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San Jose and Oakland area job markets tumble

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Re: San Jose and Oakland area job markets tumble

#31

Post by brianwawok »

11thEarlOfMar wrote: post #7

You need to read the whole article to get to the statement: “Unemployment rates throughout the Bay Area are among the lowest in the state. Almost anywhere else in the country, the Bay Area’s job trends would be the envy of that region.” Every downturn has to start somewhere, and maybe this is the beginning of a bad stretch, but the largest employers are doing fine based on stock prices. Apple, Alphabet, Cisco, Facebo…

I don't think stock price is a leading indicator. It goes something like

Profits -> hiring decisions -> stock prices

Stock price could be many months behind the profits as you don't do dialy earning reports.

Re: San Jose and Oakland area job markets tumble

#32

Post by [deleted] »

11thEarlOfMar wrote: post #7

You need to read the whole article to get to the statement: “Unemployment rates throughout the Bay Area are among the lowest in the state. Almost anywhere else in the country, the Bay Area’s job trends would be the envy of that region.” Every downturn has to start somewhere, and maybe this is the beginning of a bad stretch, but the largest employers are doing fine based on stock prices. Apple, Alphabet, Cisco, Facebo…

[deleted]

Re: San Jose and Oakland area job markets tumble

#33

Post by JDiculous »

dmix wrote: post #15

> “Right now it’s tough to find a job in I.T.,” said Steve Satariano, a San Jose resident who has been working in contracted, temporary information technology jobs in recent years. “I’d prefer to find a full-time, permanent job, but in I.T., beggars can’t be choosers. It’s a little frustrating because tech companies always want to try before they buy.” The numbers don't really back the first part of the statement up.…

You're only looking at demand figures and totally ignoring the supply side of the equation (supply of laborers in or seeking these jobs)

Re: San Jose and Oakland area job markets tumble

#34

Post by CGamesPlay »

devingoldfish wrote: post #17
wooyi wrote: post #3

These are likely seasonal job losses like retail or related. You have to do Year over Year comparisons for jobs. Month over month comparisons are misleading because of seasonality

From the article: the worst two-month stretch of job losses since the Great Recession.

If January had the highest number of jobs since the Great Depression and we have returned to the March mean, this could still be true while there was absolutely nothing interesting going on.

Re: San Jose and Oakland area job markets tumble

#35

Post by city41 »

aphextron wrote: post #14

So it isn't just me. Has anyone else in the east bay had a tough time finding work recently as a mid level front end developer?

I'm not on the market, but I've not seen any change in the number of recruiters contacting me. A pretty weak signal for sure, but it's something.

Re: San Jose and Oakland area job markets tumble

#36

Post by woah »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #26
madlynormal wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a significant difference within different roles in I.T. As someone who's worked in the cost center side of the industry, I can relate with the author. It's a problem not limited to Oakland or San Jose. Helpdesk, Desktop Support, and related jobs are commonly temp to perm with horrible pay for the amount of stress.

For sure. As a sysadmin/network admin/IT manager, it's a buyers market. As a DevOps/infrastructure engineer, it's a seller's market. I think training is part of the problem. More importantly, workers need consulting help around how to take existing skills and use them to apply to upmarket jobs with higher pay.

DevOps/infrastructure engineer is basically a programming position, which sysadmin/IT types may not have strong skills in.

Re: San Jose and Oakland area job markets tumble

#37

Post by neom »

johansch wrote: post #28
toomuchtodo wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For sure. As a sysadmin/network admin/IT manager, it's a buyers market. As a DevOps/infrastructure engineer, it's a seller's market. I think training is part of the problem. More importantly, workers need consulting help around how to take existing skills and use them to apply to upmarket jobs with higher pay.

Unpopular opinion: Nah, it's an IQ issue. It's really not a (short-term) training issue, at least.

For that to be true I suspect you'd also have to believe near zero nuance in the bell.

Re: San Jose and Oakland area job markets tumble

#38

Post by neom »

11thEarlOfMar wrote: post #7

You need to read the whole article to get to the statement: “Unemployment rates throughout the Bay Area are among the lowest in the state. Almost anywhere else in the country, the Bay Area’s job trends would be the envy of that region.” Every downturn has to start somewhere, and maybe this is the beginning of a bad stretch, but the largest employers are doing fine based on stock prices. Apple, Alphabet, Cisco, Facebo…

I've talked to ceos who have said they would love to post a Q over Q decline in opex due to automation of the salary cost center in all orgs.

Re: San Jose and Oakland area job markets tumble

#39

Post by enjo »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #27
empath75 wrote: post #18

I wonder how much of this is non-programming jobs going away. I think sysadmin jobs are going away, and those aren't coming back.

FWIW, I am quite positive I heard that statement many, many times during the original dot com bust of 2000/2001.

I simply have to believe that cloud services have taken a big bite of the sysadmin market. We currently employ zero admins (~25 employees, moderate traffic).

In my previous ventures that'd be unthinkable, but we've effecticely outsourced the position to Amazon.

Re: San Jose and Oakland area job markets tumble

#40

Post by bante »

johansch wrote: post #28
toomuchtodo wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For sure. As a sysadmin/network admin/IT manager, it's a buyers market. As a DevOps/infrastructure engineer, it's a seller's market. I think training is part of the problem. More importantly, workers need consulting help around how to take existing skills and use them to apply to upmarket jobs with higher pay.

Unpopular opinion: Nah, it's an IQ issue. It's really not a (short-term) training issue, at least.

It's weird that people who claim unpopular opinions, often at the expense of others, so rarely can find the time to argue their excellent ideas. I have a number of friends that works in "IT" in Europe. The difference between working for a US and European "IT" company is night and day. It simply has very little status as a field in the US. If you had ever seen the things a systems administrators have to deal with from highly educated engineers, you would know that it has less to do with "IQ" and everything to do with domain knowledge.
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