What is the Tech Jobs Situation in Late 2004? 1138
CareerConfused asks: "Today I came across an ad in the NY Times, put out by Microsoft, Micron, Level 3 (among others) that claimed that the H-1B visa quota for FY2005 has already expired (it claims the quota expired the first day of FY2005, which started just about a month back). OK. On the one hand, we have
stories of techies not finding jobs; and on the other, we have stories from businesses which claim that lack of H1s is killing their business, as well as public advocacy (like that ad in NYT). So, what is it? Are we in another boom, with jobs going a-begging and companies requiring more H1s to fill them? How come I haven't noticed this in the form of a fatter paycheck (or an Aeron chair, or a fooseball table in the cubicle)?" What have you experienced in your searches for technology-based jobs? Is it still hard to sell your hard-earned skills or are things looking up?
While its one thing to claim that the lack of H1Bs is killing your business because Americans don't want to move to Fort Wayne, Indiana. It's quite another to say that you can't find a job in Silicon Valley. What's needed is an overall view of how tech jobs are doing across the country. What areas are in desperate need of technical skills and what areas are suffering from a shortage of jobs?
Heck, join the military (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Heck, join the military (Score:5, Insightful)
I am a UNIX admin, 10 years experience, currently admin'ing about 1000 Sun servers. I am definitely a "new school" type admin, utilizing Perl and other tools to work smarter, not harder. B.S. degree in science/math field from large university.
I haven't found the market to be horrible in the Philadelphia/Delaware area. I think I've been lucky, but I have not ever taken a pay cut to this day.
I think good UNIX and network people will be in demand for the forseeable future. Not so sure about Windows admins and coders.
Re:Heck, join the military (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Heck, join the military (Score:4, Insightful)
We've got more H1B's per capita than you can shake a stick at. Right now, I think I'm one of less than a handful who are US Citz, the rest here are H1B's. And believe me, there were more than enough people locally to perform these jobs.
It's not a matter of NOT finding people to perform the job, it's a matter of companies not finding people to do the job FOR WHAT the companies feel like paying. Never mind you that there are plenty of qualified candidates, don't be fooled, there are. Companies will use the boo-hoo-hoo excuse to not provide higher compensation packages.
There ARE people out there to do the job, that CAN do the job, companies just don't feel they're worth it. And frankly, the excuse of comparing a BS ( or higher ) educated CompSci individual with a migrant farm worker, is not only ridiculous...it's getting old. Detractors....find a better analogy. I doubt you will, but by all means, knock yourselves out trying.
And for those "chosen" few. You can STILL be a Republican, and speak up about Outsourcing being as major an issue as is "Homeland Security". If you don't get it, you just don't. Don't worry, the rest of us won't hold it against you. We're just as responsible as the rest of us in the GOP, we just don't feel like giving up our jobs.
Re:Heck, join the military (Score:4, Insightful)
My company has been active in layoffs (we just bought an online travel site and have lots of "redundancies") but in speaking with a recuiter I usually use to GET people - he commented that he had placed lots of folks from my company who were leaving (either laid off or sick of the parent company - which I am as well).
Further - not to be brutal, but Colorado is tech heavy but had a LOT of scuds who were overpaid and underperforming in the bubble. Since, some talented folks HAVE left CO and others have found jobs they aren't willing to leave. The market for really good people is still tight. Where are you located and what's your skillset? I could always use a bad@ss Linux/*nix admin...
That being said, our governor IS worthless
Re:Heck, join the military (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Heck, join the military (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Heck, join the military (Score:5, Funny)
You're kidding. There's no place in Delaware that is 4 hours away from any other place in Delaware.
Re:Heck, join the military (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Heck, join the military (Score:3, Interesting)
I am thrilled to make 6/hr working at a bookstore. PS I have all your certifications and experience.
Its just no one wants Americans doing computers anymore.
I am happy I at least HAVE A JOB!
Re:Heck, join the military (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Heck, join the military (Score:4, Funny)
How on Earth can you single handedly admin 1,000 servers properly?
That's why he still has a job: he's doing the work of 20 sysadmins. (Someone posted a stat that the ratio is one sysadmin for 20 computers, but IME it's more like 1:50, especially with Solaris.)
