Posted on 02/29/2012 7:28:48 AM PST by SeekAndFind
SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) — Unemployment is at 8.9%? Well, you sure don’t feel it here in the Bay Area.
For the technology-versed, there are plenty of jobs to be had. The only natural conclusion is that we need to mint more coders.
Facebook is not valued at $100 billion for nothing, and it’s not the only tech company that’s growing. The CBOE Technology Index (XX:ZOC) is hovering around its 10-year high, slowly making its way back to where it was in the wake of the new millennium. The current technological growth is real. The technology market is booming, and every corporation and startup is hiring. Hiring developers.
True, a lot of these recruiting wars are among the tech giants. Google Inc. (US:GOOG) engineers have been flocking to the new kids on the block, such as Facebook and Twitter. Well, with Facebook’s impending IPO you can’t blame them; they will indeed be reaping the fruits of their labor pretty soon. But though the war over the good engineers is fierce, it’s not merely the large companies like Apple Inc. (US:AAPL) and Microsoft Corp. (US:MSFT) that are after the tech talent, but every tech company and startup. On top of that, pretty much every company in the world understands it needs an online, social and mobile presence. And the current talent pool is not even close to satisfying the demand.
This job market is unparalleled. In most industries, there are far more employees than employers. Here, it is quite the reverse. There are even speed-dating events between startups and developers. Companies will do anything to get a hold of (the good) developers.
In Silicon Valley, many people are starting to realize that their employment future lies in knowing how to code, and that it is quite possible to learn how, within months.
(Excerpt) Read more at articles.marketwatch.com ...
Just thinking out loud...
What if, instead of paying people 99 weeks for unemployment, we support them for 9 intensive months to learn a programming language/framework/toolset that is in demand?
As the article observes:
If you are thinking, “Well, this is an interesting trend, but not everyone could learn how to code.” Think again. I’ll tell you a secret: Not all coding is so tough. The tools for developing today are becoming simpler. Various Frameworks, Ruby on Rails, JQuery, CoffeeScript, HTML5, are all examples of coding technologies which enable coders to do more with less, and are based on older and more complex technologies. Technological innovations make this possible. If everyone who is capable of writing even basic code could do so, then the brightest minds could work on the genuinely complex parts, such as the algorithms. Creating a simple Web page does not require the same amount of effort as creating a trading program for a hedge fund.
BTW, There are already initiatives which help teach children to code. There are children who learn how to code using Scratch.
Scratch was designed by MIT to teach the basics of computer development from scratch, and enables one to create games and projects through a simple graphic UI.
About 99% of the population does not have the background or mental ability to learn these skills.
The 1% that does, mostly have a job already.
I am a skilled programmer in C++ and Java, and to do the simplest things in a real work environment you need to know a lot.
The problem is that about one percent of the people who know how to code are really, really good at it. The designer/artist/mathematician/supergenius coder is who these companies are looking for, not some retrained mortgage lender. Mediocre coders can be had much cheaper offshore.
That's been the truth for several decades in business and technology. We don't need any fakes and frauds in these economically critical fields.
Otherwise, many of our high-tech jobs could be easily transferred to off-shore, mud-hut countries, and our national debt could soar to fifteen trillion dollars or so.
A bit like the Vo-Tech School when I was a kid. Churned out lots of hair dressers, auto mechanics, welders, etc. Probably way too many.
Gaps in the job market tend to close very quickly. If you declare a major at the outset in 4-year degree program the field tends to be oversupplied by the time you do graduate.
Understand what your trying to say though.
That’s right, America: Learn to code. Then, when the market is glutted, you can find your job offshored to some Indian or Malaysian who will work for 10 cents on the dollar, even if he knows half of what you do.
laid off coder bump
bump
No job? Just learn to code, work 5 to 10 years to gain experience and then you will be in high demand.
Correct-o-mundo.
Case in point: IBM announced layoff of 1000+ employees in the US yesterday. Based on the news coverage that has focused on getting reaction from Union reps, I think it’s a fair bet these are not programmers or program manger jobs. They’re factory workers. And unfortunately, is is impractical in most cases to “re-train” a 30-year factory worker to become a C++ programmer. It’s not so much a question of mental capacity but rather a case of trying to acquire news skills and climb a steep learning-curve at the age when most people are much closer to retirement than to their first job.
And for the exceptional person who can surmount these odds, the fact remains that they would just be able to compete for IT jobs, along with tens of thousands of younger, more experienced candidates.
For all practical purposes, once certainjobs are lost, they are lost forever, and will not come back. And talk of retraining is going to need to be very much more focused and effective, and more selectively delivered.
At some point we’re going to reach the unavoidable conclusion, that we’re not running out of people with skills.
We are running out of jobs.
Jobs we sent to other countries.
“Free trade” is America’s single largest historical error, and may very well destroy this nation.
In this generation.
It needs to be stopped. The emperor is naked as a jaybird, and it’s not a good look.
America First.
I’m 80% done with codecademy.com and their wonderful page.
The only problem is that you can cheat by just finding the answer in the q&a page.
Codingbat.com is another one that is much harder to cheat on.
They’ve still got to be smart to become an in-demand (that is, valuable) programmer.
My company is hiring. My team has just expanded to 10 from 4 a year ago.
All eight new hires are in Shanghai, leaving myself and one other as the only US workers. In addition to my US-based Chinese boss of course. Funny how that worked out.
Thanks....looking at it now.
Too true.
At my last job I acquired (taught myself) some highly in-demand skills. When I got laid off I thought, No problem--I not only have these skills, I have years of experience with them. Employers will be happy to have me. Yes, I'd be competing with younger people who had a paper saying that they'd done course work in this field and passed a test, but the younger folks found that employers wouldn't hire them since they had no experience.
I found that even with my experience, employers didn't want me unless I had that magic paper. So I went out to get the paper and racked up some debt doing so. With skills, experience, AND the magic paper, I now find that these jobs are being outsourced to India. It's infuriating that in this economic climate we are still giving jobs away while Americans are desperate for work.
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