Not enough qualified American workers

originally posted by: Aazadan

I fully expect to never own a house in my lifetime, I'm 31 now and looking at a field with wages that are being depressed more and more by the day while housing increases by the day. The odds of landing a job that pays high enough that one can comfortably afford a home (and not get screwed on interest) are slim.

I believe that is part of agenda 21 and resource control.
It does work to their advantage in that way.

originally posted by: anonentity
a reply to: interupt42



As the economy shrinks, and people have less discretionary cash, the companies are constantly looking at ways to lower costs . Its a race to the bottom. Because who needs Disneyland.

Globalism could have been a great thing if it would have brought third world standard of living to first world standards of living.

What is likely to happen and appears to be happening is the opposite, First world standards of living will drop to third world standards.

Eventually middle class will probably be wiped out globally and those in power will build and tear down economies .

originally posted by: Aazadan
Basic incomes would fix this. It is my belief that the best thing we could do is create basic incomes, so that people can choose to not do crap work to meet immediate needs, but rather can focus on improving for real jobs later.

So let me get this straight.

Government created the HB-7 visa program.
Government controls the amount of visas that can be approved, annually.
Government is extending the numbers of visas that can be approved, and companies are exploiting this and squeezing native-born STEM workers out for cheaper foreign born workers.
America has an over-abundance of STEM workers looking for a job.

So naturally, the obvious solution is to empower the government to subsidize the native-born STEM worker instead of reel in the visas? To take money from productive people and put others on welfare?

And this makes sense... how?

originally posted by: onequestion
You guys think it's bad... You should see construction.

I know a skilled trade and I gotta compete with Mexicans for low wages on jobs where I'm the only one who speaks English.

What kind of total bs is that? I feel like I'm in another country.

in Calif you need a electricians license to do electrician work.

But i have seen companies bring in night crews of illegals to string wire or do other jobs like hang cable tray at minimum wage.
The state does not have inspectors that work at night or relies on county building inspectors to catch unlicensed trade workers.

originally posted by: jobless1
a reply to: Aazadan

Virus removal is bottom rung level experience in IT he was helping work on the mars rover are you serous!
Your a coder for video games lol. From your writing I expected a CCIE. For the people not in the IT field a CCIE is a Cisco certified internet engineer they are the top 1 percent of the IT field.

I'm not a hardware/network person. I used to be pretty good at configuring computers but I haven't kept up on it as things like Visa, 7, and 10 have come out, even had an A+ at one time while XP was current (for those unaware, that's effectively an entry level certification). I used to do things like happily open up the Windows registry and make edits or type out a new custom boot.ini file for myself but changes to the OS that I didn't update with due to a general lack of interest have left me behind.

When it comes to networking, I can barely run a functional home network. I have no problem doing web development work and writing client/server code but if you put me in a room full of switches I'm going to be pretty useless. I've met a lot of people who are worse than me in that regard, so I could easily see someone, even a person with a PHD in Computer Science being really bad on that end of things.

Also, there's a lot more to my field than you would think. Beyond simple coding, a lot of it comes down to efficiency. Big data like what Facebook and such use is way more than I have to deal with but tracking player metrics requires being somewhat efficient with what/where you record things, how you sort, how you search, etc, being competent enough to design something to use an array vs linked list as the situation requires, building with future needs in mind without compromising current performance, pathfinding and knowing when to use Dijkstra's or A* or when you can use a DFS, efficient collision detection. Then you have graphics, being able to make art assets (usually 3d models these days), correctly draw a 3d world on a 2d screen, lighting/shading, raytracing if you can do it, and you have to be able to do any logic/drawing/anything else in your program in less than 0.01667 seconds (at 60 fps), so like I said efficiency is critical. Then you have systems design, which is a book length topic just to start describing.

All of that and more is just the prerequsite to being able to implement what are hopefully good ideas, which depending on what your game is doing requires a reasonable amount of knowledge about other topics in order to know what people find fun, how players will act, what their likely actions will be, and so on.

Your a video game coder which isn't easy but you guys have programs that basically tell you when you have made a mistake in your code like a spell checker.

The same programs that any programmer has, which is having the compiler complain to you. I do about 80% of my programming work in Notepad++ alongside the command line. The only time that isn't true is C++ where I use Visual Studio.

