Is Programming a Lucrative Profession? 844
itwbennett writes "A pamphlet distributed by blogger Cameron Laird's local high school proclaimed that 'Computer Science BS graduates can expect an annual salary from $54,000-$74,000. Starting salaries for MS and PhD graduates can be to up to $100,000' and 'employment of computer scientists is expected to grow by 24 percent from 2010 to 2018.' The pamphlet lists The US Federal Bureau of Labor Statistics as a reference, so how wrong can it be? 'This is so wrong, I don't know where to start,' says Laird. 'There are a lot of ways to look at the figures, but only the most skewed ones come up with starting salaries approaching $60,000 annually, and I see plenty of programmers in the US working for less,' says Laird. At issue, though, isn't so much inaccurate salary information as what is happening to programming as a career: 'Professionalization of programmers nowadays strikes chords more like those familiar to auto mechanics or nurses than the knowledge workers we once thought we were,' writes Laird, 'we're expected to pay for our own tools, we're increasingly bound by legal entanglements, H1B accumulates degrading tales, and hyperspecialization dominates hiring decisions.'"
Depends.... (Score:5, Funny)
In my state you must have 10+ years in 5+ languages (even if the language is only 5 years old) and start at $8.00 an hour. Oh, and clerical/janitorial experience a plus!
Re:Depends.... (Score:5, Funny)
Where I can I send my resume?
No, it's $9 - Actual Reply to US Craigslist Post: (Score:4, Informative)
Hello there! .NET Technologies as well as LAMP. My Key expertise is to develop Web Applications using:
Please refer to your opening on job posting site. I, Rajesh Sharma, would like to apply for the job.
I am working as a freelancer from Pune, India. I have over 7 years of experience in IT Industry with
exposure to
1. ASP.NET/C# with SQL Server 2005.
2. PHP/MY SQL.
I have experience working with distributed teams around the globe. I am self desciplined and self
motivated who always belives in quality. I have a very good infrastructure with latest Hardware,
Software, Telephone lines, and Broadband connection for communication.
My hourly rates are $ 9 USD. If you are looking for freelancers, please reply with a time to
discuss things over IM.
Thanks,
Rajesh
--
-actual reply to a craigslist posting in a major US city, looking for a software developer to work on site - received last week.
Just so you know, it's $9 an hour without even shopping around, and that's not a joke.
We all like to pretend this isn't here and it isn't happening, but I would say conservatively half the job market has disappeared in 10 years due to this currency/standard of living imbalance.
Re:No, it's $9 - Actual Reply to US Craigslist Pos (Score:5, Interesting)
Hello there!
Please refer to your opening on job posting site. I, Rajesh Sharma, would like to apply for the job.[...]My hourly rates are $ 9 USD.
We all like to pretend this isn't here and it isn't happening, but I would say conservatively half the job market has disappeared in 10 years due to this currency/standard of living imbalance.
There's another reality: it's really, really hard to manage projects in India. I have tried this for a number of projects, and have learned the following things:
Each and every project, I have had the above things. There are lots of ways around the above, but the main thing is that it's very hard.
Re:No, it's $9 - Actual Reply to US Craigslist Pos (Score:5, Funny)
Stop hiring Rajesh FFS!
Re:No, it's $9 - Actual Reply to US Craigslist Pos (Score:5, Insightful)
There's another reality: it's really, really hard to manage projects remotely. I have tried this for a number of projects, and have learned the following things:
Not that I disagree entirely that it may be more difficult to manage someone in India, and I've certainly heard horror stories, but come on. These could all be applied to just about any remote contractor who isn't worth their salt. I have worked with/currently work with plenty of Indians who really knew/know their stuff.
Re:No, it's $9 - Actual Reply to US Craigslist Pos (Score:4, Insightful)
There's some differences, though.
1) Yes, you could have most of these same problems with any remote contractor, but you won't have them with an on-site employee. Ergo, if a project is critical, don't rely on remote contractors, rely on actual employees who have a stake in your company.
2) Remote contractors in your own country are also in your timezone, and you can call them up while you're at work to ask quick questions to. Not so with someone on the opposite side of the planet. Waiting a full day for an answer to every single question causes project schedules to slip badly.
3) Remote contractors in your own country can sign contracts with you, and you can take them to court if things fail due to bungling. Good luck filing a lawsuit against a contractor in another country.
Re:No, it's $9 - Actual Reply to US Craigslist Pos (Score:5, Interesting)
Not that I disagree entirely that it may be more difficult to manage someone in India, and I've certainly heard horror stories, but come on. These could all be applied to just about any remote contractor who isn't worth their salt. I have worked with/currently work with plenty of Indians who really knew/know their stuff.
I gotta side with cerberuss on this one. Yes, c'mon all of those can be applied to any remote consultant that is not worth his salt. However, from my experience working with remote teams (India, Brazil, within the US), there is something specific about the consulting industry in India that can really bit you in the ass harder than in other cases.
Now, just like you, I've worked with plenty of Indians who really knew their stuff. In fact, most of the remote projects I've worked that involved teams in India have had a high success ratio. But the few that have failed have done so far more miserably and catastrophically than with other teams on other countries.
