patrick.net

my guess is that any job that involves any kind of programming or system administration is categorized as a computer science job.

CaptainShuddup says

Wrong, that sentiment was so 2001, America tried that. The problem with off shoring IT work is the programmer that actually knows about the project is at home sleeping off the full day's work of coding he did while we were sleeping in the US. The folks available for QA and support in their Wee hours which are our prime office and meeting hours. Are not the on top of their game.
The result is the useless auto check out cashier machines that make you take every thing out of the bagging area and start over. And ultimately a live cashier physically scanning your order anyway.

Foreign developers don't worry me, American business men are now willing to pay more to have their developers in the same country if not the same building. So at any moments notice, they can have that person present to defend, fix or enlighten them on the project at hand.

Ever hear of elance.com ? Your argument is a bit weak as not all jobs have a 8-5 schedule. Many companies are national and have to deal with time zones. I had a job on the east coast and often times it would be slow until the pacific coast woke up. Furthermore there are plenty of places without a time zone difference that are cheaper. It isn't that hard to get online access these days.
Most of South America is three hours or less of a time difference relative to the USA (at least the east coast). Going from CA to eastern Brazil is only a five hour difference.

So why is JC Penny getting rid of cashiers?
http://ktar.com/22/1560630/JC-Penny-opting-for-selfcheckout-over-cashiers

Why are box stores scared @%$&less out of amazon.

Here's a little thing to think about. You know those debates about sales taxes online? Basically in that online companies don't have to pay and some in the physical world do so they complain. Well Amazon basically is giving up on the sales taxes. Now why would a company worth tens of billions of dollars WANT to pay more in taxes? Because the argument is weak now. The reason why taxes weren't collected is because amazon didn't have a physical entity. Ok fine so you want us to pay taxes...we'll open up warehouses all over the country
http://www.slate.com/articles/business/small_business/2012/07/amazon_same_day_delivery_how_the_e_commerce_giant_will_destroy_local_retail_.html

The one in CA is going to have 10,000 employees. There's one targeting the NYC market. If a online company can get same day delivery then I know plenty of people that will just shop online. It was never really about a measly sales tax. It was about product selection, price and service.

As for unions in IT there are some in Vermont that work for IBM but I think that's about it. Maybe one could consider the phone company unions as IT as well. The last verizon one didn't even last a month for a strike. Unions don't exactly work. If you have a closed environment with a specific skill set that no one else knows then it can work. But when everything is open...heck high school students are learning programming these days if not middle school..I remember hashing out a few lines of basic code during 5th grade.

Ever see Pawn Stars? The logic of value breaks down to this
Either

1) Something is so common that the value is nil. Everyone has it everyone can do it etc

or

2) Something is so rare that it makes it impossible to price it. Maybe someone that can code assembly in their sleep. But it makes demand so little that it again is pointless.

When it comes down to it we see less and less work to go around because frankly there is just less to do. Automation freed up more time for people to do what they want and that created more inventions. Now we have marginal gains because frankly it isn't that big of a deal for the internet to be 20% faster. If a song takes 20 seconds to download instead of 30 who really cares? Much of what the modern western world buys is disposable and bought with disposable income. That can be fine to a point but we aren't seeing major gains here. Who doesn't have a cell phone at this point? I've personally met people that live in public housing that gets wifi and even they have high speed internet. Who doesn't have some mode of transportation? If you live in a city you can walk, take a bus, cab or rail. If you cannot afford a car there are zipcars and other sharing sites. That brings this to another issue is that people are sharing goods rather than hoarding them. This brings down demand further.

If you examine bubbles in the past usually there is a liquidation of assets and "something" sparks demand. But since we know on this board about the shadow inventory we know that isn't the case.

CaptainShuddup says

The idea is to take what was behind the current door, and use that experience to guide you through the next open door, and have the knowledge to know how to utilize what you find there.

Good in theory, but not applicable in the real world. "Paying your dues" does not get you anywhere. Companies today look at tech workers as day laborers. They want a PHP guy, a JQuery guy, and a .NET guy for three months. Then they want to cut payroll.

Companies do not long term employee tech workers, so they don't care how many times you've payed your dues taking low wages for experience. And experience that is over five years old is nearly worthless anyway. Over ten and it's completely worthless.

In tech, you have to prove yourself at every job and that's just to keep a short-term contract 6 months to 3 years. So you better be getting a high rate.

omgbacon says

my guess is that any job that involves any kind of programming or system administration is categorized as a computer science job.

A Computer Science job is one where you are paid to create lol-cats:

a computer science job is a job in which you do technical things at the direction of a non-technical person and have to constantly attempt to find an excuse for why you weren't able to do the impossible in an unreasonable amount of time.

Two words..

Employment agencies.

I see them springing up all over the place.

Dan8267 says

Good in theory, but not applicable in the real world. "Paying your dues" does not get you anywhere.

Oh it's not theory.

If you're looking for rewards for the fruits of your labor, then you're missing the whole point of the effort.

Experience is cumbersome collective junk, you're never sure why have it, until you use it.

CaptainShuddup says

Oh it's not theory.

If you're looking for rewards for the fruits of your labor, then you're missing the whole point of the effort.

Experience is cumbersome collective junk, you're never sure why have it, until you use it.

