Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

We Don't Have a Talent Shortage. We Have a Sucker Shortage

resumeskills.us

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

801–810 of 810 posts

Re: We Don't Have a Talent Shortage. We Have a Sucker Shortage

#801

Post by kraigie »

bayesian_horse wrote: post #773
TuringNYC wrote: post #742

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> The idea that job applicants get offered wages which they perceive as too low does not mean that there is not a shortage of similar talent on the market, even at reasonable wages, if there even is such a thing. In the Bay Area, I rarely hear friends complaining of wages "perceived" as too low, usually it is more absolute in terms or it wont pay rent . This isnt usually the case for entry level or medium level jobs…

So, what are the experienced engineers with families and an expensive life style doing then? Unless they prefer to be unemployed, or work outside the industry (and Silicon Valley), their turning down a job offer because of too low compensation does not preclude a real talent shortage. Usually they are already employed at a wage that pays rent, right? All this talk about low wages seems to assume recruiters and employ…

>So, what are the experienced engineers with families and an expensive life style doing then?

>or work outside the industry (and Silicon Valley)

There are plenty working in the industry outside of silicon valley there are more bootstrapped SaaS than before.

The young developers fed up of silicon valley looking for a family are a great snatch for these kinds of companies.

>All this talk about low wages seems to assume recruiters and employers are stupid

I think it's more about the combination of low wages and complaint about talent shortage, either is fine but both is pretty stupid.

>If they think they could make a higher profit by doubling the wage offer and thus hiring an additional engineer, they would do it.

Yup,which tells us that they are not really that concerned about the hiring of another engineer.

Re: We Don't Have a Talent Shortage. We Have a Sucker Shortage

#802

Post by exelius »

rightbyte wrote: post #775
exelius wrote: post #728

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IBM doesn’t belong; their revenue has been flat for 20 years and they have almost no influence in the tech world anymore. My clients view IBM as a consulting company with a market position somewhere between Infosys and Accenture. On the other hand, Microsoft is still quite relevant to the future; Azure is getting a lot of traction in the enterprise world as an alternative tech stack to AWS. VSTS is rapidly displacing…

Ye, there are not much hype around IBM. But IBM is surely more technically forerunners than Netflix. Is VSTS any good? Or is it from the ash into the fire? I would love to get rid of Jira at work.

I agree; and if you want to have a conversation about media you need to include the top 4 telecoms as well. Netflix doesn’t really belong with the company it’s often mentioned in.

And yes, VSTS is good. The interface and tools are easy to use, the defaults are way better than Jira and it integrates with damn near everything (even tools it replaces, like Jenkins).

The Microsoft of the late 2010s is almost the polar opposite of the late 1990s Microsoft. It’s all about open tools that link together via proprietary orchestration platforms. Those platforms provide the bulk of the business value, so I’m ok with them not being as open.

Re: We Don't Have a Talent Shortage. We Have a Sucker Shortage

#803

Post by dangero »

kraigie wrote: post #799
dangero wrote: post #631

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As an employer it is not my job to assess and pay an employee their market value. I’m not a career counselor. I have positions I need to fill and those have salaries associated with them. Someone who is overqualified might accept a role when I think they could do better, but that’s me projecting a vision onto them. The employee has mobility to reject my offer, or leave and seek a better job. Also people are complex I…

>As an employer it is not my job to assess and pay an employee their market value Then how do you do competition market research? Are you okay with it if it turns out that the offer you make is either 3x or 1/3 The market rate? >The employee has mobility to reject my offer, or leave and seek a better job. As long as you never whine about a 'talent shortage' when they reject the offer or leave, that's fine. You made t…

An employee’s market value has nothing to do with the job openings I have available. You’re equating the two. When I do salary research I do it based on similar roles that are open. Let me give you a concrete example: A CS Phd applies to be our front desk receptionist. I’m offering them the value of the position they applied for, which has nothing to do with the fact that they could be making $300K+ doing CS research.

Re: We Don't Have a Talent Shortage. We Have a Sucker Shortage

#804

Post by bayesian_horse »

kraigie wrote: post #793
bayesian_horse wrote: post #652

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's no such thing as "worth X amount of compensation". The way it's supposed to work is that you and your employer (who represents the capital) generate a return from your joint venture. But the actual return is hard to predict. And there is no fair and obvious way to divvy up the return. So it comes down to negotiation power. There also may not be any condition where you and the capital agree to join. The capita…

>And there is no fair and obvious way to divvy up the return How about x% of average revenue per employee. Usally around 100k to 300k. So ARPE minus expenses = average salary. Probably around 60k to 70k for most companies.

There is no shortage of ideas how to distribute profits, and no shortage of arguments which one is "fair" or which one is the best for whatever reason.

This particular scheme means you are paying janitors as much as people who went to school for a decade or more. Some people would not find that equitable and fair. Few academics would find that offer competitive.

And depriving the executives of large salaries also means you are increasing the incentive for corruption. If somebody has the power to squander a billion Dollar, you better pay her more than 100k.

And you forgot to include capital gains, or you included it with expenses. Whoever owns the equity will want some return, otherwise they will invest elsewhere (or not at all).

