It's a matter of money and career perspective. Being a good software developer requires a lot of learning. The job can be quite stressful and your knowledge devalues continuously because of tech change.
In the long run other professions probably are more attractive, don't require permanent re-learning and at least provide an option to climb up a career+$ ladder.
Provide better pay & conditions and you'll see more engineers.
Why is there an engineer shortage?
11–15 of 15 posts
Re: Why is there an engineer shortage?
#12For hyper environments like SV, probably because there is a shortage of hyper individuals in the general population. For more general environments, it's probably not a shortage of engineers, just a shortage of engineers who will enthusiastically work at the rates that employers would prefer to pay.
I think there is also a different thing going on. Most companies expect their
hires to already have significant experience, but little are ready to train
new hires to match (future) needs. It's understandable where it comes from:
employees are not that loyal anymore, so any training would be an investment
that returns to somebody else.
On the other hand, times when companies were loyal to their employees are long gone, and this is pretty much why employees switch jobs so often nowadays.
Re: Why is there an engineer shortage?
#13Almost any situation described as a labor shortage is actually just a complaint about the price of said labor. Offer a $10 million/year salary, and see how easy it is to get the engineers you're keen on. "That would be a ridiculously high salary", you say? Great, you've established my point; now we're just haggling...
Re: Why is there an engineer shortage?
#14This gem from Joel On Software (2000) blog is very relevant:
"Now, let's review some microeconomics. In a free market, it is almost axiomatic that the market always clears. That's a technical term that means that when somebody tries to sell something, if they are willing to accept the market price, they will be able to sell it, and when somebody wants to buy something, if they are willing to pay the market price, they will be able to buy it. It's just a matter of both sides accepting the market price.?"
Re: Why is there an engineer shortage?
#15Almost any situation described as a labor shortage is actually just a complaint about the price of said labor. Offer a $10 million/year salary, and see how easy it is to get the engineers you're keen on. "That would be a ridiculously high salary", you say? Great, you've established my point; now we're just haggling...
Also with such a high salary, people would quit very quickly just because they would be able to retire.