IT employment grew by just 700 jobs in 2023 • Hacker News Board

Re: IT employment grew by just 700 jobs in 2023

#541

Post by everforward » Tue, Jan 09, 2024, 5:37 PM UTC

schnitzelstoat wrote: post #498

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #304

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

In my dealings with companies that had European offices, European workers had far higher non-salary costs that brought the total compensation numbers closer together.

Eg Europeans usually had much more time off. The costs of that time off scale with salary.

I do think labor arbitrage could work, I just don't think it would be in Europe. I suspect the total employee cost in Europe approaches that of the US, the money just goes to non-salary places (taxes, time off, labor protection, etc).

Re: IT employment grew by just 700 jobs in 2023

#542

Post by grotted » Tue, Jan 09, 2024, 5:46 PM UTC

unethical_ban wrote: post #427

symlinkk wrote: post #376

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean bartenders are unironically useless. If there was a machine that dispensed highballs I would much rather prefer that than leaning over the counter for 20 minutes waiting for my drink while the bartender flirts with some girl.

Well, you're going to the wrong bars!

Last weekend I got free beers for knowing the band on a bartender's shirt. We shot the shit about music while I waited for my friends. Made my day.

Pubs started as "public houses". What's the point if you don't know the regulars? Why go out?

Imagine Cheers with robo Ted Dansen. (Actually, that might be awesome, for very different reasons...)

Re: IT employment grew by just 700 jobs in 2023

#543

Post by avasii » Tue, Jan 09, 2024, 5:49 PM UTC

ChumpGPT wrote: post #338

orochimaaru wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think a lot of big-co are setting up subsidiaries overseas and hiring there. It's different from the contract based offshoring model that happened in 2007 or so which had rather disastrous results. I know my company has and plans to have almost 1/2 its IT workforce as direct employees overseas.

As soon as your company hires a Indian CIO, you're done. More and more of the staff will be H1B's and over time they will transition the work to India. I could name a very big corporation doing that right now. The CIO they just hired (last 6 months) is an Indian who just finish doing this to the previous corporation he was a CIO at. Both these companies are the largest in their respective industries in the world.

I will guess that the two industries are agricultural machinery and transportation.

Re: IT employment grew by just 700 jobs in 2023

#544

Post by grotted » Tue, Jan 09, 2024, 5:51 PM UTC

oooyay wrote: post #310

nostrademons wrote: post #240

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My company's doing apprenticeships; take somebody with no CS education, not even a college degree, and teach them to code. It's an interesting model, I remember folks on HN calling for more companies to try it since it seems to have had some success in Germany, but I predict a lot more security bugs and unmaintainable code in the near future.

I'm not college educated and I've been coding since I was about nine in different capacities. I was inspired by two engineers my dad worked with that were the same; one of them was a SWE and the other was a Systems Engineer. I ended up dropping out before I hit any of my CS courses, so I basically did a repeat of high school. The stuff you need to know for most jobs can be learned through books (DS&A); everyone, incl…

What's DS&A?

Re: IT employment grew by just 700 jobs in 2023

#545

Post by grotted » Tue, Jan 09, 2024, 5:54 PM UTC

madsbuch wrote: post #481

nightski wrote: post #285

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't necessarily think it needs to be government run. The best schools in America are private. Ironically government support (the federal student loan system) is imo largely responsible for crazy high tuition in the U.S. Maybe there is just less demand in Denmark? But I feel like demand surged here, and with easy access to capital it drove prices to absurd levels.

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…

Classic American mentality. "If we don't have it here, it can't work anywhere else."

Re: IT employment grew by just 700 jobs in 2023

#546

Post by grotted » Tue, Jan 09, 2024, 5:56 PM UTC

mschuster91 wrote: post #306

pc86 wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Serious question: Why is the answer to firms automating everything "give me money for doing nothing" and not "get a different job?" Don't get me wrong I would love shorter work weeks, fewer hours a day, etc. for the same pay. That was the promise of all this additional productivity, after all. But even that is still getting paid for work. I just can't rationalize the idea of paying an entire population for nothing.

> Serious question: Why is the answer to firms automating everything "give me money for doing nothing" and not "get a different job?" Because eventually, there will not be many jobs left that cannot be automated. Cleaning and some of the trades will remain as long as we get iRobot-style droids with dexterity and intelligence to match a human, as will politics and management, but everything else will get automated. Th…

People fought and died in the streets to get OT pay and 5 day workweeks in the US. The CIA has assassinated union leaders in the Global South for decades. You tell me.

Re: IT employment grew by just 700 jobs in 2023

#547

Post by oooyay » Tue, Jan 09, 2024, 6:02 PM UTC

grotted wrote: post #544

oooyay wrote: post #310

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not college educated and I've been coding since I was about nine in different capacities. I was inspired by two engineers my dad worked with that were the same; one of them was a SWE and the other was a Systems Engineer. I ended up dropping out before I hit any of my CS courses, so I basically did a repeat of high school. The stuff you need to know for most jobs can be learned through books (DS&A); everyone, incl…

What's DS&A?

Data structures and algorithms

Re: IT employment grew by just 700 jobs in 2023

#548

Post by HDThoreaun » Tue, Jan 09, 2024, 6:39 PM UTC

red-iron-pine wrote: post #204

bryanlarsen wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

According to the latest jobs report, average wages are up 4.1% in 2023.

where would they be if wages kept up with inflation, or value generated? 4.1% sounds nice, but inflation has been at, what, 7% over the last couple of years?

Inflation is currently 3.1%

Re: IT employment grew by just 700 jobs in 2023

#549

Post by HDThoreaun » Tue, Jan 09, 2024, 6:42 PM UTC

gedy wrote: post #484

boplicity wrote: post #325

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a second part to this argument. There would be riots, for example, if agricultural workers were paid rates that would make Americans willing to do this. If you think food inflation is bad now, that would be off the charts. Like it or not, we benefit from cheap labor, across many, many different industries.

> If you think food inflation is bad now, that would be off the charts. I don't have a stat but looking in past the manual labor costs of food is very small percentage.

True for staple crops, not fruits and vegetables. Many of those need to be hand picked still. Until theyre automated those farms would not be able to make any sales if they paid American level wages because everyone switch to cheaper imported produce. All the farms in the central valley and imperial valley could not exist without farm migrants.

Re: IT employment grew by just 700 jobs in 2023

#550

Post by HDThoreaun » Tue, Jan 09, 2024, 6:51 PM UTC

disgruntledphd2 wrote: post #521

wizerdrobe wrote: post #506

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don’t Europeans typically work less hours than Americans and do so as a point of pride? I’ve spent over a decade lurking HN, Stack Exchange, later Reddit - and I always seem to see Europeans coming in with the “We work 32 hours at most in my country” or “We have a 35 hour standard here.” Wouldn’t that necessarily imply a reduction in productivity?

Nope, because productivity is output divided by hours worked, so working longer can decrease productivity.

I think youre just using a different definition of productivity. Hourly is valid, but yearly is too.