such makrets, which makes the tech industry’s claim of worker shortage more likely true than not.
dkarapetyan 11y ago
First, I don't know how this even started. Why did tech companies all of a sudden decide there was a shortage of knowledgeable and competent workers? I'm asking because throughout my career as a programmer I've worked with people from all sorts of backgrounds that have not had a traditional CS degree. They have come from fields like math, IT, physics, mechanical engineering, etc. Engineering disciplines but not really computer science. The kind of work I've seen all those people do has also varied from things like control software for fields of heliostats to frameworks for server orchestrations to search and data mining. So how is it that I've managed to work with so many competent engineers and yet these giant corporations can't figure out how to hire semi-competent engineers to do some of the drudge work that I'm sure they need done? Maybe the problem is not with the workforce and the availability of knowledgeable and competent workers? Maybe the problem is their shitty hiring practices?
- Gibbon1 11y ago
  The tech industry's managers have been whining about this at least since I entered the workforce in the early 80's. I tend to think it's because the rise of the MBA and the consequent unwillingness to invest in people. MBA's want to hire engineers like they buy office furniture. And then manage them like a group of accounts payable clerks. Doesn't work. Then add in the managements favorite predilection 'downsizing for success' In order to boost profits over the next couple of quarters, can a a few well oiled engineering teams. Then wonder why you don't good house engineering resources for the next big thing. Frankly what they want, it's not possible.
rewqfdsa 11y ago
I've always viewed these persistent and ridiculous claims of a tech-industry worker shortage through a lens of class. To a Harvard MBA, that we programmers earn six figures is prima facie evidence of a worker shortage, since there's no way that ugly nerds should be earning that kind of money for typing into a computer. Programmers are workers, so investors and management should be able to siphon off their productive value the same way they siphon off the productive value of other works. That they can't right now is an aberration, a disease to be cured with massive immigration. That we're not doctors or lawyers and make decent money is something that simply does not compute for these types.
- 1971genocide 11y ago
  When I was in college, I was doing engineering. Many of my friends got bored and wanted to go MBAs. I almost went that path until I started programming. Ever since then I went from a commodified drone to feeling like a kid. It felt like escaping the capitalist matrix. I almost was seen upon as a hippie. I told my dad that "I have no interest in pursing an MBA, I just want to spend me time in a cave with a terminal and a few books" He was almost shocked by it. I notice it all over in society these days. If you read about how tuition fees are rising and students are in debt, people make insane arguments like "well on average a person earns X more over their lifetime by having a degree" I never noticed how ridiculous these arguments were. I have been reading a lot on economics lately and karl marx predicted this outcome. We have in many ways reached the end of capitalism, before capitalism as a system breaks apart. We are trying hard to commodify labour - but the great paradox is if you commodify labour then the free market stops existing ! I can go on and on, but yes - we need to get rid of capitalism and this free market darwinist bullshit and return to a more social and morally right form to organize society.
  - Asbostos 11y ago
    Can you explain more how the free market stops existing if you commodify labour? I don't understand that.
    - 1971genocide 11y ago
currentoor 11y ago
There is a major flaw in this article. Software developers are not cogs. Just because someone has an engineering degree does not make them just as good as any other developer. Being able to write great software usually comes from passion and practice, not a piece of paper that says "Computer Science BS". Some of the best developers I know didn't even get an engineering degree. Is there a shortage of people with pieces of paper? Maybe not. Is there a shortage of people that love writing software enough to spend most nights and weekends doing it? Yes. This is based on my experience interviewing candidates for two small tech companies.
- codeonfire 11y ago
  >Some of the best developers I know didn't even get an engineering degree. How do you know this is just not confirmation bias on your part. You like to think that degree-less people are somehow vaguely 'better.' You know some developers that don't have a degree. Consequently they must be the best developers you know. I think most would agree that you would need actual double blind research including some way to order developers by ability that made sense. You would also have to have a sufficiently large sample size randomly chosen instead of your biased sample of a few people you know. It stands to reason, though, with no research done that you are just more likely to know more developers without degrees since only 18% of the population have a Bachelors and 7% have a masters.
  - clessg 11y ago
    > You like to think that degree-less people are somehow vaguely 'better.' I don't think that he or she said that.
  - currentoor 11y ago
    I think you misinterpreted what I said. All I said was, a degree is not a necessary or sufficient condition for being a great developer. Evidenced by the fact that there exist great developers without degrees. I'm not drawing any whacky conclusions about one group being "better" than another. Also, for what it's worth I graduated with two technical degrees from descent university. Most of the developers I know have engineering degrees.
supercanuck 11y ago
This H1-B problem is not a "silicon valley" problem. Those companies are unfortunately the companies that are probably doing H1-B the way it was designed. The real issue is the tech industry outside of Silicon Valley providing services to everyday companies. That is truly where the injustice is and where the meat of this article is pointing at.
DGAP 11y ago
In this thread there's a lot of complaining about mediocre developers. I'm still finishing my undergrad, and looking to go the PM route, but how do I avoid being the type of developer complained about here?
- angersock 11y ago
