US Bureau of Labor Statistics: Programmer Jobs Will Decline 8% (computerworld.com) 349
theodp writes: Two weeks ago, as the nation's schools 'taught kids to program' with an Hour of Code, Microsoft and others celebrated a 6-year lobbying effort that culminated in the passage of legislation that made Computer Science a core K-12 subject, which the software giant said "will advance some of the goals outlined in Microsoft's National Talent Strategy." But on Tuesday, Computerworld reported that the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics has put somewhat of a buzzkill on the learn-to-code party, saying IT jobs will grow 12% over the next decade, although computer programmers will see an 8% decline. "Computer programming can be done from anywhere in the world, so companies sometimes hire programmers in countries where wages are lower," explained the government. The silver lining is that software developers, the largest occupational group in IT, will increase by 17% or 186,600, over this period. The nomenclature here is a little muddy, since "programmers" and "software developers" are often used interchangeably. Here's how they're distinguished in this article: "Programmers are focused on coding and implementing requirements, and that’s why they may be more susceptible to offshoring, in contrast to software developers who may be more engaged with the business, analyzing needs and collaborating with multiple parties."
Short term: change title from programmer to dev (Score:5, Insightful)
>> software developers who may be more engaged with the business, analyzing needs and collaborating with multiple parties
In other words, don't ever let anyone figure out what exactly you do, and make sure you're attending more meetings than actually working. Mission accomplished!
Re:Short term: change title from programmer to dev (Score:5, Interesting)
Long term, get the hell out of tech, and stop giving your employers any loyalty ... because they'll drop you like a hot turd the moment they can.
But, then, we've pretty much all known this teaching all kids to code was a self-serving thing to get them more cheap labor.
Got kids you want to be gainfully employed? Get them into a trade like an electrician, welder, or plumber.
Tech is being gutted to the lowest bidder. So all of these years of saying tech jobs were the way of the future ... well, so long, suckers.
Re:Short term: change title from programmer to dev (Score:4, Insightful)
Tech jobs were the way of the future until technology itself, created by those tech jobs, allowed companies to hire people overseas for those same jobs.
Re:Short term: change title from programmer to dev (Score:5, Insightful)
Tech jobs are only one way of using programming skills.
When kids learn to code, they learn to think algorithmically. They learn to break down problems into smaller, easier to define sub-problems. They learn to construct models. They learn to apply numerical methods to problem evaluation. They learn about the relationship between inputs and outputs, cause and effect. They get to explore feedback mechanisms, hysteresis, system complexity and instability.
These are highly desirable workplace skills in a wide range of occupations. Physicists, bankers, data scientists, pricing specialists, marketing consultants, accountants (the list is endless) all benefit from the analytical mind of a someone who understands how to code.
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I've been programming for 30 years, and only at the start was I in anything I call a "tech" job. Granted the term is flexible and vague but it mostly seems to imply working with technology without having to know how it actually works - pushing buttons on a black box, following the script from the certification course, thinking inside the box.
There's been a disturbing trend recently about minimizing the amount of effort necessary to get a job. Taking the fewest classes, skipping the hard classes, skipping
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I didn't go into the traders, but I get the hell out of tech. Worked for 11 years as a dev, saw the writing on the wall and left. Now I'm a PharmD, making the same money, never have to work overtime and can land a job anywhere in the country.
Fuck the silicon valley rat race.
We could learn a lot from PharmD's (Score:2)
I'm not discounting what pharmacists do -- they know more about drugs than most doctors. I am saying that they have a very nice, protected work life, the entry into the field and licensure is limited to keep supply low, and demand is high; you can go anywhere you want and get a pharmacy job. If I could tell "19-year-old Me" anything, it would be to study hard and get a job in s profession, rather than fight tooth and nail for the last remaining IT or developer jobs.
The reason CVS and the like haven't remove
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Re: Short term: change title from programmer to de (Score:2)
And why couldn't a robot vending machine do your job? It would be a lot cheaper
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An actual pharmacist still needs to sign on the bottom line as a professional for pill delivery.
One could argue this is needless government-required cost (especially when it could be replaced by pre-filled bottles, cheaper) but it will be there for the forseeable future.