This has given me a glimpse to a darker side of Indian offshore consulting, which I've actually talked a lot with several of my Indian colleagues who also agree on this: you can end up with a consulting firm that sells the idea of development guided by a a top-notch architect, and you swallow the tripe. And then the top-notch architect designs a system which looks solid, then he moves to another project. Then the consulting firm gets a whole bunch of sophomore kids from college find ways to replicate GOTO statements in Java to do the implementation. My first encounter with such practices from such a consulting team was when I was working together with an Indian colleague of mine (a really good software developer) in trying to make sense out of the mess. When we looked at the code and the original design, all we could do was say "WTF?".
That's an experience I've had to repeat several times. It's a reality, and it has nothing to do with dissing people from X or Y country. It's an unfortunate reality that cannot be denied or politically correctly sugar coat it.
Re:No, it's $9 - Actual Reply to US Craigslist Pos (Score:5, Interesting)
Analyst Programmer monthly salaries [jobstreet.com]in Malaysia
According to Google: 1 Malaysian ringgit (RM) = 0.292184 U.S. dollars
So at the higher end, RM4500/month * 12 = USD15777 a year [google.com], or about USD7/hour. The low end is naturally even lower...
For some strange reason[1] a company I used to work for outsourced some work to India. When the Indian workers came over and we compared salaries, they were paid more than the average Malaysian programmer in our company, and while we weren't very good, most of the Indian team made us look good in comparison, one or two of them had some clue (they were paid quite a lot in comparison), but the rest were like the sort of programmers who would be responsible for the notorious Excel bug (where 77.1*850=100000).
FWIW, RM5-6 buys you a decent lunch, you can rent a room for about RM250-500/month and taxes at the RM4500/month level aren't that high.
A lot of people in "the West" are unaware of the huge differences in cost of living. Wages are really low elsewhere. So when you see people say "it must be child labour", it's often bullshit, or someone misinterpreting a picture/video ( just because a bunch of oriental/asian workers are petite doesn't mean they are children - my cousin is 40+, she lives in New York and she has to buy some of her clothes in the children's section).
[1] Apparently the company had money stuck in some country (not India), so they decided to use it by outsourcing work to a company that then outsources it to India... Can't remember how many layers there were. Something like that anyway. I was wise enough not to say in one of the first meetings - "why don't we just buy a whole load of merchandise, ship it to where you want the money to be and sell it, you'd lose less that way", go figure why
Not if you have a magic time machine... (Score:3, Insightful)
There are a lot of ways to look at the figures, but only the most skewed ones come up with starting salaries approaching $60,000 annually...
Not if you have a magic time machine back to 1999.
Re:Not if you have a magic time machine... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Not if you have a magic time machine... (Score:4, Insightful)
Indeed. I started college in 1999, and I remember in my first semester of Freshman year some guy coming in to talk to our CS 101 class. He was exclaiming how wonderful it was and how he could probably place most of us in a good job ALREADY with just 8-9 weeks of college under our belt.
Fast forward to graduation in 2003. I managed to get a job teaching computer classes at a certificate factory "school" within a month, but only for $10.00 per hour. A few friends from school went on to work in fast food for a while. It took me nearly a year to move from the teaching thing to a "real" job, and now almost 7 years later I've worked my way up to just BARELY $50,000 per year (I'm in South Carolina so cost of living is lower here than in say, California). It's a living - it pays my bills and I have enough money left over to have some fun, but the idea that programming is the easy-street ticket to rolling in gobs of money for almost no work is long gone.
Not so much (Score:4, Insightful)
If you have experience, and are willing to lead a team, you can make decent money. Of course, how do you get experience?
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
The same way you do in every other technical profession: Volunteering, working for yourself on pet projects, internships and companies willing to hire the inexperienced for very little money.
missing number (Score:5, Insightful)
Depends on specialization and responsibilities (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Depends on specialization and responsibilities (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Depends on specialization and responsibilities (Score:5, Insightful)
Answering "yes" to that question will result is a system crash.
The rest of the questions also looks like bullshit.
Writing/interacting with assembly is only needed when your higher level compiler doesn't have full support for the architecture. Assembly should be avoided as much as possible.
Why would you need to have more than 3 C and (or?) C++ compilers. Are they for different architectures? Or the same? Why would you need C or C++ compilers when the compiler for your architecture doesn't use C or C++?
Why would a CS programmer need more than 1 Linux distro on your home computer? Should (s)he also be a Linux distro tester?
Crappy compilers take longer, slow systems take longer, large non modular systems (which are bad) take longer, etc. Longer compile times is usually a bad thing, not a good thing.
Forgetting languages? I'd suggest you stop drinking. I can understand you become rusty at a language, but forgetting, that's just bad memory. Also, why good is it when you know 100 variations of brainfuck.
Re:Depends on specialization and responsibilities (Score:4, Insightful)
Honestly, it's not even a matter of remembering languages. I never remember languages. When I pick up Java again after not using it for a little while, I always forget how to create an array. I can never remember how you declare a const pointer vs a pointer-to-const in C, I have to look up how to do heredocs every single time, and both Windows batch and Bash if statements escape me.
But none of that matters. Programming is not about knowing a language; it's about expressing yourself clearly. [xkcd.com] It doesn't matter if you're expressing yourself in for loops or while loops or s-expressions or regular expressions or list comprehensions or whatever new and shiny tool they come up with next year; what matters is that you know what you want to do well enough that you can split it into tiny, computer-sized chunks. Without that clarity, you cannot create a non-trivial program in any language.
I may forget every programming language that I have ever learned, but none of them matter as long as I know what I want to do.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
EXACTLY!
You know where the REAL money is: Dead Programming languages.
