Which city/state has the maximum number of jobs available that are accessible to self-taught devs w/o college degrees?
Ask HN: What’s the best city/state for self-taught web devs without a degree?
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Re: Ask HN: What’s the best city/state for self-taught web devs without a degree?
#2[deleted]
Re: Ask HN: What’s the best city/state for self-taught web devs without a degree?
#3Portland, Oregon -- if you got skills and can prove it you will get hired.
Re: Ask HN: What’s the best city/state for self-taught web devs without a degree?
#4Best bet would be to just apply for jobs everywhere and move wherever you get the best offer
Re: Ask HN: What’s the best city/state for self-taught web devs without a degree?
#5san francisco hands down. hopefully will change in the future, but hasn't yet
Re: Ask HN: What’s the best city/state for self-taught web devs without a degree?
#6Self-taught web dev here. Just have a solid portfolio and solid github account. Focus on small and medium sized companies which will care less. Should not matter where you are. Two Lead guys at a former startup I was at, did not have degree. Chops matter.
Re: Ask HN: What’s the best city/state for self-taught web devs without a degree?
#7If you can code well and get freelance gigs, and if you are completely flexible, you might want to consider becoming a global nomad. I'm sitting in Medellin, Colombia right now with a team of developers from around the world who are here because their money goes three times as far as anywhere else with this level of quality of life.
Re: Ask HN: What’s the best city/state for self-taught web devs without a degree?
#8Not web-dev but self-taught(did college for a few years but landed a job in industry so I didn't complete).
Your best bet is to target small companies/startups to build experience. Large corporations tend to filter out candidates without a degree and extensive experience. Prove that you can deliver and the rest will follow.
Also don't stop learning, you will have gaps and the only way to fill them out is to get off the comfortable path and dig into domains that you might not traditionally work on.
Re: Ask HN: What’s the best city/state for self-taught web devs without a degree?
#9san francisco hands down. hopefully will change in the future, but hasn't yet
In SF, with a good portfolio and the ability to demonstrate your coding skills well in an interview, you can expect to get a job w/in about 3 months. This will cost you between $5 and $8k (cost of living) and you will be able to take home anywhere from $53 - $80k/yr (after taxes and before cost of living.) I don't know how this compares to other options, but just thought I'd give you some numbers.
Re: Ask HN: What’s the best city/state for self-taught web devs without a degree?
#10I don't know how anyone could answer this question accurately unless they've gone through the process of applying for jobs in many different cities when they had no work experience.
In San Francisco I was able to break into the market - it didn't happen quickly - it took a couple of years to move from free websites for friends to part-time work to a full-time salaried position. I have a music performance degree. That was about six years ago.
My sister was able to break into a real job much more quickly. She had a degree from UC Berkeley in Oceanography and then went to Hack Reactor for a couple of months. After a couple of months of applying for jobs, she got a pretty decent salaried position. This was from late 2015 to early 2016.
When you are starting out, it seems like getting a job is a matter of
1) Having a portfolio of work demonstrating that you can code
2) Applying to a ton of jobs
The San Francisco Bay Area has so many jobs that you can apply to positions literally all day long.
Good luck!