Job market collapse has people packing

San Francisco Chronicle ^

[RCW2001]

Jobless and broke, Bryan Clouse sits among the dwindling possessions in his studio in San Francisco's Fillmore District getting ready to leave what he once thought was a computer nerd's promised land.

In a week, the 35-year-old programmer will load up a rented SUV and say goodbye to the city that has been his home for the past nine years. He will go to live with his grandparents in Brooklyn, Mich., a tiny town of brick storefronts and clapboard houses a few hours west of Detroit. There, with no rent to worry about, he will look for work.

[ComputationalComplexity]

formality is not always a bad thing. One thing that I've noticed over the years is that our programmers really neglect any sort of formal documentation of their work. Thats really my only complaint with the code(aside from poor architecture, and reusability) This may ensure their jobs for the short term, but it also hampers efficiency, the Indian engineers are really anal about documentation, they usually document every little detail of a project to death, but it helps.

[palmer]

It may be a cliche, but good code documents itself.

[blueriver]

As I said, my wife taught undergraduate and graduate-level Petroleum Engineering at a major university (and one very well-respected in the PE world, I might add). She saw students from all over the country, and all over the world pass through her and her colleagues classes--certainly enough to be a valid statstical sampling.

A statistical sampling involving one college in one engineering discipline - with that you think you have the data to broad stroke the entire nation of American engineers in every discipline?

[speekinout]

Drop the H1B programs, and engineering salaries will rise, thus attracting more Americans to study the field.

You got it backwards, Engineering salaries were high, but American students weren't interested in doing the work. US companies needed the work done, so they went where the expertise was.
American students are lazy these days. They're trained that way from elementary school on. Their self-esteem is more important than their knowledge. And there are plenty of polls that show that we teach our kids self-esteem while the Asians teach theirs engineering.

Anyone who runs a company for profit would rather have employees who know their jobs than ones who just "feel good about themselves".
We are way off track, and shutting the border isn't going to change a thing.

[FormerLurker]

Complaining to the government is not the answer.

You've GOT to be kidding me. The CORPORATIONS complained to the government in order to allow a flood of cheap foreign workers into this country due to an alleged shortage of software developers back in the 90's. There IS no shortage today, yet the H1B program continues to operate at the same level as it did during this questionable "shortage" of personal.

There are hundreds of thousands of engineers currently out of work, thus there is obviously no need to import help from other countries in order to fill positions in the software development field.

I really can't understand how people can't see that this IS one major reason why our economy is suffering today. With that many people out of work who used to earn high wages, there is that much less money being spent for consumer goods and services. It is just a snowball effect, where the snowball apparently hasn't finished picking up more snow in it's downhill roll....

[Joe Hadenuf]

Great, now these liberals will spread across the land, and begin the same destructive cycle over again in another place...

LOL, most of these liberal are from out of state to begin with. Hehehe, most in Cal are not from here. Very few of us actual natives.....Just like the guy in this article, lol, he's from Michigan.

But your right, I wished all these libs would go back home to what ever state they are from.......

[rightofrush]

THIS POST MAKES ME SICK. I HAVE POSTED AND POSTED HERE ABOUT THE LACK OF DESIRE OF OUR YOUNG TO LEARN. AS A TEACHER, I HAVE ENDURED UNIMAGINEABLE ABUSE WHEN TRYING TO PUSH STUDENTS TO HIGH LEVELS. I HAVE NO SYMPATHY LEFT.

SOMETIMES, PEOPLE GET WHAT THEY DESERVE

I know, firsthand, whereof you speak.
I taught HS math & science (mostly Chemistry) for 30 years and had to take early retirement at 56 for my physical and mental health.

[FormerLurker]

It isn't only recent graduates that are out of work these days. Engineers with over 15 years experience are out on the street with little or no chance of finding work. So don't blame it on laziness or ineptness, as these people are the ones who HAVE written much of the software that not only you and I use everyday, but that which forms the infrastructure of our nation's telecommunications network.

[blueriver]

This may ensure their jobs for the short term, but it also hampers efficiency, the Indian engineers are really anal about documentation, they usually document every little detail of a project to death, but it helps.

