235,000 Fewer Programmers by 2015

RonMcMahon writes "According to a CNN Money article, Forrester Research is predicting that there will be 235,396 fewer Computer Programmers and Software Engineers employed in 2015 than there are today in America. This is a 25% reduction in the number of positions from today's depressed numbers. This sucks. I know that many companies are moving work off-shore, but wow, that's half the population of Wyoming!"

Comments

Not to be partisan or anything

[Alien54]

but I have been sort of intrigued by the graphs seen on this page, based on official government data.

Of course, it is notup to date on the stock market, but I suspect that that may be a shell game anyhow, at least on some level.

Re:Not to be partisan or anything

[radio4fan]

If I remember correctly, presidents in the U.S. are elected by the people.

Nope. You remember incorrectly.

Re:Not to be partisan or anything

[cgenman]

If I remember correctly, presidents in the U.S. are elected by the people.

Interesting theory. I guess that depends on your definition of "people."

Personally, I feel that the state of the economy is due to the combination of the policies of the sitting president and the president that came before them. For example, Clinton fed the bubble despite a long cautionary history about preventing an economy from expanding too quickly. However, a sitting president is most definitely responsible for the federal deficit that is racked up during their administration, as they have direct control over such policies.

Specialize or change fields

[nich37ways]

Note I am in Australia which has some of these problems but nothing it would appear in comparison to America.

As much as it does suck I honestly see the only real way forward for software engineers and programmers is to either move into or start a research and development company and develop highly specialized software or to move into a new area of IT.

Honestly I would prefer if you didnt move into the system administration area, that would be mine, ;)

The only way to keep your job secure is to work in face to face/onsite support or IT management although I am sure some clever CEO/CTO will figure out how to move those overseas as well.

One of the funniest things I read this year was a guarntee from our American management that they would not be moving the software development section from Australia to America from Australia, it was originally an Australian company so we didn't steal any American jobs :)

The real thing I want to know is where will the jobs be that are not outsourced to other countries and why will they be the ones to stay in comparison to those that are sent overseas.

Re:Time for a career switch...

[snkmoorthy]

As far as I know India doesn't have an H1B equivalent, so even if you are willing to relocate, it is near impossible.

Re:Big Deal

[Total_Wimp]

We actually did it to ourselves.

First we made information networked and portable so that anyone is capable of working with it at any place.

Then we actively promoted "free" software that we work on for no pay. We actively promoted others to use "free" software and to produce it themselves.

Now we act surprised when others are capable of writing software in other countries and are willing to do it for low wages.

Survival of the fitest in this case means we ACTIVELY WORKED at making our jobs less valuable and our presense less nessesary. I'm not saying this is a bad thing; we just reap what we sow.

TW

Re:Big Deal

[the uNF cola]

It doesn't take a prior expert in the field to micromanage. It also doesn't take a fool not to micromanage. A good manager should know when to step back and when to get involved. But when my manager gets involved, I want him to fully understand what's going on and prevent bad things from happening, and encouraging the good.

My current manager isn't the most cluefull, but he's a good guy with good management skills. I try to make sure he understands w/o a doubt what i'm doing and why i'm doing it. Not to an atomic degree, but to a good general one.

Regarding "941,584 programmers today"

[brokeninside]

The US Bureau of Labor statistics has numbers from Y2K in its Occupational Outlook Handbook:
585,000 computer programmers
697,000 software engineers

And that doesn't include the 887,000 systems analysts, computer scientists, and database administrators, some of which are almost certainly working in programming positions.

However, given that these numbers (1,282,000 computer programmers and software engineers) are from the year two thousand, before the massive layoffs of the past few years really started happening, the 941,584 number doesn't seem all that out of the ballpark.

It's the end of the world as we know it...

[markxsd]

I've been doing Consulting for the last 10 years. I've worked with (am still working with) lots of customers over that time and I think that the prediction is accurate. I just don't see anyone with big expansion plans for IT right now. And I don't see anything on the horizon that will change that. Most customers are happy enough with their current IT that they don't want to spend big any more. The ERP is in place. The online presence is in place. The board room question that's being asked is "WTF is IT doing now?"

