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Ask HN: Are you unable to find employment?

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Re: Ask HN: Are you unable to find employment?

#381

Post by cloverich »

m_ke wrote: post #116
thw09j9m wrote: post #113

My thoughts from ~ 6 weeks ago: >> This is the toughest market I've ever seen. I easily made it to on-sites at FAANG a few years ago and now I'm getting resume rejected by no-name startups (and FAANG). The bar has also been raised significantly. I had an interview recently where I solved the algorithm question very quickly, but didn't refactor/clean up my code perfectly and was rejected. I've since landed one decent…

Yeah the process these days is insane. I went through 4 rounds of interviews with one company, did really well and was expecting an offer but they want me to come in for a full day of onsite work mixed in with more technical rounds. I’m interviewing with like 10 companies right now and it feels like a full time job, I have full days of interviews lined up for almost every day in the first 3 weeks on January.

This is actually identical to my experience in 2021/2022 when the market was red hot. I literally did treat it as my full time job, failed a lot, but rarely had less than 4 interviews which it seems most of the good companies do.

Re: Ask HN: Are you unable to find employment?

#382

Post by steve_adams_86 »

akmarinov wrote: post #235
steve_adams_86 wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

An argument against not being allowed to import more people after layoffs (and it’s the one people like PG and Musk are making) is that the people who were laid off simply don’t have the skills required to allow companies to succeed. They need to import labor because the domestic labor pool isn’t good enough. A quieter part is that people immigrating also expect less for their outputs.

How can that be true though? Are you and Elon saying that India’s education system and universities are just plain better than MIT, Stanford, etc? If so - why are so many studying abroad in places like Canada and Australia? If not, then are Indians just genetically smarter than Americans, so that their pool is better? It just seems like immigrants are willing to work more for less, so that in the future when they’re…

Sorry, I wasn’t making a case for that argument. I’m only pointing out that it exists, it’s a prominent way of thinking, and it’s worth considering.

I don’t personally subscribe to that belief.

My position is more so that wealthy, powerful people stand to gain a lot by disempowering their workforce, and they’re working hard to do just that. People like Elon would love to see cheap labour and AI beset the workforce such that it had no leverage and lower wages. He has said about as much in various ways already.

I’m a little disappointed that my comment wasn’t voted down more, because I really did phrase it as my own opinion.

Re: Ask HN: Are you unable to find employment?

#383

Post by softwaredoug »

jcalvinowens wrote: post #283

Yes, this is what everybody I know is experiencing right now. Caveat lector: This is simply a retelling of my personal experience, YMMV. This is not advice. What has consistently worked for me: I stopped applying for jobs, and redirected all that effort into creating and publishing open source projects that demonstrate competence in the areas of work I want. And, just as importantly, I contribute to big established o…

I think people see networking as some skeevy thing, but what your describe is what actual networking looks like:

1. Contribute your time generously to a software community

2. Get to know the people and help them

3. Most people have a bias towards reciprocity, want to help you!

Bonus: do this before you need a job, but while you’re employed.

Re: Ask HN: Are you unable to find employment?

#384

Post by steve_adams_86 »

vbi8iBEX wrote: post #349
akmarinov wrote: post #235

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How can that be true though? Are you and Elon saying that India’s education system and universities are just plain better than MIT, Stanford, etc? If so - why are so many studying abroad in places like Canada and Australia? If not, then are Indians just genetically smarter than Americans, so that their pool is better? It just seems like immigrants are willing to work more for less, so that in the future when they’re…

Working more for less is the issue, that's exactly what this boils down to.

Yes, it’s a major component at least. I’ve wondered if there should be protections against this to maintain some baseline of safety for people’s workloads, but that would never fly in North America as far as I can tell. And it could actually harm some people who legitimately need to work overtime to take care of their families.

Re: Ask HN: Are you unable to find employment?

