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U.S. Employers Struggle to Match Workers with Open Jobs

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Re: U.S. Employers Struggle to Match Workers with Open Jobs

#391

Post by QuercusMax »

evgen wrote: post #311
danjoc wrote: post #261

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ahhh, that explains it. When the market crashes, you become plebs like the rest of us. Except you'll be living in the most expensive place in the country.

Not really. At worst you lose a couple of years of growth in prior equity grants but your yearly refresher will be bulked up significantly to account for the diminished value of the stock and voila, pleb no more...

Yup, if the stock goes down, and you get a bigger (# of shares, not $$) refresh, if it goes back up to where it was before, bam, you've got it made. If you're lucky, you'll have enough for a down payment on a house....

Re: U.S. Employers Struggle to Match Workers with Open Jobs

#392

Post by ryandrake »

lj3 wrote: post #369
gozur88 wrote: post #336

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know people who are making mid six figures working for Google-tier companies. But I don't think there are very many of those kinds of people - hundreds, maybe. And these are people with highly specialized skillsets in addition to their software development skills - pattern recognition, for instance. You're not going to get a job like that because you know Python really well. Asking a software developer "Why aren't…

> I know people who are making mid six figures working for Google-tier companies. But I don't think there are very many of those kinds of people - hundreds, maybe. This is the thing that annoys me the most about these conversations. Some people take a few outliers and use them as proof that the rest of the bell curve is [ bad at negotiating | incompetent | lazy ]. Drives me nuts. I can name several multimillionaire b…

These "HN salary" threads would be a lot less annoying if those guys would just admit "Yea, $300K or $400K is super rare, for outlier folks out outlier companies who have outlier skills," rather than the usual "Lots of people make that! Just negotiate better, bro!!" bluster.

Re: U.S. Employers Struggle to Match Workers with Open Jobs

#393

Post by thanksgiving »

saint_fiasco wrote: post #310
yahna wrote: post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm okay with CEOs making more money, but what I can't stand is the golden parachutes and lack of responsibility.

Apparently they do that because otherwise CEOs would never take risks, for good reason. You can't be CEO of several companies, so a CEO is fully invested in the success of that one company. From the point of view of a CEO, it makes sense for the company to not take risks. On the other hand, investors can invest in diverse companies and expect some of them to fail and some of them to win big. From the point of view of…

I am not ok with a golden parachute at all, especially for people like John Thain but also for all publicly traded companies.

Re: U.S. Employers Struggle to Match Workers with Open Jobs

#394

Post by stale2002 »

mrep wrote: post #380
stale2002 wrote: post #235

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And now to bring things full circle, if tech salaries are very high, doesn't this ALSO imply a shortage of programmers, as demand is far outstripping supply?

Shortages are irrespective of the severity of price. Shortages imply their is enough demand that normally price would increase to match supply at a given price point but cannot due to outside forces such as price controls. What you and a bunch of other people confuse as a shortage is just basic market dynamics. Price is high but costs are also high (not a lot of people are willing and capable of being programmers). C…

That might be the way that economists describe shortages, but it is not the way that normal people describe shortages.

Personally, my definition of a shortage is "There is not enough of X, and it would be a very good thing to increase X".

Using my bread example, if bread cost 100$ a loaf, and people were literally starving to death because they couldn't buy bread or other food, then there IS a shortage of food.

It does not matter if "supply is equaling demand", because it is a very bad thing for food to cost 100$ a meal.

Re: U.S. Employers Struggle to Match Workers with Open Jobs

#395

Post by watwut »

saint_fiasco wrote: post #310
yahna wrote: post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm okay with CEOs making more money, but what I can't stand is the golden parachutes and lack of responsibility.

Apparently they do that because otherwise CEOs would never take risks, for good reason. You can't be CEO of several companies, so a CEO is fully invested in the success of that one company. From the point of view of a CEO, it makes sense for the company to not take risks. On the other hand, investors can invest in diverse companies and expect some of them to fail and some of them to win big. From the point of view of…

What exactly is risk here? That the person is looking for another job (which tends to be succesfull) and the he is not super uber rich, just very rich?

I give you that being good ceo is hard and all that. But seriously, calling it financial risk is ridiculous.

Re: U.S. Employers Struggle to Match Workers with Open Jobs

#396

Post by howlgram »

flachsechs wrote: post #274
humanrebar wrote: post #269

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> imagine trying to buy a product or service, but nobody will tell you how much it costs, but instead tries to subtly hint that you should name your price There are tons of products that don't have a listed prices, just a "call our sales representatives". Heck, the job listings don't list salary expectations, even when they're cold calling you .

"call our sales representatives" means they'll tell you if you call. i'm guessing you never call, because you don't actually want to talk to anyone, which is exactly what they're trying to do: filter you out.

They'll make you offers going from most expensive to cheaper, also it's a filter in order to lure in people who believe the product has value. You could say is a subtle way of asking people if they value the product highly, basically asking people to name the price even though not directly.

Re: U.S. Employers Struggle to Match Workers with Open Jobs

#397

Post by Nursie »

jcadam wrote: post #259
Nursie wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yup, see this all the time in the UK. Businesses complain they can't find the skills they need, but what they mean is they can't the skills they need for a derisory price. Particularly in the UK there seems little appteciation that software is a valuable thing, created by professionals. Too often the MBA types consider it just another form of generic office work, and seek to pay in line with that. Then they wonder wh…

I occasionally peruse job listings for other countries (I'm in the US, but sometimes entertain delusions of emigrating). I came to the conclusion pretty quickly that the UK has got to be the absolute worst place in the western world to be a software developer.

Not sure about worst, and you can make a decent living as a contractor, or going into coding for a financial firm.

But in terms of money on offer for a generic development job, yup, the pay is peanuts and they do indeed end up hiring monkeys.

Re: U.S. Employers Struggle to Match Workers with Open Jobs

#398

Post by flachsechs »

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #356
throwaway911233 wrote: post #296

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I make ~$200k in an affordable city not on the coast. I could make $300k - $400k in NYC. I write and maintain programs for finance.

How do you get a job in finance while not on the coast? Remote work? Work in a branch? Work for a regional outfit?

live on the coast for a while, build/augment your career and social circle, and then move somewhere else and keep your job(s).

note this plan actually involves dedicating years of your life to something without a guaranteed payoff or clearly defined steps, which is why it seems like such a mystery to most people.

Re: U.S. Employers Struggle to Match Workers with Open Jobs

#399

Post by fred_is_fred »

arca_vorago wrote: post #109
altotrees wrote: post #91

Recently had a recruiter call me, interview me over the phone once, in-person once, and via skype once. The job seemed to be a great fit, the pay was there, everything seemed to be lined up. The recruiter called me again to tell me that they were going to be taking the next steps with me very shortly. A week of silence goes by, then another. I email, inquiring about the position. "Oh, we gave that to someone we had b…

The latter, hands down. I quit college to startup an IT support company, and despite going back in spurts, never finished. I got quite a few jobs after I left the startup though, and in retrospect I think the primary factor that got me those jobs, despite my many years of expertise, was the fact that since I didn't have a degree they could pay me less vs most of the other candidates. The most recent one, that promise…

You should have started looking after they reneged on their 6 month promise (which for the record is BS usually anyway, as you've discovered).

Re: U.S. Employers Struggle to Match Workers with Open Jobs

#400

Post by kartickv »

learc83 wrote: post #387
kartickv wrote: post #383

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unless you're currently making $50K, in which case why would you turn down a 100% raise?

If your choice is only between your current $50k job and the $100k job then of course. For most people looking at a $100k a year job, that's not the case.

That's a fair point.
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