Re:Heck, join the military (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Heck, join the military (Score:3, Funny)
Of course, that was the weekend the Marines all left the base because the Air Force was giving the sysadmins real guns. Never did get the ammo, though...
Re:Heck, join the military (Score:3, Insightful)
The other route you could have taken would have been to become a DoD contractor. They tend to have fewer responsibilities, make more money in the short and long term, and rarely get deployed overseas into combat zones.
M
Re:Heck, join the military (Score:5, Insightful)
Basic Training (8 Weeks): Rolling in mud. Getting yelled at. Pushups. KP.
AIT (8-40 Weeks depending on MOS): "Learning" how to do your wiz-bang commo-crypto stuff from NCOs who are so incompetent that the only place the Army dare send them is . . . AIT.
First Duty Station (1-2 years): Pick up cigarette butts. Run a buffer.
Second Duty Station (1-2 years): Pick up cigarette butts. Run a buffer. Do something related to your MOS on occasion.
Third Duty Station (remainder of enlistment): Supervise the picking up of cigarette butts. Teach FNGs how to run the buffer without banging the shit out of the walls and/or exhausting themselves. Do something related to your MOS fairly regularly. Be shit upon by NCOs for every little thing that goes wrong in the unit.
Enjoy.
-Peter
Thanks a lot (Score:4, Funny)
I probably won't sleep for days, now.
Re:Heck, join the military (Score:5, Insightful)
The military is good for some people I suppose, but after knowing someone this closely I can't believe anyone with a family would opt for that kind of life. I've heard it's better if you can go the route of a CO, but the majority of the armed forces aren't that high level. It's definitely not like the commercials on TV with soldiers jet skiing and playing golf -- at least not in my personal opinion formed by observing from afar.
True (Score:3, Interesting)
Yes I agree, their marketing is a little dubious. Most of the jobs they show you that look interesting are the ones that require you to be an Officer and hence have a college degree. I have the utmost respect for people that would m
Re:Heck, join the military (Score:3, Informative)
If he was having issues as severe a
Re:Heck, join the military (Score:5, Insightful)
Anyone who things they're getting a get-out-of-iraq-free card when they join the military with a non-combat MOS should seriously think again.
Re:Heck, join the military (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Heck, join the military (Score:3, Interesting)
still tight in Houston. (Score:3, Informative)
Re:still tight in Houston. (Score:3, Interesting)
Unfortunately, the vast majority of oil co's are Microsoft shops.
Re:still tight in Houston. (Score:3, Insightful)
well (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:well (get out while you can!) (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, if other places are like where I work, people are looking for jobs because they are tired of VPs who got fat bonuses this year telling them "you don't get a raise this year, and you are lucky you even have a job." They are willing to treat their employees like crap because the market will bear it. You can only take that for so long before you start looking. Because I work for a very large company, if the market picks up it would be a year or two before I would see any benefits from it (like a raise). Therefore, my best option is to get out as soon as possible. It may take longer to accomplish this because of the market, but that is what I am working towards.
I don't get it. (Score:3, Insightful)
Moved here, and had a great paying job as a Data Analyst in NYC within a week.
If I can do it... either you're spending all of your time just looking online (which is doomed for failure) or you just don't know how to properly search/interview for a job.
An employment councillor can help you with either problem.
Re:I don't get it. (Score:5, Funny)
If I can do it...
Most slashdotters are falling down a few stages before the "getting married".
Re:I don't get it. (Score:5, Insightful)
Seriously, dude, just because you had a single good experience in one of the hottest IT markets in the country does not mean the less fortunate are all doing something wrong. Sheesh.
Re:I don't get it. (Score:5, Insightful)
Its not really "doomed", but last I heard, the odds were stacked against you. At the end of the "boom" times, most Monster job ads supposedly got around 100 resumes each.
Perhaps knowing what that number is now is of greater interest to everyone than "I joined the army" or "You suck if you don't have a job".
Re:I don't get it. (Score:3, Insightful)
But since you're quite the ASSumption maker...
My wife wanted to move to Canada when we got married... she's a highly trained research scientist; she could get a job there in a second. I quit an even higher paying job then I have now to marry her and move to the US.
She wanted to move there because (in her opinion) it's safer, cleaner, friendlier, more liberal, and the general quality-of-life kicks the US in the ass.
