Laid-off Techies Face 'Sense of Impending Doom' With Job Cuts at Highest Since Dot-com Crash (cnbc.com) 124
An anonymous reader shares a report: Since the start of the year, more than 50,000 workers have been laid off from over 200 tech companies, according to tracking website Layoffs.fyi. It's a continuation of the predominant theme of 2023, when more than 260,000 workers across nearly 1,200 tech companies lost their jobs. Alphabet, Amazon, Meta and Microsoft have all taken part in the downsizing this year, along with eBay, Unity Software, SAP and Cisco. Wall Street has largely cheered on the cost-cutting, sending many tech stocks to record highs on optimism that spending discipline coupled with efficiency gains from artificial intelligence will lead to rising profits. PayPal announced in January that it was eliminating 9% of its workforce, or about 2,500 jobs.
For the tens of thousands of people in Croisant's [anecdote in the linked story] position, the path toward reemployment is daunting. All told, 2023 was the second-biggest year of cuts on record in the technology sector, behind only the dot-com crash in 2001, according to outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas. Not since the spectacular flameouts of Pets.com, eToys and Webvan have so many tech workers lost their jobs in such a short period of time. Last month's job cut count was the highest of any February since 2009, when the financial crisis forced companies into cash preservation mode.
For the tens of thousands of people in Croisant's [anecdote in the linked story] position, the path toward reemployment is daunting. All told, 2023 was the second-biggest year of cuts on record in the technology sector, behind only the dot-com crash in 2001, according to outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas. Not since the spectacular flameouts of Pets.com, eToys and Webvan have so many tech workers lost their jobs in such a short period of time. Last month's job cut count was the highest of any February since 2009, when the financial crisis forced companies into cash preservation mode.
The ruling class (Score:1)
Doesn't like working from home and people must be punished.
Re:The ruling class (Score:5, Funny)
Yeah that's it. It has nothing to do with macro economics. It's all about rich people firing effective workers just because rich people are mean!
Re:The ruling class (Score:5, Insightful)
Lilo and Stitch earned more than $200 million at the box office and generated more than a billion dollars in merchandising revenue. Michael Eisner responded by firing hundreds of irreplaceable animators and utterly annihilating the studio that created the film. They justified their actions by claiming 2D animation is "too expensive."
Then they wrote a $7 billion check to buy Pixar.
What would you call that other than rich people firing effective workers for no other reason than to be mean? They certainly didn't share any other reasons for those layoffs.
If putting over ten figures on your employer's top line isn't good enough, what is?
P.S. I'm fairly certain I don't have to go into Bob Iger's track record regarding Pixar and the billions of dollars of other acquisitions he insisted on.
Re:The ruling class (Score:5, Informative)
Unfortunately, Disney was probably right. Lilo & Stitch was a swan song of the 2D animated movie industry. Yes, some animators still play in that space, but not with the budgets and levels of quality you saw in 20th century feature films (few exceptions).
You're totally ignoring comparative flops like Treasure Planet and Atlantis.
It was a gamble on Disney's part to spike their own cannon in favor of a newer model. Turns out it was the right move for them.
Re: (Score:2)
One could easily argue Disney's subsequent "failures" were the results of self-inflicted wounds.
And the events of the past 2-3 years would have proven them right.
Re: (Score:2)
Ehh, maybe. If you're referring to Treasure Planet and Atlantis, those movies were just not terribly good and had some other problems (poor promotion campaigns and poorly-chosen launch windows). Which, again, might have been avoidable, or might have been symptomatic of Disney slowly killing their own legacy 2D projects. Though if you look at the production budgets for both movies, they were pretty beefy with all the expensive computer effects that were included (Futurama had similar problems during it's i
Re: (Score:3)
We could apply exactly the same logic to Black Cauldron. It was a box office disaster too. Good thing Disney didn't use that as an excuse to heave their entire animation division overboard, isn't it?