The real value in a pharmacist is recognizing drug interactions and unusual doses / prescriptions as a second check against the prescribing doctor; which is why it is important to get prescriptions filled at one place, which ensures the pharmacist has a complete list of your meds to evaluate. Yes, a computer could do the same checking and is a good tool for notifying the pharmacist who can then check with the doctor and patient to ensure the prescription is correct and safe. In addition, I think we will see
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I don't work at CVS, but they hire every pharmacy graduate they can get. I work as a clinical PharmD in a hospital.
It doesn't really matter if you work for drug stores or not, your employment is still affected by the same market forces as the PharmDs who do work at CVS. This is because if their industry is disrupted, more of those workers will move to hospitals and drive down wages there.
Government regulations are the only thing that can save pharmacist jobs over the next decade or two. Filling the correct pills into bottles and checking for drug interactions are two tasks modern AI systems already excel at, and continu
Skip the plumber (Score:2)
Go into medicine. It's the last field that still has a Union (the AMA, who's smart enough to not call themselves a Union).
Re:Short term: change title from programmer to dev (Score:4, Insightful)
Or just become useful. The problem is that so many programming jobs, in IT especially, are cookie-cutter. Anyone who can program can fill the role with minimal training. No degree or experience necessary, just present a certificate. But change it up a bit and it is very difficult to offshore the job. Know the math as well as programming, you'll be much more likely to keep your job even if your job is more difficult than moving around a box on a web page. Know the physics too, or the business, or the EE, or the economics, or whatever it is that the company actually *does*. In embedded systems learn how the system works, learn the hardware, learn the OS. Overall work together with the designers instead of sitting passively waiting for some bite sized pieces of programming assignments to filter down. Yes this is harder for junior level employees but that's also the best time to flex some mental muscles and learn new stuff, volunteer for projects, and make sure the boss thinks of you as more than adequate.
And just by saying "tech" you dumb it down because tech is already dumbed down. Call it engineering or development or product creation, just call it anything other than something that can be done after a semester at a trade school.
Re: Short term: change title from programmer to de (Score:2)
Dude I was told on Slashdot to change my major from computer information systems to business as by 2015 no one would program anymore. WORST mistake EVER! If grads with 0 years experience can pull 70k while managers with 10 years pull 55k I think that advise is full of it if you don't mind me saying so
Re: Short term: change title from programmer to de (Score:2)
I can find an Indian willing to do your job for 60k. 220k is too much money for a non executive position and a welder who is skilled can work in the oil fields for 100k
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I thought this was about "engineers". My bad.
Oh, developers https://youtu.be/Vhh_GeBPOhs [youtu.be]
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No, software developers are people who are more than just code monkeys. They are people who can understand requirements, design things, and develop the entire architecture, rather than just bashing out a program.
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Has anyone ever outsourced a major product that requires a fair amount of thinking and interaction with the home team to an offshore firm and gotten good results? Maybe it works for web pages, e-commerce, and IT, but not for building a real product. You wouldn't want a medical device surgically implanted in you if it was developed by the cheapest workers with minimal schooling using the lowest bidder for parts, so why trust a company's future to the same thing?
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Go where the money is. If management is what you want to pay me for, I'll be a manager. How hard can it be to pretend I know what I'm talking about despite not having any clue?
Re:Short term: change title from programmer to dev (Score:5, Insightful)
Go where the money is. If management is what you want to pay me for, I'll be a manager. How hard can it be to pretend I know what I'm talking about despite not having any clue?
Actually its difficult for a lot of people. To say with complete confidence "we know that the future is sub-prime lending" or "stock markets will keep going up, we've seen the end of boom and bust" is very difficult for anyone who understands empirical methods, basic probability, and so on. It is also something that anyone with a conscience would feel bad doing (unless they really believe it).
Re: Short term: change title from programmer to de (Score:2)
Very difficult. For the 1st embarrassing time of my career I got demoted back. I kept pointing to problems and solutions which is what us non professional managerial types do. I made very powerful enemy's who wanted to be told what to hear and stressed myself crazy. It's not for everyone
The same holds true for other jobs, too. (Score:5, Funny)
Re:The same holds true for other jobs, too. (Score:5, Funny)
And I'm changing my title from "troll" to "agitation engineer".