I convin
Re:I don't get it. (Score:3, Insightful)
He said "My wife and I have a long established history of a relationship; for you to insinuate that I "used" her in any way just to come to this country, is reprehensible and disgusting."
Is it really so hard to believe that 2 people in separate countries can be interested in each other without some hidden motive?
Re:I don't get it. (Score:3, Funny)
Well, since I get all my socialization from movies and TV, yes.
(Ba dum bum. I'll be here all week. Oops, week's over.)
You don't get it (Score:3, Insightful)
We have a government obsessed with moral values yet we allow this sort of behavior just so people can get jobs that born/raised Americans need.
I suspect you're misreading him. It's entirely likely he married for love or such reasons. His "If I can do it" is likely reminding the complainers that there are jobs available if they search. If he can find them...
Meh, or I co
Looks Pretty Good From Here (Score:5, Informative)
1. Google's still screaming for people to join them (well, OK, they then axe highly-competent people during their interview process, but I'm sure it's for the best
2. When I was looking for a job in late August, I ended up in a competitive bidding situation between two companies;
3. The company for which I work now (which has a fabulous environment, IMHO), is looking to hire people, so far with no great success. Of course, we're also looking for pretty decent people
It's getting better, I think.
Re:Looks Pretty Good From Here (Score:3, Insightful)
Point to the jobs (Score:3, Informative)
Put your hyperlink where your mouth is, and point to the jobs. That can be either on your company website careers section (don't expect people to find it via google for quite a while), or the listings at your preferred online job site if you do that kind of thing. Otherwise we'll assume you're just blowing smoke like most of the corporate executives are doing.
Re:Point to the jobs (Score:3)
But seriously, look, there's a reason I don't mention where I work here. I don't want my behavior here to be at all attached to my company, or for my company's behavior elsewhere to be at all attached to perceptions of what I write here. I'm not writing here as a company representative, I'm here as an IT (now software-testing/project management/whatever) guy on his personal time.
So get off the "you must be lying about the jobs" thing
Re:and your company would be?.... (Score:3, Insightful)
And I certainly am not looking for 1,236,731 resumes to come in from Slashdot readers because "look! A job!"
An old firearms instructor of mine had a saying -- "You can never miss fast enough" -- to emphasize that if you do someth
I live/work in the SF Bay Area... (Score:5, Insightful)
I've spent about two and a half years now in a fairly stable job at a big company. I work with people I either like or don't mind, the work is sufficiantly satisfying even considering that I have to occassionally deal with big company political bullshit, the hours are reasonable and I (obviously) still have time to do some light /.'ing. All of this is a significant improvement over the
two startup jobs I had back in 2001 where the hours were insane, the
people were nutjobs and I was very, very unhappy.
OTOH, I've been more or less in limbo in terms of pay. Despite adding considerably to my skillset, I've gotten extremely modest raises that have more or less kept up with inflation if you don't count in gas prices.
Aside from that: Items like Aeron chairs and foosball tables and game systems in the break room and people keeping excessively odd hours can stay gone. I never liked those -- maybe I'm an exception, but I'm at work to *work*, I want to get my work done and leave. I'm working so I can afford to have a life outside of work, not because I really get off on plugging away on my TPS reports. The absolute worst part about all of those "perks" were that they slowed down the whole works and as a side effect created an expectation that you should live at work more than the 8-9 hours a day God intended. "Where's Bob? I need him to look over something." "Oh, he's playing in the Wednesday Tekken Tourney, he'll be out in an hour or two"...
Back to the subject at hand, though: The environment now is such that I could probably go make more money someplace else, but to be honest I am *extremely* hesitant to stick my head back out there after getting bitchslapped so badly last time.
Well said, my brother (Score:5, Insightful)
Aside from that: Items like Aeron chairs and foosball tables and game systems in the break room and people keeping excessively odd hours can stay gone. I never liked those...
I was going to post more or less the same thing but you beat me to the punch. I wanted to smack the submitter when I read him whinning about not seeing foosball tables making a return. All that shit was complete waste. Those days are gone, my friends. Here at slashdot we like to laugh at how stupid management is. But they are smart enough not to get burned twice on buying a lot of pointless shit like that.