That would have cost them somewhere in the neighborhood of two billion at the box office and north of $20 billion in merchandising. Would have upended the Capital Cities merger and driven the company into bankruptcy too.
Pixar wouldn't have had to "make up for it" if Disney had simply done what they had always do
Re: (Score:2)
Disney didn't have anything to fall back on when Black Cauldron bombed, other than their also-underperforming live action studio. People forget how hard Disney had it before Little Mermaid hit the big screen.
Re: (Score:2)
You win. Fire 'em all. They can all get server jobs at TGI Friday's.
Re: (Score:3)
I think the bigger issue is telling good stories. It seems Disney can't do that for shit so it doesn't matter whether it's animated or live action. Even the Pixar movies have flopped as of recent.
Re: (Score:2)
Swansong of the American 2D animated movie industry.
Budget, I've no idea but it would be a tough sell to say for example that Miyazaki is of lesser quality than Disney.
Re:The ruling class (Score:5, Funny)
Lilo and Stitch earned more than $200 million at the box office and generated more than a billion dollars in merchandising revenue.
I bet neither of them got a penny of that. :-) #HollywoodAccounting
Re: (Score:2)
Lol, someone mod this up.
Re: (Score:1)
I hear Lilo has been turning tricks at NJ Turnpike rest stops to make ends meet. Apparently her momager didn't do such a good job of squirreling away their residuals.
Re:The ruling class (Score:5, Insightful)
Disney didn't cancel the studio because they're rich people who hate talent. Disney killed it because Disney has been a poorly run company for a long time living off the good will of generations of people who grew up on family friendly fare that has been discarded because "reasons". Now that the last few bits of that hard earned good will and genuine love for the company is being burned to hot ashes in the last ~5 years, their stock has taken a huge hit, their movies are losing money big time for the first time ever (en mass), and they continue to double down on their company killing stupidity by producing ever more content their traditional fan base does not want.
Disney isn't mean. They are fucking stupid and just plain crazy. The chickens have come home to roost.
And btw, L&S didn't earn $200m. It profited roughly $200m when international is included. It cost $80m to make and earned almost $280m in theatres. The toy side is opaque. There's no real way to say what the toy profit was once you take into account production, marketing, shelf space, etc, but we can safely assume they made a fuck ton on that, too.
Not mean. Stupid. Disney does stupid things. It's in their nature in this last generation.
They killed Star Wars. They are killing Marvel. They just canceled a ton of upcoming movies because test audiences hated them. A few others have undergone multiple rewrites which is always a bad sign. They need to change their entire attire away from, "we hate our fan base and want to piss them off" back to "we love making people happy to buy our stuff".
Re: (Score:2)
Distinction without a difference.
I don't disagree, but they can be mean and stupid at the same time.
Re: (Score:3)
I just wanted to point out LnS did even better than he thinks. I wasn't diminishing it.
In Disney's case the meanness is directed to their fan base from earlier whom they loathe and hate. There are many videos, posts, etc, from people at all levels of Disney management making it very clear they hate the fans who enjoy family content and the simple mindless Marvel pew pew pew cgi content. They want the old fans to hate what they're making. They want the fans to go away. They don't hate talent unless the
Re: (Score:2)
They justified their actions by claiming 2D animation is "too expensive."
Well, guess what, coders are expensive too, especially when they're human. A LLM should be able to do the same work for cheaper, no?
Re: (Score:2)
Chernobyl was cheaper. How did that work out?
Re: (Score:3)
It doesn't have anything to do with macro economics - that's the excuse that every CEO is using because it's a term few people understand unless you're an economist.
Funny how the layoffs are spiking up, but the stock buybacks continue unabated. Seems if it was "macro economics" they would be preserving cash instead of enriching shareholders.
Re: (Score:2)
I didn't get rich by devaluing anyone. I got rich through a combination of long hard work, careful career planning, working hard, networking, working hard, being smart, working hard, being lucky, working hard, making good guesses about future technologies, and working hard.