You learn how to use Cobol - and then you spend the time searching for the ONE company in your city still using it, you go to him and say "I can keep things running exactly how they used to be."
And bam, you can demand any salary you want.
Are nerds not aware (Score:5, Interesting)
That they are essentially mechanics? They're just not auto mechanics, they're more or less computer or software mechanics?
That shouldn't be a surprise to any. Especially as we see more about self-fixing computers, the furthering of object oriented programming which is leading to simpler and simpler APIs so you don't even have to be a programmer to make things happen. Or technologies like Sharepoint where you don't even have to have a GED to prop up multiple sites / data sources, etc.
Re:Are nerds not aware (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Are nerds not aware (Score:4, Informative)
At some publishers I think that's an apt analogy. Some places produce real works of literature and others crank out pulp-fiction.
Re:Are nerds not aware (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Are nerds not aware (Score:5, Insightful)
You get that attitude even amongst programmers... hell especially from some programmers.
I'm no web developers, I know enough web design and development to be sure I'm no web developer and I've seen some fantastical cockups from programmers who've decided they are web developers.
Re:Are nerds not aware (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't think it's possible to do it "right". I looked into it a little for a personal project I wanted to do (I'm an embedded C programmer by profession), and quickly came to the conclusion that web development is a fundamentally broken paradigm, basically a bunch of hacks piled on top of each other, starting from the simple fact that the WWW was initially designed to show static pages using a simple mark-up language. Every attempt to do so much more with it has resulted in a whole framework of hacks, including JavaScript. So, unlike other types of programming where you just write in one language (like C++) and that does everything you need, to make a decent website with dynamic content, you have to so something like write pages in one language (PHP), which will render into HTML on the server side, and then can be modified on the client side by a totally different language (JavaScript), plus they have to fetch data from your database using an altogether completely different language (SQL). It's a giant mess IMO.
The whole thing needs a complete redesign. I think doing something to get rid of the whole HTML thing would be a giant improvement; just display things straight into a window from application code like we currently do with C++ applications, instead of mucking around with a intermediate markup language. It's trivially easy to run full applications remotely with the X Window protocol; why can't something a little more like that be done with the web?
Re:Are nerds not aware (Score:4, Insightful)
Yeah, ActiveX was incredibly stupid, because of its complete lack of security and full access to system resources. Why they didn't think that would be a problem, I have no idea. A sand-box system is exactly what's needed. Java did that in a way, but it was incredibly slow.
Re:Are nerds not aware (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Are nerds not aware (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Are nerds not aware (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Are nerds not aware (Score:5, Insightful)
Why is your company hiring people that only know interpreted languages when your company mainly uses "real" languages? That's very strange to me. I also find it odd (and funny) that you that you blame programming languages for your co-workers incompetence, then in the next sentence complain about how your coworkers blame a programming language for their incompetence.
As C++ programmer with 10 years of experience, and about 5 years of C# experience, I can tell you that C#, Java, etc. can be very useful tools for the right type of software. People who know these languages can be very valuable for the right company.
To be honest, if I were a manager I would not hire someone who is so narrow-minded about programing languages. Computer Science is not a static field. Don't expect them to teach the same things they taught 20 years go.
Re:Are nerds not aware (Score:5, Interesting)
The fact that you are talking about memory allocators shows that you may be thinking about this problem on a much to high level.
It is very common for some of the problems involving real-time embedded systems to require "creative" low-level uses of the C compiler, that would scar high-level programmers for life. Low-level code is where you operate with maxims like:
For a high-level programmer, the concept of writing code without using indirection is a foreign concept. Indirection is vital to advanced programming techniques, including malloc, _vtables, arrays, strings, and linked lists! However, on certain embedded architectures, significant speed gains result from having deterministic memory accesses. If it takes writing code without access to malloc, _vtables, arrays, strings, etc., then that is what you do to get the system working and shipped. Some of embedded code needs to execute without an operating system, or before the operating system loads, and sometimes before the "stack" is set up. "Heaps", in certain embedded applications, you wish such a thing existed ...
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
B/c there's any point in developing a real-time embedded Word Processor, or IM, or.... Those languages all have their place, I think it's unfortunate that software professionals balkanize themselves so much by demonizing the other folk who don't live on their software island. What we should focus on is promoting good engineering standards (something which is very possible in Java and C#...less sure about VB), not on the specific language. FWIW, C++ can be much less "predictable" than Java or C# unless yo
Re:Are nerds not aware (Score:4, Insightful)
Java, C# and VB are real languages (they have and will continue to solve problems for actual customers). You are just hiring the wrong kinds of people, or are hiring them and not training them properly.
Re:Are nerds not aware (Score:5, Insightful)
A friend of mine went through this as a graphic designer, in the 80's. Once Adobe software showed up on the receptionists' desk, she knew it was time to get out. By not forming a professional group, they let their worth be watered down.
What programmers need to do is form a professional society that has licensing, regular career development, etc. and get employers to sign on and have various levels of gov't require licensed work for public software projects. 'Course, this may be too late. Probably shoulda' been done back in the 90's.
Re:Are nerds not aware (Score:5, Insightful)
Guess it's time to stop reading Atlas Shrugged, pretending that those above us in the hierarchy are looking out for us, and start forming a union, eh?
Re:Are nerds not aware (Score:5, Insightful)
Guess it's time to stop reading Atlas Shrugged,
That's good advice for anyone.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
(...)and start forming a union, eh?
