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>> The problem is there's a shortage in qualified candidates. ... I've been trying to hire, and my inbox is full of people who know half a language and want a s

>> The problem is there's a shortage in qualified candidates. ... I've been trying to hire, and my inbox is full of people who know half a language and want a starting salary of $130k. The money isn't the issue; I'd pay way more than that for someone good. But six figures is crazy high for the average developer in SF. >> How much more? $250,000? $500,000? $1,000,000? $3,000,000? Sure, it is plausible that if all the companies in SF tried to pay virtually unlimited amount of money for exceptional programmers, they'd eventually run out of those programmers. After all even in major league baseball there are only so many 100 MPH pitchers to go around. But it's hard to credit claims that we are in that situation rather than one where the money _is_ the issue, when you aren't seeing numbers that would make a BigLaw junior partner or investment bank managing director jealous, much less a professional baseball player.

cellis 11y ago
Exactly. You want to know of a true shortage of workers? 7 ft centers who are aggressive, not injury prone, and can hit a free throw. They're so rare that 17% of all 7footers in the US play in the NBA. It's why Deandre Jordan is making 100 million over the next 5? years. A shortage of programmers, ha! There is one kind of shortage though, and one that is adequately compensated; programmers willing to work at below average wages for lottery tickets (read: technical cofounder equity) that happen to hit, and therefore end up making millions -- they don't even need to be exceptionally skilled, just right be in the place and right time (I've known several of these). But show me an Anthony Davis of coding who is paid as such, and I'll show you someone who is a skilled manager/entreprenuer.
- kev009 11y ago
  This so much. Let's also consider that the middle management layer is earning 2x and upper management at least 3x a senior developer who's stuck somewhere in the 100k range. Trim the fat and you can have as many developers as you want.
  - LoSboccacc 11y ago
    add in that all the show offs have made programmers aware that the system they build for 90k years is making millions and valued at billions. it's about time for (good) engineers to get an appropriate share of the pie.
pbiggar 11y ago
The issue for the US is that they want to keep those good jobs here, and so they need to keep the good companies here. If the price is driven up -- and it is being driven up -- but you can get good devs in Estonia, India, the Philippines, Uzbekistan, etc, at a far more affordable price then: a) US companies will hire those remote workers, causing cash to flow out of the US b) companies will set up in those countries to compete with the US companies, but without the burden of the US' skyrocketing salaries. This happened in manufacturing: the US had high salaries, so costs of manufacturing were too high, so the US started outsourcing to Asian, and now the manufacturing industry in the US is so bad that companies can actually afford to hire US manufacturing workers again. The solution: when wages skyrocket, bring in foreign engineers. When wages are depressed, don't.
- deciplex 11y ago
  > now the manufacturing industry in the US is so bad Isn't this pretty soundly debunked at this point? Honest question because I hear alternately "US manufacturing is dead" and "US manufactures more crap than anyone else except China, barely". I get the sense that saying the US manufacturing industry is dead because it doesn't employ many people, is the same as saying the US agriculture industry is dead for the same reason, and also wrong for the same reason (i.e. number of people employed is a weak metric for the strength of an industry).
- vellum 11y ago
  >US companies will hire those remote workers, causing cash to flow out of the US Most US companies won't even hire remote workers here.
  - pbiggar 11y ago
    The question then is at what price point does that change?
- LoSboccacc 11y ago
  > The issue for the US is that they want to keep those good jobs here, and so they need to keep the good companies here. nope. you are mistaken, nothing keeps companies in any specific place except opportunities. With labor prices so cheap in Asia, what would stop company to just move all production off shore like they did for electronics? they are trying, have tried and will try again countless time to outsource tech jobs, but it will take more years for them to figure out the quality issues they're having in doing so. anyway it's not like oversea there are millions of great coders and engineers just waiting to code for food. STEMSs tend to be of higher education overall, which makes exploiting them harder.
sliverstorm 11y ago
Do we really have to hit 8-figure salaries for college grads before we can say with any confidence that we have hit a supply-limited market? We are supposedly a group of smart people; I hope we can notice the smoke before the house is burning down around our ears. I'm not saying we have one. But I'm also suspicious of the self-serving opinions that rank-and-file developer salaries ought to be 10x higher.
sheepmullet 11y ago
Spot on! We have tapped out the supply of developers who are willing to invest thousands of hours in self training just for the love of the craft. Now businesses have to either pay for training (which can take years and is expensive) or pay enough to encourage people to get into complex software dev for the money. If you go the second route the starting salary needs to be six figures and needs to go up to 500k+ just like for lawyers and doctors.