Along the way, I helped many many people advance their careers, improve their skills, get promotions or career track changes for the better, get raises, training, and whatever else each person needed to do better in life. Someone of the
Re: (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
" A recent survey showed that almost 50% of hiring managers admit that they advertise jobs that they have no intention of hiring people for -- just to create the impression that the company is growing. "
" Some of these unnecessary people end up actually getting hired, and when companies are looking for a way to increase profits these people are laid off."
You do realize you have established NO connection between these two statements, yes?
hire to fire is an thing as well (Score:5, Insightful)
we need to hire people just have people to fire so we can keep our core team in place as we need to rank people at the bottom.
Impending? (Score:1)
Re: (Score:3)
Getting canned is only a big deal if you can't find a replacement job reasonably soon.
I've been fired/laid off about 5 times during my career. The only one that sucked was in the middle of the dot bomb era when there were literally no tech jobs available and I was unemployed for 6 months. All the other times I had a new job lined up before I got around to depositing my 2 week good bye check.
Re: (Score:3)
Like I've said here before, make sure you are not a clone in your job. Make sure you can't be replaced by someone cheaper. If your job can be done by anyone, from anywhere in the world, then your job is at risk. Maybe it means they hire four people in an emerging economy instead to replace you, it's still cheaper. If one claims to be irreplaceable then one should prove it to the bosses. Don't aim for the the same skill set that millions of people already have, doing the same job that millions already do
Re: (Score:2)
Truth. Great advice.
The problem is when small companies do cuts they tend to die entirely with in a few months and big companies don't give a shit who you are. No one is special at a big company.
The reason to have special skills is to get your next job not to save your last one. Be the guy who stands out during interviews.
The most amusing interview win I had was the CTO at small company asking me what I would do first if he hired me as IT Manager. I paused briefly to think about core IT functionality an
Learn to save the world! (Score:3, Interesting)
Save which world? (Score:1, Insightful)
Pretty amusing you want to "keep the climate and food supply from being destroyed."
A warmer planet means more food, since more regions are arable. Regions that get hotter generally do not become desert, they become more able to support plant life just as jungles do.
So you have to pick one - do you want more food, or do you want to keep the climate from getting warming because of some vague feeling it's bad? Just because it MIGHT harm some coastal cities? They mean nothing when compared with supplying the
Re: Save which world? (Score:1)
Vague feeling?
We're starting to hit the boundaries of literal human survivability in hot climates during heat waves now. One grid failure at the wrong time and millions dying is a reality that is way closer than it ever was. Like, we were damn close to it last summer. In the southern US, among other places.
The collapse of ocean ecosystems. That's important for food too you know. That's a thing.
Maybe not a food issue but destroying our coastal cities is also a "vaguely bad" result of warming.
Re: Save which world? (Score:2)
Climate change is already causing droughts which can severely impact the ability to grow crops. Where I live, in the last 14 years, there is barely a drop of precipitation between April and September.
https://yaleclimateconnections.org/2021/06/california-americas-garden-is-drying-out/
Not really (Score:1)
California is "drying out" because they suck at water management. They just let a tremendous amount of water they could have captured from massive storms drain off into the sea. They are closing down reservoirs without considering where water is going to come from.
Also, they halted a large desalination plant - so really California deserves what they are getting.
Yes some areas will continue to have draughts - you seem to have forgotten that weather is not climate, we are talking on a global scale. Colorad
Re: (Score:3)
There is so much wrong in your post that it boggles the mind.
Climate change affects different locations differently. I was talking about climate change in CA. Not the global climate, or Colorado, or Canada !