  You shouldn't go trying to be a PM, because you've got neither the experience nor the respect to get there. Sorry to be blunt, but this'll save some time. Instead, focus on being the best engineer you can be, on building and crafting software as well as you can. That will earn you the respect of the people whose respect is worth something, and will give you the insights needed for leading a team properly.
  - DGAP 11y ago
    >You shouldn't go trying to be a PM, because you've got neither the experience nor the respect to get there. Sorry to be blunt, but this'll save some time. I get that, the only reason I have my sights set on it is that I'm already working as one for a company. :) I think that I'll best be able to leverage my experience and skills in some sort of technical product or program manager role, but I wanted to be sure I can pass a big 4 technical interview ect in addition to my pm/ business skills.
    - bbcbasic 11y ago
      > I'm already working as one for a company. :) Wow THAT is a touche!
      - angersock 11y ago
        Depends on the company. :) Either way, the desire to hone the technical skills is in the right place.
- jschwartzi 11y ago
  Just act like you give a crap about the future of what you're building more so than meeting deadlines and other engineers will enjoy working with you. People have different ways of measuring this, so watch other team members to see what they value in code, and try to make sure you include those features. You don't have to put out clever or insightful code, only code that is succinct and readable and can be maintained by the existing team.
morgante 11y ago
This article makes the perennial mistake of assuming all "STEM graduates" are equal. This is flawed in three main ways: 1. STEM graduates includes many fields where there genuinely is a huge surplus of labor (we don't really need more physicists). 2. Talent is critical and sadly a large number of CS graduates do not have the talent to be good developers. Many fresh graduates just don't have the skills to cut it as a high-quality professional developer, yet the best ones have six-way auctions going. Companies are absolutely desperate for good developers, with the operative word being good. (Don't even get me started on bootcamp graduates.) 3. The shortage of developers is most acute for senior developers. It takes about 10 years to become a truly senior developer and 10-15 years ago not many people were interested in starting a career in CS (the dot-com bust was still raw). This shortage can only be solved with time or immigration and until then senior developers can command considerable salaries ($250k+ all in).
- superuser2 11y ago
  The market doesn't "need" any physicists. Hiring in sciences basically scales with available federal grants for research, which basically scales with the success of liberal politics.
curiousjorge 11y ago
"we looked everywhere for someone who'd be willing to work 7 days a week with no overtime at an annual salary that does not keep up with region's cost of living, we really tried, so it must be that there are no workers available."
amsheehan 11y ago
It is also true that computer science curriculum doesn't really cover anything but a specific subset of the software development jobs out there. The same may not apply to other STEM fields, but it is certainly true for software.
1971genocide 11y ago
The more I read articles like this the more I hate america. america wants to be global hegemonic power without paying the price for it. america only has 5% of the world's population and deserves only 5% of the world's GDP, and should limit itself to absorbing only 5% of world's resource. American multinationals who also control america's govt want to absorb the best of the world's labour and force wage suppression on its own people. Guess what - its working so well that they can even ignore to invest in their OWN infrastructure, education and people.
- sliverstorm 11y ago
  I'm not clear how a country can deserve a fixed portion of global GDP, no more, no less. It's not a zero-sum game, and how exactly do you apportion productivity? And FWIW, in GDP per capita, the US is only #10.
  - 1971genocide 11y ago
    5% +- 1% I am a strong believer that all people have equal ability, and if all countries were on a equal footing then their GDP size would be more of less reflective of their labour force. Ofcourse it gets complicated if countries have resources only to their geography. GDP per capita is a weak measure since america has high inequality, some people in america are as poor and hungry as the worst conditions in africa. America was built mostly out stealing labour from the rest of the world in a selective way, without taking full advantage of your own labour force. The unfairness comes when we talk about investment. A lot of counties like India invested heavily on education. What happened to the talent produced by that investment ? They all ran away to US. Its okay if a small number of people do it, but when a huge portion of the population does it then its not fair to the country involved. It also allows america to get away with it by not investing in their own education or labour force. Some countries figured out this game - south korea, china. who force their labour to pay back the investment - is it wrong ? yes. But given america's hypocrisy they had no other option. Right now america is loosing its ability to attract talent, since the global financial meltdown in 2008. It used to be a blackhole to world labour and investment (using wallstreet). But as countries develop american multinationals and the american govt will need to downsize and they are not happy to do it, since it means downsizing its global bullying power. ----------------------------------- If you want to learn more about how america has screwed over humanity. 1) http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Global-Minotaur-Economic-Controversies/dp/1780324502 http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Global-Minotaur-Economic-Controv... 2) http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Oil-Kings-Changed-Balance/dp/1439155186 http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Oil-Kings-Changed-Balance/dp/143... 3)https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confessions_of_an_Economic_Hit_Man https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confessions_of_an_Economic_Hit... ------------------------------------ I have been reading about it and making sure things are historically accurate, not only am I becoming more economically literal - I am also enraged about how horrible america has being, I used to celebrate american culture and now really feel bitter. I have been reading them only for the past 20 days or so, so my initial phase of angry is still not complete.
nevdka 11y ago