I think it's time for programmers to stop waxing nostalgic about crap and start worrying more about how to make programming in the US (as opposed to outsourcing it) a valuable commodity. Time to start worrying about saving up enough money that you might actually get a chance to retire when Social Security collapses. Time to start paying more attention to whether a prospective employer has a solid medical plan rather than counting the number of foosball tables or arcade games they have in the break room. In short, it's time to grow up.
GMD
The Bay Area isn't *that* expensive... (Score:3, Informative)
There are a few other high items (gas is expensive), but beyond that things can be had here for the same price or lower than elsewhere in the country. And Bay Area salaries *are* higher than elsewhere, not to mention that this place is where all the tech companies are. If you're cool with renting, living here isn't out of reach
Submitter new here (to America)? (Score:3, Insightful)
See, managers wised up. They found out that you can either hire a domestic techie for 50-80k/yr or hire an imported techie for 25-35k/yr. As an added bonus, the imported techie will be thankful for the opportunity he has, and do everything he can to appease the management that hired him.
I'd _love_ to see a tariff on 'imported' labor. However, I'm not an economist.
Re:Submitter new here (to America)? (Score:5, Informative)
Of course the system is gamed, but it's not as if there are no mechanisms to prevent sweatshop hiring.
Re:Submitter new here (to America)? (Score:3, Insightful)
Why are IT jobs exempt anyway?
Re:Submitter new here (to America)? (Score:5, Informative)
If that's happening, then you already have legal options without needing new legislation for tariff's on imported labor: H-1B's are, by law, supposed to be paid in line with US workers -- one of the hurdles in getting a H-1B is getting the state's department of labor to sign off that the wage level is kosher. Most of the stories you here about dramatically underpaid foreign H1-B's turn out to be urban legends.
I was a H1-B for six years, and I was always paid in line with U.S. workers, both at my company and in the industry in general.
Re:Submitter new here (to America)? (Score:3, Interesting)
Oh yeah, I'm sure the labor department is totally up on what the current wages are among, of all things, *tech* jobs. Riiiight.
Actually that's untrue (Score:4, Informative)
As noted in a footnote to the article), U.S. employers *must* pay foreign workers the prevailing wage for their job fields and show that qualified U.S. workers are not being passed over.
In my experience the BCIS (formerly INS) has pretty stringent about these requirements and as a result companies end up paying H1 workers the *same* amount as they would pay a domestic worker. Please do the research or atleast RTFA.
Re:Actually that's untrue (Score:3, Informative)
Yeah- but the H-1b is a new graduate when the US techie has 10 years of experience, therefore 25k-35k is the going wage for the experience and the business still saves money. And in my experience, getting the BCIS to actually investigate anything requires several months of 8-hour-a-day work researching and showing your ev
Re:Submitter new here (to America)? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Submitter new here (to America)? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Submitter new here (to America)? (Score:3, Informative)
It doesn't work that way. There are laws in place that forbid companies from hiring foreign workers at a lower wage than local force. Any company doing what you describe is breaking the law.
Have you ever considered that some of us are just BETTER than locals for the job offered?
Re:Submitter new here (to America)? (Score:5, Insightful)
The general practice is to lay off, say, "Senior Developer III" who made $80k/yr, and got the job by having 8 years experience with C. Then you close the position. You list a new position in your paper: "Junior Tech I", 8 years experience with C required, starting salary $35k. No takers? "See," you say to the Labor Dept. "We need immigrants to fill this job." So the Labor people look to see what you're paying other "Junior Tech I" people, and you don't have any others, you just made the position. So they look on their little charts to see how much they should make. "Hm, Tech, thats $50k starting. Junior -$10K. Entry Level I position, -$5K sounds about right".
And this is how the company gets the Senior Developer III for $35K.
If you don't believe it, see any of the other responses in this thread with cites for how Intel abuses it across the board, as well as other companies that have been caught abusing it.
Changes (Score:5, Insightful)
Other than that, it's the same old situation:
1. Employers seeking ridiculously diverse skill sets. What do you want, a software developer with ten years experience, or a GIS specialist with database skills? Pick ONE!
2. Employers requiring experience or expertise in obscure software, but who are unwilling to train. (We're smart; we can learn your industry-specific database front-end for god's sake!)
3. Shops with a depressing preference for Microsoft and IBM languages and software. LAMP jobs and their ilk are comparitively scarce, and therefore highly competitive.
4. HR people who don't know what they want/need. The other day someone posted a "need" for a C# developer with more than five years experience.
