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Escape from California?
An anonymous reader asks: "Is there any escape from California? I'm a very experienced software engineer (7+ years) with a MSEE and lots of great work experience. Even in this market, jobs in CA are easy to grab if I want them. Trouble is, I don't want to live here anymore. Six figures in Northern CA gets mostly pissed away on a mortgage for a house that isn't worth half that anywhere else, and I'm pretty much just waiting for the earthquake to hit and wipe it out. I'd love to move to the midwest, but decent software jobs seem to not exist. I'm more than willing to take a huge paycut to get a job there, but where to even start looking?"
Hey Konstantinos, why don't you start up a software firm in Nebraska and give this guy a job?
You may find a cool, sweet job in another state, but be aware, your most likely not going to really find what you want, or where you want it. Sure, some engineering firms are hiring developers again, but things are just downright slow, and nearly non existant. A lot of things have contributed to this economic downfall... and Its not going to fix its self till many things happen..... I'm not going to go into a list, but the .com economy is a good cause of our current economic state in the rest of the country.
I'm comming up on being out of work for three months.... with little end in sight. I have hope, but when you have bills to pay, hope does not spring eternal. I say, stay where you are, or maybe commute from Navada. Yes, I'm serious.
There's loads of software jobs in the Seattle area.
novell is looking for an experienced software engineer.
Seriously, I'm looking for some good Software Engineers. We outsource most of our development and are looking to move it in-house. Drop me a resume justin@_NOSPAM_Llamakeeper.com.
JUSTIN
Rule of Life Number 2: Remember, it can all go to hell at any minute. --Jimmy Buffet
The top states for Californians to move to were:
Washington - 534,000
Texas - 523,000
Arizona - 449,000
Oregon - 374,000
Neveda - 320,000
I'm not kidding, it worked fine for me. Strong tech sector, affordable housing, good wages for engineers, friendly people, world class recreation (biking, skiing, hiking, climbing, etc.) I was glad to escape California, it didn't even take much adjusting: considering the fact that most of the people living in my neighborhood are from California.
One future, two choices. Oppose them or let them destroy us.
Are you joking? i went to the east coast (specifically maryland) for the first time ever and the houses were MUCH cheaper than they are where i live. The houses being built around mine (i live in a 1000 sqft condo/duplex that is worth $300k) are averaging in price at about $800k with the low end starting at about $600k.
The high end TRACK HOUSING goes for about $1.5million. I live in north county san diego, it isnt cheap.
In maryland i saw houses as large as these 1.5million dollar ones for around $500k or less.
..three times: Nevada, Amsterdam and NYC. I've also lived in Boston and SF, among other places.
:-)
Not that I pretend that Nevada is the place for anyone (for goodness' sakes, I live 52 miles from the nearest town, and it has one shitty bookstore). On the other hand, I just bought a house (with 3 buildings) on an acre for $40K. I do what I want, I run an online business. I signed up to teach classes at the local college and I just picked up a non-profit web programming job that they'll let me do from home -- they're paying me the full salary they allocated for the position and I only have to work 20 hours a week. I used to make > $200K/year, and I couldn't imagine feeling secure enough to have a child. Now I can't wait for the benefits to kick in again so we can crank out a kid.
The one thing I did differently this time was I picked the place and then looked for my setup. I've moved to many cities for jobs -- this time I picked the place I wanted to live in and figured if I committed myself to a place for a while, things might start happening differently for me. People in a small town get excited when someone with skills (of any kind) show up, and I've met some people with whom I honestly think I'll end up starting other businesses/efforts with.
I don't really measure my happiness in $$ anymore -- hell, tonight I felt guilty blowing $20 on dinner.
On the other hand -- I have a high profile job interview back in SoCal in January. Not sure I'll go, but I don't imagine that I'd really take it. I might even just give the plane ticket back.
Now, if only my garden would blook and solar panels would magically show up on my roof, I could wear an "off the grid" t-shirt....
Oh, and to contribute something that's a little more on topic: I vet the Utah suggestion; strangely enough, a friend from NYC/SoCal is really happy in Kansas City. I've always wanted to move to Portland (my best friend lives there) but I think the weather would depress me. That's the one thing leaving either LA or SF: the weather there is so much nicer than anywhere else. It's hard to compete in that regard.
Good luck, anyway.
the Northern Virginia/DC area, is pretty cool. While not, say, California cool, it has:
3% unemployment.
While telecom has been nuked, the government sector is growing and defense contractors are hiring. (Can you say homeland security?)
You are halfway between the chesapeake bay and the Shenandoah mountains, so most people can find something (sailing, hiking, lazing at the beach, hanging out downtown) to do.
And, when bored, you can always go to the whitehouse and watch people protesting all manners of things.
I don't know, its okay down here. Housing is expensive by most standards, but still maybe half of NoCal standards.
good luck to you--peace and joy
--Pete
www.avacal.com -- the home page of pete shaw
A few pointers:
"It was a summer's tale: Just a boy, his Linux, and a head full of dreams..."