California rejected one desalination plant, not all plants in general. It seems there were multiple reasons. Apparently, the area had other abundant sources of water. The utility company didn't want to purchase the desalinated water at what it would cost. And there were environmental issues.
https://apnew
Re: (Score:1)
I moved from computing to studying and helping the environment. We need to balance urban planning for two more billion people projected to be born by 2050 and keep the climate and food supply from being destroyed. I know there are a lot of "skeptic" trolls on Slashdot, but at least agree you want breathable air and non poisoned food. Use your tech skills with the maths and algorithms you learned in computing to help "nature's intelligence", aka "real intelligence" and not "artificial" intelligence.
Did you really think this out? We are going to "compute" our way out of the physical problems we have? Is the AI feeding you through a tube right now?
Great Depression (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
Yep. Because a 4% unemployment rate is the same thing as a 25% unemployment rate.
Re: (Score:2)
To be fair, for the person being laid off it will suck when it's a depression and it will also suck when the economy is booming. It sucks.
I remember being unable to find job openings for a long time after leaving school, with plenty of people, including friends and past employers, saying "we'd love to hire you but there's a big hiring freeze." This was at the same time that the news was going on an on about how great the economy was, and that the unemployment rate was at an optimum level (too low and infla
Re: Great Depression (Score:1, Informative)
It is if you redefine the unemployment rate, which is what Obama did. Labor participation rate is very low right now in all measures with true unemployment hovering about 20%
Re: (Score:2)
If you are going to claim that 1 in 5 people are unemployed in contrast to basically every publicly available data point, you damn well better back that up with some concrete fucking facts.
Accordingly, as you neglected to do so, there is absolutely no reason to believe a word of what you posted.
Re: (Score:1)
It's true.
There is site that collects stats the various ways before BOL changed metric definitions. Unemployment is indeed at 25 percent the old way, before long term discouraged defined out of existence in 1990s
https://www.shadowstats.com/al... [shadowstats.com]
Re: Great Depression (Score:3)
These are made up stats, plain and simple.
Read
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shadowstats.com
"Negative" section.
Plenty of references to valid criticism. Even the site maintainer admits he is adding some arbitrary factor for his "data".
Re: (Score:1)
not relevant to the unemployment data, that is all derivable from BoL and other places than shadowstats have it. Wikipedia is ten times as suspect as a source. You're being mentally lazy to not except the truth that unemployment by pre 1994 measure is 25 percent and would be reported as 25 percent by BoL without the redfinition
Re: (Score:2)
I am admittedly not an economist, and I would certainly not be able to derive the data from BLS myself.
I had never heard of shadowstats . I lazily asked both Chatgpt and Gemini about its credibility. The results were mixed.
Chatgpt :
Ultimately, whether ShadowStats is considered credible depends on individual perspectives and the extent to which one agrees with its methodologies, interpretations, and conclusions. It's essential to critically evaluate economic analyses from various sources and consider a range
Re: (Score:3)
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GF... [twimg.com]
Re: (Score:2)
Imagine offering these propaganda figures as part of your argument.
Re: (Score:2)
Imagine calling publicly available and uncontested statistics "propaganda" in a one-liner, without offering a single shred of dispositive proof.
Re: (Score:2)
No, it really isn't.
My wife was laid off in January. She's now employed at a different company, doing work she loves.
If it was a depression, she'd still be looking for work. So would I. And so would you.
By the way, there was no shortage of printing presses from 1929 to 1939. So basically you're just wrong.
Re: (Score:1)
Since we're making arguments out of anecdotes.
Heard a story once about a recently discharged officer from the U.S. Navy. Won the silver star. And a purple heart. Got promoted to O-4 and chief engineer of an attack sub. During a civilian job interview the manager asked this question:
"What makes you think you're qualified to be a manager in this company?"
His answer:
"My job in the Navy was to teach recent high school graduates how to run a nuclear reactor while being shot at. I'm still alive, so we did somethi
Some Perspective + Interest Rate Corrections (Score:4, Insightful)
IMHO a more interesting perspective is how far back in time we're going. Are our total number of jobs at the level they were in 2022? 2020? 2019?
