
Silicon Valley job growth has reached dot-com boom levels, report says - Lightning
http://www.mercurynews.com/business/ci_22524360/silicon-valley-job-growth-prodigious-returned-dot-com-boom-levels
======
espinchi
It's a great time to be a software developer.

However, this can't last forever. For those of you that have also experienced
the low times in this industry. What do you recommend in order to be ready for
a potential big change?

By a big change, I mean when the moment comes where developers are not so
highly demanded, so well paid, so nicely appreciated.

~~~
cageface
Always be learning something new and try to anticipate what specific skills
will be in demand a year or two from now. My favorite thing about this
profession is that you have to be learning new things constantly.

------
sincerely_
There's a tech boom going on in the bay area, and it seems like I'm constantly
reading comments here on HN about how companies are having to scramble to find
enough people with programming skill to fill the jobs being created. I hope
this is true, and I have a related question.

Let's say you have a 22-year-old living in the bay with no post-high school
education and no programming experience. How far does this boom go? If he's
smart, can he get a job out of this if he decides, today, to self-study as
hard as he can and see if he has an aptitude for this kind of thing? Are there
'low-level' jobs being created for the non-rockstars, too?

Argh, it's really hard to keep this impersonal. Obviously this is me, and I
want really badly to be told I have a shot. I genuinely have no idea whether
this is a pipe dream. Thanks to anyone who responds--a job counselor I asked
was "encouraging", but somehow I feel like a semi-anonymous HN comment would
be worth more....

~~~
SiVal
_If he's smart, can he get a job out of this if he decides, today, to self-
study as hard as he can and see if he has an aptitude for this kind of thing?_

Aptitude for what kind of thing? Since this is HN, I'll guess it means
becoming a programmer, but you might also mean non-technical startup partner,
other entrepreneur, or something else.

If you are dreaming of being a programmer but have no programming experience,
I'd have to wonder what it is you are dreaming. It's not a glamorous
profession when seen from the inside, but if you've been programming for a
while and love programming enough to want to do it whether you are paid or not
(like me), then it makes sense to try to get paid for it. But you'd have to
program for a while before you could know that.

I think someone in your position should just find a job, any job that leaves
your evenings free--Home Depot is hiring--and try to teach yourself to program
every evening after work. Programming is frustrating for quite a while, so
don't let it make you feel stupid. Just see if it starts to grow on you
eventually or you gradually lose interest. If it grows on you, then start
attending in-person meetups, participating in projects online, building things
of your own and (later) showing them off, and talking to people you meet about
your interest in a programming job somewhere.

Continue building skills, relationships, experience, and your resume by being
strategic about gaining experience. If you can live with a Home Depot-level
salary, you'll probably find small companies that won't care about your lack
of college if you don't care that they don't pay much. Big companies like
Google or Apple probably won't even talk to someone without either an
impressive degree or an impressive list of professional accomplishments. You
can eventually come up with the latter if you really do come to love
programming, but until then, a bootstrap strategy suggests starting with
programming for free (after work), then programming for a small company (that
might not pay much), then specializing your skills a bit into whatever area
you do best, then working at better (but not giant) companies, then deciding
what to do from there.

If you find that you hate programming, don't despair. My Silicon Valley
plumber makes $140/hr and thinks my programming job sounds like having to do
math homework all day long for a lifetime (as if that were a bad thing, go
figure), while his is driving around saving people and socializing, running
his own company, working whatever hours he feels like...and the grime washes
off at the end of the day.

~~~
sincerely_
Thank you for the detailed reply. I guess I was a little coy about "no"
programming experience. I dipped my toe in far enough already that I feel I
can guess (with not too much precision) what to expect. I'm not expecting
glamour, but I am hoping I end up loving it. I do wish I had started
programming earlier.

The "find a job at Home Depot and program at night" strategy is basically what
I plan to do. And yeah, plumbing is on the list of possibilities too. But I
hope I find something I like in programming.

Somehow it feels like I've been waiting for "permission" to do this, which is
bizarre and makes no sense. But the five replies I've gotten to the first
comment are confirmatory enough that I think I can keep my mouth shut, stop
doubting, and just pursue this for a few months. Then I can pop up for air and
see how far I've gotten. Again, thanks.

------
beatpanda
Can some of these jobs please go somewhere else?

Pretty please?

There's no good reason all of this growth needs to be concentrated in the Bay
Area, and it is hurting long-term residents in favor of people who will, in
all likelihood, not be here in 5-10 years.

