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Tech Workers Think Silicon Valley and Startups Are Losing Their Luster (qz.com)
An anonymous reader shares a Quartz report: The job site Indeed.com found Silicon Valley's hold on tech workers is slipping as opportunities, and the cost of living, changes the equation for living and working in one of the priciest places in the country. "There is more opportunity for tech professionals in more places than ever before," wrote Terence Chiu, vice president of Indeed Prime by email, citing cities such as Austin, Boston, Seattle, and New York City. "Obviously the San Francisco Bay remains the largest tech hub [but] what has made it so attractive has also made it expensive." Indeed's most recent survey of professional tech workers found more than 66% of tech workers say living and working in Silicon Valley is either "not that important" or "not at all important" for a career in technology. Just 12% consider it "very important." Opinions were split on generational lines. About half of millennial tech workers say it's important (26.5%) or very important (19%), but the number declined to 10.2% among the Boomer generation. "Seasoned talent is often searching for opportunity elsewhere," stated the report. New employees may see the high cost of living as an acceptable tradeoff for building up a reputation and experience in the Bay Area, but that seems to fade over time.Recently, Google co-founder Sergey Brin advised people to not come to Silicon Valley to start a business for the very same reasons.
When you're fresh out of college, cost of living really isn't on your mind, or at least it wasn't for me. I wanted to live in the area where I knew there were all the things I wanted, from food to entertainment to job opportunities. Fast forward a bit, and I realized that the area I was in was ridiculously expensive for no good reason, had insane traffic that would never get better, and that I could get 90-95% of the things I wanted in a far, far cheaper area, cutting my housing costs all but in half.
It should be no surprise that the older people get, the less they're willing to put up with the kind of things you have to suffer through in the SF Bay area. Living 4 to an apartment is fine in your early 20s, but when you get older, you want a place of your own, nevermind the space to have a family.
I've been telecommuting for the past two years, for a virtual company, and I hope I never need to give it up.
There are some things I miss, in particular (a) my wife not needing to keep our kids somewhat quiet during school vacations, and (b) having a ready-made social life due to being cooped up with coworkers.
But after working out some of the kinks, and with a just a little extra self-discipline, it's so, so worth it.
Even if an employer needs to pay and $5k/year to cover telecommute-specific costs (such as decent video conference equipment, etc.), it seems it must be a win-win for just about everyone involved. (At least for software development jobs. Not sure about other kinds.)
Well yeah, of course. Look at the situation of a young college grad today; they're entering the workforce loaded on with $80,000+ dollars of debt, in an extremely cutthroat environment that pays minimum wage on entry, and for companies that lower pay and outsource year after year. Silicon Valley is frankly just not really viable for starters anymore, it's too expensive and cutthroat, and I wouldn't move to San Francisco in that kind of a climate either. Furthermore, Silicon Valley is dominated by experienced people who've worked numerous high profile projects, and often have a whole rainbow array of certifications and degrees.
If you're just starting out, you're hammered between the minimum wage jobs in China and India that take away your entry level positions, and you can't compete with the existing crowd because they outclass you in experience, titles, and existing reputation in almost every way (even after accounting for the whole age thing). Honestly, young people in many jobs face a similar problem - it's not exclusively a tech industry problem, we just see it to the strongest degree at the moment - It's a serious issue, and if we don't start to do something about it and soon, we are going to slowly but surely strangle off our workforce.
"Set a man a fire, he'll be warm for the rest of the night. Set a man afire, he'll be warm for the rest of his life."
Look at the situation of a young college grad today; they're entering the workforce loaded on with $80,000+ dollars of debt, ...
You must go to "top" schools to get a job these days. Anecdotal:
At a July 4th party, and someone was complaining about how there is a shortage of CS grads and the bidding war over them. After having been at a recent graduation at a state uni and seeing half the class stand up when the college of computer science was called, I was a bit incredulous. So I asked.
The response was "we only recruit from top colleges."
"MIT, Stanford, ... ?"
"Georgia Tech."
So some really sharp hard working kid who commutes to say Kennesaw State to save money and get the most out of his HOPE Scholarship and not end up in debt for most of his life, will be passed over. I think SHE/HE's the goddamn genius!
Employers are fucking stupid.
I have another ancedote about my 60 year old neighbor who was fired because he didn't go to Stanford and he was "too old to be a programmer" - (lawyer said he couldn't prove it so no case.)
There's a lot of snobbery in this profession now. Even when I started in the 90s, if you didn't have a college degree you were discounted and not hired at many places.
The famous quote "those who don't remember history are doomed to repeat it" is very applicable here. This exact scenario played out in the late 90s during the build-out of the Internet and the web. The things that are different this time are phones and social media are the primary focus, and the bubble is almost entirely in Silicon Valley this time. (Last time, New York City had a part in this because of the financial ties and the fact that traditional publishers and broadcasters were throwing money at the Internet.)
