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The Myth of the Science and Engineering Shortage

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Re: The Myth of the Science and Engineering Shortage

#71

Post by edanm »

x0x0 wrote: post #64
eranation wrote: post #58

There is no shortage of bad programmers, there are plenty of medium programmers, it's also not that hard to find decent programmers. It's harder to find good programmers, but much harder to find great ones. The thing is that a great programmer can do 5X more than a good programmer, that can do 2X more than a decent one, that can do 2X more than a medium one. It's not just the number of features they can write in a gi…

Sorry, but that's nonsensical. 1 - virtually no supposed 5x or 10x programmer makes even 2x more. If people are really 5x, why on earth don't I see $300-$500k salaries? Particularly given the fall in communication costs ala Brooks, it would be an enormous win for employers 2 - at least in the bay area, there would be tons and tons of highly qualified candidates if moving to the bay area wasn't a financial nightmare (…

"1 - virtually no supposed 5x or 10x programmer makes even 2x more. If people are really 5x, why on earth don't I see $300-$500k salaries? [...], it would be an enormous win for employers"

Some reasons you don't see higher salaries:

1. It's very hard to measure the difference in programming ability directly. Good programmers also tend not to realise just how much better they are, and are generally unwilling/unable to demand higher salaries (not because they're programmers, but because most people by default aren't good at these things.)

2. Good programmers tend to cluster around good companies, one of their advantages being that they're surrounded by people at their level. Think Google, Facebook. Over there, if everyone is as good as you but making the same as you, then you don't feel there is a disparity.

3. Some programmers DO make 300-500k. You just don't hear about it.

4. More importantly, some people make 300-500k in roundabout ways. E.g. some great programmers work as freelancers and make that amount, because that's one way to solve the problem of companies being unwilling to pay so much more.

5. Some programmers with more business-fu start consultancies and startups, making lots of money that way in a non-obvious way.

Re: The Myth of the Science and Engineering Shortage

#72

Post by keypusher »

All I know is from my own experience, and that experience is that I have recruiters calling up at least once a week and a few more via email looking for software engineers. I never got that kind of attention when I was working a cash register in retail, and my friends with liberal arts degrees certainly aren't getting it either.

Re: The Myth of the Science and Engineering Shortage

#73

Post by PhantomGremlin »

jshen wrote: post #57
mehrdada wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> it's that very few good engineers come in the door I have one possible answer for this issue: Well, no one in the Valley (to best of my knowledge) really advertises that they are going to pay a meaningful multiple of what's considered the market rate to potential employees. So from the potential employee side, it is reasonable to assume that they are going to get paid around the "market rate". The Valley seems to b…

I think we pay very well because when we do find a good person, we offer them enough to get them unless there is some non monetary reason they went with another company. We do not have a problem with people turning down offers, we have a problem with finding enough good people. Another interesting wrinkle to this is the fact that hiring someone at a high salary is a big gamble. How confident can you really be after i…

> we have a problem with finding enough good people

I'd love to see one of your job postings. I'd bet at least one of the following is happening:

1) unreasonable academic requirements

2) unreasonably broad list of required previous experience

3) unqualified HR people pre-screening and discarding resumes

You need to be willing to "kiss a lot of frogs", i.e. do phone screens and onsite interviews, of people who might generally be suitable. Then be willing to hire not-quite-perfect candidates who are willing to learn and are willing to work hard.

> How confident can you really be after interviewing someone?

I've seen an increase in contract employment postings. That might be a way to go. Start someone on a six-month contract. You might find some takers. Not everyone is ready to "get married" after a single days worth of job interviews.

Re: The Myth of the Science and Engineering Shortage

#74

Post by droithomme »

jshen wrote: post #57
mehrdada wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> it's that very few good engineers come in the door I have one possible answer for this issue: Well, no one in the Valley (to best of my knowledge) really advertises that they are going to pay a meaningful multiple of what's considered the market rate to potential employees. So from the potential employee side, it is reasonable to assume that they are going to get paid around the "market rate". The Valley seems to b…

I think we pay very well because when we do find a good person, we offer them enough to get them unless there is some non monetary reason they went with another company. We do not have a problem with people turning down offers, we have a problem with finding enough good people. Another interesting wrinkle to this is the fact that hiring someone at a high salary is a big gamble. How confident can you really be after i…

Please state the salary you offer, the location of your company, whether or not you pay full relocation, and the skill set you are looking for.

Re: The Myth of the Science and Engineering Shortage

#75

Post by azth »

hueving wrote: post #67
x0x0 wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry, but that's nonsensical. 1 - virtually no supposed 5x or 10x programmer makes even 2x more. If people are really 5x, why on earth don't I see $300-$500k salaries? Particularly given the fall in communication costs ala Brooks, it would be an enormous win for employers 2 - at least in the bay area, there would be tons and tons of highly qualified candidates if moving to the bay area wasn't a financial nightmare (…

>virtually no supposed 5x or 10x programmer makes even 2x more. If people are really 5x, why on earth don't I see $300-$500k salaries? Small sample size. These types of developers are very few and far between. I worked with one that I keep in touch with and he is making somewhere between 400 and 500k at his current job. His output of good code was pretty amazing to see. He did manage to produce the work of 5 average…

What line of work is he in?