Big tech has spent almost 2 decades "talent hoarding"...hiring the best and brightest they can find and figuring out what to do with them later...this is obviously not very efficient, but this was how they competed among each other and with record levels of VC funding and very low interest rates you could do wasteful practices like this. They also can't as easily do moonshots or unprofitable loss leaders.
Once interest rates rise, this gets a LOT more expensive. It's not surprising talent hoarders stopped hoarding...the only surprising thing was how long it took.
The other consequence we'll see shortly is increased pressure to monetize. For example Amazon Alexa....it's a bit expensive of a service to give away for free for life with the purchase of a $20 puck. Tech sector free services are going to become a lot less free very soon. If you work for a loss-leader or unprofitable product, you may be at risk. However, having survived the 2001 crash as a new grad, I've always ensured every job I took was where the company was making money. Sometimes, that has been a mistake, but it was to prepare me for this scenario...it took 15 years longer to arrive than I thought, but my job is likely to be safe as are all jobs linked to projects that can easily demonstrate value to a company.
This downturn could become a major employment apocalypse, but it isn't one just yet. Most talented developers are having no problems finding a decent job. They might get into their dream job as easily as before, but they can find some job in their field that pays a living wage. It sucks for recent grads and people entering the field from other fields, but most of us are fine for now.
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
Jobs lost numbers are real - these are actual layoffs.
New jobs numbers are government issued garbage that mean nothing, just as the official unemployment rate means nothing.
If new jobs were really > jobs lost they everything would be great, but they are not. Lot's of tech people have been out of work for a long time, applying to hundreds of jobs (many of which turn out to be fake "ghost" job postings).
Re: (Score:2)
Jobs lost numbers are real - these are actual layoffs.
Here is a very odd coincidence: 50k layoffs, 50k suicides. Odd isn't it? The suicides happened before the layoffs, but it is still very odd that the numbers are so similar. (numbers apply to USA)
Re: (Score:2)
260k jobs lost isn't fun, but 300k NEW jobs were listed in 2019.
And how many of those 300K jobs were ghost jobs [slashdot.org]?
Once interest rates rise, this gets a LOT more expensive.
Except these companies are still living off the hoardes of money they built up when interest rates were effectively zero. They haven't yet had to go out and raise money at the current rates.
Most talented developers are having no problems finding a decent job.
Except not all these people are developers. There are bunches of people who make s
Re: (Score:2)
Big issue there is that the jobs created in recent years have been entry level and service industry type roles.
Not the kind of positions that will replace the relatively high salaries tech workers have enjoyed.
Job listings aren't recorded as jobs (Score:2)
And how many of those 300K jobs were ghost jobs [slashdot.org]?
Simply listing a job is meaningless to labor statistics. You don't collect taxes on an unfilled job listing and you cannot be laid off from it. Ghost jobs are shitty and all, but not relevant to this equation. The fact is that in the last 5 years, far more tax-paying tech jobs were created than were shed in the last year....and that is following trends of continuous growth. Comparing to 2001 is disingenuous as the original author stated, unless you convert to percentages.
Let them band together (Score:3)
50k tech employees is enough to form several large, potentially-successful companies. They can all work from home and collaborate across long distances. If they have the skills, it might actually work.
survived it before (Score:3)
There's a couple of lessons here. First, ebb and flow is how capitalism works. What was hot last year, may be cold this year... anyone wanna buy a bored ape nft? bwa haahahaha . That's the danger of jumping on the latest hot fad, including jobs.
If you want something that can't be disposed of, need for trades is huge. HVAC, plumbing, electrical work, not glamorous, but they pay decent, you'll never be replaced by a chatbot, and you won't have a mortgage sized student loan.
Remember, there's always room for good people. That means go above and beyond. Do you're best. Take pride in your work. Whining about wanting to work from home or culture at the office is a fast ticket to unemployment in a tight market. Managers don't want to deal with problems and there's plenty of people wanting jobs who aren't
Lastly, remember, if your name isn't on the building, you are a disposable commodity. Nobody protects your ass but you.