I think that people are starting to see the top of the bubble and opting not to join startups. Startup culture isn't for the young either; you really have to have the fraternity/sorority member personality type to work there so as people age they're less likely to trade salary for beer pong or free dinner. This will be the third recession that I've been on the sidelines doing "boring" work in old-school companies watching the startup mania from a distance. No one with a family or other responsibilities is going to do startup work as their first choice unless they have massive amounts of savings. Very few people (should be) willing to put up with the terrible commutes, traffic and real estate prices in the Bay Area. (That's coming from a New Yorker, we have the second-most insane housing market and I think it's crazy...$1 million+ for a tiny house a 2-hour one way drive to work? $4500 a month for a 2-bedroom hipster loft in San Francisco? Nope, sorry.)
I think, just like last time, it'll all come crashing down, we'll pick up the cool new stuff that came out of the last bubble (not much this time...), and it'll inflate all over again. I just hope something more useful than advertising algorithms comes out of the next bubble.
Being in Silicon Valley makes sense if your goal is to obtain VC money. If your goal is to make a successful tech business, though, Silicon Valley hasn't been the place to be for a very long time.
> No evidence yet of an imminent recession
It does seem like the market will continue to inflate as long as the Fed continues to keep the interest rates at zero.
That certainly is tough on people on a fixed income or even just hoping for some return on a passbook savings account.
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If we used the same inflation metric as back in the 1970s and 1980s we'd still be officially in a recession - since 2006. And if you look at the stock market and correct for the 70s/80s inflation metric, you'd see it's basically flat since 2007 as well. We're "doing well" in the stock simply because of the massive influx of cash from the Federal Reserve, and it's papered over as "good" by fudging the inflation and unemployment numbers.
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
It does seem like the market will continue to inflate as long as the Fed continues to keep the interest rates at zero.
You're not current on Fed policy. If the Feds can get away with it, they want to raise interest rates by a quarter-percentage four times a year. The first interest rate increase was December 2015 — and the financial world didn't come to a cataclysmic end. Financial data and political events cancelled interest rate hikes so far this year. September looks like a possible go for an interest rate hike.
Fudge inflation numbers (artificially calculate them as low - like we're doing relative to the 1980 metric) and the GDP will rise. Inflation factors in to the nominal GDP, and understating inflation will cause the nominal GDP to overstated.
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
get rid of unlimited student loans / no bankruptcy.
If the schools / banks had to bear some of the risk we will see real change in the school system and no more schools saying law / etc is the ticket to big bucks. It's about time for the schools / banks to hit the whammy!
When you are young and don't yet have a family, you typically want to seek "fame and fortune" and be where the action is. Even if you don't strike it rich, it's where you get experience with the latest trends (or sometimes fads).
When you have a family, or just want stability and convenience, you are happier with something relatively mundane. You worked your ass off for a while, and want to settle into more of a cruise mode as you mature. Working long hours will burn you out eventually. You will have at least one of weight problems, marriage/relationship problems, and/or physical problems like back and hand issues, or just shear boredom from doing the same thing for so long.
The high churn-and-burn rate, and cost of living of the Bay Area and start-ups can wear one down.
Table-ized A.I.
Artificial is to change the measure so that your GDP appears to grow faster than it really does. Inflation scales down the GDP growth rate, and calculating inflation is - as you rightfully point out - a fairly fuzzy function. However, if you want to talk about ending a recession, or the "best GDP growth in decades" you should use the same measures and ways of calculating your variables - not change them from Administration to Administration.
If we used the 1980 inflation metric, we'd see inflation is not at the 1% level claimed now, but around 9%. That brings the GDP growth way down, especially over the last several years, and we'd find that rather than having a GDP growing by 2-3% per year as claimed, we'd actually have a slowly shrinking GDP. Meaning we'd still be in a recession (as defined pre-1990s). That would change the narrative in the media - and might be politically untenable for the current group of fools in DC.
I think a LOT of the tension in the US right now is because of the constant media narrative of "we're doing great! See how wonderful DC is to the rest of you?" versus the actual results felt by the average person. Stagnant wages, ever-increasing costs, lack of jobs. It's a LOT easier, emotionally, when you're struggling but you also know everyone else is as well, and you're all trying to work for something better. When all you're told is that everything is fine, there is not problem, and YOU lose your job or your house or start missing payments on bills - it feels like it's just YOU and it's you against everyone else.
An honest, consistent metric for inflation would show that.
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
The schools will lower costs / cut joke degrees. And this will save the nightmare of student loan repayments that even with people who disabled and can't work it is hard to get rid of.
It's a LOT easier, emotionally, when you're struggling but you also know everyone else is as well, and you're all trying to work for something better. When all you're told is that everything is fine, there is not problem, and YOU lose your job or your house or start missing payments on bills - it feels like it's just YOU and it's you against everyone else.
"A recession is when your neighbor is out of work. A depression is when you're out of work." - Ronald Reagan