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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.
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.)
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.