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Spain Runs Out of Workers with Almost 5M Unemployed

bloomberg.com

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Re: Spain Runs Out of Workers with Almost 5M Unemployed

#31

Post by ldng »

whamlastxmas wrote: post #5

The article says the average salary in Spain is around $22k. Even at twice that, it's not hard to see why developers are not working for (or maybe even in) Spain. I suspect the problem has more to do with Spanish businesses not being willing or able to compete for developers with market salary rates. It's frustrating that they don't provide data like that in articles like this. Instead of they a single data point ane…

A lot of skilled Spanish dev have fled to Paris and London despite the high cost of living of those cities and being paid less because they're foreigners because it is still more rewarding.

In Spain, politician and corruption are pushing skilled people away. I have seen (and heard of) too many people moving out to be just mere coincidence.

The subtlety is that most of the time the greedy consulting firm will keep 198K out of the 220K and the be surprised not to find anyone.

"Spain is different" as some friends say.

Re: Spain Runs Out of Workers with Almost 5M Unemployed

#32

Post by charlesdm »

vemv wrote: post #29

Spanish dev here, 3 years in the business, been twice a freelancer and twice an employee. My main complaints: - The maximum salary a developer can earn at any given company is almost written in stone - around 36000 euros. Every public job posting will have that figure as the max. When it's higher, they'll water it down in the interview. Why? Probably because they don't have the notion of a 10x programmer at all. We a…

Have you considered working remotely for a US company? I know a guy making €7 or 8,000 per month, after tax, living in Paris. Best of both worlds: amazing quality of living, cheap cost of living + healthcare, lots of spending (or investing) money! Seems to be working well for him.

Re: Spain Runs Out of Workers with Almost 5M Unemployed

#33

Post by anjc »

Same thing is happening in every country, it seems. Spanish companies have the entire EU from which they can draw workers without any paperwork or issues, and yet they can't find any? From central/eastern Europe even, whose workers may have lower wage expectations?

No. They're flagging this "shortage" and will simultaneously petition their government to allow faster issuing of/more visas to non-EU countries, i.e. India etc, with lower wage requirements for incoming workers.

Re: Spain Runs Out of Workers with Almost 5M Unemployed

#34

Post by konschubert »

> It takes at least eight months for an experienced software developer to earn an Agile qualification and they also need the ability to deal with senior executives,

I am a bit confused by this sentence. How does one "ear an Agile qualification"? Why does it take eight months? What is "the ability to deal with senior executives"?

Re: Spain Runs Out of Workers with Almost 5M Unemployed

#36

Post by [deleted] »

altoz wrote: post #8

You have two groups: 1. 5 million unemployed people 2. very highly sought after workers The employers complaining about people in group 2 being scarce are merely not paying enough. The workers complaining in group 1 need more skills that the market wants. They're at different ends of the spectrum. Other than that they live in the same country, they really don't have much to do with each other. Whether you can convert…

[deleted]

Re: Spain Runs Out of Workers with Almost 5M Unemployed

#37

Post by HannibalLecter »

altoz wrote: post #8

You have two groups: 1. 5 million unemployed people 2. very highly sought after workers The employers complaining about people in group 2 being scarce are merely not paying enough. The workers complaining in group 1 need more skills that the market wants. They're at different ends of the spectrum. Other than that they live in the same country, they really don't have much to do with each other. Whether you can convert…

Guidance counselors need to stop asking kids what they want to do when they grow up and start telling them what is likely to become available by the time they are able to work (post education), matrix'd with the student's potential. Too many idiots trying to be programmers that are no better than VBA and Dreamweaver script kids.

If you want to be a programmer, your only option is to get your skillset into group #2, rather than build the skillset you want to build.

The best programmers are good at the things people strongly dislike.

Re: Spain Runs Out of Workers with Almost 5M Unemployed

#38

Post by adwf »

ldng wrote: post #31
whamlastxmas wrote: post #5

The article says the average salary in Spain is around $22k. Even at twice that, it's not hard to see why developers are not working for (or maybe even in) Spain. I suspect the problem has more to do with Spanish businesses not being willing or able to compete for developers with market salary rates. It's frustrating that they don't provide data like that in articles like this. Instead of they a single data point ane…

A lot of skilled Spanish dev have fled to Paris and London despite the high cost of living of those cities and being paid less because they're foreigners because it is still more rewarding. In Spain, politician and corruption are pushing skilled people away. I have seen (and heard of) too many people moving out to be just mere coincidence. The subtlety is that most of the time the greedy consulting firm will keep 198…

After Brexit, I'm very tempted to move in the opposite direction. If the Spanish consulting firms can be undercut to that extent, there's a potentially lucrative market.

Unfortunately I only know French and German, but I could learn Spanish relatively quickly I guess. The corruption and politics is troubling however.

Re: Spain Runs Out of Workers with Almost 5M Unemployed

#39

Post by joshyeager »

ZenoArrow wrote: post #28
zeveb wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm wondering what is the cognitive dissonance with employers who are unwilling to train workers. I mean, I understand the reasons if you're a an SMB, but large corporations used to train their employees or hold something close to apprenticeship programs. It was far less common for people to change jobs back then, too. Neither employers nor employees feel any real loyalty towards one another, so investing in one an…

> "It was far less common for people to change jobs back then, too. Neither employers nor employees feel any real loyalty towards one another, so investing in one another feels foolish. There's nothing to incentivise someone to stay once he's learnt the skills he needs to get a position elsewhere." Sorry, I still don't understand this attitude. I live in the UK, it's common here to have at least some level of on-the-…

We invest a lot in training and mentoring, especially for a small company. Someone once asked "what if we train them and they leave?" Our CEO replied "what if we don't train them and they stay?"

Re: Spain Runs Out of Workers with Almost 5M Unemployed

#40

Post by jules »

charlesdm wrote: post #32
vemv wrote: post #29

Spanish dev here, 3 years in the business, been twice a freelancer and twice an employee. My main complaints: - The maximum salary a developer can earn at any given company is almost written in stone - around 36000 euros. Every public job posting will have that figure as the max. When it's higher, they'll water it down in the interview. Why? Probably because they don't have the notion of a 10x programmer at all. We a…

Have you considered working remotely for a US company? I know a guy making €7 or 8,000 per month, after tax, living in Paris. Best of both worlds: amazing quality of living, cheap cost of living + healthcare, lots of spending (or investing) money! Seems to be working well for him.

Is the cost of living in Paris less than a normal US city?
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