So employers are feeling a crunch from the H1 issue. Fine, I'll take that underpaid position! Where is it? We've talked about this before, and I understand that employers are trying to thin the pool by posting stringent (or ideal) requirements, but I think it's getting out of hand and alienating worthy applicants in the process.
As for the relocation bit, I don't buy it. I would welcome the change to relocate almost anywhere in the world for a decent job. I would appreciate a system that makes it easier for employers willing to hire from a remote job pool to find job seekers who are serious about relocating. Monster's [monster.com] system is just too limited.
Re:Changes (Score:3, Insightful)
You're assuming they meant they want five years of C# experience. Having been involved in a number of job listings, while its easy to poke fun at a listing like that, its accurate. They need a developer who knows C#. They need a developer with at least five years experience.
As anyone on here probably knows, professional software development exper
No no no.... (Score:3, Informative)
What it IS, is that companies want to fill CURRENT US Jobs (Hear: YOUR job) with an H1 worker who will work for less pay...
Want a better job? Quit, denounce your citizenship in the US, move to India - file for H1B visa and wait for the 2006 roundup. HA!
Seriously, though - in a previous
Market's still a little shallow in DFW area... (Score:3, Informative)
D.C. Area is doing well (Score:3, Informative)
Actually...everything I just said is a lie. There are no jobs in D.C. or Northern Virginia. Stay away.
Re:D.C. Area is doing well (Score:5, Informative)
Solution: retrain! She went out to some temp agencies and farmed her resume around, then taught herself Visio when a client requested it. She spent the last few weeks down in the District building contacts and making money while working on a Post Office project. If you want jobs, you can find jobs - just don't expect people to throw money into your lap as per the bubble-days of the 90s.
For those not in the know, a security clearance is a pre-punched meal-ticket - and you don't have to be in DC or Virginia. If you're able to find work with someone who's willing to sponsor your security clearance process, and you've no particular qualms about working for The Man, take it. A Secret clearance will keep you employed anywhere in the nation. A Top Secret brings a higher salary and even more options to choose from, though laying hands on one is sometimes more a matter of fate than desire.
Re:D.C. Area is doing well (Score:3, Informative)
And theres the BIG IF. I found a lot of jobs where the HR would have been happy to have me, but they needed someone who could get to work right away and not sit around for 6 months pushing unimportant papers around.
Since you can't get a clearance by yourself (why not?), you're pretty much at the mercy of the BIG IF. And trust me, if anyone shows up with the needed clearance, unless you're super wonder dog A
The Chronic Labor Shortage (Score:3, Insightful)
here in Seattle... (Score:5, Interesting)
I received sixty resumes in four days. And probably 20% were well-to-over-qualified.
Story of a Recent College Graduate (Score:5, Interesting)
Now I'll only comment quickly that the job is mediocre on a good day and Cincinnati blows. The mid-west it seems is teaming with tech jobs though. That doesn't mean I'll stay here but apparently there are co-op jobs a plenty out here that go un filled while I spent last summer mowing lawns for lack of a co-op position.
From my experience techs jobs are mostly only available in certain areas which are cheaper to operate a business in. People my age don't want to move to the mid west though (I'm moving back [someone give me a job in the Boston area]) and older people have already put down roots somewhere else.
Sympathy for you living in Cincinnati... (Score:3, Informative)
To make the best of a shit place, I would recommend:
Ambar Indian Curry house in Clifton. Simply the best Indian I've ever had, and that includes from my home country of Britain. Chicken Tikka Massala to die for.
The Comet Pub, somewhere in the west of Cinti. Excellent Bluegrass, and they have Newcastle Brown
Re:Story of a Recent College Graduate (Score:3, Interesting)
To put this in perspective, I worked in Tucson, then in Cinti, then back to Tucson. Tucson is a radiant shining city of equality and tolerance compared to Cinti. Christ, am I glad to be out of that shithole.
The racism there is frightening - I'm originally from Britain, from a suburb of London, and after
Not looking (Score:4, Interesting)
Healthcare IT is doing well (Score:3, Informative)
The tricky part is hiring well qualified individuals, which seem harder to pick up these days. I'd recommend the field for anyone looking for a job. Healthcare organizations are pretty stable during economic downturns (people still get sick) and you get to feel like you're making a real difference in people's lives.