Thanks, but no thanks. I'm not yet convinced that the unimaginative or unskilled Computer Scientist needs to be leveraged up.
Re:Are nerds not aware (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Following the "yellow brick"/gold road to to the glorious Emerald City is a safe route. Venture from that road and you find all kinds of strange creatures who were "broke" or you lose track of your goals in a field of sleep inducing flowers were you will be dependent on someone else to save you. The wicked witch of the east (aka, King of England from the East?) had to be "cut off" from the little people who were just trying to make it at a the origin of the yellow road (founding of the country and the gol
Putting a dollar figure down is problematic (Score:5, Insightful)
60K in a place like Cincinnati, not bad. 60K in DC, can't live on it. Be sure to take regional salaries into consideration.
Re:Putting a dollar figure down is problematic (Score:5, Funny)
As a native, I can say with authority that a $30K/year pay cut isn't the worst part about living in Cincinnati.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
After working in Omaha for 7 years as a Java developer and software architect I managed to work my way up $80k. I moved to DC and as a DoD contractor/consultant I make $125k. The TS-SCI clearance helps.
The bottom line is, if you want a large salary you have to be willing to master your craft. Subject Matter Experts are the ones that are indispensable and can negotiate a better salary. Don't think you will get there writing php websites. If you do Java...really DO Java. Take Sun's Expert lead Performance Tu
More than just programming (Score:3, Informative)
The report must be on the low side.
I don't feel comfortable saying exactly what I made, but when I got out of the Marine Corps, with 4 years experience developing software and no degree, I was making more than that report's bottom end. And that was just after the .Com bust in a relatively small mid-west city.
A developer I worked with while I was in the MC, back in Washington DC was a consultant who's pay rate was $125k a year. Again, this was post .com bust. And most of the other folks I know who are workin
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
In the DC area, you'd expect a starting salary near $60k. For starting salary with a technical Ph.D., $100k is reasonable (although I'm not a programmer and do not know how that compares to other technical fields).
It completely depends on the field for government pay. For technical staff, the government pays terrible. They tend to value people with technical degrees/professions the same as non-technical ones. The private sector/contractor pay is much better and you can get equal or better benefits with
Hyperspecialization (Score:4, Insightful)
The position is going to be long term and pays 80k+ per year because of the limited number of programmers skilled in C# / Corporate Mobile & Web applications. I guess you could say I made a deal with the Devil by going MS exclusively, but it pays the bills.
William Howell
Resume (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
C# and Cb
the key to earning well in this field (Score:5, Insightful)
Goes for programming and infrastructure and all things IT -- you have to move around a lot. Employers in general have no interest in paying you more once you work there. If you want another $15k, you have to move elsewhere. Time at a company is spend padding resumes and earning certifications. Then you move. You might move back to the original company if they make a better offer. Employer logic is "We got the guy for $x, why should we pay him any more once we have him?" Doesn't matter if you complete a second degree while you're there, move from jr. developer to lead designer, take on more responsibilities, you'll get piddle-shit raises.
This kills me. I don't want to be job-hopping. I'd like to build some time with a place, earn some kudos and sweat equity. But those things don't exist. Been at a company a month or twenty years, you are equally expendable. Treat your employer the same way. And die a little inside. People want to think of the office as family because we're social creatures. Few people enjoy living life out as a lesson in Randian objectivism, looking for leverage in the battle of who's screwing whom. We aren't meant to live like that.
Re:the key to earning well in this field (Score:4, Insightful)
Goes for programming and infrastructure and all things IT -- you have to move around a lot. Employers in general have no interest in paying you more once you work there. If you want another $15k, you have to move elsewhere.
That holds up to a point, then you start to find that you've more or less topped out and moves get you little, if anything. At that point, you have two choices to continue increasing your income: Leave the salaried world behind and start taking on contract gigs, where you can pretty easily get significantly higher pay, but no other benefits and no guaranteed income (though if you're good you can keep the contracts coming), or go to a big company where you can settle in and just accept the 3-6% annual raises and then let the years work for you. Eventually you'll get to where you can't move (except into contracting or management) without taking a pay cut. Hopefully you like the job.
Re:the key to earning well in this field (Score:4, Insightful)
and no guaranteed income
You say that like there is a guaranteed income in "full time employment".
I'm totally unclear why you would think that. You are a cost center to your employer. They will lay you off the instant it becomes convenient to do so.
Where exactly is the "guarantee" in that?
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
I am a developer, most of my friends are developers. I literally do not know a single developer who has ever stayed at a job more than 3 years.
Don't do it! (Score:5, Funny)
Don't be a developer. They will work you 24/7. You will be cuffed to your desk most of the day. Your hair will turn gray and fall out around the edges so you'll have a friar cut. They'll water board you for overtime. They make you buy your own computer, desk, and chair. You aren't allowed outside except for one hour a day of supervised time in the yard. Coworkers will shank you with shivs made from sharpened USB drives. You'll have to gang up to get respect. First thing you'll have to do when you come to work is shank someone, to let them know you mean business! Wages are a lie. You'll be paid in honey buns and cans of tobacco so you can roll your own. If you work hard enough you can get a free day with your spouse, but this depends on company performance.
