Tech Sector Slow To Hire 450
Iftekhar25 writes "The NY Times is running an article about soaring unemployment rates for IT in the US (6 percent) despite a tech sector that is thirsting for engineering talent. Quoting: 'The chief hurdles to more robust technology hiring appear to be increasing automation and the addition of highly skilled labor overseas. The result is a mismatch of skill levels here at home: not enough workers with the cutting-edge skills coveted by tech firms, and too many people with abilities that can be duplicated offshore at lower cost. That's a familiar situation to many out-of-work software engineers, whose skills start depreciating almost as soon as they are laid off, given the dynamism of the industry.'"
Read closer (Score:4, Informative)
IT is not engineering. The two fields are not analogous
Six percent (Score:4, Informative)
Sure, it's not great but it's perhaps not as terrible a crisis as newspapers would like to make out; considering how every section of the economy is impacted right now I would read too much into it.
Fill in the blanks. (Score:1, Informative)
"not enough workers with the cutting-edge skills coveted by tech firms" ...
who are willing to work for $20,000 a year.
No kidding (Score:4, Informative)
Especially since the national average is over 9% currently. Seems to me a more accurate story would be "Tech sector hasn't recovered to previous levels, but has much lower unemployment than many other areas."
Re:50% right (Score:5, Informative)
It is a real issue, but HR is the most massive problem in the IT sector today. They get a list of requirements and filter based on those. Many of the folks that have those requirements that are unemployed are unemployed for good reason. There are however a whole slew of people that could do the job that don't have exactly those requirements that get thrown in the trash by many an HR clerk.
In my experience the above is the leading cause of IT understaffing. Personally I look for a "Skills" section on a resume, and test the claimed skills in an interview. If they can get past my cursory test they're worth a shot, if they are just good at BSing then its obvious within a month, or at least well within their 3 month probationary period. You get more quality employees that are actually interested in what they are doing that way. Of course you end up interviewing more complete idiots as well, but its no loss, as you were going to interview (approximately, again, in my experience) the same amount of unsuitable candidates regardless.
Its partly a problem of the jargon too. Most of the HR folks aren't going to have a clue how your previous job relates to this one or how your own pet projects relate to the job you are applying for, but for an engineer say, they realize that working as building designer for 5 years necessarily includes that you have a lot of civil engineering requirements even if you don't have a degree in civil engineering. If you have 10 years experience working in C with some minor experience in Java but the job requires almost pure Java, the HR girl/guy likely doesn't have a clue how the skills could be transferable and will dump you in favor of someone with a college/uni degree that focused on Java at some point, meanwhile they end up firing the guy because he cheated his way through school and doesn't actually have a clue.
Re:3... 2... 1... before that old H1B rant (Score:1, Informative)
http://www.immihelp.com/visas/h1b/h1b-visa-requirements.html [immihelp.com] (site dedicated to migrants from India but it applies to everyone)
The rules are here. They're (very) restrictive. I'm not saying they work 100% right. But it's not a free for all to hire cheap labor either... at all.
Re:3... 2... 1... before that old H1B rant (Score:5, Informative)
I DO know the rules, and I have also seen first hand how the companies that abuse them are evading them. The most common strategy is to list an impossible requirement, and then miraculously find that the foreigner they want to hire happens to have that on his resume. Miracle of miracles, the job is filled. Meanwhile, to get an american to do the job would have cost 2-3x the 'prevailing wage', so they have a huge financial win.
Re:Ok (Score:3, Informative)
By "real unemployment rate" people usually mean the U6 number [bls.gov], which includes those whose unemployment has expired, discouraged workers, and those working part time for economic reasons (underemployed). This is also know as the "Repbulican president unemployment number", as the press has a habit of reporting the big number when a Republican is in charge, and the small number (the U3) when Democrat is in charge.
The U3 and the U6 are both interesting. The U3 is the most objectively measurable, and so is good for the mathematics of macroeconomics. The U6 is the most representative of the pain level in a bad economy. The U6 tells us that 1 in 6 americans is unemployed or underemployed (which is historically high but no where near Great Depression levels) and likely predictive of voters being quite unhappy with incumbants in November.
Re:3... 2... 1... before that old H1B rant (Score:1, Informative)
Bullshit. These rules and regulations are not enforced.
When companies layoff qualified and often long term American employees en masse and replace them with Indians immediately then that is not in accordance with the rules but it happens all the time.
When there is no enforcement of the rules there might as well not be any rules.
Re:3... 2... 1... before that old H1B rant (Score:3, Informative)
I didn't expect any PhD's to apply. I said it would be a bonus, and that I would stretch my salary range $20K to accommodate. The last time I hired one of these roles was in 1998, and I had been inundated with strong PhD's from a variety of physics programs eager for the opportunity. The one we hired was great and still is in the same company (ironically, he moved to Marketing and is a great resource there).
HR didn't throw any resume's in the trash. We just got garbage. I was serious that we just got nothing meeting the requirements who were authorized to work in the US.
Talent (Score:3, Informative)
The job situation in I.T. has nothing to do with talent, much like manufacturing has nothing to do with American Unions.
Pure and simple, they want slave labourers that live in dormitories and once they get old you throw them in the oven.
We have the slave labor camps and dormitories, we just don't have the ovens yet back in vogue.
The surf sector, I mean the service sector economy is a direct goal of this.
Do you people honestly believe in any of the people you vote for? Do you think congress is stupid?
Quite to the contrary, congress and the people who pull their strings know exactly what would happen if you took away manufacturing.
It was planned. It will continue...and they won't stop till everyone is living in a dormitory in public housing and you have nothing left.
-Hack
Re:Read closer (Score:3, Informative)
I've often heard it said (and it makes sense to me) that much of the argument here is over the difference between this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Engineer [wikipedia.org]
and this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Professional_Engineer [wikipedia.org]
Where the later is "registered or licensed within certain jurisdictions to offer professional services directly to the public" and "The professional status and the actual practice of professional engineering is legally defined and protected by a government body."
It makes no difference to me, but I can see why it does to some. I've also frequently seen a clever way of discerning between the two... where "Capital E, Engineer" indicates someone who is somehow registered and licensed to provide services that are "legally defined and protected by a government".
Re:Read closer (Score:4, Informative)
"Engineer carries with it a liability as you are responsible for your actions in a way that a software programmer is not."
I hear this said a lot and don't see it in the real world. Engineering companies, just like software companies, enter into contracts to provide services to a set quality and schedule with penalties if these are not met. Liability of an individual engineer doesn't enter into it in either case.
And the reason I am not a "Professional Engineer" in the accredited sense is because accreditation is not settled yet. I have no problem considering myself, with a degree and a decade's experience, an Engineer in all the same ways.
Re:3... 2... 1... before that old H1B rant (Score:3, Informative)
Just no early career people to fill the role (it was a junior applications engineer role).
As someone who has been desperate for a job--any job--and been turned down for having "too much experience" may I please extend a hearty "Fuck You" to you, your company, and anyone affiliated with your program.
Do you really think some 55 year-old with boatloads of experience gives a rat's ass if a job is "junior" when they're just trying to keep a roof over their head?
It probably cost us the better part of $200K by the time we were done to hire someone from China
(smacks forehead)