Re: (Score:3)
The goddamn mortgage doesn't ebb and flow. It's due every month day and date.
Something tells me if a homeowner (or renter) could suspend their mortgage/rent payments due to unemployment the problem would get fixed in a right now motherFUCKING hurry. Like over a weekend.
As long as an employer has the power to take your house, you are a slave. Full stop.
Re: (Score:3)
Your employer doesn't take your house or evict you, the owner of the property does... that's the landlord or bank. How does an employer who fires staff replacing them with "AI" learn anything by not paying rent/mortgage? People agreed to pay rent or pay back the money you borrowed f
Re: (Score:2)
I thoroughly enjoy cavalier borderline hostile rhetoric like yours when it comes to the job market. I walked away 23 years ago and never looked back.
Employers derive intense psychotic sexual pleasure from destroying people's careers. They are black-hearted, hissing, godless evil.
If you participate, you have only yourself to blame.
Re: (Score:2)
> People agreed to pay rent or pay back the money you borrowed for the place to live.
Add to that that people agree to drink and eat and you'll get the neoliberal gold medal.
> you're responsible for your own ass.
Bullshit. You're dependent on thousands of people doing stuff every day that you don't even think about.
Re: (Score:2)
Ebb and flow as in the capitalist economy cycles from growth periods to recession . Recessions happen on average every 4 to 7 years. .com bomb, 2008 crash, 2020 covid/recession... 3 times in 20 years, yep right on schedule. ...
Choices have consequences. Nowhere does it say in any employee handbook you're guaranteed a job for life no matter what. Again, you're responsible for your own ass. Part of that whole "freedom" thing is freedom to fail.
You're sneering as if the problem is that people don't understand the short-term debt cycle. The things people are annoyed about look indications that we're reaching the end of a long term debt cycle.
We're also right on schedule for one of those, and they always have significant political consequences.
You also seem to be claiming that "freedom to fail" means a society that will sit back and watch people's lives fall apart due to macro-economic shifts. That's completely backwards. Freedom to fail is what you
Re: (Score:2)
Re: survived it before (Score:2)
I have a paid off mansion. No mortgage for 5 years. The property taxes, maintenance and insurance are still very significant.
The county could take the home if I fail to pay the taxes.
The employer has nothing to do with any of it.
Re: (Score:2)
Lastly, remember, if your name isn't on the building, you are a disposable commodity. Nobody protects your ass but you.
I can only assume this was said forcefully with the with the national anthem loud in the background, swelling chests and wetting eyes with pride.
You're not wrong, but as an American, this is fucking shameful and pathetic. 0 labor protections go hand in hand with 0 national healthcare, etc. Land of the Serfs, home of the Timid.
Different kinds of smart (Score:3)
There's the kind of smart that gets you a tech job. Then there's the kind of smart that knows better than to go balls deep financing a Bay Area home and a luxury car. There's the kind of smart that knows the cops can crash your party any time. I know I've got it, but I kind of wish I'd had the 3rd kind of smart that pounds just a little while longer; but that brings us to yet another kind of smart: The kind of smart that goes in to work the day after your doctor says your blood pressure is high, and makes you think about how all the money isn't worth it if job stress kills you before 50.
Dupe (Score:3)
https://tech.slashdot.org/stor... [slashdot.org]
This dupe got a bit more creative, modifying the summary. But this one cites the exact same site--which relies on self-reporting--for its layoff statistics.
Layoff numbers don't tell the whole story (Score:3)
First, the site cited, gets its numbers from self-reporting, not from actual research.
Second, the tech industry overall *grew* by 5.4% in 2023. https://www.zippia.com/advice/... [zippia.com]
Third, the 260K jobs lost in 2023, according to the site, represent just 2% of the 12.2 million tech workers overall (see link above).