Overall being a developer is the most horrible job in the world. If I were young and choosing a career I would do something else. Like be a reality star or join the circus.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
We are becoming more disposable (Score:4, Insightful)
The problem is, when people start working for the economy instead of the other way around, you get the problem of treating people like so many disposable parts. Unions have helped bring the human component to our work lives, but with their waning influence (and with people so willing to subsume their own interests to please the boss), we are going backwards and workers, even highly skilled, intelligent ones, become little more then means to an end (profit).
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Unions are just one more tool for the wealthy to suck money from the working man's pocket. But I'm a senior developer, I don't consider myself a "working man". That's why we need to form a professional cabal like the doctors and the lawyers have. We need to set prices across the board higher. Until that happens, wages in this most important of fields will continue to erode. You aren't competing with the programmer in the next desk for money. You and him (or her) are both on the same side competing aga
Re:We are becoming more disposable (Score:5, Insightful)
That's a critical point. It seems that economists (especially but hardly exclusively) have forgotten that without people, economy doesn't even have a reason to be. The entire point of an economy is to provide for it's participants. It's good or bad is to be measured exclusively in terms of how well it serves it's participants.
Given the supposed growth in the economy, it SHOULD be possible right now to support a family of 4 with a house and 2 cars on a single 20 hour a week income.
Unfortunately, as long as labor is treated as a market like any other, it is literally impossible for the masses to ever see the benefits of high technology. Ideally, machines work so we don't have to, but when labor is a market, machines work so we don't get jobs (or income) at all. The only way to make things equitable and progressive while even pretending to use market dynamics is to create an artificial labor shortage. Otherwise, all of the benefits of an expanding economy and improving technology will inevitably accrue only at the top.
Listen to the suits (Score:5, Insightful)
If you listen to people who don't do tech work talk about techies, you'll quickly realize that a lot of them do in fact put techies on roughly the same level as mechanics or bricklayers. You can think of yourself as a "knowledge worker" all you want, but the fact remains that you are going to be treated like a bricklayer. My most educated guess on why this is true is that techies produce useful products. In most businesses, the act of producing something (rather than selling something or organizing other people to produce something) severely limits your chances for advancement past the equivalent of senior foreman.
There are 3 ways to avoid this fate that I know of:
1. Do some serious and visible work for your company about issues that aren't tech-related. For instance, if you provide intelligent input about pricing, the salespeople will respect you a lot more.
2. Work at a company who's business is technology, which is still run by a techie. Make sure to leave once the suits take over.
3. Start your own company, and watch out that you don't completely become a suit.
Re:Listen to the suits (Score:5, Insightful)
"Work at a company who's business is technology, which is still run by a techie. Make sure to leave once the suits take over."
Excellent advice, wish I could mod it up more. Probably the hardest one for a young worker to grok, considering that the very first piece of boilerplate the suits will utter will be, "We don't expect to make any changes here at all!". See, they know the game too, and are playing the other side of it.
Re:Listen to the suits (Score:4, Insightful)
If you listen to people who don't do tech work talk about techies, you'll quickly realize that a lot of them do in fact put techies on roughly the same level as mechanics or bricklayers.
Except they have no problems asking tech people to do free work.
"Oh, you're a bricklayer? Hey, can you stop by sometime and replace the bricks on my front sidewalk? I'll give you a beer...."
Re:Listen to the suits (Score:4, Insightful)
Absolutely true. And notice how much social reward and top of the career path a good mechanic gets, unless they also have a really funny NPR show or own their own shop.
I don't have a degree... (Score:4, Informative)
I work in the Washington DC area, and something like only 1% of programmers in this area are employed with no degree, but it can be done, and lack of a degree doesn't have to have an impact on salary. It certainly can, but it all depends on the company you choose to work for.
Re:I don't have a degree... (Score:5, Insightful)
I agree with that. I have worked with nondegree'ed devs who were fantastic... in fact ALL of them were fantastic.
Which explains why they were employed. In order to make it without a degree one has to be way above the rest. Mediocre developers without a degree soon find themselves either unemployed or in school.
Ironic.
Re:I don't have a degree... (Score:4, Interesting)
I don't have a degree (in this field, anyway), either, and my income is currently $100k/yr, though I've spent most of the last five years working as an independent contractor, so it can vary quite a bit -- it's usually closer to $60k, so I feel pretty lucky considering the state of the economy right now. All that said, it took me fifteen years to get to this level. My observation of my coworkers is that the degree buys you almost nothing at the outset, but it will let you advance faster. Of course, how much faster will depend on what you actually learned in school, how fast you learn on the job, and particularly on your social skills. I've supervised people far more skilled than I am -- and I'm no slouch -- but who couldn't play the office political game, and I've been supervised by total morons whose lack of constructive skills was more than balanced by their skill at kissing their superiors' asses and taking credit for the work done by the people below them.
The degree helps, but it's not the be-all and end-all that dewy-eyed college kids would like to think it is. The big shock that everyone entering the real world has to adjust to is this: it's not remotely meritocratic. A degree, both as a simple credential and as the knowledge that (sometimes) goes with it, is one tool among many, and it's not necessarily the most important one.
I'll say this, though: I wish I'd gotten the degree. There is no such thing as a free lunch, and the work you don't do in school will have to be done on the job, where the stress and stakes are higher, and it will almost certainly take longer to fill in all of the gaps in your knowledge.