cellis 11y ago

Exactly. You want to know of a true shortage of workers? 7 ft centers who are aggressive, not injury prone, and can hit a free throw. They're so rare that 17% of all 7footers in the US play in the NBA. It's why Deandre Jordan is making 100 million over the next 5? years. A shortage of programmers, ha! There is one kind of shortage though, and one that is adequately compensated; programmers willing to work at below average wages for lottery tickets (read: technical cofounder equity) that happen to hit, and therefore end up making millions -- they don't even need to be exceptionally skilled, just right be in the place and right time (I've known several of these). But show me an Anthony Davis of coding who is paid as such, and I'll show you someone who is a skilled manager/entreprenuer.

kev009 11y ago
This so much. Let's also consider that the middle management layer is earning 2x and upper management at least 3x a senior developer who's stuck somewhere in the 100k range. Trim the fat and you can have as many developers as you want.
- LoSboccacc 11y ago
  add in that all the show offs have made programmers aware that the system they build for 90k years is making millions and valued at billions. it's about time for (good) engineers to get an appropriate share of the pie.

pbiggar 11y ago

The issue for the US is that they want to keep those good jobs here, and so they need to keep the good companies here. If the price is driven up -- and it is being driven up -- but you can get good devs in Estonia, India, the Philippines, Uzbekistan, etc, at a far more affordable price then: a) US companies will hire those remote workers, causing cash to flow out of the US b) companies will set up in those countries to compete with the US companies, but without the burden of the US' skyrocketing salaries. This happened in manufacturing: the US had high salaries, so costs of manufacturing were too high, so the US started outsourcing to Asian, and now the manufacturing industry in the US is so bad that companies can actually afford to hire US manufacturing workers again. The solution: when wages skyrocket, bring in foreign engineers. When wages are depressed, don't.

deciplex 11y ago
> now the manufacturing industry in the US is so bad Isn't this pretty soundly debunked at this point? Honest question because I hear alternately "US manufacturing is dead" and "US manufactures more crap than anyone else except China, barely". I get the sense that saying the US manufacturing industry is dead because it doesn't employ many people, is the same as saying the US agriculture industry is dead for the same reason, and also wrong for the same reason (i.e. number of people employed is a weak metric for the strength of an industry).
vellum 11y ago
>US companies will hire those remote workers, causing cash to flow out of the US Most US companies won't even hire remote workers here.
- pbiggar 11y ago
  The question then is at what price point does that change?
LoSboccacc 11y ago
> The issue for the US is that they want to keep those good jobs here, and so they need to keep the good companies here. nope. you are mistaken, nothing keeps companies in any specific place except opportunities. With labor prices so cheap in Asia, what would stop company to just move all production off shore like they did for electronics? they are trying, have tried and will try again countless time to outsource tech jobs, but it will take more years for them to figure out the quality issues they're having in doing so. anyway it's not like oversea there are millions of great coders and engineers just waiting to code for food. STEMSs tend to be of higher education overall, which makes exploiting them harder.

sliverstorm 11y ago

Do we really have to hit 8-figure salaries for college grads before we can say with any confidence that we have hit a supply-limited market? We are supposedly a group of smart people; I hope we can notice the smoke before the house is burning down around our ears. I'm not saying we have one. But I'm also suspicious of the self-serving opinions that rank-and-file developer salaries ought to be 10x higher.

sheepmullet 11y ago

Spot on! We have tapped out the supply of developers who are willing to invest thousands of hours in self training just for the love of the craft. Now businesses have to either pay for training (which can take years and is expensive) or pay enough to encourage people to get into complex software dev for the money. If you go the second route the starting salary needs to be six figures and needs to go up to 500k+ just like for lawyers and doctors.