The cycle of students (Score:5, Insightful)
New Vistas (Score:5, Insightful)
Fast forward to 1997, when I was graduating college. For years I had worked as an intern / volunteer / gopher in various computer labs and become familiar with the major issues in computer science. For one thing, information technology jobs had not gone away, they had just changed to the point where they no longer looked like they did when I was a kid. On the other hand, some of the scientific coders were having to learn how to code HTML and produce graphics, which was really a strange thing to ask them to do based on their last 20 years of experience.
IT doesn't go away, it intensifies, and so to do IT professionals. My company, www.trellon.com, is almost unable to find qualified people to work on our projects. This is not because their is such high demand for workers we cannot compete, this is because it is tough to find professionals with the right mix of technology and other disciplines in their background. For every 20 people I meet, 16 of them get disqualified based on a lack of subject matter expertise outside of coding. (3 of the rest turn out to be exaggerating on their resume, and the 1 truly qualified applicant seems to always have some issue that keeps us from wanting to make him an offer).
I guess what I see is that there is still demand in IT, sometimes it just doesn't look like the work you used to do. GIS is big right now, I still get calls from recruiters offering insane salaries. OSS programmers are big right now, lots of people are looking for data warehousing solutions that do not depend on Oracle and SQL Server. Flash is big right now, and I regularly receive RFPs for companies willing to build RIAs.
Threads like this irk me a little bit because it always looks like people are waiting too long to ask the right questions. There should be some place where people can just ask what technology is in big demand and hook up with the resources to learn so they can provide a more valuable service. But fretting about the state of the IT industry is like worrying about automated coding back in the 70s - it's here right now, but all we know about IT is that innovation is forever.
M
Re:New Vistas (Score:4, Insightful)
Well, suck it up. If you can't find talent or experience, its because your company hasn't been promoting it from within. Anyone with more than five years experience with GIS likely owns their own business, competing with yours. Face it, the perfect candidate already has your software written for you. Five years ago, linux was a joke. Insurance agencies weren't about to deploy 2.4.2 on their mainframes.
Maybe companies should focus on training and employee development rather than let a position go unfilled for lack of candidates with 3+ years exp?
Neither of the above? (Score:4, Insightful)
> "So, what is it? Are we in another boom"
You're not in a boom, or in a bust. You're in a plutocracy. [m-w.com] So Americans lose jobs and companies hire foreigners for less money to help pay for those multi-million-dollar executive bonuses. You realize your annual salary is probably a fraction of what your CEO's office furniture is worth, don't you? In the grand scheme of things, your worth (my worth) is slightly below that of a desk and chair. Welcome to the new economy.
Re:Neither of the above? (Score:3, Interesting)
Our Director of sales is sitting at a desk that cost the company $120,000.00.. His chair cost more than every regular employee's car in the parking lot at $45,000.00
And then management wonders why the workers have no respect for them.....
Maybe they need to form a focus group to study it.
H-1B quota changed. (Score:3, Insightful)
Pretty consistent. There may be an oversupply of techies in the economy at large, but the H-1B supply is not constant, regardless of demand.
US immigration law "caps" H-1B immigration at a set number. During the boom, it was once 65,000 - high demand and low supply meant that employers couldn't hire enough people, and they bri^H^H^Hpetitioned Congress for a law that would raise the cap. That law said that in 2000, it was to be 115,000, and in 2001-2-3, it was to be 195,000.
As you can see, any time a politician attempts to choose a number for supply and demand and slam it into the market with the fist of legislation, he'll fuck it up, which is precisely what happened. The H-1B cap kept going up, long after the economic bubble that actually made these new employees useful had burst.
So what's the situation now? Well, just like in the last paragraph -- when politicians attempt to legislate the economy, they invariably fuck it up. The law that was passed to increase the cap came with an expiry date. So what happens - after the cap goes up to 195,000 during the recession? Why, it's Fiscal Year 2004 (starting on October 1, 2003)... and now that the economy's picking up, and demand is growing we... well, there's increased demand so let's... let the law expire and cut the H-1B quota from 195,000 back to 65,000! Cut the supply by 2/3! Yay!
And we wonder why our economy's fucked up?
Because even the most cynical of us would never believe our government would be this stupid, a link [wfu.edu].