Not all tech companies are the same. Google needs engineers with skills that most tech workers don't have. You might have a CS degree from a great school and 15 years experience with J2EE, but you're not experienced with say... reactJS. If Google (or Facebook, or startup that just raised $25M) is looking to hire a team of reactJS devs, then they can very quickly exhaust the supply of locals who have used it. From Google's perspective, there is a shortage. But some other companies, usually 'IT' more than 'Tech' from my experience... yeah... they can get a bit squirrely. When a company gets newly 'redundant' workers to train the new migrants, they can't really claim that there are no suitable qualified locals.
- codeonfire 11y ago
  Hiring for specific skills in my mind is the mark of a inexperienced company, manager, or department. Usually people think their choice in technology is prescient and amazing. Anyone that doesn't know that specific technology must be a dullard who will never be able to 'get it.' Right now huge numbers of new people are flooding the industry and their stature as managers or "seniors" in the company after one or two years is far above their experience level. More seasoned managers know not to hire for specific skills like "reactJS" as usually those magic technologies turn out to actually be very basic.
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- michaelchisari 11y ago
  If you want the absolute best for the job, in a very specific skill-set that has only existed for two years, then you'd best be willing to pay considerably, or you're going to have to be willing to train people with the proper fundamental skills in that specific toolset. A lot of companies are unwilling to do either of those. Offering $110k for a ReactJS developer? Better be willing to hire someone with a good understanding of software development patterns and a solid history of shipping code with the understanding that some on-the-job training will be required. Won't settle for anything but the best? Then set the salary to somewhere it would pull the level of talent you need. And if you're not willing to do that, then consider how you can get by with the first candidate.
Animats 11y ago
The IEEE points out regularly that there's no shortage of engineers. Otherwise, salaries would be going up across the board. Whenever some employer complains they can't find engineers, ask how many people they have in off-site training right now. Companies need to be paying for training that's just conversion from one skill set to whatever skill set the company needs right now. Most programmers who are competent in at least two languages can easily learn a third. A combination of explicit training and someone to answer hard questions is usually sufficient. (There's startup potential there - offer conversion training courses, where people who already know A are taught B. A "hard question" answering service, sort of like StackOverflow but paid, with a service level agreement, and without the clueless closing of questions, could work as a business.) This industry has forgotten what management is for. Part of the job of management is to organize the division of labor. Not everyone can do everything. It's the job of management to divide up the job so that no one part is too hard. Instead, we see a demand for "full stack developers". That's a confession of incompetent management.
abritinthebay 11y ago
My company has been trying to hire good Ruby and Frontend developers for... well.. a while. There's no shortage of applicants but the quality...? Eh. Finding even a Junior level engineer that knows more than "I can use these libraries" rather than "I know the language" is hard in both (but especially in JS). There's a big pool... but sadly most of it is shallow.
rmason 11y ago
Shortage may be phony? Ask all the unemployed engineers over fifty if it's phony. Ask all the women leaving the field after less than five years if it's phony. Ask developers who want to work remotely if it's phony. If you don't see companies making simple, easy changes then you can be pretty assure the shortage is phony.
karmapolice 11y ago
Yes, this is a constant thing in Spain too. Tech companies whining about worker shortage hit the news several times every year, yet working conditions and salaries never get better.
mlamat 11y ago
One word: training
hysan 11y ago
From the frequent articles I see on HN and the subsequent reactions, would it be fair to say that this is the situation? There is no shortage of programmers. However, there is a shortage of programmers (of X skill level) willing to work at the salary that a company desires. And that is where outsourcing and H1B comes in. Having a larger pool of candidates (at X skill level) will force the local candidate pool to lower their asking salary. In turn, this will allow companies to keep salaries deflated and profits up.
ceoj 11y ago
There is power law distribution of programming skills as in every other field. I am a web developer, I have worked with both established companies and startups from every continent in the world. I was hired recently by a client from USA, whose previous programmer created mess of code base, they were about to go out of business, had they not hired me to fix that up. I was able to fix all critical issues within a week, and was able to start developing new features withing two weeks. Were they not hired me from outside of their geographic area, they would not have survived today. So, what should you do to be able to hire good developers- 1. Broaden your horizons, don't limit yourself to a geographic area. World is not limited to Silicon Valley. 2. Be willing to hire remotely. I myself working remotely from start of my carrier, it is really exciting. 3. Give freedom to developers, let them think out of the box. 4. Before hiring developers full time, give them some real work(may be a small contract), this is better than asking them to solve puzzles :) Feel free to ping me if you have any questions, sfix [at] outlook.com
curiousnoob123 11y ago
The idea here seems to be that there are vacancies for people that are good at the craft, care about it and are generally skilled. And that a lot of visas today are being taken up by inexpensive foreign labor that may not be accurately described as highly skilled. So, HN, what if the government raised the cap for US educated international students? The average quality of STEM education and the average skill is certianly higher in the US. The issue is that the international students that go through US education have to compete with other foreign workers and often don't end up getting visas even though they are able to fill those skilled position vacancies. Curious to know the pros of cons of such an approach.