I've got a shitload of experience that tells me the Boomers, who are now withering old senile coots- think the whole country should shape their economic policy around their sense of self-entitlement and accomplishment.

My EXPERIENCE also tells me that your golden years are likely to be completely miserable.

omgbacon says

a computer science job is a job in which you do technical things at the direction of a non-technical person and have to constantly attempt to find an excuse for why you weren't able to do the impossible in an unreasonable amount of time.

It's gotten so bad I had to drop out of the field.

They EXPECT this kind of attitude these days.

Software is mostly about soft skills. A trained ape can almost take over the coding part nowadays. :-)

well well well, if it isn't Peter P himself.

'Soft Skills' = bullshit artist and yet another sign that our economy is in a self-destruction phase. It's become part of the culture of California.

MershedPerturders says

well well well, if it isn't Peter P himself.

'Soft Skills' = bullshit artist and yet another sign that our economy is in a self-destruction phase. It's become part of the culture of California.

"Communism doesn't work because people like to own stuff." -Frank Zappa

I do not dispute that. Self-destruction may be a little strong, but it is becoming increasingly zero-sum or negative-sum.

MershedPerturders says

'Soft Skills' = bullshit artist

Classic! +1.

I.T is like any other skilled job. Never needed a seepskin.
Hardware nowadays is throwaway after the warranty expires. Code is written where the best deal is made.

Rin says

So I don't exactly see this trend ending anytime soon as the former India Inc will be replaced by other nations which want to cross the digital divide.

Pretty much. That reminds me of a theory that major economies have boomed and flatted going from east to west. France, UK, USA..even USA domestically as industry moved to the west, Japan, China, India...if it wasn't for sanctions I'd argue that Iran would boom..probably will once they are taken off.Dan8267 says

Good in theory, but not applicable in the real world. "Paying your dues" does not get you anywhere. Companies today look at tech workers as day laborers. They want a PHP guy, a JQuery guy, and a .NET guy for three months. Then they want to cut payroll.

Years ago I had a class for some certificate thing but it turned out to be a sham school. The professor (I don't think he had a license let alone a degree) argued the opposite in that you could pretty much work for a few hours and act like it was a full days work..that was right before the dot com bubble burst though.

It used to be that part time jobs were more lower ended skills. Now it's everywhere. I just saw an ad looking for a degree and experience but it's only 19 hours a week for a one year term. I have also see jobs described as salary for 25 hours a week...so anything beyond that 25 hours they get for free. Heck reminds me also of a friend of my father who can weld stainless steel. He makes $75/hr...but the place would only need him for four hours a week!

It used to be that a 40 hour week was expected. Now with efficiencies that is no longer the case.Dan8267 says

Companies do not long term employee tech workers, so they don't care how many times you've payed your dues taking low wages for experience. And experience that is over five years old is nearly worthless anyway. Over ten and it's completely worthless.

Maybe. I think it is more marginal than anything else. I would say if a job as little variance then the worse experience looks. If it's totally open then it is more valued. In other words lets say a job asks for 10 years experience or more. You have three applying. One has nine, one has ten and one has eleven. On the surface who has 11 should be picked. But how much more is that extra year really worth? On the other side how much less is the one with nine years really worth?

A metric should be established as to why the standards are what they are. Otherwise it throws it all in the air. It could be a degree, level of experience, a certificate etc. I once worked in an office where my coworkers were hired because they had office experience. The company MEANT MS Office or any other office suite. They (mid 60's and older) thought it was just general office experience. These women went back to the workforce after a few decades when their husbands lost their jobs. So they knew how to type and that's about it. I tried to train them but after three months of trying to show cut, copy, paste, drag (basic GUI functions) I had to cut them off. One was fired for doing half the work of others. The other two finally learned.

Of course there is also the opposite of this. I applied once to a company that has their own programming language. Somewhat like C but not that much. Unlike MIcrosoft with C# this is REALLY closed. There are no programming books for anyone to buy, no guides online and you cannot buy it to use it at home. So by asking for experience with it that assures them it is mostly just internal employees. The company is known for paying really low rates (30-40k) for programmers. The benefits are sky high though and that kinda traps people especially if they decide to have children. You cannot afford to leave and yet you probably have the best healthcare plan in the state for free for you and your family.

CaptainShuddup says

If you're looking for rewards for the fruits of your labor, then you're missing the whole point of the effort.

That is the whole point of working FYI for most everyone, they're looking for "rewards" in the form of better pay, and that isn't an unreasonable request at all.

We don't have a society or economy where learning/doing stuff for free is really practical or sensible for most of the population unfortunately, so they cannot afford to settle for some hand-wavy form of "satisfaction" either.

Most children would be better off getting they butts in which ever arm of the military that will take them and not just for the GI Bill. I was a damn mess afore I joined up. Cutting tile during the days and whoring and drinking Rodrigo Rum by the gallon jug. EVery night!! It was A stint as Bosun's mate what knocked my dumbass into shape. It still is the best education out there I think.

All nine of my boys avoided military service and a few went to school and even though I love them they are all candy asses. One boy I know actually uses hand lotion!! None of them knows how to hustle like old dad.

JodyChunder says

One boy I know actually uses hand lotion!

Obligatory:

This nation hires more Chinese, Indians, and Mexicans than Americans. Who would hire an American when there is cheap labor everywhere?