Trade Group: US Software Developer Wages Fell 2% Last Year

First time accepted submitter russotto points out the claim of industry group TechAmerican Foundation (reported by Computerworld) that "wages for the software industry are falling, not rising. Wages fell 2% to $99,000 in 2012." Averages are one thing; the article points out though that wages vary vastly within the industry, and that some jobs are harder to fill (thus, better paid) than others. An excerpt: "Victor Janulaitis, CEO of Janco Associates, a research firm that also analyzes IT wage and employment trends, cited a number of reason for the decline in wages for software professionals. First, technology is becoming easier to implement without having an IT professional, he said. Also, the option of turning to outsourcing creates less pressure to increase wages. As the recession continues, companies continue 'to look at productivity and will often look to hire individuals who are lower cost employees,' said Janulaitis. That could include displaced baby boomer workers who have been out of work for some time and 'will take a lower paying job just to get back into the workforce.'"

Comments

Re:Sad, but true

[HornWumpus]

Worker was a fool for starting the conversation without an offer in hand.

Then next line should be:

WORKER: Hire those programmers, I quit. Best of luck to you.

Re:Sad, but true

[cranky_chemist]

No, you need to change jobs, period.

According to this site: http://www.westportone.com/candidate/counteroffer.htm :

"According to national surveys of employees that accept counter-offers, 50-80 percent voluntarily leave their employer within six months of accepting the counter-offer because of unkept promises. The majority of the balance of employees that accept counter-offers involuntarily leave their current employers within twelve months of accepting the counter-offer (terminated, fired, laid off, etc.)."

So, basically, if you go to your boss with another offer in hand and accept a counteroffer, he or she is going to screw you over simply because they can. And that's how the big sharks swim in the deep end of the pool. If you want better working conditions and/or more money, change jobs. The only exception is if you work in academia, where you have the protections of tenure.

See also:

http://money.usnews.com/money/blogs/outside-voices-careers/2012/03/26/why-you-shouldnt-take-a-counteroffer

http://ask.slashdot.org/story/02/06/13/0615238/is-it-wrong-to-accept-an-employment-counter-offer

Re:Sad, but true

[Anonymous Coward]

A few years ago, a coworker in another department accepted an offer from another company in town. He turned in his notice the next day. Lo and behold, they gave him a counter offer. Seems that they really did think his specialty was worth more than they were paying him and it was just the economy limiting what they could do. After a bit of negotiation, he accepted the counter offer and told the other company he wasn't coming to work for them.

Well, three years later he was complaining about how he wasn't getting a pay raise that year like the rest of us. Turns out he hadn't gotten a pay raise since accepting the counter offer. He'd gotten so upset with it that he'd started looking for another job. But guess what? He couldn't even get interviews - especially at the company that he'd turned down (I wonder why...) which had two job postings that looked exactly like his experience. Seems the word had gotten out around town that he couldn't be trusted and other companies were treating him like poison.

Having accepted then changed his mind, he didn't realize what the other company had put into the process. They had spent hours screening candidates, performing phone interviews, calling people in for personal interview, etc. And then when they had offered him a job that he'd accepted, they had needed to call up the other candidates (some of whom were just as qualified) and tell them "thanks, but no thanks, we have someone else". That had left the company in a lurch as well as hurting their reputation with the other people involved - of course they were upset. And the people involved can carry long memories even as they go to new companies, talk to their friends down the street, talk to recruiters, and so on.

I left there over 2 years ago and still keep in touch with some of my former coworkers. Last I heard, this guy was still complaining about no pay raises and no interviews.

Moral of the story: be careful not to burn any bridges, you might need to cross them someday.