If you think that's fucking retarded, remember that this is the INS (now BCIS) we're talking about. These are the same folks that, approved the 9/11 hijackers their flight school visas SIX MONTHS AFTER THE ATTACK. [dailyherald.com]
So in the grand scheme of things, the H-1B cap manipulations that seem to be legislatively timed for maximum negative economic effect, are pretty small potatoes.
Stop looking in the wrong places (Score:3, Interesting)
In my job, I get to do all kinds of different things, so it never gets boring. And I don't have to deal with stuff I don't like (managing windows computers). I get to write code, manage certain hardware/software, consult on networking, set policies, create solutions with open source products, etc. FWIW, I am a network security analyst.
Market -speak (Score:3, Insightful)
What they are really saying is that "We can't find enough tech people willing to work at the wage we want to pay them (usually low) with the benefits that we want to give them (usually poor) in the location that we want to employ them (usually low rent for the company, but high rent for the employee - unless he likes commuting an hour one way)."
Jobs are disappearing and salaries dropping (Score:5, Insightful)
So if your job doesn't end up going overseas, they may just centrallize it to a city with a low cost of living and just have generic techs in all other sites.
H1Bs ploy to lower salaries (Score:3, Insightful)
By that measure H1Bs will always be short.
Just sell the Visas (Score:3, Interesting)
This would solve several problems with the current system:
(1) The current "First to the trough" assignment method would disappear. Instead, it would be replaced by a "highest value user" method. Companies that truly need some foreign worker b/c there is no American who can do the job will be able to fill those positions. But, companies that are just trying to low-ball their development costs probably won't.
(2) THe disparity between domestic labor and imported foreign labor would shrink, due to the increased cost of the foreign labor.
(3) Helps pay off the budget deficit.
My experiences (Score:5, Insightful)
The times of being able to post "OH HAY GUYS I CODE AND STUFF" on craigslist and having recruiters trying to beat your door down so you could make 90k to write text parsing code were a fluke.
H1B needs (Score:4, Interesting)
This isn't a case where we want to outsource jobs, and I can promise you that what we're paying our foreign workers is FAR above our regional average. We simply have a problem finding the relevant experience we need, it's that simple.
From someone who has been hiring (Score:4, Interesting)
The sad fact is that there just isn't that many good candidates out there. In the first company especially - they were located in a not-so-desirable geographical area - we could not find good candidates, who were permanent residents or US citizens, at all. We had a bunch of really great H1-B candidates, but due to all kinds of hassles related to hiring H1-Bs we couldn't hire but one of them (there were half a dozen positions open). This REALLY hurt the company.
I see the same situation in my current job, though I suspect since we're located in a little bit of a better geographical area, we're seeing a few more qualified candidates who are permanent residents or US citizens. However, once again, the best candidates were H1-B visa holders, and we couldn't hire them either. This delayed hiring a new developer by about 6 months.
I'm not sure what the problem is, but there just doesn't appear to be enough GOOD candidates out there.
PhD baby (Score:3, Interesting)
What you can do, seriously, is just attend grad school and look for a job while you're there. You have financial security if you're enrolled in a PhD program that pays you (like most sciences), and your resume looks better with the "Master's expected June 2006" at the top. You can always quit (even if your department will hate you) when you find a job.
What this means... (Score:5, Funny)
Programming job observations (Score:3, Insightful)
The market is definitely firming as compared to the Iraq War period when the market was non-existent. But companies (like mine) are addicted to programmers in India. So hiring will be slow. One of our "senior programmers" has said "we have hired that special 1 in 100 person in the past. Now we want to hire that 1 in 1000 and surround him by willing learners." Person for person they are nowhere near as productive as Americans, yet, but they are still paid proportionately even less. I have to think that even in India the number of adequately trained programmers in not inexhaustable. Management likes them because they can be treated like a commodity, which they can understand.
I think the H1B program should be suspendended for tech in the US when unemployment levels rise to a structural level, say 5%. That did not happen in this tech cycle and there is still a massive excess of labor.
The "experience" catch-22 (Score:3, Interesting)
"Sorry kid, you don't have the experience to do this job."
"But how do I get experience if you don't hire me?"
For the past 4 years almost every sector has lost jobs, including tech. The job market seems less stingy than before, but for four years, many people haven't even been getting experience, so how can you hire experienced people?