131 points by veryluckyxyz 11y ago

... "may be phony" Oh LOL, isn't this well known? Are people really just now figuring out NOW that this is, and always has been, about lowering expenses for these big companies? I mean, they aren't really even trying to hide this! "our immigration system has failed to keep pace." The nation's outdated limits and "convoluted green-card process," she said, had left firms like hers "hampered in hiring the talent that they need."" ... "Only a few weeks after her June 2 talk, the San Diego company announced that it would cut its workforce, of whom two-thirds are engineers, by 15%, or nearly 5,000 people"

timbuckley 11y ago

> What Tornquist didn't mention was that Qualcomm may then have had more engineers than it needed: Only a few weeks after her June 2 talk, the San Diego company announced that it would cut its workforce, of whom two-thirds are engineers, by 15%, or nearly 5,000 people. How do we know that 15% isn't mostly coming out of the non-engineering 33%? And they may well still be hiring engineers massively.

ZoeZoeBee 11y ago

The very real issue is the use of H1-B visas to drive down the cost of labor across the board. Its not a coincidence that real wages in the US have declined since 1970 while the percentage of population immigrants represent have tripled from 4.7 to over 14%

allworknoplay 11y ago
You're using a real wages figure for the entire workforce, not engineers. Engineering salaries are extremely healthy, while the real minimum wage has also fallen. Unless you have data on inflation adjusted engineering wages, this is a totally misleading/inaccurate argument.
- ZoeZoeBee 11y ago
  Not at all, as the entire work force has felt the effect of immigrants tripling as a percentage of the population, so to will Engineers with the increase of immigrants via H1-B visas
  - allworknoplay 11y ago
    Did you read/understand my comment? I didn't say you're abjectly wrong, I just asked for actual data about engineering wages. We know average real wages have slipped, but we also know the real minimum wage has fallen a lot, and also that our GINI coefficient is up. In the absence of better data, the logical supposition here is that real incomes amongst lower-income employees have fallen more than amongst higher income employees. Again: Unless you have data on inflation adjusted engineering wages, this is a totally misleading/inaccurate argument.

gkoberger 11y ago

So, I can't speak specifically to Qualcomm's case, however there's a weird paradox in Silicon Valley. There's both an excess of jobs and excess of employees. This is probably true in every industry (every Starbucks is hiring, yet everyone complains how hard it is to find a job), but it's especially true in tech. The problem is there's a shortage in qualified candidates. Salaries have gotten so high that even the most mediocre developers are demanding six figures. There's been a huge inflation of salaries in tech, and a decrease in craftsmanship and quality. So, companies are getting less done for more money. It's a gold rush, and we're getting to the point where "3 months experience [1]" is the norm. I've been trying to hire. I'm not worried about high salaries for someone good. However my inbox is full of people who know half a language and want a starting salary of $130k. That's crazy. [1] http://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/29/technology/code-academy-as-career-game-changer.html?smid=tw-nytimes http://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/29/technology/code-academy-as...

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- hoodoof 11y ago
  "it's suppose to be a bonanza for everyone involved"...... errrr why?
  - deleted 11y ago
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- jsprogrammer 11y ago
  How can the owners get good ROI if much of the return is spent on salaries/benefits/bonuses?
  - deleted 11y ago
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- ChuckMcM 11y ago
  Not exactly. The complaint was people who want big money and don't create a lot of value. The ones who want $130K and you ask them why page loading is so slow and they tell you its because the bubble sort they run on every update takes forever. They create negative value.

fivedogit 11y ago

All arguments aside, there's one fundamental way to answer whether companies' talent shortage complaints are "phony" or not: pay. If there really were a shortage, pay would be rising dramatically. Average engineers would make 200k, 300k... Just like doctors do. But it isn't happening. These BigCos just want more supply so they can pay even less than they do now. Plain and simple. Edit: Doctors and lawyers make so much because of artificial governors on the supply. They're not absurdly more talented or educated than other people (e.g. engineers), there are simply fewer of them. In the case of doctors, med school is the limiting factor. The time and $ investment is nuts. For lawyers, it's the Bar exam. When there are too many lawyers, the Bar association makes the test harder. When there aren't enough, they make it easier. This makes me want a standardized programming test so a) talent level could be gagued more accurately than a cursory glance at someone's github account and b) the supply of engineers would be choked off.

pbh101 11y ago
Pay in the field has indeed risen dramatically in the last decade. Maybe not uniformly or to the level we would like (or in a way we think will last, such as being accompanied by increases in status in contrast to doctors, to expand on your example), but it has notably risen.
- _delirium 11y ago
  A pay-trend graph for some of these "established" companies, like Qualcomm, Texas Instruments, Seagate, IBM, Dell, HP, etc. would be interesting. My guess is pay has indeed been rising, but not as rapidly as the Silicon Valley boom would suggest. Unfortunately I don't think there is a good public data set.
tdicola 11y ago
Companies have been looking for other ways to keep wages from growing, see for example the poaching lawsuit Apple, Google, etc. lost: http://www.nbcnews.com/business/business-news/apple-google-intel-adobe-reach-new-deal-employee-poaching-suit-n287241 http://www.nbcnews.com/business/business-news/apple-google-i...
11y ago

nichochar 11y ago

Wow... as a VISA immigrant, who had a VERY hard time getting through the visa process, this kind of silly american opinion is quite irritating. When a company lays off 20,000 people, those are _not_ the same people as the ones coming in on visas. They are probably very low skill engineers. The people coming in on visa's (have you met any?) are usually way more skilled than their american counterparts. America is _winning_ by exercising this brain drain. >These are designed to serve high-skilled immigrants but often >enable the importing of Indian and Chinese guest workers to >replace an older, more experienced, but more expensive >domestic workforce Come on. Really? All the young indian and chinese talent I meet is way above average.