#385

Post by cloverich »

mmmmmbop wrote: post #320

To answer your question: No, I did not struggle to find employment. I'm at a FAANG right now, but was shopping around last year for offers, and got decent offers from the likes of Snowflake and Uber. Ended up not taking them because I'm happy where I'm at. I took a look at your LinkedIn. If I were a hiring manager, I'd be concerned that in the last 8 years you mostly stayed at each company for a year or less and that…

What would good tenure ranges look like to you? I feel 3 is the magic number, and 7 is too long (dep. on many factors of course) but feel this is under discussed.

Personally id have questions about anything sub 2, but seeing 2 or more 3s would be enough for me to ignore a short stint or two.

Re: Ask HN: Are you unable to find employment?

#386

Post by [deleted] »

bdangubic wrote: post #370
dachworker wrote: post #365

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As I said in the other comment, I just don't think it would be a good experience when one is a foreigner. Maybe if you consider it as just an adventure. I personally think I would get bored and lonely very fast.

oh man, honestly this can’t be further from the truth, regardless of your age, marital status… belgrade in particular and europe in general would be anything but boring for US folk!

[deleted]

Re: Ask HN: Are you unable to find employment?

#387

Post by brickfaced »

krapp wrote: post #345
brickfaced wrote: post #298

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just not true. The H1B visa program didn't exist until the 1990s. In fact, until passage of the Hart-Celler Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965, the US was under strict immigration restrictions established by the Johnson-Reed Act of 1924. During that time we assimilated the Ellis Islanders, beat the Great Depression, out-produced the Axis to win World War 2, split the atom, rebuilt Europe and Japan, electrified t…

>During that time we assimilated the Ellis Islanders, beat the Great Depression, out-produced the Axis to win World War 2, split the atom, rebuilt Europe and Japan, electrified the country, fed the world with our Green Revolution, invented the transistor, cured polio, invented the integrated circuit, and built the Empire State Building, Golden Gate Bridge, Hoover Dam and interstate highway system. Cheap tech labor be…

>Because I'm pretty sure America needed plenty of foreign help to split the atom

The whole point of my comment was that such truly high-skilled immigrants were able to arrive and thrive during the term of the Johnson-Reed Act. The rest of your critique on that point is ill-founded and irrelevant.

>Almost everyone has something made by Sony or Panasonic, but no one has a Zenith TV anymore.

Yes, tariffs will be needed to reshore those industries.

>The "Green Revolution"... depended entirely on the cooperation of foreign governments, investment and labor. The US absolutely did not "feed the world with our Green Revolution," just as the US did not "win World War 2."

You'd do well to read a biography of Norman Borlaug. He did a lot more than repackage Haber-Bosch. American charity during the 1960s and 70s is the only reason tens if not hundreds of millions of Indians are alive today. Whether that's ultimately in America's best interest remains to be seen.

The sweeping socialist polemics and corny "y'all" was very funny, thanks for the laugh.

Re: Ask HN: Are you unable to find employment?

#388

Post by silisili »

bdangubic wrote: post #358
dachworker wrote: post #356

Earlier quoted context omitted.

NYC is a much more attractive location than Warsaw, not just because of the salary, so I fully expect the open roles in NYC to be filled very quickly. I always wondered why American companies have offices in such unattractive locations. Last time I saw a company whose only European office was in Belgrade. Who are you going to convince to move to Belgrade to work for your company, lol? This is not like the US were all…

On a below-average US salary living in Belgrade your quality of life would be equal to a 7-digit salary living in the US. Not to mention that you would be in one of the safest cities in the World for women and children and generally would live better than Seinfeld on Park Ave :) and of course everyone speaks english…

I'll say this: I once had to talk with a team in Belgrade. I was honestly not looking forward to it due to language barrier and such, but I didn't know anything about Serbia.

I was pleasantly surprised that that team spoke better English than most folks in the US. Every one of them.

If that's any indication of how most of the city speaks, I don't think any English speaker would have a bit of trouble communicating.

Re: Ask HN: Are you unable to find employment?

#390

Post by abnercoimbre »

wsintra2022 wrote: post #366
ajmurmann wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And once they are hear the H1B somewhat locks then into an employer gutter damping salaries

It’s spelt here. To hear means to use your ears.

Small tangent but I’ve seen a sharp increase in typos in the front page comments throughout December. Very surprising to me (I’ve been here since 2016.)
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