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Let the Other 95% of Great Programmers In

paulgraham.com

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Re: Let the Other 95% of Great Programmers In

#301

Post by Htsthbjig »

hacknat wrote: post #271
austenallred wrote: post #12

I really want to believe this, but I'm not sure that I do. Of course the tech companies want to hire people from overseas; being able to hire someone from India for half the cost but have them live in the US so there's some level of accountability/trust is a no-brainer. Huge new, cheap talent pool. But, if I'm an entry-level, US-based programmer, what I see are floods of cheap talent, some with questionable skills, c…

I agree with you. Fortunately we already have a system that lets only the exceptional talent in. It's called the "American" Higher Education System, and it's pretty good at bringing the top talent to the U.S. already. Perfect? Of course not. Good enough? I think it is. Normally I don't hold someone's wealth against them, but on this issue it's hard for me not to be a little prejudicial.

"Fortunately we already have a system that lets only the exceptional talent in. It's called the "American" Higher Education System"

Because, you know, people educated outside the US, like Europe, South Africa or Japan, have not value whatsoever.

It is American E.S who lags behind them. e.g Most educated Europeans need to speak at least 2 to 3 languages fluently.

You also believe Chinese, African and South American will remain in the dark forever.

I have an advice for you: travel the world.

Re: Let the Other 95% of Great Programmers In

#302

Post by killedbydeath »

ta75757 wrote: post #62

Paul Graham is fighting for his side. I hope any developers here are smart enough to fight for theirs. He's arguing that the same companies who colluded illegally to drive down the wages of the "best" programmers, now have no interest in lowering their wages when they're arguing for increased immigration. LOL.

Is "your" side US-born developers? I was born outside and was able to immigrate to the US on H1B. For the last few years it is very hard for my friends to do the same. I wish they were given the opportunity. In no way they are inferior to Americans. US became what it is because of openness to immigration. But these days it's easier for engineers to immigrate to Europe or Asia than the US. It may have long-term competitive consequences for the US companies as there is definitely a lot of programming talent outside the US. However if you view this as a zero-sum game with a "they came for our jobs" xenophobic vision, you of course would not care about that.

Re: Let the Other 95% of Great Programmers In

#303

Post by [deleted] »

edgyswingset wrote: post #101
austenallred wrote: post #12

I really want to believe this, but I'm not sure that I do. Of course the tech companies want to hire people from overseas; being able to hire someone from India for half the cost but have them live in the US so there's some level of accountability/trust is a no-brainer. Huge new, cheap talent pool. But, if I'm an entry-level, US-based programmer, what I see are floods of cheap talent, some with questionable skills, c…

What you touched at the end is part of a bigger problem, I think - people who write something as inconsequential as a shopping website, or Yet Another Chat App, are not worth $150,000/year. Maybe one out of one-hundred of those folks could use their talent on something that demands a wage like that outside of the absurdity that is the Bay Area. I don't feel the talent pool will be diluted so much as your run-of-the-m…

[deleted]

Re: Let the Other 95% of Great Programmers In

#304

Post by oceanstone »

> A great programmer doesn't merely do the same work faster. A great programmer will invent things an ordinary programmer would never even think of. > ... a great programmer might invent things worth 100x or even 1000x an average programmer's salary.

I like how Paul slips in some encouragement for engineers wanting to start their own businesses.

Re: Let the Other 95% of Great Programmers In

#305

Post by Terr_ »

kaykay wrote: post #209
pastProlog wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. Over 100,000 H1-B's are coming over every year. This keeps discussing exceptional programmers. You mean we need more than 100,000 exceptional programmers coming over every year? The reality is that the idea that even 10,000 of these people are exceptional programmers is a laugh. Every year 100,000 H1-Bs can come in. To believe this article, we'd have to pretend that we have a big wall up preventing these dozens…

Where did you get the > 100000 H1B's number?

Easy enough to find through the Wikipedia citations.

153,223 visas were issued in 2013, although some of that is to continue the presence of people who were already here in previous years... It's not all new arrivals.

Re: Let the Other 95% of Great Programmers In

#306

Post by [deleted] »

mrottenkolber wrote: post #233
fsloth wrote: post #219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are basically saying that programming is not engineering but a (highly technical) craft and the best way to foster talent in it is to utilize the age old master/apprentice relationship? If so I agree. Universities do give the necessary theoretical muscles for a lots of things but they surely do not prepare for the craftmanship aspects (beyond informal cultural indoctrination, if any). I wonder if there could be a…

I never really did academia so I wouldn't know. To be honest, I think the age of academia is over. I have more against these institutions than I see value in them. I say get rid of them, we can do better. Why can't we teach "theoretical muscle" outside of universities? Wait, was the purpose of universities to maintain the state's control of education? Have they been putting thoughts in chains? Kept science away from…

[deleted]

Re: Let the Other 95% of Great Programmers In

#307

Post by fdesmet »

pg may be right in some respects, but that doesn't mean his opposition is wrong.

pg's argument cannot explain the reality that we've all seen: companies hire droves of H1B folks who are anything but exceptional.

Only a fool fails to understand why.

Re: Let the Other 95% of Great Programmers In

#308

Post by hacknat »

rewqfdsa wrote: post #277
wallflower wrote: post #236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> and eventually someone will have the idea. Having read the HipHop paper, I am pretty sure that most people would not have been able to contribute meaningfully to that type of revolutionary project. Execution is everything.

What advances in computer science were necessary for HipHop? It's a bog-standard JIT system of the kind we'd been building for years. Sure, it's well-executed, but it's hardly a "revolutionary project" to those who weren't born yesterday.

@wallflower xargs?

Re: Let the Other 95% of Great Programmers In

#309

Post by waterlesscloud »

andrewmutz wrote: post #276

I have a quick question for those arguing against PG's position: Do you genuinely believe that increasing the number of talented software engineers emigrating to the United States is bad for the United States? Or bad for you ? In the same way that I would argue for public policy that benefits us all (not just me), I think we should have immigration policies that benefit everyone, not just Software Engineers.

Drive down the wages of your most talented citizens and yes, you hurt the entire country.

Re: Let the Other 95% of Great Programmers In

#310

Post by aortega »

davidw wrote: post #296
ta75757 wrote: post #62

Paul Graham is fighting for his side. I hope any developers here are smart enough to fight for theirs. He's arguing that the same companies who colluded illegally to drive down the wages of the "best" programmers, now have no interest in lowering their wages when they're arguing for increased immigration. LOL.

> I hope any developers here are smart enough to fight for theirs. I'm confused. I'm a developer, originally from the US, who lives in Europe. Is an Indian guy who works as a developer on my side? How about a German woman? Is a guy in Alabama willing to work for cheap on my side? Is someone like PG, whose actions have created a shitload (that's the metric shitload, not the American version) of companies completely on…

Labor can be seen as a scarce resource. If a US developer want to maximize profit he needs to be as scarce as possible.

PG and startup employers are in the reverse situation: they need to commoditize labor as much as possible to maximize their profit (labor can be 80% of the fixed expenses in a IT business).

A developer residing outside US needs to support PG at first so he has access to bigger profit, but once he's in US, he's in the same position as the US developer (he needs to become scarce).

This is basic economic theory.

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