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Spain Runs Out of Workers with Almost 5M Unemployed

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

#81

Post by yulaow »

adwf wrote: post #38
ldng wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

If you know decently French you will learn Spanish extremely fast, give it a try.

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

#82

Post by fovc »

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…

Is there a good place for hiring Spanish devs to work remote? I'm a native Spanish speaker and this sounds like a great arbitrage opportunity

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

#83

Post by calgoo »

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-…

There is "some" training, but I think the general understanding is: "There are 50,000 others who want the job, and if we dont like this one, we will get someone else" so why train them? The normal training I see here is "know the company" kind of stuff and the yearly health and safety course mandated by the government.

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

#84

Post by fchollet »

jules wrote: post #40
charlesdm wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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?

Paris is much less expensive than the bay area, but more expensive than the average US city. In fact, it's barely less expensive than NYC, one of the most expensive US cities.

Also, if you are working remotely you cannot command a bay area salary.

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

#85

Post by ArkyBeagle »

Daishiman wrote: post #3

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. I'm guessing this is more along the lines of "we want qualified work but we're not really willing to pay for it"?

I spent years doing maintenance (and for not much money ) before I really started doing new development. I know for a fact that starting in the late '90s, the freshouts I met were unwilling to do that.

Look, companies are barely able to say what they want, much less evaluate anyone's work, much even less able to hire. Throw in adherence to Paradigm religion and creeping Dunning-Kruger and this is what you get.

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

#86

Post by cloakandswagger »

macspoofing wrote: post #22

This was a frustrating article to read. I got the sense the author missed something. Spain is part of the EU common market which numbers 500 million people - how is it that this is only a problem for Spain, and why can't they recruit fellow EU citizens to make-up the shortfall?

This assumption is the same mistake made by almost all supranational federalists.

Europe is composed of different countries with vastly different languages, cultures and economic conditions. Just because they're technically "joined" together via treaties doesn't mean labor is going to naturally distribute throughout the union.

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

#87

Post by calgoo »

UVB-76 wrote: post #47
anjc wrote: post #33

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. Ind…

How many people from Eastern Europe speak Spanish? Obviously not as important for low-skilled, manual labour, but we're talking about highly skilled jobs in the tech sector here.

Romania is one example, but there is a bit of a racial issue going on between the countries.

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

#88

Post by vemv »

fovc wrote: post #82
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…

Is there a good place for hiring Spanish devs to work remote? I'm a native Spanish speaker and this sounds like a great arbitrage opportunity

I guess Upwork is the leading place to find freelancers. It's a race to the bottom (i.e. competing with third-world devs) though so that can discourage one.

Then there's Linkedin. Personally if I receive a job offer from outside Spain I assume it's clueless recruiter spam. Your message should be extremely clear that you are actively seeking remote developers from abroad.

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

#89

Post by vimes656 »

biztos wrote: post #65
ldng wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

Doesn't this give a competitive advantage to early-stage startups in Spain? Pay a little more than the average, but still way less than in Paris or London, and you'll have your pick of the good devs who don't want to emigrate, right?

Conditions are improving in Madrid and Barcelona for startups, but in general I'd say the laws, the banks, the bureaucrats and the system in general are all very startup unfriendly.

That I think it's the root of the problem. Dev salaries don't rise because there is no real competition for top talent. Many established software companies in Spain can get away with mediocre programmers with low salaries because they operate in captive markets and the quality of their products don't really matter.

If politicians really wanted to fix this problem they'd make it easier for new companies to compete with the old ones, but they are doing just the opposite.

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

#90

Post by ArkyBeagle »

Daishiman wrote: post #16
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…

The benefits were far better too. I've worked at the same place my father did; the benefits he had when he started 35 years ago are literally unobtainable for our generation.

I started roughly 31 years ago and I was making $10 an hour, with rent @ $400 a month. That's $22 2016 an hour with inflation against $880 a month rent for a crappy apartment with air conditioning in 90-100 degree heat about 80% of the time, for half a year ( Dallas ). But at least we had a pool. Helicopters chased people down the "creek" at night.

"The benefits" are because health insurance has been a slow-moving disaster starting in 1949. And from about 1989 until 1993, I did without health insurance.

IT was a low-paying job. I paid my dues and the money's gotten better.

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