No, this is not 2001 again.
Remember Pud? (Score:2)
During the dot.com implosion, he had a site called fâ(TM)d company. (Full word used). I used to read it daily. Of course, on one level it was a tragedy for the regular joes who lost their jobs. But, his take on the founders of the failed companies, or the inanity of the ideas and business plans were priceless. It kind of faded out as the worst of the fallout subsided. One of his tricks was to occasionally include naked women pics in some of the stories just to spice things up. I knew we were finally
Learn to code! (Score:2)
I guess they'll both have to learn to flip burgers or move furniture or something.
Time to eliminate some tax breaks (Score:2)
A lot of these tech companies were given state and local tax breaks in exchange for employing people in those areas. If these tech companies have decided against employing people, it's time to start clawing back those concessions.
Interesting (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
non-technical "techie" jobs.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Oh no! (Score:5, Funny)
Are you suggesting coders need to learn to mine coal?
Re: (Score:2)
Extracting precious metals from used electronics?
Re: (Score:2)
No, coal is over. The mining buzz is around rare earth metals. Wait, those mines are all in China so we need to learn Mandarin first
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
Learn what in trade school? IT? Then maybe. In California, a plumber's median income is 50k. A construction worker .. 45k. A mechanic about the same. Yes you can earn into the six figures as a construction worker once you get good at it and have experience etc. A software engineer's median income is $130k. And you can get good at that too and earn more.
Re:They can learn to mine coal (Score:5, Insightful)
Learn what in trade school? IT? Then maybe. In California, a plumber's median income is 50k. A construction worker .. 45k. A mechanic about the same. Yes you can earn into the six figures as a construction worker once you get good at it and have experience etc. A software engineer's median income is $130k. And you can get good at that too and earn more.
A software engineer... not just a basic programmer, but a real, full-stack software developer... isn't comparable to a plumber or concrete tech, though. So the comparison is a bit unfair. Those are skilled jobs, but a full-stack developer with a CS degree is more like a CPA, a white collar professional. One of the reasons that CPA and devs make the kind of money they do is that most people don't have the cranial firepower to do them... or there'd be more devs and CPA's. Which is also another reason why it's batshit silly to require CS to graduate high school. It's part of the same mindset that said "every child is an undiscovered math prodigy" that we saw in the 80's and 90's. Again, it's just not the case.
We have a LOT of people in IT that shouldn't be (just like college), and to a great extent they're in the field because guidance counselors and parents seem to think that anyone can be a network admin, or sysadmin, or dev, etc. And many would be better suited learning welding, plumbing, or some other skill.
Re: They can learn to mine coal (Score:5, Insightful)
Wait a sec, compare apples to apples. Your plumber will likely have 4 to 6 years of earning by the time your software engineer is out of school, and no significant student debt.
The comparison is not as bad as you think.
Also the job sites don't usually track business owners as typical jobs. So yeah if you work for someone else as a plumber you have those salaries. If you go on your own after a few year's working, like many do, you will blow those numbers out of the water.
I know several later career tradespeople clearing 200k a year, in Maine and protip Maine is not California. That's comparable to high paid professionals for sure.
Do not look down on trades. If you're motivated and smart you can do as good if not better there than in most other career paths you can mention, and their job security moving forward is absolutely guaranteed.
Re: (Score:1)
Do not look down on trades. If you're motivated and smart you can do as good if not better there than in most other career paths you can mention, and their job security moving forward is absolutely guaranteed.
I am in no way looking down on the trades. I'm an admirer of men that do such jobs, and I consider those jobs both highly important, and well-deserving of high compensation. My point is that some people are not cut out for various fields, and while people doing trades are in no way "dumb" (in addition to skill, many trades require a lot of knowledge and more than a good bit of practical math that average people would probably struggle with), they're still not cut out to do things like software development,
Re: They can learn to mine coal (Score:2)
Fwiw, I intended to reply to the parent, not you. Apologies for the confusion.