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Joky 11y ago
You seem to over-generalize your own experience here, did you miss the Disney story? You may also find comment like this one useful: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9370415 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9370415
learc83 11y ago
>this kind of silly american opinion is quite irritating. I'm not sure accusing the other side of holding silly opinions is the best way to start a debate >The people coming in on visa's (have you met any?) are usually way more skilled than their american counterparts. This may be your experience, but it hasn't been mine. Sure the ones working at Google are exceptional, but in my experience, companies outside of the top tier are using H-1Bs to recruit indentured servants who are tied to the company under penalty of deportation. >Come on. Really? All the young indian and chinese talent I meet is way above average. There are plenty of other anecdotes to refute this. I've worked with (and went to school with) many very talented and exceptional young indian and chinese programmers, but they weren't above average as a category.
tsotha 11y ago
>Come on. Really? All the young indian and chinese talent I meet is way above average. Not in my experience. Most of them are chair warmers. There are certainly exceptions, but "way above average" is far from the rule.

droopyEyelids 11y ago

Until the law is passed that releases all restrictions on visa-workers and simply grants them citizenship or an extremely permissive stay-while-looking-for-a-job situation, increasing the h1-b quota is simply a means to create a reduced-rights cheaper workforce. It really fills me with disgust to see influential people present this issue as a skills shortage, while hiring workers at reduced wages and burdening them with the threat of deportation.

crdoconnor 11y ago
That's the reason behind this too: http://www.forbes.com/sites/tomiogeron/2013/02/26/bill-gates-celebrities-support-education-for-computer-programming/ http://www.forbes.com/sites/tomiogeron/2013/02/26/bill-gates... Jack Dorsey, Bill Gates, Drew Houston, Tony Hsieh and Gabe Newell and Mark Zuckerberg aren't throwing their name and money at learn to code charities out of the goodness of their heart. They're very directly trying to lower the primary cost that their investments face - wages.
- chetanahuja 11y ago
  "throwing money at learn to code charities out of the goodness of their heart. They're very directly trying to lower the primary cost that their investments face" Wow that's a unique level of cynicism even for this generally cynical forum. I'm speechless. So you see all these efforts to raise interest in computer science in younger generation of Americans and all you can think of is how all these new, enthusiastic programmers are going to compete with you?
  - rewqfdsa 11y ago
    Well, they are, aren't they? Cynicism isn't somehow automatically wrong.
    - chetanahuja 11y ago
      Well it's not "wrong" in the sense of being factually incorrect but wrong in the sense of being just pathetic for a professional to be thinking such thoughts. Honestly, if you see a younger generation of students taking interest in your field, and instead of encouraging and teaching them, all you see is a threat to your livelihood... well... the profession will probably benefit if you found yourself something else, less competitive, to do.

asuffield 11y ago

This article makes the persistent assumption that any graduate is the same as any other engineer. Having worked for a whole bunch of companies over the past few years, one thing is a constant in the tech industry: there is a limitless supply of candidates for any given job, all of which are bad. It is a huge, challenging problem to find the small number of people you want to hire. I'm not sold that "10x developers" really exist, but I know that "0x developers" are plentiful: these candidates aren't just a "poor fit", they are entirely unable to do the job they're applying for. I've seen far too many graduates who are entirely unable to solve the most basic screening questions, and just don't seem able to write code. In a similar vein, it is entirely reasonable for a company to be simultaneously cutting jobs and hiring, if they are cutting persistent underperformers and trying to hire more promising replacements. (Some legal fiction is necessary to do this in the current regulatory environment)

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- umanwizard 11y ago
  Downvoted this for being snotty and egotistical. Regardless of whether it's true, it's annoying.
  - angersock 11y ago
    It's the truth, and it didn't strike me as particularly egotistical. If you're having trouble hiring, maybe you need to wise up to the idea that some of these "snotty and egotistical" developers are worth every penny.
jedmeyers 11y ago
If only those bad developers were "0x developers", it would have been the problem of spending money on their salaries. In reality there are many "-10x developers" which may increase the costs for maintaining the software, or cause a lot of performance problems with the results of their work.
11y ago

SomeCallMeTim 11y ago

This is a difficult problem to discuss, in large part because not all developers are created equal. There is a reasonable supply of entry-level and low-skill developers. I refer to them as commodity developers: Developers who have a very basic skill set, who can do only a few specific things, none of them with extreme skill, but some of them reasonably competently. They typically do web front-end work, but sometimes work in Java on server back-ends. Typical pay ranges from $80-$120k, the same as it has been for 10 years or more. There also is a shortage of high-skill developers. Compensation north of $250k-$500k is becoming standard in some areas for such developers. [1] That pretty much could only happen if there were a shortage, since real wages have remained flat in general since the mid 1970's. [2] The problem is when companies ask for more H-1B employees, citing the fact that they can't hire developers for their highest skill positions (or claiming that they can't hire mid-skill developers at "market rates", because even the mid-skill tier is asking for more money now), but then import commodity developers. By importing such workers, it unfairly keeps those developers' wages down by creating an artificial surplus of employees at that level. The idea of an H-1B worker is that they are not supposed to be paid less than the "prevailing standard" for a worker of equivalent skill in the local market [3]. But if by hiring H-1B workers you're holding down the "prevailing standard" in pay, that hardly seems like companies are following the spirit, or even the letter, of the law. [1] My own compensation was in that range when I took a job working from remote full time, and I know several other developers at top companies whose compensation is well within that range. [2] http://www.thestreet.com/story/11480568/1/us-standard-of-living-has-fallen-more-than-50-opinion.html http://www.thestreet.com/story/11480568/1/us-standard-of-liv... and many other such charts and reports. [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H-1B_visa#Employer_attestations https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H-1B_visa#Employer_attestation...

