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Software company's response to Australian government abolishing migrant visas

rexsoftware.com

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Re: Software company's response to Australian government abolishing migrant visas

#41

Post by sanswork »

empressplay wrote: post #38
sanswork wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Say you need a senior developer and there are none on the market so you offer mine a 10% increase and free chocolate bars to come work for you. You now have a senior developer and I'm now in need of one but there are none of the market. When you suggest someone pay developers more to hire them away from the competition you aren't solving the problem you are just moving it to another company.

Wages go up, people flood into the field -- I'm not sure what the problem is there? Don't we collectively want software development to become more financially attractive so that more students choose to study it?

You seem to fail to understand the difference between a junior and an intermediate to senior dev and think they are interchangeable.

A bunch of new people flooding into the field are zero use to companies that need higher level employees to grow. And will be zero use for a number of years.

I get planning for the future is good but it doesn't solve the current problem at all.

Re: Software company's response to Australian government abolishing migrant visas

#42

Post by yakult »

mkj wrote: post #25
yakult wrote: post #6

They should just replace the whole shebang with 'pay us $x to get a visa, $y for PR, $z for citizenship'. Company wants to hire from overseas? Fine, they can figure out how to split the cost between company and employee, with zero government involvement. Rich people from the US seeking doomsday shelter? A few million dollars, a clean criminal record and less than 48 hours in the queue. Much easier than the current sy…

A business investment visa already is that.

No, a business investment visa is an invitation to come over and set up a minimum viable, likely-not-profitable 'business' for the duration it takes to satisfy requirements. The government gets peanuts out of it, the 'investors' waste years of their lives playing pretend.

It's a shit show. Much better to just charge cash, speed up the processing and let in those who actually think they can make money despite the steep cost of entry. And if they fail anyway - reserve a small portion of the ticket price to put them on the dole.

Re: Software company's response to Australian government abolishing migrant visas

#43

Post by catmanjan »

yakult wrote: post #40
catmanjan wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes money makes things easier. I think our biggest problems now are housing and the future of employment (aka the youth), unfortunately neither of these issues needs more money involved.

Do you seriously think those problems can't be fixed with money? Increasing housing supply costs money. Upgrading the education system costs money. UBI and other social services for people replaced by automation costs money. Investment in innovation and basic scientific research costs money. In the same way, preventing monoculture is a simple case of directly subsidizing people's visas/PR/citizenship on various groun…

Yes I do.

Increasing the supply should fix the problem but there are so many other factors at play in the Australian housing market. Tax concessions, foreign investment, wage stagnation, youth unemployment make it a very hostile market for many people. It's all too big to fail and prices need to go up to keep everyone's super from devaluing.

Investment in the education system won't lead to big change without deregulation of university either, something which is very unpopular.

UBI plus the policy you suggest would lead to a system where people can pay once and never have to work.

As Atlassian said, the problem with innovation isn't the money, it's the government which is only now just catching up with the new way business is happening.

>In the same way, preventing monoculture is a simple case of directly subsidizing people's visas/PR/citizenship on various grounds, humanitarian or otherwise, under my scheme.

If we still can't even select uni entrants based on those holistic measures what chance do we have of selecting migrants?

Re: Software company's response to Australian government abolishing migrant visas

#44

Post by brokenmachine »

sanswork wrote: post #20
cynix wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sounds like they're simply expensive to hire, not necessarily hard to find.

Say you need a senior developer and there are none on the market so you offer mine a 10% increase and free chocolate bars to come work for you. You now have a senior developer and I'm now in need of one but there are none of the market. When you suggest someone pay developers more to hire them away from the competition you aren't solving the problem you are just moving it to another company.

I thought the whole premise of capitalism is that jobs will be paid what they are worth according to supply and demand.

If the wages go up because there is more demand (or it's a job that people are unwilling to do), you will be amazed how quickly more devs will appear.

Putting the band aid of cheap workers from overseas will not fix the problem either.

Re: Software company's response to Australian government abolishing migrant visas

#45

Post by sanswork »

brokenmachine wrote: post #44
sanswork wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Say you need a senior developer and there are none on the market so you offer mine a 10% increase and free chocolate bars to come work for you. You now have a senior developer and I'm now in need of one but there are none of the market. When you suggest someone pay developers more to hire them away from the competition you aren't solving the problem you are just moving it to another company.