Now I have heard everything. Most Indian software engineers on H-1B visa's can hardly even send email without major grammatical errors. A lot of good companies are ISO certified and require documentation as a part of the engineering process. Writing documentation is always a scheduled item and if a manager does not want it done then it does not get done and vice versa.

[ComputationalComplexity]

The question is what kind of documentation. Alot of engineers turn out docs that cannot be used to later enhance or modify the software that they wrote, its just self preservation, this is also true for most domestic consultant companies. They deliver docs, but its meant to satisfy computer-illiterate managers, not the engineers.

[Joe Hadenuf]

so now I'm on the East Coast. Perhaps if all the bozos leave, I will move back to the country North of San Francisco, get the old ranch back and run some sheep, plant some grapes and put in that hot tub I couldn't persuade the folks to.....

Got news for you. There are twice as many libs on the east coast, maybe three times more than Cal has.. Hehehe.....Since you don't know this, feel free to stay where your at.....

[nanny]

"Because then the "education majors" would actually need to know something about the subjects they teach."

I agree, my daughter is going back to college to be a teacher and I was so surprised at the amount of her subjects that were going to be education, child psychology, child development, etc. Not a log of education there as in subject matter, I mean.

[Red Jones]

thanks buddhaboy; Also please understand, my goal here is to inform people; I take a dramatic stand in order to inform people, not to bash my fellow americans.

[blueriver]

US companies needed the work done, so they went where the expertise was.

What really happened is that US companies over estimated markets. Managers, directors and CEO of companies with their MBA's didn't know what they were doing. They needed a massive amount of workers to get the job done...Fast forward.. They miscalculated.., over built their inventories, didn't need all the workers after all. LAID OFF THOUSANDS. This was just poor management and incompetent corporate insight.

[CatoRenasci]

Of course the East coast has a lot more liberals, but they're usually not as offensively loopy as the ones who've migrated to, and ruined, Northern California. I live in a nice, cultured, Republican town, full of Congregational (still calling themselves 'congregational') and Episcopal hurches and people whose three (or four) names are all family names. Oh, it's cosmopolitan enough that the clubs don't keep out ethnics very often, but it's still got an essentially WASP character. I'm getting cranky in my old age, I don't like to have to listen to bad Spanish spoken by people who can't speak English as I go about my daily routine. I like help in the stores who knows something about the goods, because they buy the same sorts of things I do. I'm just a reactionary who yearns for an earlier time when the melting pot was still the American ideal, and the country was open about its essentially Anglo-Saxon and Christian (but not fundamentalist) character.

Where I live now on Long Island Sound reminds me very much of what Northern California was like 50 years ago, except the weather isn't as good.

[speekinout]

I'm certainly going to grant you a big point - management in high tech companies comes from the MBA programs. They're clueless about what it takes to have a successful technical venture.
Hey, dudes - if you want to have a technical business, you need technical people.

You'd think that MBA types would get this, but they don't.

[ezo4]

I just got laid off three weeks ago, and Im all ready getting work in just two weeks as a contractor, its out there. Im in one of the high tech areas as well. I have my concerns and all but there is work out there.

PS...Laurie Dhue on fox is a babe!

[Fred Hayek]

And even in the nuke world that may be changing. Safety critical systems in refineries, chemical plants, and large offshore platforms (such as those in the North Sea) in the past were hardwired relays and analog modules. The current trend has been more towards triple redundant microprocessor systems (related to PLC's, but with triplicate I/O, processors, communication busses, and power supplies). It may not be true currently for the US nuke power plant industry, due mostly to no new plants in the US and the industry hostile environment of the NRC (which tends to be opposed to new controls technologies - I think the NRC has been infiltrated by the "no nukes" crowd)

[blueriver]

The question is what kind of documentation.

Most companies that I worked for required a Technical Design Specification for any major software component.

[ComputationalComplexity]

I know, but the problem is that the design spec could be specific or vague based on the company, the clients of most software companies usually do not have too many experienced software engineers(they do it themselves if they had), so most of the design specs turn out to be wordy pieces of bs totally meant for the management.