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IT employment grew by just 700 jobs in 2023

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Re: IT employment grew by just 700 jobs in 2023

#491
post #394
post #352

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Something I advocate for in the UK is that we should actively suppress wages of industries like healthcare and agricultural with cheap foreign labour, while providing access to good and affordable education so that native workers maximally benefit from the migrant labour underclass. Specifically I think we should bring foreign workers here on mass to work in specific industries then deport them if they're unable to f…

> some people disagree with the ethics of importing a migrant underclass and those very same people would also "disagree" with higher prices for essential goods/services.

Yeah exactly.

When people cite the benefits of mass immigration, eg, "where are all the nurses going to come from it we don't import workers?". I'd argue what they're actually saying here is, "if we don't create a migrant underclass who is going to work for the crappy pay we give nurses?". The only reason we need migrant workers to fill these roles is that they don't pay attractively enough for natives to apply to them.

The main benefits of immigration on a native population is that you create a migrant underclass. So if that's what we seem to want then our current immigration system could be improved. That's really all I argue.

Re: IT employment grew by just 700 jobs in 2023

#492

For most of my career, I was being hounded by various recruiters virtually every day. For the past few years... crickets . This told me everything I needed to know, regardless of the many whom have been in denial.

Yeah I've noticed a distinct reduction in linkedin spam too.

Maybe you're the wrong person to ask this to but.. how does one get noticed at all without participating on something like LinkedIn. I think the privacy implications of a platform like that or any public resume are pretty worrying (essentially a timeline of ones whole life) but I don't understand how to even get any job prospects without this kind of self marketing. Not having a clue about marketing but having technical domain specific skills I just find it completely impossible to find any position where one is valued/compensated fairly.

Re: IT employment grew by just 700 jobs in 2023

#494
post #273

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Takes a low IQ person to accept ridiculous workload for kinda ok money

No offense, I'm curious: do you happen to be younger than 30?

No lol, why would anyone work crazy hours for not an impressive salary?

Re: IT employment grew by just 700 jobs in 2023

#495

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is and interesting, and very American, point of view. In Europe all countries have tuition free universities, in Denmark people even get a government stipend of ~1000 USD/month by the government. And yet, there is availability on most programmes (like computer science) It seems like the market powers do not apply for American universities? When tuition (demand) surges, it should be profitable to expand supply (n…

>In Europe all countries have tuition free universities The UK doesn't (and didn't before Brexit either).

Sorry my statement should have been moderated: "In EU most countries have institutions with insignificant tuition costs"

Re: IT employment grew by just 700 jobs in 2023

#496

> Based on analysis of US Bureau of Labor Statistics data by Janco, news that the IT industry added just 700 jobs following an estimated 262,242 jobs lost amid mass layoffs is shocking, but not surprising. So it isn't that only 700 jobs were created, it's that despite the massive layoffs everyone is reporting on and focusing on, there was actually a small net positive in job growth. > Currently, there are almost 100K…

Yeah but over 100,000 people graduate in CS/IT per year. 700 net jobs is rough. (I should know - several of those graduates are old friends of mine who struggled massively to find jobs.)

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Re: IT employment grew by just 700 jobs in 2023

#497
post #357

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder how many “unfilled” roles are ghost jobs. I keep seeing the same roles re-posted or just never filled.

I'm an unemployed staff/sr level software engineer who's been unemployed for 4 months. The only interview I got in the past 3 months was due to an internal referral. I'm seeing a lot of similar re-posts.

Basically my story, but with a longer timescale.

I was getting rejected from jobs that seemed a perfect fit for my resume. End up getting a job I wasn’t qualified for on paper via referral.

And some of those jobs that rejected me are still reposting the same damn job monthly.

Re: IT employment grew by just 700 jobs in 2023

#498

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That sounds like a frustrating experience. I wonder what caused this problem? We’re the people leading your company’s subsidiary’s hiring efforts incompetent? Was it a management issue? It’s not like there’s something about being German or British or Indian or Filipino or Australian, as opposed to American, that makes you think input validation doesn’t matter. With contracted outsourcing the root of the problem is ge…

Companies can have internal intermediaries. Suppose you go to a country and talk to a charlatan who tells you that they have many qualified people and they'll work for 30% of what you're paying in the US. You hire them and tell them to hire more staff there. Then it turns out there are many qualified people in that country, but they don't work for 30% of what you're paying in the US, because it's a global market and…

You kind of can though. In Europe even 30% of a US FAANG wage would be an incredible wage here. 50% certainly would be.

There are other problems like timezones etc. and maybe payroll taxes are higher here too but I think the possibility for labour arbitrage is definitely real.

Re: IT employment grew by just 700 jobs in 2023

#499
post #366

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To me it looks like tech is just falling more in line with other industries pay/workload. I think there are many who joined the tech workforce during the pandemic thinking the norm was to make $135k while doing 10 hours of real work a week from home, twiddling a few lines of bootcamp level javascript to appease your largely absent boss. Many may forget, or not have been there, but 10-15 years ago tech jobs were notor…

Software industries outside of VC are still pretty normal, decent pay but in line with other local industries, nothing jawdropping. Working pretty hard still, but balanced enough compared to the overtime all the time days. That's going to depend on your company.

I’ve had this conversation with my boss, we’ve settled on about 3-4 modes of compensation.

Lowball, either because on ignorance (bro I have an app idea!), intention (fast buck artists preying on folks that don’t know better, maybe it’s a BS startup with 80k S.E. base and worthless ISO), or something like government.

Middle-Road, all the normal companies in all those “flyover” states or something to that affect. You’ll get paid a reasonable market rate for a reasonable expectation of work, e.g. an American 40 hours work week. If you’re lucky these might be a small tech-shop, but no flashy VC driven mania. I’ve worked at several, currently work at one. From the inside looking out the ZIRP issues are nonexistent, Cost-of-Living raises might not be as high as I’d like but I have 0 worries about the trends of tech layoffs I read of here.

Upper-Middle, places that are similar to Middle Road in that they are not flashy VC driven firms but “real” companies delivering profitable software or tech-enabled products and services but they also highly value their IT as a force multiplier. As a result the compensation might be a fair bit higher than Middle Road but nothing insane. You’re not walking about with 300-500k Total Comp. Nice 200k TC for a quality Senior here for a normal place of living. I’ve worked at one such firm but something of a unicorn.

Finally, VC world where the rules don’t matter and the points are made up… or something like it. Compensation is ludicrous and often detached from real-world value provided.

I know this is neither exhaustive scientific, but rather to play with the idea that there are different patterns of compensation than the 5 hours of work and 500k of compensation I see some thinking is both reasonable and deserved (trolling?)

Re: IT employment grew by just 700 jobs in 2023

#500

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Staying current with skills is always part of an IT professional's job. Gotta love capitalism. CEO sees some shiny new thing and all the sudden some poor shlub's entire livelihood is fucked.

I am realising that this is what taxes pays for in Denmark. I have a masters in computer science (5 year, postgraduate + thesis, Aarhus University which is top 100 and even higher for PL + semantics, which is my thesis subject) that I received tuition free and I am continuing with a professional degree in business at a reasonable tuition at 10k USD for the entire degree . It appears like continual learning should be…

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