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And I'm changing my title from "troll" to "agitation engineer".
Please, you are nothing more but self-stimulation engineer.
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Yes sir Mr. Johnson.
You're completely missing the point (Score:2)
Unions (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Unions (Score:5, Insightful)
That's indeed one of the most powerful propaganda gimmicks of the plutocrats: claiming unions are for unmanly wimps, and if you can't "cowboy" it out there on your own, you deserve to perish. They spend a lot of money to shove that message up the population.
Of course, the rich have their crony "buddy system" that does pretty much what a union does. Bill Gates had access to a minicomputer as a kid because his parents had money and lived in the better school district. Mitt, Trump, and the Bush bro's had daddy's money and influence.
Re:Unions (Score:5, Insightful)
See, you're doing it.
Citizens accept a certain degree of inequality because we know it's necessary for capitalism to work properly. However, populations won't accept HUGE inequality very long. The claim that huge inequality is necessary for "motivation" is utterly ridiculous.
It's not just about "fairness", but the very political system. The rich buy laws they want via campaign contributions and political ads, short-circuiting democracy.
Look at their attack on climate change research and solutions. They don't want to pay for greener energy, and so spend boatloads of money to discredit the idea. And it works, roughly 40% of the population fell for it.
Re:Unions (Score:5, Interesting)
We can bargain with megacorps quite effectively so long as supply and demand of labor is balanced. Compare your consumer experience when shopping for personal electronics (lots of competition, abundant supply) vs dealing with Comcast (monopoly). It's exactly the same with jobs - if you have a skill set which is in short supply, you will get great deals without any unions.
So the best solution for oversupply of labor is for government to hire part of the workforce away from private market and put them on projects that reduce fixed costs of living for everyone else and increase disposable impact to purchase privately made goods. That's why New Deal worked well for recovery from Great Depression. If we build good roads, affordable housing, public transportation and affordable domestically produced energy, we provide lots of jobs while freeing up most of people's paycheck to go into private economy rather than mortgage and gas bill.
So politics is a better direction to put your time in money than unions, although I guess the later is a useful stopgap measure and can be an organizing force for politics.
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Why would not feeding your children be a consideration in a balanced labor market? If I leave a job, I can find another job in reasonable time, so both me and my employer have choices and incentive to treat each other well. Just like most people consider having some kind of cell phone a necessity, but have a choice of Apple, Samsung, LG and many others, so prices and features stay great.
It's said that most people never lived under such sane conditions, all while our public infrastructure is crumbling from d
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Why give basic income away for free when you can spend the same money and get recipients to do some useful work, especially work of a kind that improves private sector employee purchasing power and reduces need for government assistance in future? If you are saying that some people are not willing or able to do any useful work whatsoever and still should not starve, or that students who are making good progress should get a stipend, I agree. But addressing these corner cases is a lot easier and more afforda
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Tarrifs (Score:2)
It's a "you can go home, but you can't take the ba
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They haven't brought power or protection for a long time. They do so for line workers and people that are easily replaced and have a fixed cost (manual labor etc). People that aren't easily replaced (eg. programmers/developers) with fluctuating incomes (based on capability rather than seniority) don't benefit from a labor union. Unless you want all of us to work for 35k/year and 40h/week regardless of what you do and pay dues on top of that, you don't know what you're asking for.
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The problem is that we are told that corporations are people too, yet citizens are affected greatly by immigration laws. Corporations, seemingly not.
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Re:Unions (Score:4, Informative)
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Actually Germany sold lots of its steel factories to India and China. They got dismantled here, the parts got numbered, and they where build up there 1:1 again.
Germany, and most of Europe, simply learned it does not pay to outsource high skilled work. After all, our skills are still higher than the foreign ones.
The sold steel plants, e.g. produce "generic steel" while Germany (and Italy for that matter) focus on special steels or recycling steels for e.g. cars.