Of course, if I had it to do over, I wouldn't be in this field at all. The same things that interested me about computing in the 80's are still around, but I haven't spent the last fifteen years working on AI, VR, or even games: I've spent it building web apps, billing software, and other mind-numbingly boring crap. Once I've got the kid through college, I think I'm going to go do something else. As the main thread notes, there's not even any prestige left to the field. When I was a kid, computers and programmers were exotic, mysterious things. Now, computers are ubiquitous, and programmers are thought of by non-programmers as digital janitors.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
25 with no degree in a programming field? I don't expect to be making much :p
As a mechanic, I was making BANK. $50k a year at the age of 19 with a GED. I was making as much if not more than the teachers who told me I wasn't going to amount to anything :-) I loved doing it, but had to stop due to physical injury -_-;;
you keep dry and sit around all day (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Indistinguishable? Really?
I have yet to meet a non-graduate with who I can discuss a performance problem in terms of time and space complexity. Big O notation? What's that? Some kind of cheerio?
That's not to say that there aren't some very intelligent people without University degrees and some very stupid people with them. I've just found that most people with a passion for their profession are those with degrees. They did have the drive to spend 4 extra years of their lives going to school after all.
Really? (Score:4, Informative)
writes Laird, 'we're expected to pay for our own tools,
I don't think it's actually common for hired programmers to buy their own tools.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Mechanics generally have to do this. We didn't have to worry about welders and such, but all the "hand tools" I used were bought by me.
Lemme tell ya, buying (and paying off) ~20k worth of tools before the age of 22 made my credit score look unbelievable.
As a recent graduate... (Score:4, Insightful)
Location, Location, Location (Score:4, Insightful)
Simply put, there's three factors that determine what you're going to make. Where you work physically (Palo Alto and Austin have significantly different pay rates for the same job), where you work financially (startups pay less than huge companies, state governments pay less than the feds, banks pay less than almost everyone ;^), and where you work professionally (it's unlikely that an C or Java programmer with 10 years experience will make as much as a CCIE w/ 10 years experience). A CS/BS is a ticket to ride, but you still gotta find your seat on the car and some have a better view than others :^).
If you're in it for the money, do something else (Score:5, Interesting)
I had a co-op student once, who obviously had no affinity for programming . . . or, more to the point, no affinity for computers in general. (This was back in the 80's, before PCs were as pervasive as now).
I really couldn't understand why he was torturing himself with a degree program, which he didn't like, so I asked him why he chose computer science. The answer:
"I heard that I will be able to make a lot of money in this field."
Money is not the reason to choose computer programming as a career.
Or any other career for that matter . . . do you want to have your tonsils removed by a surgeon, who is, "in it for the money . . . ?"
Re:If you're in it for the money, do something els (Score:4, Insightful)
So we're all just supposed to starve to death because we're doing something for a career that we 'enjoy', but pays shit?
While it's great to be studying computer 'science' and all, when the student loan bills come due, YOU NEED TO HAVE A JOB. Four-year universities should focus on giving students marketable skills, not a bunch of useless theory that has no real-world impact.
And cue all the overeducated computer 'scientists' claiming that they use what they learned in their 'theory' classes every day. That's great up in your ivory tower, the rest of us grunts need to be able to write actual code.
Supply and demand, welcome to capitalism (Score:3, Interesting)
Anyone with eyes to see knew the relatively high pay of the last century couldn't last in the face of easy off-shoring and other factors.
We should be thankful for what we had, not complaining about more rational (from a capitalistic perspective) compensation.
On the flip side, most people who make okay-or-better programmers have the brains and basic skills to do a variety of careers with maybe a year or two or less of additional training, and most of us hopefully know it's not wise to put all your career eggs in one basket.
Also, some jobs such as most of those in the defense industry will remain in-country.
So, yes, there may be fewer newly-minted programmers in the Western world in the future, fewer domestic jobs available, and lower pay for the remaining jobs, but it won't be the total disaster it was for say, the steel or textile industries.
From an overall global economic health perspective, I see this as a good thing, even if it hurts me personally and Western economies in general.
no-hire and non-compete agreements (Score:4, Insightful)
Salary (Score:4, Interesting)
I have been principally been a Perl Programmer so that is the market I know, but the salaries I looked at have been all over the place with a good bit of it depending on location.
Recently I was looking at Sr Developer positions in LA, NYC, Nashville, and Austin.
Now I technically have 10+ years of programming experience. If I stayed one place as a programmer (theoretically speaking) I might have gotten to an architect level position and earned 150K. Or you some Chinese super guru out of school, some companies will throw money at you, but that is a rarity.
I had also seen positions where companies wanted you telecommute for 10/hour because they thought that was what they could get from some guy in Russia or India.
Basically, if you become a programmer, you are going to be treated as skilled labor. Skilled but still labor and they will never be interested in paying you more because they will have no way of determining if you are good at your job. At that point, you will need to job boat to get a real raise. Then you need to know how large the market is for a particular technology in your area, otherwise you will end up moving all over the place.
Money isn't my primary interest (Score:4, Insightful)
I got into programming because I love building stuff. I don't really care what I get paid as long as I can live in contentment, and I do. I'm very lucky to have found a profession that aligns with my interests. A lot of people got into programming in the 90s because it was lucrative; well, it's not now. Be glad you have a job, Quit bitching. Welcome to reality.