ForHackernews 11y ago
> Compensation north of $250k-$500k is becoming standard in some areas for such developers. Do you have any more data on this? What skills in which areas are routinely worth north of $250k?
- rewqfdsa 11y ago

Apreche 11y ago

Another factor is that even though there may be plenty of graduates with STEM degrees, they may not have the exact skills a company wants. Just about every job posting is looking for someone with very specific knowledge of languages, frameworks, tools, platforms. etc. How many people with a CS degree already know the technologies that your company is using? By expanding the employee search to the entire world, companies are more able to find someone who has the specific skills they need. Yes, they are very likely trying to hire H1-B to pay less salary. But they are also hiring H1-B to save money by not having to pay for training. Even companies that work with very obscure proprietary technologies that almost nobody knows seem to insist on hiring people who have experience with that technology rather than hiring an otherwise skilled candidate and letting them learn on the job.

shahryc 11y ago

I think the idea that “Tech industry's persistent claim of worker shortage may be phony” seriously misses the point. First, since it usually takes a considerable amount of time to specialize in high skill labor markets (ex. Doctor, lawyer, engineer, etc.) ---- there is a gap in the signal (present vs. future). So, today there may not be enough workers that are familiar with designing chips for wearables (subset of hardware engineers). Then, because of limited supply --- prices go up. Other people see this, and are incentivized to train for the role (takes time, investment, etc.). Then, what usually down the road that causes such layoffs --- the industry changes and there’s more labor in that market because of the previous signal. This gap in the signal is a basic feature of such makrets, which makes the tech industry’s claim of worker shortage more likely true than not.

dkarapetyan 11y ago

First, I don't know how this even started. Why did tech companies all of a sudden decide there was a shortage of knowledgeable and competent workers? I'm asking because throughout my career as a programmer I've worked with people from all sorts of backgrounds that have not had a traditional CS degree. They have come from fields like math, IT, physics, mechanical engineering, etc. Engineering disciplines but not really computer science. The kind of work I've seen all those people do has also varied from things like control software for fields of heliostats to frameworks for server orchestrations to search and data mining. So how is it that I've managed to work with so many competent engineers and yet these giant corporations can't figure out how to hire semi-competent engineers to do some of the drudge work that I'm sure they need done? Maybe the problem is not with the workforce and the availability of knowledgeable and competent workers? Maybe the problem is their shitty hiring practices?

Gibbon1 11y ago
The tech industry's managers have been whining about this at least since I entered the workforce in the early 80's. I tend to think it's because the rise of the MBA and the consequent unwillingness to invest in people. MBA's want to hire engineers like they buy office furniture. And then manage them like a group of accounts payable clerks. Doesn't work. Then add in the managements favorite predilection 'downsizing for success' In order to boost profits over the next couple of quarters, can a a few well oiled engineering teams. Then wonder why you don't good house engineering resources for the next big thing. Frankly what they want, it's not possible.

rewqfdsa 11y ago

I've always viewed these persistent and ridiculous claims of a tech-industry worker shortage through a lens of class. To a Harvard MBA, that we programmers earn six figures is prima facie evidence of a worker shortage, since there's no way that ugly nerds should be earning that kind of money for typing into a computer. Programmers are workers, so investors and management should be able to siphon off their productive value the same way they siphon off the productive value of other works. That they can't right now is an aberration, a disease to be cured with massive immigration. That we're not doctors or lawyers and make decent money is something that simply does not compute for these types.

1971genocide 11y ago
When I was in college, I was doing engineering. Many of my friends got bored and wanted to go MBAs. I almost went that path until I started programming. Ever since then I went from a commodified drone to feeling like a kid. It felt like escaping the capitalist matrix. I almost was seen upon as a hippie. I told my dad that "I have no interest in pursing an MBA, I just want to spend me time in a cave with a terminal and a few books" He was almost shocked by it. I notice it all over in society these days. If you read about how tuition fees are rising and students are in debt, people make insane arguments like "well on average a person earns X more over their lifetime by having a degree" I never noticed how ridiculous these arguments were. I have been reading a lot on economics lately and karl marx predicted this outcome. We have in many ways reached the end of capitalism, before capitalism as a system breaks apart. We are trying hard to commodify labour - but the great paradox is if you commodify labour then the free market stops existing ! I can go on and on, but yes - we need to get rid of capitalism and this free market darwinist bullshit and return to a more social and morally right form to organize society.
- Asbostos 11y ago
  Can you explain more how the free market stops existing if you commodify labour? I don't understand that.
  - 1971genocide 11y ago

currentoor 11y ago

There is a major flaw in this article. Software developers are not cogs. Just because someone has an engineering degree does not make them just as good as any other developer. Being able to write great software usually comes from passion and practice, not a piece of paper that says "Computer Science BS". Some of the best developers I know didn't even get an engineering degree. Is there a shortage of people with pieces of paper? Maybe not. Is there a shortage of people that love writing software enough to spend most nights and weekends doing it? Yes. This is based on my experience interviewing candidates for two small tech companies.

codeonfire 11y ago
>Some of the best developers I know didn't even get an engineering degree. How do you know this is just not confirmation bias on your part. You like to think that degree-less people are somehow vaguely 'better.' You know some developers that don't have a degree. Consequently they must be the best developers you know. I think most would agree that you would need actual double blind research including some way to order developers by ability that made sense. You would also have to have a sufficiently large sample size randomly chosen instead of your biased sample of a few people you know. It stands to reason, though, with no research done that you are just more likely to know more developers without degrees since only 18% of the population have a Bachelors and 7% have a masters.
- clessg 11y ago
  > You like to think that degree-less people are somehow vaguely 'better.' I don't think that he or she said that.
- currentoor 11y ago
  I think you misinterpreted what I said. All I said was, a degree is not a necessary or sufficient condition for being a great developer. Evidenced by the fact that there exist great developers without degrees. I'm not drawing any whacky conclusions about one group being "better" than another. Also, for what it's worth I graduated with two technical degrees from descent university. Most of the developers I know have engineering degrees.

supercanuck 11y ago

This H1-B problem is not a "silicon valley" problem. Those companies are unfortunately the companies that are probably doing H1-B the way it was designed. The real issue is the tech industry outside of Silicon Valley providing services to everyday companies. That is truly where the injustice is and where the meat of this article is pointing at.

