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Are American Engineers in Short Supply?
I think that the scenario that you are describing is already here. The entire country is mobilizing around software because people see it as a way to land an outsourced job, or to get hired via an H-1B Visa. The numbers of new colleges that are opening in India is staggering. I have an Indian friend who lives in Mumbai and he told me that the ultimate destination for everyone is to land a job in the States. That's why the India media is heavily focused on issues revolving around the H-1B Visa and outsourcing. There are also lots labor abuses going on, particularly for Indian owned businesses rather than Western companies that have outsourced development centers. These software sweatshops have a lot in common with their manufacturing counterparts such as Foxconn in China. An Indian friend who travels to India often told me that it's not unusual to see one of these companies where the development is done on one floor, the men's dorm is on another floor and the women's dorm on the third floor. Basically people slaving away for long hours and then go up to their dorm to catch some sleep before grinding it out again. That's one reason why software is often so buggy and shoddy these days. It's SW development stripped of process and boiled down to basic labor.— March 24, 2011 11:46 a.m.
Are American Engineers in Short Supply?
So did anyone see it? I see that's available for downloading via iTunes so I will probably watch it tonight.— March 23, 2011 7:19 p.m.
Are American Engineers in Short Supply?
"arguing that software & other engineering disciplines are a poor investment"..."I have a number of friends who I consider to be just as smart, or more so, than I am. They are struggling financially not because they are less intelligent, but because their career choices pay substantially less than going into engineering." The dynamic of less jobs (outsourcing) and more people (insourcing) is affecting everyone and not just engineering because everyone is getting pushed down. You haven't said what career choices these people have made. But of my friends, those who are hurting the most, opted for "soft" careers - photography, graphics art, etc. The Great Recession hasn't been kind to this group because they were the first to be let go/cut back. Of friends of mine who went into professional careers such as medicine and law, they are doing just great. In particular the people that I know who switched careers from engineering into professional careers feel that they have more free time and more job security. Basically a higher quality of life. So on this point, I think I'll have to disagree with you. My guess is that you've benefitted greatly by working for start-ups and haven't been seen your projects outsourced or insourced or seen the steady ratcheting up of hours and expectations that have steadily been increasing at large tech companies. It used to be the case that people worked for start-ups knowing that the hours would be long, but there is the possibility of a pay-off at the end. This was as opposed to working for large companies where the pace was slower, there was job security, the pay was steady but without much top side. How things have changed! Big companies push their employees just as hard if not harder than start-ups now (without the up-side potential) and I think that this is directly related to the outsourcing and insourcing (H-1B) dynamics that we've been discussing. If some manager sitting in an office somewhere sees $$$ on a project shipping widget X by Christmas, the whip comes down and people are expected to push hard for this new deadline. The fact that they have seen unending streams of similar deadlines doesn't weigh on the decision at all. By comparison, start-ups have become more humane because management is usually in touch with the toll that the long hours have taken and they tend not to push their staff into the ground, at least not as often. Incidentally, most of the large companies that push their staff hard tend to be large monopolies and these are also the same companies that hire the largest numbers of H-1Bs and I think it's for the same reasons (H-1Bs are handcuffed for immigration reasons). Bottom line though, I think that the differences in our viewpoints shows a disparity between SW Engineering and Web/App development.— March 23, 2011 7:16 p.m.
Are American Engineers in Short Supply?
Well Said!— March 23, 2011 6:48 p.m.
Are American Engineers in Short Supply?
"We continue to have higher salaries and lower unemployment" IEEE and other organizations have reported that engineering unemployment is only a few percentage points below the wider unemployment rate. Both of which are too high. You can make the claim that SW Engineers are paid higher salaries than the average American, but you can make that same case with any other professional career such as Doctors, Lawyers, Accountants, etc.— March 23, 2011 6:44 p.m.
Are American Engineers in Short Supply?
The ageist issue is very prevalent in engineering. This is particularly true in bay area tech companies, which coincidentally (or not) have some of the highest H-1B populations. Google was recently sued for age discrimination. Here is an article about it: http://gawker.com/#!5568975/at-google-youre-old-a…— March 23, 2011 6:37 p.m.
Are American Engineers in Short Supply?
kball, interesting points. Perhaps things are better in the App and web development world. I started in Apps development and then specialized in lower level embedded programming because I liked the challenge and it brought me closer to key technologies that I found interesting. It also seemed to be the case that salaries were higher, although I didn't specialize in this area for that reason. Last time I looked, it does seem to be that the delta in salaries between web/App developers and SW Engineers working in embedded areas has decreased and I think that much of this is because many HW centric projects are being outsourced. Perhaps it's also the case the demand for Web programmer's has increased because we have become so web centric. Not sure, but it's good to hear that you're finding things to be better in the Web arena.— March 23, 2011 6:32 p.m.
Are American Engineers in Short Supply?
"And forgetting about Qualcomm, you are totally unwilling to consider suggestions like abolishing H1B and giving green cards to foreign students who are intelligent and become pillar of innovations in USA. " Actually I would be in favor of this if it did mean abolishing the H1B program. There are serious issues with stapling Green Cards to Diploma's though. Here is just one example. American Public Universities such as the UC System were built at great expense mostly through taxes paid by Middle Class Americans. The intent of these educational systems wasn't to educate foreigner's but to allow American's who aren't rich and who can't afford more expensive private colleges to better themselves with a top education. The US has a long history of being an egalitarian society with a large and strong middle class and having access to inexpensive but good education is a big part of that process. In other countries that are more class based, education is only affordable by the elites. Allowing unrestricted access to American Universities by the children of primarily wealthy people from other countries, even while it's primarily being subsidized by Middle Class Americans is an obvious injustice and affront to the system. Sure these foreigner's can contribute to American society, but they can also take their new found knowledge back home and use it to compete against Americans. If they stay here and add to a growing labor pool that are chasing smaller numbers of jobs, then is a problem as well. But if the H-1B program and the majority of all of those 276,000+ skilled workers per year coming into the country were eliminated then the effect on the labor pool from these graduating students wouldn't be nearly so harmful, which is why I would probably agree with this even given the issues.— March 23, 2011 6:10 p.m.
Are American Engineers in Short Supply?
Fantastic. Too bad that Time Warner in San Diego dropped HDNet. I hope that the interview is posted on youtube or elsewhere on the net.— March 22, 2011 4:33 p.m.
Are American Engineers in Short Supply?
"Also, the Mindlance posting you keep referring to is by some 3rd party consultant trying to dupe local people rather than direct Qualcomm posting." This is complete and utter nonsense. A simple Google search shows that Qualcomm has been using Mindlance for years and in fact currently uses the company. If you are one of Qualcomm's "Best and Brightest" you should be able to do a Google search. "Now it may be true Qualcomm uses 3rd party contractor but those contacting companies are paid highly". Wrong again, the currently running test engineer position that I linked to is according to Mindlance's own website a $30K/yr job. Rock bottom slave-wages for engineering in San Diego. It's a temp job, but still it shows that they are targeting H-1Bs for slave wages. "and it is not Qualcomm's problem what they are paid by contacting company. And if those contracting company got H1B sponsored with those low salary's than there is something totally wrong in system." Now you've finally said something that makes sense. Yes there is something wrong with the system! It's called flooding the market to reduce the price of skilled labor. When Americans are pushed into becoming a minority in the workforce through discriminatory hiring practices that favor cheap labor. Yes, then there is something clearly wrong with the system!— March 22, 2011 4:04 p.m.