The tech sector seems pretty stupid to me with regards to handling "experience". In manufacturing, you were hired at a plant because you were eager, hard working, and listened to the boss. You got experience while actually working, and people were in it for the long haul. The tech sector expects you to have 10 years experience in 3 year old technologies. I've also seen few decent training programs designed to hire promising college grads and mold them into the type of worker a company wants. Many of those programs died with the bubble, but they need to come back!!
I've seen several posts on this thread talk about "I can't find good qualified workers" but how many of those posters belong to a company who actually tries to bring in new hirees at the entry level and make their own qualified workers? Or do they just expect to fall off the tree that way?
Silicon Valley Jobs (Score:5, Informative)
Two years ago, the company laid off a few programmers, then six months later, gave everyone a 7% paycut so that they didn't have to lay off more programmers. People took the paycuts in stride.
A year ago, many of the people who took paycuts, left the company. The company hired people to replace them. Lots of qualified candidates applied for the open positions, but the company actually had to pay the new people more than the people who had left the company. It took about two weeks to fill the positions.
This past year, the company saw a huge upswing in business and needed to hire more people. The were two hiring phases, one in the spring and one in the fall. In the spring, there were lots of candidates again, but few qualified ones. The ones that were hired demanded a salary that was ~10% greater than people hired for the same position a year before. It took about six weeks to fill the positions. In the fall hiring, there were far fewer candidates and very few qualified ones. Salaries were still about 10% higher than the previous year. Not all positions have been filled after eight weeks.
Not many jobs in upstate NY (Score:4, Interesting)
My company, one of the major local employers, is slowly abandoning engineering and manufacturing for a strategy of purchased products and service offerings. The number of engineering openings in the company these days is roughly about 1/10 of the total. The rest are sales and marketing, particularly for acquired products.
Government and Corporations are conspiring for H1B (Score:4, Insightful)
Drive a trash truck. (Score:4, Informative)
Yeah, you can laugh all you want. But being a union worker, I get paid more money than I did working on a computer, and the benefits are all there. Yeah, it smells kind of bad and shit, but who cares. It's easy money. Then, I go home and work out my complex investing problems using Mathematica and I make more money by investing in all kinds of instruments. It works pretty well.
Re:they're doing fine (Score:4, Funny)
Re:they're doing fine (Score:5, Funny)
Re:We have been trying to hire people without luck (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:jobs (Score:3, Funny)
Jobs are hard to find while I'm reading Slashdot.
Re:To avert the usual avalanche (Score:3)
Exactly. I would much rather have all the smart and ambitious people come to America. In todays economy I have to compete with them one way or the other. I would just as soon that their house didn't cost two orders of magnitude less than mine.
Re:To avert the usual avalanche (Score:5, Informative)
If you're gonna shoot out numbers at least endeaver to make them remotely accurate. The visa caps varied over the last six years:
1998 65000
1999 115000
2000 195000
2001 195000
2002 195000
2003 65000
2004 65000
This gives us a total of 895,000 total H1Bs over the last six years. I'll be generous and use your figure that only 60% were IT specific, which gives us: 537,000. Now, you idiotically compared your total figure to the number of people in this country to come to the conclusion that your 270k number (which I've already proven is completely wrong) is statistically insignificant. Your comparison is retarded. That 300 million includes people who don't even try to work, like INFANTS for example.
Why don't you compare it to the number of IT workers in the country? Here, let me do it for you: there are roughly 3.3 million IT workers and 537,000 H1Bs which gives us a percentage of (537k/3.3m * 100) 16.2%. Hmmm...16.2 percent doesn't seem insignificant to me. For example, if I told you not to go into a specific bar because you had a 16.2% chance of having your head blown off, would you? Didn't think so.
Oh, and before you tell me that these people are out in 3 years, think again. It costs them all of about $500 to have a lawyer get them a 3 year extension.
Anyway, just wanted to say STFU about shit you know nothing about. Oh, and the moderators should be ashamed for modding this idiot up.
Re:In Portland (Score:3, Interesting)
Dijkstra [RIP] said it best. (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:MOD DOWN (Score:3, Funny)
While its one thing to claim that the lack of H1Bs is killing your business because Americans don't want to move to Fort Wayne, Indiana.
I can see how you might think this is a complete sentence, but on the other hand.