DGAP 11y ago

In this thread there's a lot of complaining about mediocre developers. I'm still finishing my undergrad, and looking to go the PM route, but how do I avoid being the type of developer complained about here?

angersock 11y ago
You shouldn't go trying to be a PM, because you've got neither the experience nor the respect to get there. Sorry to be blunt, but this'll save some time. Instead, focus on being the best engineer you can be, on building and crafting software as well as you can. That will earn you the respect of the people whose respect is worth something, and will give you the insights needed for leading a team properly.
- DGAP 11y ago
  >You shouldn't go trying to be a PM, because you've got neither the experience nor the respect to get there. Sorry to be blunt, but this'll save some time. I get that, the only reason I have my sights set on it is that I'm already working as one for a company. :) I think that I'll best be able to leverage my experience and skills in some sort of technical product or program manager role, but I wanted to be sure I can pass a big 4 technical interview ect in addition to my pm/ business skills.
  - bbcbasic 11y ago
    > I'm already working as one for a company. :) Wow THAT is a touche!
    - angersock 11y ago
      Depends on the company. :) Either way, the desire to hone the technical skills is in the right place.
jschwartzi 11y ago
Just act like you give a crap about the future of what you're building more so than meeting deadlines and other engineers will enjoy working with you. People have different ways of measuring this, so watch other team members to see what they value in code, and try to make sure you include those features. You don't have to put out clever or insightful code, only code that is succinct and readable and can be maintained by the existing team.

morgante 11y ago

This article makes the perennial mistake of assuming all "STEM graduates" are equal. This is flawed in three main ways: 1. STEM graduates includes many fields where there genuinely is a huge surplus of labor (we don't really need more physicists). 2. Talent is critical and sadly a large number of CS graduates do not have the talent to be good developers. Many fresh graduates just don't have the skills to cut it as a high-quality professional developer, yet the best ones have six-way auctions going. Companies are absolutely desperate for good developers, with the operative word being good. (Don't even get me started on bootcamp graduates.) 3. The shortage of developers is most acute for senior developers. It takes about 10 years to become a truly senior developer and 10-15 years ago not many people were interested in starting a career in CS (the dot-com bust was still raw). This shortage can only be solved with time or immigration and until then senior developers can command considerable salaries ($250k+ all in).

superuser2 11y ago
The market doesn't "need" any physicists. Hiring in sciences basically scales with available federal grants for research, which basically scales with the success of liberal politics.

curiousjorge 11y ago

"we looked everywhere for someone who'd be willing to work 7 days a week with no overtime at an annual salary that does not keep up with region's cost of living, we really tried, so it must be that there are no workers available."

amsheehan 11y ago

It is also true that computer science curriculum doesn't really cover anything but a specific subset of the software development jobs out there. The same may not apply to other STEM fields, but it is certainly true for software.

1971genocide 11y ago

The more I read articles like this the more I hate america. america wants to be global hegemonic power without paying the price for it. america only has 5% of the world's population and deserves only 5% of the world's GDP, and should limit itself to absorbing only 5% of world's resource. American multinationals who also control america's govt want to absorb the best of the world's labour and force wage suppression on its own people. Guess what - its working so well that they can even ignore to invest in their OWN infrastructure, education and people.

sliverstorm 11y ago
I'm not clear how a country can deserve a fixed portion of global GDP, no more, no less. It's not a zero-sum game, and how exactly do you apportion productivity? And FWIW, in GDP per capita, the US is only #10.
- 1971genocide 11y ago
  5% +- 1% I am a strong believer that all people have equal ability, and if all countries were on a equal footing then their GDP size would be more of less reflective of their labour force. Ofcourse it gets complicated if countries have resources only to their geography. GDP per capita is a weak measure since america has high inequality, some people in america are as poor and hungry as the worst conditions in africa. America was built mostly out stealing labour from the rest of the world in a selective way, without taking full advantage of your own labour force. The unfairness comes when we talk about investment. A lot of counties like India invested heavily on education. What happened to the talent produced by that investment ? They all ran away to US. Its okay if a small number of people do it, but when a huge portion of the population does it then its not fair to the country involved. It also allows america to get away with it by not investing in their own education or labour force. Some countries figured out this game - south korea, china. who force their labour to pay back the investment - is it wrong ? yes. But given america's hypocrisy they had no other option. Right now america is loosing its ability to attract talent, since the global financial meltdown in 2008. It used to be a blackhole to world labour and investment (using wallstreet). But as countries develop american multinationals and the american govt will need to downsize and they are not happy to do it, since it means downsizing its global bullying power. ----------------------------------- If you want to learn more about how america has screwed over humanity. 1) http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Global-Minotaur-Economic-Controversies/dp/1780324502 http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Global-Minotaur-Economic-Controv... 2) http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Oil-Kings-Changed-Balance/dp/1439155186 http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Oil-Kings-Changed-Balance/dp/143... 3)https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confessions_of_an_Economic_Hit_Man https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confessions_of_an_Economic_Hit... ------------------------------------ I have been reading about it and making sure things are historically accurate, not only am I becoming more economically literal - I am also enraged about how horrible america has being, I used to celebrate american culture and now really feel bitter. I have been reading them only for the past 20 days or so, so my initial phase of angry is still not complete.