I thought the whole premise of capitalism is that jobs will be paid what they are worth according to supply and demand. If the wages go up because there is more demand (or it's a job that people are unwilling to do), you will be amazed how quickly more devs will appear. Putting the band aid of cheap workers from overseas will not fix the problem either.

I've answered this elsewhere in these comments.

Re: Software company's response to Australian government abolishing migrant visas

#46

Post by brokenmachine »

sanswork wrote: post #41
empressplay wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wages go up, people flood into the field -- I'm not sure what the problem is there? Don't we collectively want software development to become more financially attractive so that more students choose to study it?

You seem to fail to understand the difference between a junior and an intermediate to senior dev and think they are interchangeable. A bunch of new people flooding into the field are zero use to companies that need higher level employees to grow. And will be zero use for a number of years. I get planning for the future is good but it doesn't solve the current problem at all.

The current problem is that companies are unwilling to pay what they need to to get what they want.

I understand your point about there not being enough senior devs locally, but I'm still iffy about that being true. I would accept that argument if the wages had doubled in the past few years or so, but that hasn't happened. The companies aren't trying hard enough.

Re: Software company's response to Australian government abolishing migrant visas

#47

Post by sanswork »

brokenmachine wrote: post #46
sanswork wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You seem to fail to understand the difference between a junior and an intermediate to senior dev and think they are interchangeable. A bunch of new people flooding into the field are zero use to companies that need higher level employees to grow. And will be zero use for a number of years. I get planning for the future is good but it doesn't solve the current problem at all.

The current problem is that companies are unwilling to pay what they need to to get what they want. I understand your point about there not being enough senior devs locally, but I'm still iffy about that being true. I would accept that argument if the wages had doubled in the past few years or so, but that hasn't happened. The companies aren't trying hard enough.

So I'm guessing you have found your attempts to hire senior devs in Australia to be easy?

Re: Software company's response to Australian government abolishing migrant visas

#48

Post by ZvG_Bonjwa »

empressplay wrote: post #31
sanswork wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm guessing you haven't had to try and hire devs in Australia before if cost of developers is what you think the main problem is.

I've recently had a pretty good look at the Melbourne software dev market and there are seemingly plenty of senior devs looking for work, companies here appear to have the "pick of the litter" when hiring. Maybe you're just in the wrong part of Australia?

Melbourne is a positive outlier and not at all representative of the rest of Australia. Finding senior devs in Brisbane is an insanely arduous process and its not uncommon to see positions take 6+ months to fill (at least at the places I've worked at). Even when companies start throwing money around like crazy, the talent just isn't there.

I've heard that Sydney isn't so great either. Once devs hit seniority they run along to join a hip Melbournian startup, get gobbled up by Atlassian, or just migrate to Silicon Valley.

Re: Software company's response to Australian government abolishing migrant visas

#49

Post by sanswork »

empressplay wrote: post #32
sanswork wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And those students might be helpful for these roles in a decade. So do you expect these companies to survive just cooling their heels until then?

That's a bit of a gotcha argument. Besides, it's my experience there are plenty of senior devs to go around.

Your experience is apparently going to a meet up to help a friend find a job. I'm not sure your experience is reality.

Re: Software company's response to Australian government abolishing migrant visas

#50

Post by brokenmachine »

sanswork wrote: post #47
brokenmachine wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The current problem is that companies are unwilling to pay what they need to to get what they want. I understand your point about there not being enough senior devs locally, but I'm still iffy about that being true. I would accept that argument if the wages had doubled in the past few years or so, but that hasn't happened. The companies aren't trying hard enough.

So I'm guessing you have found your attempts to hire senior devs in Australia to be easy?

I'm not a hirer but a lowly employee.

See my recent edit. I keep an eye on the market and I haven't seen any crazy wage increases.

I'm not against being convinced of the point but atm I'm just not convinced that there's no senior devs to find, at the right price.

Also, how long have these visas been going on for?

It's kind of a chicken-and-egg problem I guess. Because of the band-aid fix of the visas, the wages never go up and there's no extra incentive for people to become devs.

edit: I can't reply any more, I guess because it's become too deep.

You say I don't know the problem, but I am actually intermediate-level IT, and atm I have little incentive to move up because the wages are not commensurate with the extra responsibilities in my opinion.

So I feel I do have some knowledge of the problem at least anecdotally, as I would personally be applying for those positions if I felt I would be fairly paid for the extra stress/time/responsibility.

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