The problem in an economy is: you have housing,
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Problem is we need to learn to either make corporations loyal to their country, or to stop treating them as citizens and legal residents. If the corporations screw with this country then we should be allowed to screw them right back, if you harm us we harm you back. Kick their headquarters off shore to a third world country where their workers live and send the executives there too. If workers and production are moved overseas then why keep the executives here? But some free market true believer will sa
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To the free market believer, civil liberties are unimportant compared to economic liberties and a 2% growth in in their stock portfolios.
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Answer: Unions need to go global as well.
Many of them already have. [aflcio.org]
Re:Unions (Score:5, Insightful)
John Galt gave up on the system and ran off to be a farmer. What does that say about progress?
Nothing.
But it says a lot about Ayn Rand's juvenile self-centered world-view.
Systems Analyst (Score:3)
The BLS is confusing Software Developer with Systems Analyst.
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I suspect that also.
But one problem is that one should get several years of hands-on experience in programming before becoming an analyst. But if more of it is offshored, then there are fewer chances to get such experience.
You can't just major in "systems analyst" and be good at it out of school. A lot of it is about working with people and business to learn how people communicate ideas, often indirectly, and how they interact with technology and UI's.
Office politics is often a big part of it, and if you do
'Programming' should decline... (Score:3)
Given the distinction described, programmers being just implementation and 'developers' actually understanding the needs and wider context, programmers really should be on the decline, and there shouldn't be room for a 'software developer' to need 'programmers' as time goes on.
Already the divide has been largely responsible for some of the most infuriating software I've had to use. The people actually creating it have no clue about the wider context. Meanwhile you have 'architects' that don't know the first thing about how the code works or can work or most critically how it wouldn't work. Somehow enterprise industry has latched onto the model of 'architect' versus 'implementer' and never shall the two cross and it makes for some terrible software.
Sometimes it makes a mountain out of a molehill (don't need a massive team to maintain what amounts to be a simple script, and often giving it a massive team makes it senselessly more complex) and sometimes it does address some issues of tedium associated with a genuinely complex project. For the first part, people should not confuse 'importance' with 'complexity'. People presume that something very important warrants a large team, which is often wrong. For the latter, the large team may be warranted, but no coders should be exempt from understanding the context for their work. I've seen that last bit happen all the time, to the point of bad coding decisions resulting in the programmer resenting the paying customer for what ultimately is the programmer's lack of understanding the use case rather than the customer 'not being smart enough to deal'.
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I have never seen anybody who is this mythical 'programmer' who is some flunky who people hand complete specs to.
Well, that's not true ... at one point my company had outsourced some coding to India. They got shit code, delivered lat
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Somehow enterprise industry has latched onto the model of 'architect' versus 'implementer' and never shall the two cross and it makes for some terrible software.
I'm a software architect and I have to fight against this model almost every sprint.
Not bloody likely (Score:5, Insightful)
Everybody tried outsourcing and realized that it doesn't work. Creating a great product requires creativity and each contributor capable of saying no to superiors and standing up for their improvements to the solution. This mind set does not yet exist much outside Silicon Valley, let alone USA and huge lifestyle disparity between american bosses and outsourced coders would not allow it to flourish.
By the time developing countries have the kind of talent in greater quality/quantity than US, labor will not be that cheap anymore because employees will know their worth. At that point, I will just move there.
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In my mind there is no question that outsourcing results in inferior work that translates in less secure, less robust product. None of this matters, as long as it is still possible/acceptable to blanket-absolve any corporate responsibility for software product flaws. In software quality doesn't seem to matter, as a consequence outsourcing will continue prospering. Change that, and the jobs might come home.
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Outsourcing can and does produce as good if not better software. The problem is that unless you're very familiar with said outsourcing organization, you're essentially rolling the dice between horrible results and amazing results per dollar spent. If this sounds exactly like hiring an any regular employee, then you're exactly right. All HR related work needs to be adjudicated properly or you're risking your business viability. Given that giant American mega-corps haven't fallen into ruin, it seems like they
Re:Not bloody likely (Score:5, Insightful)
Outsourcing can and does produce as good if not better software.