nevdka 11y ago

Not all tech companies are the same. Google needs engineers with skills that most tech workers don't have. You might have a CS degree from a great school and 15 years experience with J2EE, but you're not experienced with say... reactJS. If Google (or Facebook, or startup that just raised $25M) is looking to hire a team of reactJS devs, then they can very quickly exhaust the supply of locals who have used it. From Google's perspective, there is a shortage. But some other companies, usually 'IT' more than 'Tech' from my experience... yeah... they can get a bit squirrely. When a company gets newly 'redundant' workers to train the new migrants, they can't really claim that there are no suitable qualified locals.

codeonfire 11y ago
Hiring for specific skills in my mind is the mark of a inexperienced company, manager, or department. Usually people think their choice in technology is prescient and amazing. Anyone that doesn't know that specific technology must be a dullard who will never be able to 'get it.' Right now huge numbers of new people are flooding the industry and their stature as managers or "seniors" in the company after one or two years is far above their experience level. More seasoned managers know not to hire for specific skills like "reactJS" as usually those magic technologies turn out to actually be very basic.
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michaelchisari 11y ago
If you want the absolute best for the job, in a very specific skill-set that has only existed for two years, then you'd best be willing to pay considerably, or you're going to have to be willing to train people with the proper fundamental skills in that specific toolset. A lot of companies are unwilling to do either of those. Offering $110k for a ReactJS developer? Better be willing to hire someone with a good understanding of software development patterns and a solid history of shipping code with the understanding that some on-the-job training will be required. Won't settle for anything but the best? Then set the salary to somewhere it would pull the level of talent you need. And if you're not willing to do that, then consider how you can get by with the first candidate.

Animats 11y ago

The IEEE points out regularly that there's no shortage of engineers. Otherwise, salaries would be going up across the board. Whenever some employer complains they can't find engineers, ask how many people they have in off-site training right now. Companies need to be paying for training that's just conversion from one skill set to whatever skill set the company needs right now. Most programmers who are competent in at least two languages can easily learn a third. A combination of explicit training and someone to answer hard questions is usually sufficient. (There's startup potential there - offer conversion training courses, where people who already know A are taught B. A "hard question" answering service, sort of like StackOverflow but paid, with a service level agreement, and without the clueless closing of questions, could work as a business.) This industry has forgotten what management is for. Part of the job of management is to organize the division of labor. Not everyone can do everything. It's the job of management to divide up the job so that no one part is too hard. Instead, we see a demand for "full stack developers". That's a confession of incompetent management.

abritinthebay 11y ago

My company has been trying to hire good Ruby and Frontend developers for... well.. a while. There's no shortage of applicants but the quality...? Eh. Finding even a Junior level engineer that knows more than "I can use these libraries" rather than "I know the language" is hard in both (but especially in JS). There's a big pool... but sadly most of it is shallow.

rmason 11y ago

Shortage may be phony? Ask all the unemployed engineers over fifty if it's phony. Ask all the women leaving the field after less than five years if it's phony. Ask developers who want to work remotely if it's phony. If you don't see companies making simple, easy changes then you can be pretty assure the shortage is phony.

karmapolice 11y ago

Yes, this is a constant thing in Spain too. Tech companies whining about worker shortage hit the news several times every year, yet working conditions and salaries never get better.

mlamat 11y ago

One word: training

hysan 11y ago

From the frequent articles I see on HN and the subsequent reactions, would it be fair to say that this is the situation? There is no shortage of programmers. However, there is a shortage of programmers (of X skill level) willing to work at the salary that a company desires. And that is where outsourcing and H1B comes in. Having a larger pool of candidates (at X skill level) will force the local candidate pool to lower their asking salary. In turn, this will allow companies to keep salaries deflated and profits up.

ceoj 11y ago

There is power law distribution of programming skills as in every other field. I am a web developer, I have worked with both established companies and startups from every continent in the world. I was hired recently by a client from USA, whose previous programmer created mess of code base, they were about to go out of business, had they not hired me to fix that up. I was able to fix all critical issues within a week, and was able to start developing new features withing two weeks. Were they not hired me from outside of their geographic area, they would not have survived today. So, what should you do to be able to hire good developers- 1. Broaden your horizons, don't limit yourself to a geographic area. World is not limited to Silicon Valley. 2. Be willing to hire remotely. I myself working remotely from start of my carrier, it is really exciting. 3. Give freedom to developers, let them think out of the box. 4. Before hiring developers full time, give them some real work(may be a small contract), this is better than asking them to solve puzzles :) Feel free to ping me if you have any questions, sfix [at] outlook.com

curiousnoob123 11y ago

The idea here seems to be that there are vacancies for people that are good at the craft, care about it and are generally skilled. And that a lot of visas today are being taken up by inexpensive foreign labor that may not be accurately described as highly skilled. So, HN, what if the government raised the cap for US educated international students? The average quality of STEM education and the average skill is certianly higher in the US. The issue is that the international students that go through US education have to compete with other foreign workers and often don't end up getting visas even though they are able to fill those skilled position vacancies. Curious to know the pros of cons of such an approach.