Ask HN: Is there a tech talent shortage going on?

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27992867

by muzani • 5 years ago

13 18 5 years ago

news.ycombinator.com

It's clear in parts of Asia and Australia that there's a shortage of tech talent. Friends in UK have also reported it. Recruiters are getting pretty damn aggressive these last two months.

Is this the case in other countries as well? Is there a reason for it?

morulus• 5 years ago

Hi There... greetings fro Germany :)

In my opinion, this will get much worse over the next few years. Today's school leavers come to us without any prior technical knowledge and with outrageous salary expectations.

It is always suggested to them that "If you have a problem, just watch a tutorial video on Youtube and solve your problem with it".

The problem here is the lack of neural networking in the brain to solve complex problems on their own and strategically go about finding a solution. The youth is not stupid, they just do not learn to solve problems effectively and sustainably.

This is reflected in the quality of the applicants. We have more and more work, the quality is dwindling.

So HR has to hire such "mediocre goods" and we have a spiral that pulls us deeper and deeper down.

This is - in my opinion - a worldwide problem. Solvable only by a lot of commitment from private organizations and people who deals with the youth and promotes here again know.

The school system will not be able to do this.

ck_one• 5 years ago

Most of my talented friends from Germany/Europe leave for the US. I wouldn't say people are worse at problem solving it's just that they understand their value prop much better and know how to use the system to their advantage. At the end you get what you pay.

benque• 5 years ago

Where exactly is the so called tech talent shortage? I would certainly like to immigrate there. (Australia is out of bounds now, but which parts of Asia are you referring to?) Also all "tech" is not equal. Are you specifically referring to back-end web development?

muzani2• 5 years ago

Malaysia specifically, but I'm seeing recruiters from Singapore, Indonesia, Australia, Thailand recently. So I assume it's regional to SE Asia. I'm experiencing it with mobile dev, but I'd assume it applies to web as well.

Now that I think of it, it could be that richer countries are hiring remote from cheaper ones, as they're hiring remote anyway. But it doesn't explain why Australia has a shortage.

runawaybottle• 5 years ago

There’s no shortage. It became a buyers market during Covid (employers had the pick of the litter). It seems to be tilting back towards the middle. I don’t know anyone that’s not trying to get into tech.

It’s hyper competitive out there for anyone in the middle of the normal distribution.

quickthrower2• 5 years ago

I guess like real estate there are multiple markets. There is more of a shortage of experienced decent senior devs than people trying to break in.

this2shallPass• 5 years ago

Does demand sometimes exceed supply at current prices? It seems like it. Sometimes prices go up and more of an equilibrium is achieved, sometimes buyers complain they can't find adequate quality at current prices. The world keeps spinning.

Is that a shortage? Kind of. It is in some sense, it is not in others.

quantified• 5 years ago

Along those lines: Shortage relative to needs or wants of whom? Maybe. Might be a surplus of demand in the form of an arms race between adequately-resources rivals and lots of smaller businesses that can’t all succeed even if they found the tech workers they sought. A glut of demand rather than supply, and, frankly, a much happier circumstance for tech workers that way.

giantg22• 5 years ago

I don't think so. Companies like to say this, but I don't see it reflected in the salaries. I think part of it is the unrealistic expectations you can see in their job postings.

If there's an actual shortage, it's their own fault. Everyone wants to hire senior developers and nobody wants to train junior people to become seniors.

cableshaft2• 5 years ago

Yep. There's a proper used car and truck shortage and prices jumped about 45% this past year.

There's supposedly a 'tech shortage', but I just went through a job hunt myself, and while I got contacted by 3-4 times more recruiters than I ever have been in the past, it felt like I was pulling teeth just to get the average wage offered to me from before the pandemic, let alone higher than that, and also interviewed for at least a half dozen companies that were still super picky, had really long interview cycles with multiple coding assessments, and were clearly looking for any minor reason to disqualify me and my 10+ years of experience.

I was also still getting about a third of the recruiters trying to tell me that 100-120k (no equity, no bonus) was the max the company they represent could do for senior engineer or sometimes principal engineer roles, and tried to convince me that it's the best I would find in Chicago (it wasn't).

If companies think they can still play games like this, there can't be a tech shortage. Fast food workers seem to be getting courted more than software engineers right now (not in absolute wages, obviously, but in percent differences in wages, perks, and flexibility).

AnimalMuppet• 5 years ago

Out of curiosity, what is a good salary for a principal engineer in Chicago?

seattle_spring• 5 years ago

Recruiters are getting pretty damn aggressive these last two months

I've noticed this as well. The trend of sending 5x followup emails when I don't respond drives me up the wall. I get something like 10 recruiters reaching out to me a week, and most of them do not deserve a response.

rl1987• 5 years ago

People were complaining about the supposed shortage of developers for many years now. However the very same people who complain are building multi-stage obstacle courses that one candidate out of hundred is supposed to clear.

BFLpL0QNek• 5 years ago

No tech talent shortage in Australia. I’ve been job hunting for the past two years and it’s jobs offering 30-40% less than my current salary or fail to get me excited about the product/tech means I’m still looking daily. I have a few friends in a similar situation. Career wise, moving to Australia has been career suicide.

Australia has a tech job shortage. Australia is a tech dinosaur a good 10 years behind the UK.

It’s either low payed startups, with no funding, no equity for the risk+low pay, not that strong a product or it’s large corporate big data jobs (ETL) with all the issues of large old corporate companies where IT is a cost center and layers of management and staff churn.

Since Australia has closed the borders they haven’t been able to import developers. Likewise salaries have remained stagnant. People in good jobs are staying in good jobs with no temptation to move for better pay or more exciting projects.

muzani2• 5 years ago

Ah, that explains it. Closed borders, and locals aren't keen on working there. You're right, Australian tech jobs seems to even be behind places like Indonesia even with much better pay than Indonesia.

g1991• 5 years ago

I think for a long time now, there have been more people with money and ideas than engineers who can build them. I don't think this status has changed much in the last few years.

Ask HN: Is there a tech talent shortage going on?

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