Re: We Don't Have a Talent Shortage. We Have a Sucker Shortage

#805

Post by bayesian_horse »

kraigie wrote: post #801
bayesian_horse wrote: post #773

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So, what are the experienced engineers with families and an expensive life style doing then? Unless they prefer to be unemployed, or work outside the industry (and Silicon Valley), their turning down a job offer because of too low compensation does not preclude a real talent shortage. Usually they are already employed at a wage that pays rent, right? All this talk about low wages seems to assume recruiters and employ…

>So, what are the experienced engineers with families and an expensive life style doing then? >or work outside the industry (and Silicon Valley) There are plenty working in the industry outside of silicon valley there are more bootstrapped SaaS than before. The young developers fed up of silicon valley looking for a family are a great snatch for these kinds of companies. >All this talk about low wages seems to assume…

On the other hand, other tech-hubs than Silicon Valley have the same talent shortage. Even outside the US, the picture is always the same, except for maybe developing countries.

Again: Individual movements, individual market mismatches, don't disprove a talent shortage.

Your arguments only make sense if you assume the worth of an engineer to be virtually limitless, or else there is no shortage. That companies should ruin their business models by treating engineers like kings and handing them all the profits.

Re: We Don't Have a Talent Shortage. We Have a Sucker Shortage

#806

Post by luk_hol »

bayesian_horse wrote: post #722
TuringNYC wrote: post #681

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is totally fine, but it isn't a "shortage". It is poor product market fit, poor pricing, or just a bad business. If a business cannot support input costs, the business is just a bad business. If I start a business that sells Ferraris for 20k, then complain how I cant buy them cheap enough wholesale, there isn't a shortage.

This example certainly constitutes a "shortage", especially from the point of the employer. He has a demand which he can't fulfill. Due to not fulfilling it, he has problems investing his capital as productively as possible. The idea that job applicants get offered wages which they perceive as too low does not mean that there is not a shortage of similar talent on the market, even at reasonable wages, if there even i…

I cannot fully agree on this. What is your definition of "shortage"?

From a supply/demand perspective, there is no such thing as a shortage. At least not without further qualifications. Prices adjust so that the demand meets the supply. In theory that should always be possible. Concept of a shortage per se does not have a place in this theory. You can only speak about a shortage/oversupply at a certain price level but such a thing has no significant meaning because that price level is just an arbitrary number.

Thus to speak about a shortage you must add some other components to your model. Those other components will always be partially subjective (i.e., what you want to maximize?) and fairly complicated. (I believe.)

In any case, one could for example argue that there are not enough engineers to fill the roles "needed" in the economy at a sustainable price. (What is "needed", though?) But I am very sceptical about such a claim, considering the huge profits many US companies are making, even the software companies for that matter.

Re: We Don't Have a Talent Shortage. We Have a Sucker Shortage

#808

Post by seattle_spring »

rubicon33 wrote: post #755
seattle_spring wrote: post #600

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> A high school student with a week of JavaScript and HTML could write AirBnB I actually love it when a developer says something like this, because it tells me way more than even 2 full days of pairing or interviewing could: They know absolutely nothing about software at scale, and are probably extremely arrogant to boot.

I actually love it when I get a response just like yours. It informs me that you're probably a JQuery developer, personally offended because you believe that your work is incredibly advanced and challenging. In reality, what you do is probably some of the easiest "coding" to have ever come to fruition. Yet, you toss out the "at scale" comment ad nauseam because you think it'll make you sound important. Just by the fa…

Yeah all those useless frontend engineers (sorry, "jQuery developers") at Facebook and Google, being paid $500k+ / year to work on their 10k hits / day blog.

Edit: Also, I'm not your buddy, pal.

Re: We Don't Have a Talent Shortage. We Have a Sucker Shortage

#809

Post by BrandonMarc »

Reminds me of what I hear over and over and over about the "crisis" shortage of truck drivers in America, and because of this "crisis" they just have to spend billions developing automated trucks that will put millions of current drivers out of work.

It's simple economics - if there truly is a shortage of drivers, offer a higher salary. Yes, it really is that simple.

There's no shortage of drivers - or of people who would become drivers. There's a shortage of people who will accept a low-ball wage, whereas with an autonomous truck you don't have to deal with inconvenient things like salary, health insurance, union dues, etc.

Re: We Don't Have a Talent Shortage. We Have a Sucker Shortage

#810

Post by AndriyKunitsyn »

neffy wrote: post #761
pedrosorio wrote: post #525

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Not to mention we get free health care The (many) issues with US health care do not affect upper/middle class professionals. From a "patient perspective", as long as you are employed as a software engineer in SV, health care is not a concern at all (insurance is covered by the employer). If anything, it is superior to anything I experienced in Europe.

I've experienced American healthcare and European healthcare. I'll take European any day of the week, over the Silicon valley version (and seriously if that's the best, god help the rest. I'm actually lucky I survived the US system.) The issue in America is essentially that the system is paid by piecework. So the entire system optimises for the number of tests/procedures/operations etc. that can be performed. And tha…

That's interesting, because I had a different experience. What Europe are you talking about here?

In the Netherlands, a patient should not expect from a doctor to conduct any tests at all. I had no experience with the Dutch healthcare myself, but I've heard horrendous stories about it, for example how Irish expat went to a doctor with a problem of pain while swallowing, received nothing more than an advice "well, swallow less, then" (like in a bad joke about doctors), went home to Ireland a got diagnosed with a throat cancer there.

Post reply on HN