People can and do win lottery. In my experience, outsourcing to China and India results in a quality drop. Indian teams tend to practice cowboy coding and are more comfortable releasing without robust testing. Chinese teams tend to value seniority and rigid hierarchy, as such problems that are discovered are not communicated and as a result go unaddressed. Sure, all of this can happen without outsourcing, but outsourcing makes it a lot more likely.
It works peachy (Score:2)
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I myself ran companies that outsourced jobs from over there successfuly. Large companies like IBM, Oracle, Microsoft, etc. even hire p
The decline of the american dev (Score:3)
What am I? (Score:5, Insightful)
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Am I a programmer? Am I a Software Developer? Maybe I'm a Software Engineer! Maybe a software architect... honestly I can't tell anymore
Thus went Bob's from accounting existential crisis.
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I dont mind being called any of those things, just please dont call me a coder.
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Post execution plans with wait stats somewhere the devs can see. Call it the "Wall of Shame".
Double Plus Good (Score:3)
Great to see the 5 year plan to increase the number of programmers is already paying off. Time to push for more STEM.
That can only mean (Score:2)
that the US is going to kick out 8% of the people working in programming jobs in the US who are only there on H1B visa, right?
Right?
get income based student loan repayment (Score:2)
income based student loan repayment plans are good even if you get a job for a few years then you are replied by an H1B then they can't touch your mc job min wage pay.
Good News (Score:2)
Though the number programming job is in the U.S. will fall 8% in the next decade, the number of programming jobs in New Delhi will rise 120%
Great Time to Be a Programmer (Score:3)
The BLS stats miss the point.
1) The ability to off-shore programming jobs has been a reality for 20 years. It's done nothing but increase my bill rate. Here's the deal. Accenture, IBM, Wipro, etc come in to take care of all the IT needs. On paper the costs are cheaper. Five years later the companies that did off-shore development are typically very unhappy with their work product. Too much re-work, not enough velocity of code getting into prod. Once a offshore company has your entire IT process they can turn the screws and increase bill rates.
I come in with teams that kick out the off-shore units, clean house and usually within a year the problem we have is our backlog doesn't have enough work. We're just too efficient. The reason it's increased my bill rate is companies pulled back from college hire programs. It really creates a problem keeping experience developers in the pipeline. I don't have much competition domestically because the ivy league MBAs that decided to offshore decided not to invest in the next generation workforce. I laugh all the way to the bank.
2) Start Up Factor. You don't need to get hired to make money programing. There are hundreds of thousands of developers making money by releasing their own apps.
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I come in with teams that kick out the off-shore units, clean house and usually within a year the problem we have is our backlog doesn't have enough work. We're just too efficient.
I've done that for I.T. support work. The previous help desk company got caught generating unnecessary tickets to increase billing. The Fortune 500 company kicked them out and brought in the company I worked for. We were given 90 days to clean up a 900+ ticket queue, and got it done in 30 days. A year later the Great Recession kicked in. We were told to do the same level of work for half the cost. I got laid off because I was too efficient. Given the choice of firing three people or firing me, I got the boo
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What percentage of jobs out there are being done by H1Bs? I would assume they would feel the 8% hit first.
As long as they are cheaper, you can safely assume that they will feel the 8% hit last.
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So we should expect all the executives to be fired first since they have the highest salaries.
Except that it's the executives that decide who is to be fired...
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Well, legally speaking, that should not be the case. There will be 8% less jobs that are currently going unfilled because of lack of domestic workers.
I'm sure that you know well that there are ways to prevent domestic workers from being able to get the job so they can use cheaper H1B resources.
It's not uncommon to tailor-make the job description and application requirements to fit the candidates from a foreign staffing company supplying H1B applicants.
But something as simple as "must be proficient in [insert language] for efficient coordination with outsourced development" will also do.
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You are all foreign cows. Mooo, MOOO go the H1-B cows!
Re:Programming is for Cows (Score:5, Insightful)
No, Sexconker, it's the H1-B workers who are cash cows for asshole U.S. corporations who keep firing U.S. workers and hiring them, so they can make more money off of destroying the middle class in this country.