~~~
dasil003
Tech job growth _is_ happening everywhere, it's just that macroeconomically it
only moves the needle in places like SV where it's a big enough percentage of
the overall job market.

I'm curious how to figure that a strong job market is hurting local residents
though. If you plan on living in a place for a long time the worst thing that
could happen is job loss.

~~~
criley
Startup millionaires driving up housing prices to ridiculous levels, I
imagine.

~~~
dasil003
But if you live there then this helps your property values. Otherwise why not
live in Detroit?

~~~
beatpanda
Assuming you own, which most residents of San Francisco do not. Long term
residents are getting pushed out of their homes and have nowhere to go, and
the tech community refuses to take responsibility for its part in this.

------
jquery
This is cause for euphoria, yes, but also a moment to reflect on the lessons
of the past. Let us forge our path forward with sobriety and humility this
time, and embrace a more disciplined and sustainable future.

~~~
yen223
Or maybe we should let it blow up, so that tech jobs will go back to non-SV
locations :D

------
ericabiz
This article is Silicon Valley-centric...but other metros are growing as fast
or faster.

Austin, TX (where I live now after being in the Valley for 10 years) also
added a similar amount of jobs in 2012:

<http://www.deptofnumbers.com/employment/texas/austin/>

Many of those jobs are in high-tech. A nice side benefit is that, due to the
much lower tax rate and cheaper cost of living, you can actually be
comfortable on a lower salary. My co-founder rents a 2000-sq.ft. house for
$1250/mo.

tl;dr: Check out areas other than the Valley as well if you want a job in
tech, and factor in quality-of-life to your decision on where to live.

~~~
JohnCohorn
Austin is a great place to be. I haven't found a place with better balance of
big city amenities and pay/cost of living ratio. You can live here as
cheap(used to have $325 rent with one roommate) or as spendy as you prefer.
Been living here for some time, lots of tech companies and a healthy community
of people that do software. There are even startups - I'm starting with one in
a couple of weeks.

------
jtchang
So when do I get to go to a launch party held on an aircraft carrier?

~~~
rms
<http://www.uss-hornet.org/groups/corporate/>

Just keep waiting for someone to book it...

------
speeder
I wish this were affecting São Paulo, here we do have a kinda thriving tech
industry but if you are earning 60k you are the manager with 20 years of
experience.

I code mobile games here and get around 20k, and this is already way more than
my peers, and don't pay my bills ( and I don't have a car, or a house, a
videogame, or even a watch, my most valuable possessions are my glasses and my
phone, and the last one I never paid, it was a gift )

I am sure if more SV companies learned how to use telecommuting they would
have a decline in costs, as all those third world coders are crazy to get even
scraps is SV and work for 40, 50k.

~~~
seanmcdirmid
So why not move? Ideally, you should compete on a global market. Even an entry
level programmer from a good university can do better than that in Beijing.

~~~
speeder
I won't move without a solid offer first. (and not for 50k).

I have things to take care here, and if I ever move, I need to be stable
enough and have money enough to return here sometimes to see how things are
going.

I cannot just go adventuring and move without a chance of getting a job first.

~~~
argonaut
You can see a bit of the chicken-and-egg problem here. You're not willing to
move without an offer. Yet your chances of getting an offer are dramatically
multiplied if you do move to the Bay Area, even if only for a few months.
Telecommuting has a bit of a bad rap at many companies.

~~~
yen223
As a guy from a different third-world country, I could point out something:
travelling to the US is not cheap for us.

A flight ticket to San Francisco alone costs me about 1 month's salary, and
that's before considering living expenses and the painful 3x currency
conversion rate. Visa applications aren't cheap, and is a major pain in the
ass to apply for.

In other words, I can understand why speeder won't simply up and shift to SF.
Simply put, I cannot afford to go the US without a solid job offer.