Do what you love and take control (Score:5, Insightful)
In Defense of Statistics (Score:5, Informative)
i think when plumbing was first invented (Score:3, Insightful)
it was the domain of the greatest scientists, engineers, craftsmen, and artists
now its the domain of guys with ass crack showing
all industries go from new and fantastic to mundane and ordinary. IT work is no exception. for some of us in networking, it pretty much IS plumbing
but there's an important caveat here: some plumbers make a shitload of money. reason being, simple economics of supply and demand: if you're a good plumber, and you're willing to mess with a toilet, you're a rarity, and you can charge good money
the same simple economic truths apply to IT work, and always will. just like plumbing's disagreeable facets to the job according to average folk, to average folk, dealing with the technical aspects of a computer is a mindnumbing experience
this means there is and always will be a natural barrier to entry in the field, and so those of us who thrive in the nominally difficult mental arena of dealing with the innards of a computer will therefore always, for generations to come, make good money, just like plumbers today
hopefully we'll show less ass crack though ;-P
Re:i think when plumbing was first invented (Score:4, Funny)
They wore togas in ancient Rome, so instead of the crack you got to see the whole ass.
My Favorite Job Requirements (Score:4, Insightful)
I love the job requirements that are literally impossible to meet. Like, 10 years of C# experience. I wonder if they actually do any research or if they're just going the H1B fast track ("Hey, we couldn't find any American workers...but some guy in India says he's been doing C# for 20 years!" "Wow, that's amazing! Let's interview him!")
Go independent (Score:5, Insightful)
After 15 years I can say to the younger generation coming in with 100% certainty - go independent.
What does this mean? Well obviously you need experience so getting a job to bootstrap yourself and pay your rent is first priority. But what you do on the side will impact your career greatly.
Things you can do in your spare time:
1. Work on an Open Source project and wrap it into a solution you can sell as a service
2. Create your own shrink-wrapped application and sell it
Either way you are partaking in the foundation of wealth - ownership. Only through ownership can you be truly "free" in the western world. Owners are first class citizens in any country. Everyone else is just a worker bee.
Just to convince you let me break down a little math for you. I currently bill our clients at around $190/hr for my programming services and I'm in an average "enterprise software" development position. But I only get a fraction of that - let's say around $50/hr for argument's sake. Some goes to infrastructure but the majority of that profit goes to the ownership. If you are the owner you get it all. Yes it's more work. But let me ask you this - would you put in 10-20 more hours per week to make 3-4 times as much? And that's just the tip of the iceberg. Some indy developers have really made a name for themselves and a fortune to boot.
And if it all fails, you still have that experience to learn from. Nothing ventured nothing gained.
We are drowning in a sea of mediocre programmers (Score:4, Insightful)
Is Programming a Lucrative Profession?
No, it is not. And it shouldn't be just because it's "programming"
There is a big difference between modifying JSP/ASP/PHP pages vs low-level programming or programming and architecting highly available e-commerce back ends. There is a big difference between IT support calls where you try to help users how to press the any key vs being a Tier III support Sysadmin/Network guy who knows that kind of shit inside out.
Just as software-related jobs run the spectrum from mundane to highly complex, so the salaries that go with them. That is reality. We got to "thanks" the dot-com brainfartopocalypse and the washing down of undergraduate CS curriculum that we still get new graduates that think they'll make as much as the under qualified prima-donas of the late 90's even if don't know the difference between a pointer and a coconut or don't know the difference between a Vector from an ArrayList in Java or who think C# is the same as C++ or who have never written anything more than a "hello world" program in assembler.
You can tell the difference between the graduate who just went through the bare minimum course curriculum and the one who took far more programming courses and who tried to work at the college labs or tried to get internships somewhere (anywhere!) or who at the very least tried to run Linux at home and played with as many programming classes as possible and who found big-O notation fascinating.
What type of job should each of these two should get? And what salaries should they get? There are people who graduate from MIS and CS now who should have never been able to graduate 10-15 years ago. But they graduate. Schools let them as a response of what the industry need.
And what the IT industry now needs is a gamut of software professionals that can do a variety of jobs, from the mundane to the holy-crap-this-is-hard(10+1)! With more of the former than the later. The drop in salaries is just a reflection of that.
If programmers want more moolah, then they should try to tackle harder jobs that warrant better salaries. That requires specialization of skills: be it embedded programming or system-level programming or becoming a JEE specialist/architect who knows how to write solid back-end systems, or becoming a systems engineer, or a software architect, or work your way to become a team lead, or become a solid gold SysAdmin/DBA, etc, etc.
Being a "computer guy" stopped being a cash cow a long time ago. It can provide for a decent living (just like any other well-done trade or profession). But for those who go to school and graduate thinking they should deserve $70 just because their diplomas read "Computer" somewhere, nope. Graduate and become an specialist that can tackle hard problems. Then earn it. The reality is that salaries are going down, and that's a justified reflection on the fact that the software industry is inundated with mediocre programmers.
Re:Capitalism will find a way (Score:4, Interesting)
Well, Germany was much more socialist in early nineties. And the standard of living was also quite higher than now, after a lot of American-style capitalist reforms.
Re:Capitalism will find a way (Score:5, Informative)
And then you guys raised taxes quite a bit to pay for reconstructing Eastern Germany - and haven't gotten around to lowering those taxes yet. Absorbing all of that is what killed your economy.
That's not to say it's bad you guys did it - it was good and necessary to do. I just mean to say that Germany is a special case.
Re:grad vs masters vs phd the myth. (Score:5, Funny)
I can believe 54,000 grand.
I cannot. 54 grand I just might.
Re:grad vs masters vs phd the myth. (Score:5, Funny)
Because they might show up your grammar and spelling skills?