Re: The Myth of the Science and Engineering Shortage

#76

Post by tsotha »

matteotom wrote: post #69
tsotha wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>On the public policy side, there is probably a belief that more STEM professionals will increase the economic competitiveness of the nation, even if there is a surplus. Except that it doesn't work, and it should be obvious why. There's no reason to bust your ass in college to enter a field the government floods with foreigners. The more people the government imports the less attractive the field looks to domestic st…

As somebody graduating from high school in a bit, I have to ask: what would you do differently today? It seems to me that, as somebody who can do comp sci reasonably well, that's my best option right now.

If I were going to do it today the first choice would be business degree and MBA from Harvard or Yale. I'd be willing to borrow what it took, because the payoff is there. In the US today this is the ticket to the C-Suite.

If I couldn't get in I'd try to get an ROTC scholarship for as prestigious a place as I could manage and graduate without borrowing money. Either business or liberal arts, though the latter case is a minefield of worthless programs, so it would require some research.

Re: The Myth of the Science and Engineering Shortage

#77

Post by NAFV_P »

mjn wrote: post #50
mehrdada wrote: post #9

I think it is important to avoid using the term STEM and specifically dissect it in the discussions about shortage. Computer Science is a very peculiar part of STEM and not all of the STEM fields face the same challenges. As Hadi Partovi of Code.org put out eloquently in his testimony before Congress[1], there is a difference between enrollments in Computer Science and STEM in general. For instance, in US high school…

I think it is important to avoid using the term STEM and specifically dissect it in the discussions about shortage. Computer Science is a very peculiar part of STEM and not all of the STEM fields face the same challenges. I think there's a bit of a rhetorical issue with this, though. The dominant narrative is that we have too many people doing soft, fuzzy, weird, useless liberal-arts degrees. Studying things like lit…

> To a certain extent I think the whole STEM construction is based fundamentally on trying to hand-wave across this gap: math and physics are prestigious and perceived as hard/rigorous, while computer programming is in demand. The union (not intersection) of these two fields is STEM, which perceives itself as rigorous + hard + in-demand.

[0] was linked in the article, detailing the unemployment rates and earnings among most college majors, mentioning 7.8% unemployment among recent college CS graduates and 5.6% for experienced ones. This is used to support the claims of the article.

If CS was broken down into specialised fields, like the rest of the STEM, you would get a more accurate picture.

[0]https://georgetown.app.box.com/s/og6p8y9x1yeacejk1ci0

Re: The Myth of the Science and Engineering Shortage

#78

Post by firstOrder »

jshen wrote: post #57
mehrdada wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> it's that very few good engineers come in the door I have one possible answer for this issue: Well, no one in the Valley (to best of my knowledge) really advertises that they are going to pay a meaningful multiple of what's considered the market rate to potential employees. So from the potential employee side, it is reasonable to assume that they are going to get paid around the "market rate". The Valley seems to b…

I think we pay very well because when we do find a good person, we offer them enough to get them unless there is some non monetary reason they went with another company. We do not have a problem with people turning down offers, we have a problem with finding enough good people. Another interesting wrinkle to this is the fact that hiring someone at a high salary is a big gamble. How confident can you really be after i…

ExxonMobil brought in $469 billion in revenue last year, on which they made $44 billion in profit. It's not a big gamble for them at all if some programmer who gets $100k, $150k or whatever does not work out.

Of course, some bootstrapped company, or some company which had minimal angel funding or the like is taking more of a gamble, but everything is a gamble when you have no product/market fit and only 18 months or less worth of cash in the bank.

Re: The Myth of the Science and Engineering Shortage

#79

Post by jedanbik »

I must study politics and war that my sons may have liberty to study mathematics and philosophy. My sons ought to study mathematics and philosophy, geography, natural history, naval architecture, navigation, commerce, and agriculture, in order to give their children a right to study painting, poetry, music, architecture, statuary, tapestry, and porcelain.

John Adams US diplomat & politician (1735 - 1826)

Re: The Myth of the Science and Engineering Shortage

#80

Post by fredophile »

edanm wrote: post #71
x0x0 wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry, but that's nonsensical. 1 - virtually no supposed 5x or 10x programmer makes even 2x more. If people are really 5x, why on earth don't I see $300-$500k salaries? Particularly given the fall in communication costs ala Brooks, it would be an enormous win for employers 2 - at least in the bay area, there would be tons and tons of highly qualified candidates if moving to the bay area wasn't a financial nightmare (…

"1 - virtually no supposed 5x or 10x programmer makes even 2x more. If people are really 5x, why on earth don't I see $300-$500k salaries? [...], it would be an enormous win for employers" Some reasons you don't see higher salaries: 1. It's very hard to measure the difference in programming ability directly. Good programmers also tend not to realise just how much better they are, and are generally unwilling/unable to…

I don't buy the hard to measure argument. CEOs at large companies make a tonne of money. This is usually justified by saying that they are more skilled than the average CEO but this kind of skill is also hard to quantify. Why does this argument work for CEO pay but not programmer pay?

If there was really a shortage you'd see salaries for programmers going up. Instead there are documented cases of companies colluding to keep pay down. Based on the high salaries you could argue that America has a CEO shortage and needs to increase visas for foreign CEOs.

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