This is why you must vote for Bernie (if you're a liberal) or Trump (if you're a conservative). Clinton, Bush and Rubio want exactly the same thing which is to make their corporate masters richer while gutting the middle class. When Disney was laying off their entire IT department and forcing them to train their H1B replacement workers, whose campaign do you think Disney was funding? Hillary and Jeb's. Not Bernie or Trump: Disney hates these guys.
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This is why you must vote for Bernie (if you're a liberal) or Trump (if you are scared of mexicans and muslims).
Trump doesn't give a shit about anything but his own ego. All he cares about is that the spotlight is on him. He'll do anything and say anything to keep that going. If I was going to compare Trump to anyone on the democrat side it would be Hillary. He's just a weather vane. Granted he's a better weather vane than Hillary, but that's all he is.
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That's blatantly untrue. He's funny. And has a great hairpiece.
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For that matter, there's nothing Conservative about the GOP.
Sure there is. They are pro-life and anti-gay. Those are pretty conservative positions.
Re:END THE FED! I saw this coming 30 years ago. (Score:4, Interesting)
The view from down here is there was no recovery from 2000 or 2008, there is no recovery on the horizon, R&D infrastructure is being dismantled, manufacturing is gone, and the engineering job market is in a luge-ride race to the bottom. There's a little money to be made picking the bones or sucking up health care dollars or green energy dollars or whatever is fashionable enough to attract foolish greedy investors, but long term it looks bad to me. I'm getting out... buy into a wood pellet fab or something else that will do well when everyone becomes poor.
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24 year old, 1 year of experience, bachelors degree in computer science, in a small city in NYS north of NYC. I applied to 10 software dev jobs 4 months ago. I received 8 offers. I am absolutely no one special. My skill set isn't better than anyone else, my degree isn't from an overly prestigious university, etc.
I understand my experience is anecdotal. But, your analogy doesn't hold up either. If anything a recruiter wants to make you think you have no options, and that you aren't special, so they can
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I can confirm that hiring talented C++ or Java developers in the Twin Cities area is very difficult. It takes us a long time to fill open positions, and headhunters are calling people everyday. And we are losing people to other firms that routinely offer someone a big bump to switch.
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When you remove the signals, the end result becomes much, MUCH worse.
Does it become... noise?
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We need a new social model that will for us, not just for the rentiers and 1%ers.
Demonstrate one that doesn't rely on unicorns and universal goodwill and you'll be a hero to seven billion people. In the meantime we muddle along with the system we've got.
We can't grow eternally. It's not physically possible or socially desirable.
A falsehood and a subjective value judgement. Nothing to see here, move along.
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As a more practical measure, as long as the population is growing, the economy can grow.
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So you contradict your own premise.
No. It seems unreasonable that population growth will continue forever.
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http://freakonomics.com/2014/01/24/can-economic-growth-continue-forever-of-course/
I stand corrected.
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Productivity comes from paying less for the same amount of work, wage growth means paying more for the same amount of work
I guess that would be true if there was never any progress, and some amount of "work" always required the same amount of effort. Most economists define productivity as producing more for less effort. Like if you invent a machine that makes doing your job easier, you can do twice as much work for the same effort.
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Huh? Why should they stop screwing over U.S. Citizens? What's special about that type of consumer?
What makes you think any corporation gives half a shit about any country? Or the people living there?
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I've been telling you guys that's what's happening. Companies these days make products or for internal use by throwing together a bunch of open source software, rarely making a contributions in either case. It used to be just system integrators but now it's everybody.
That's the new model.
What's exacerbating things now is that so few people give a shit about the GPL these days, preferring other licenses that are easier to work with, as the goal of Open Source has transited from sharing to cost cutting.
What you say is true, but I think less than half of the problem - in fact the fact that they don't contribute the solutions back leaves more tech work to do. The main issue is that the "cobbling together" is often outsourced to an overseas company that pays way under a Western country's minimum wage.
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People have been saying that since Fortran on punch cards and the 90's brought plenty of languages that allow any simpleton to 'program'. Between Logo, BASIC, HyperCard, JavaScript, Python etc I don't know how much simpler you can make it.
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