The fundamental fact is that there are too many people in IT for the total budget available for IT spend. That means it's going to be tough for many. There will be little time to work out who is the best person for the job. In this climate, being good at your job is no guarantee of employment or a reasonable salary.

Overseas outsourcing will become less attractive because employers can get away with paying jack shit for local employees by relying on the over-supply of people who don't want to believe that the CS degree isn't worth anything to anyone any more.

Re:I knew I should have gone for an EE degree

[the Man in Black]

Modded funny, but an MBA from a decent, fairly reputable Business School WILL take you places, regardless of your skillset. Plenty of people who don't even need them get them. We as techies turn up our nose at management, but one thing you'll notice is that, while we're all getting laid off left and right and our wages whittled down to nothing, managers and executive salaries are going up.

You'll always have a job if you have a clearance.

[BulletProofMonk]

A security clearance is the closest thing to lifetime guaranteed employment that I know of.

S/W Engineers vs Programmers

[ReusableCoder]

According to the US Dept of Labor, from their 2002-3 Occupational Outlook Handbook, s/w engineers "are projected to be the fastest growing occupation over the 2000-10 period" while employment growth for programmers "will be considerably slower than that of other computer specialists, due to the spread of pre-packaged software solutions".
If you're worried about your job security, start learning more than just programming languages and APIs. (Of course, until we have a proper accreditation system, anyone in the s/w industry can call themselves an engineer...)

Arabic numbers were an INDIAN invention.....

[Salgak1]

Actually, the Arabs only POPULARIZED the "Arabic" number system: it came from India, originally, and was adopted by Arab traders, who saw its' ease of use as a clear reason to move to the "Arabic" numbering system.

Even the Muslims say so. . .

Re:Time for a career switch... ... back to college

[N3WBI3]

Thanks Bush! Thanks Congress! Thanks for giving big corporations huge tax incentives to move overseas!

It was Bill Clinton who signed NAFTA and GAT into law (after Clinton promised not to during his run for pres).

Thanks for giving the wealthiest 5% huge tax cuts so they'll never know near-poverty, like I do.

Everyone got tax cuts and that wealthiest 5% of Americans still pay nearly half or the US tax base. Also for someone who came close to six figures a couple of years ago to be near poverty now does not say allot about how you managed your money.

WTF is $1700 going to do towards tuition? nuttin

Its a good chunk of tuition at an Undergrad school you don't have a right to college money for school take the money which covers the fees and be glad. if you flip burgers 40hrs a week in the summer you can earn most of the years tuition and if you work 10-15 hrs a week in tuition like I did you'll get the rest and beer money to boot.

e first American president to START a war. The first American president who detained American citizens, in the United States

Lincoln did not start a war?, LBJ did not start a war?, Clinton did not drag the US into Kosovo? BTW Lincoln also detained without charging people, and without due process but why let history interfere with your rant.

Do you know that we are holding over 660 men at Camp X-Ray, in cages, like dogs?

Really being allowed to practice, your religion, 3 squares a day, seeing an imam is being treated like a dog? I am against camp x-ray but moronic exaggeration is not going to help.

So, thanks to the 49% of the country that did vote for Bush, and those who still support him, we have a hitler in office.

Its called the constitution, and the Electorial college system, gets over it. Its designed to make urban and rural area equally politically important if Gore had managed to win his own state it would not have mattered. That's it compare Bush to Hitler, its so clear to me now Gross use of slander for those you politically disagree with has shown me the light..

My job in IT, and countless like them are disappearing - and whats most disturbing is that our industry is only 35 years old! Only 10 of which did our industry emerge from specialized functions to become an sizable group, and already we are sent out. So thank you, America, for sitting back, watching your reality TV and 4 hours of sportscenter every night and allowing all this to happen. It's the fault of both parties and both wings, Republicans wrote NAFTA/GAT and Bill Clinton Signed it. Bill Clinton allowed the Chinese to get computer and rocket technology that should have stayed secret. And finally its your fault for bitching about it on slashdot and not registering voters, and pumping for a third party candidate who cares about the US (this excludes the Greens).