Re:grad vs masters vs phd the myth. (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm in software. I freely admit my spelling and grammar skills SUCK. :)
(re)Learning spelling would be a good idea. I'd hate to be the one to debug human resources code with a variable named /*Whether or not higher subject*/
bool higher=False;
which actually determined if someone was hired, but another coder thought it was a boolean for hierarchical levels, and was making it flip-flop between true/false.
Coders, as the future jacks of all trades, need to know a little of everything, and a lot of the fundamentals.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Sure there are - try changing the order of the words in a sentence or not using plural endings. It'll soon be more ambiguous or utter nonsense.
A lot of the grammar rules are derived (or evolved) from the root languages. English isn't as ad hoc (no need to capitalise Latin expressions either) as you suggest.
Re:grad vs masters vs phd the myth. (Score:4, Informative)
I could give a shit about "breadth of knowledge."
I want people working with me who know VHDL and C ***EXTREMELY*** well. The better be good with vi, and not have to rely on a GUI to configure a linux box.
Other than that, nobody in this building cares.
I don't give a rat's ass about their (for example) Java experience quite frankly. And why should we?
Re:grad vs masters vs phd the myth. (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't give a rat's ass about their (for example) Java experience quite frankly. And why should we?
You shouldn't. Well, not directly, anyway, given it's not a requirement for the work you do.
But not caring about "breadth of knowledge" is a little silly. Breadth (and depth) of knowledge is a good proxy indicator for an individual's ability to learn on-the-fly and pick up new skills as needed. It also indicates a deep-seated passion and curiousity about their profession, something that's vital in a truly skilled developer. Plus, a broad range of skills means a larger range of tools (for example, the ability to approach a problem from a functional, procedural, or object-oriented perspective as needs require), which can only be a good thing.
So, while it's true that, from a checklist standpoint, candidates should have the specific set of skills you need, it should definitely be considered a plus if the individual shows a wide range of skills.
Re:$60K seems very believable for starting salary (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
High school kids and anyone who spends two years at a technical school can 'program' nowadays, but coming up with a proper design is something people are still willing to pay for.
Good companies, perhaps. But in general it seems design doesn't really matter, ultimately. Business wants a blackbox that works. If it takes more time to design it and test it well, that will be deemed unnecessary at many companies. I worked at a company and the most cherished developer there was a guy who wrote terrible code,
Re:No. (Score:4, Informative)
They pay programmers better in India relative to other jobs there. Yes they get paid less in India than they do in the US. But your buying power with that income is far greater in India than it is in the US.
An Indian friend of mine went back to India for that very reason. His standard of living is quite higher now than it was in the US. No more living in a tiny studio apt. He has a house and a car and plenty of money left over.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
The Bureau of Labor Satistics would disagree with you...
Median annual wages of computer and information scientists were $97,970 in May 2008. The middle 50 percent earned between $75,340 and $124,370. The lowest 10 percent earned less than $57,480, and the highest 10 percent earned more than $151,250. Median annual wages of computer and information scientists employed in computer systems design and related services in May 2008 were $99,900.
http://www.bls.gov/oco/ocos304.htm [bls.gov]
Mind you, Programming == Computer S
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
I should add, for a software engineer
In May 2008, median annual wages of wage-and-salary computer applications software engineers were $85,430. The middle 50 percent earned between $67,790 and $104,870. The lowest 10 percent earned less than $53,720, and the highest 10 percent earned more than $128,870. Median annual wages in the industries employing the largest numbers of computer applications software engineers in May 2008 were as follows:
In May 2008, median annual wages of wage-and-salary computer system
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
"Mind you, Programming == Computer Scientist as much as Machinist == Mechanical Engineer."
Hardly. If that were true we could have a moratorium on giving out CS degrees for a decade and still have too many. Outside of academia there isn't much use for a non-programming computer scientist.
Re:I guess they forgot about the dip of 2002-04 (Score:4, Informative)
I'll just throw out my .02 - not that it means much.
I went to Northern Il. University - not exactly the best school, not a bad school either though. I was told, by the University, that the average starting salary for their Computer Science graduates was 59k.
Not to toot my own horn, but I was a big fish in a little pond, if that makes sense. I had internships and Fermi, Hewitt Associates, Volt. I was also the Microsoft Student Ambassador for the University and had a 3.9 GPA in my major.
I had interviews with every company I spoke to at the job fair, and job offers from all three that I pursued. They were 40k, 43k and 50k (but ~50% travel required). I negotiated the 43k up to 47k.
I was pissed.
I felt like a failure after all that - but my roommate who was also Comp Sci ended up taking months to land his first gig at ~30k. Similarly, every one of my friends that was Comp. Sci. - who I knew well enough to find out, ended up making less than 50k out of the gate. Many less than 40k And a few took several months to land a job.
My girlfriend at the time, was finishing her Masters and even with that, she started at 45k....which pissed her off to no end at the time.
To this date, none of us, have ever gotten a call from NIU asking us what our starting salary was. Everyone I knew personally, took a position for far less than the 'average'.
Re:There is gold rush top do that. (Score:4, Interesting)
Everything can be commoditized. Even you.
We cannot compete with an overpopulated world. The relative few of you that can pipe in with well-paying jobs are a dying breed. The pattern will repeat. Yet you still believe in open markets that have killed 90%+ of the rest of the country, on the chance that you will be the special exceptions.