Re: (Score:3)
Yeah I work in a company that had several high qualified contractors that were slightly expensive and now replaced them wi5 a few people who did a 6 month Rails Bootcamp cause they are cheaper! Yeah! Less $$$$$$! Kaching!!!
Bad plan. Very bad plan. The one experienced guy left had all the stuff dropped on his lap and is rapidly going into burnout.
I was one of the replacements, with loads of experience but the lot are spending all the time discussing ways to improving the process and slapping each others back
Re: (Score:2)
I know several later career tradespeople clearing 200k a year, in Maine and protip Maine is not California. That's comparable to high paid professionals for sure.
Absolutely. "Makes half what an experienced SWE does" is a very clear comparison.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
The world will always need plumbers, carpenters, electricians and mechanics.
Making 6 figures in the right trades isn't that hard.
Re: (Score:2)
Maybe, but we're in a transformative phase due to AI. Jobs under threat include coding, marketing, design, editorial, creative for art, generative video is coming along, as is music, finance can be accelerated, potentially also legal (accelerated, not replaced).
Some trades probably won't absorb a lot of people. You mentioned carpenters... people are very price sensitive and will import goods or buy premade items from big box suppliers.
Plumbers, mechanics... sure, but if everyone turns to that supply will ou
Re: (Score:2)
The blue collar trades require skills. Real estate was mostly bored housewives looking to make a quick buck.
I've had housewife agents and quality professional agents. The difference is stark.
Re: (Score:2)
And who is going to fund this trillion dollar project of yours? Why dont you just replace the whole electric net too while you are at it. Piggy back it with the new digital infrastructure
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
Where regulations require them to have certs, maybe, but if you've used modern stuff like pex it is as approximately as difficult as building a lego set to do a lot of that stuff these days.
Yep, it's just that easy. All of that other stuff, like dealing with existing pipes, codes, plans, crawling, cutting, hauling, and scooping up shit is just a small part of the job. That's why plumbing is so easy.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
Because I'm retired. I do my own plumbing, light carpentry and physical labor where it makes sense. I'm my own pool boy, too.
I do not do any form of electrical. I do not like work where a careless moment could lead to serious injury or death.
I hire people for bigger jobs. It took 2 guys 3.5 hours to mount my tv on the wall. Two other guys spent 90 minutes installing the over hang microwave I bought from best buy. If it's taking 2 pros a few hours to do, fuck that, I'm not doing that solo to save $100.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Uh wow, yeah... lol. I hired a guy to replace the broken old pump and change out the salt/chlorine converter (he charged materials only for that part but I know how to do it now) but otherwise I take care of the chemicals, cleaning, filters, etc.
Ok, I admit that when I opened the filter last week and saw a fist sized spider staring back at me, I closed the lid and walked away hoping it would just go away on it's own but otherwise I take care of it. We have a lot of big critters here but that was just too
Re: (Score:2)
Would this be the government that manages SS and Medicare so GrandMa doesn't move in with you? Or the gov. that investigates highway accidents to learn how to prevent future accidents? Or the gov. that mandates you cannot set up Ma and Pa Kettle's Medicine and Bait Job with establishing you can actually produce safe and effective medicine? Or the gov. that keeps tabs on diseases so we can prove to morons that not getting vaccinated means their kids might die from measles no matter how much they pray? Or the
Re: (Score:3)
Except that the Indian super stars are in US and Europe. Offshoring is done because you can hire 4 for the price of 1, and bean counters like that. In reality those 4 probably all have two jobs each, so you think you're hiring full time workers at a contracting house by you're really get part time workers. And you get churn, the people you work with today might be gone in a month and now you've got new people who don't know your product or code or processes.
Ultimately it's never as cheap as they think it
Re: (Score:2)
Yep. I know a In Indian superstar DevOps guy. He knows what he is doing. He lives and works in Frankfurt.