More Tech, STEM Workers Voluntarily Quitting Their Jobs (dice.com)

Nerval's Lobster writes: New data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) suggests that more tech professionals are voluntarily quitting their jobs. In August, some 507,000 people in Professional and Business Services (which encompasses tech and STEM positions) quit their positions, up from 493,000 in July. It's also a significant increase over August 2014, when 456,000 professionals quit. Voluntary quits could be taken as a sign of a good economy (Dice link), hinting that people feel confident enough about the market to jump to a new position (likely with better pay and benefits), if not strike out on their own as an independent. For tech pros, things are particularly rosy at the moment; according to the BLS, the national unemployment rate among tech pros has hovered at under 3 percent for the past year, although not all segments have equally benefitted from that trend: Programmers, for example, saw their unemployment rate dip precipitously between the first and second quarters of this year, even as joblessness among Web developers, computer support specialists, and network and systems engineers ticked upwards during the same period. If there's one tech segment that hasn't enjoyed economic buoyancy, it's manufacturing, which has suffered from layoffs and steady declines in open positions over the past several quarters.

Comments

retirement?

[turkeydance]

disability? there's lots from which to choose.

Hewlett-Packard effect

[BenJeremy]

At HP, there are a LOT of people leaving, as morale is at an all-time low. Those with marketable skills would rather leave on their own than get a dreaded "offer" to work at Ciber or Modis at 30% less pay, reduction in benefits, and a loss of seniority - and finding they can make more at a company willing to actually offer reasonable compensation increases on a regular basis.

There may be other companies, not as high profile as HP, where this is also occurring. Obviously, there are many companies "below average" (Kind of has to be that way), but the disparity is pretty high - when people start shopping around, they quickly realize they are underpaid, and the rest of the pieces start falling into place.

It can't go on forever... which is all the more reason those people confident in their ability to place at better companies are going now, rather than waiting.

Fed up

[paugq]

I see more and more people in IT leaving their jobs to work on something else.

People are fed up with low pay, crazy schedules, lots of pressure -often times for no reason!- and technology changing at Formula 1 speed (just take a look at the web: what was good and trendy 2 years ago is proscribed today).

To top that up, add off-shoring: today you are key, tomorrow your job is in India, Vietnam or who knows where. People do not like job insecurity.

What are they moving to? Everything else: law, gardening, plumbing, cake shops, teaching, whatever with a more relaxed schedule, people not discussing about hourly cost and difficult or impossible to offshore. Really.

Re:Fed up

[Anonymous Coward]

And lack of vacation. I've only quit three jobs in my life, and all three were to get time off. I worked from college until I was 35 without a single week off, and it sucked. I quit that job so I could go on a cruise. Now, my current employer has a no vacation rule until we release, and we're three years past that original release date now. Yes, there's a massive developer shortage so there's more work to do than can possibly be done, but too many companies just don't get that it costs less to let someone take a week off than it does to hire someone.

Re:Leave no H1-B behind!

[__aaclcg7560]

Are you kidding? I got laid off from my tech job just before the government shutdown in October 2013 and I was out of work for eight months. Meanwhile, the CEO gave himself a 60% pay raise and bought a new yacht for having a lousy fiscal year. That didn't stop the company from hiring Indian workers to replace American workers.

And doing what?

[rsilvergun]

I sorta get your sentiment, but you didn't finish it. What exactly are they doing about it? Are they joining communes? Committing Sepuku? Otherwise there's 3 possibilities: a) they're starting their own businesses, unlikely in this economy. b) They're job hopping because that's the only way to move up in the world or c) they're having nervous breakdowns and/or being forced to quit/retire.

Re:You like our work?

[Anonymous Coward]

You got it!

Company offers a 2% raise, competitor offers 30% more pay and better benefits. No contest.

Actually, I went to my boss and explained that I could get 30% more by getting another job. His response was "I don't believe you, times are tough and you should be thankful you have a job." He was surprised when I turned in my resignation 48 hours later. Seems the listing company jumped when I sent in my resume, interviewed me same day and offered the next morning.

i've been at the new job a year and love it!