Interesting Article:
Laid-off IT workers muzzled as H-1B debate heats up:
www.computerworld.com...

People better start to wake up on how the Gov't is siding with nearsightedness of corporate America chasing the quick dollar , when they are the ones creating our regulations and policies.

The 200,000-member engineering association, IEEE-USA, said the I-Squared bill would "help destroy" the IT workforce with a flood of lower paid foreign workers.

sees "little progress" in the past year. "Americans are going to have to act and they are going to have to act in mass, because we are fighting a huge, unseen force," said Buchanan.

"Their freedom of speech is being taken away from them with the non-disparagement agreements," he said.

originally posted by: onequestion
a reply to: jobless1

I've really been considering the CCNA, CCNP route, to me it seems easy.

its a start on the way to CCIE if you get both of those certs just keep getting more cisco certs.

We were just planning a trip to Disney for our grandkids. After reading this, we will go elsewhere and spend our money.

originally posted by: Aazadan

originally posted by: jobless1
a reply to: Aazadan

Virus removal is bottom rung level experience in IT he was helping work on the mars rover are you serous!
Your a coder for video games lol. From your writing I expected a CCIE. For the people not in the IT field a CCIE is a Cisco certified internet engineer they are the top 1 percent of the IT field.

I'm not a hardware/network person. I used to be pretty good at configuring computers but I haven't kept up on it as things like Visa, 7, and 10 have come out, even had an A+ at one time while XP was current (for those unaware, that's effectively an entry level certification). I used to do things like happily open up the Windows registry and make edits or type out a new custom boot.ini file for myself but changes to the OS that I didn't update with due to a general lack of interest have left me behind.

When it comes to networking, I can barely run a functional home network. I have no problem doing web development work and writing client/server code but if you put me in a room full of switches I'm going to be pretty useless. I've met a lot of people who are worse than me in that regard, so I could easily see someone, even a person with a PHD in Computer Science being really bad on that end of things.

Also, there's a lot more to my field than you would think. Beyond simple coding, a lot of it comes down to efficiency. Big data like what Facebook and such use is way more than I have to deal with but tracking player metrics requires being somewhat efficient with what/where you record things, how you sort, how you search, etc, being competent enough to design something to use an array vs linked list as the situation requires, building with future needs in mind without compromising current performance, pathfinding and knowing when to use Dijkstra's or A* or when you can use a DFS, efficient collision detection. Then you have graphics, being able to make art assets (usually 3d models these days), correctly draw a 3d world on a 2d screen, lighting/shading, raytracing if you can do it, and you have to be able to do any logic/drawing/anything else in your program in less than 0.01667 seconds (at 60 fps), so like I said efficiency is critical. Then you have systems design, which is a book length topic just to start describing.

All of that and more is just the prerequsite to being able to implement what are hopefully good ideas, which depending on what your game is doing requires a reasonable amount of knowledge about other topics in order to know what people find fun, how players will act, what their likely actions will be, and so on.

Your a video game coder which isn't easy but you guys have programs that basically tell you when you have made a mistake in your code like a spell checker.

The same programs that any programmer has, which is having the compiler complain to you. I do about 80% of my programming work in Notepad++ alongside the command line. The only time that isn't true is C++ where I use Visual Studio.

I'm not criticizing you or your level of precision in writing code. I have written code and I hate it with a passion! It's boring tedious work that requires extreme attention to detail. Its your attitude or perspective on other people you work with that I have an issue with. I worked with someone who was very good at his job and he was a total a-hole who enjoyed putting others down when they made a mistake however the a-hole was also so stressed out and afraid he would make a mistake that it pushed him to become good. Everyone except for the boss really didn't like this guy and he used his position in the company as a weapon to verbally abuse the people around him. The a-hole was always stressed out and everyone saw it however management wanted everyone to be like this guy and it created a work place that was just toxic. I watched as everyone started to stress out and verbally abuse each other trying to push themselves up the ladder by making fun of the people who made a mistake. Then it got clicky where they would push people out of the inside group. I noticed it was an ideal situation for the boss as everyone was jockeying for a better position within the group plus it wasn't for a raise just not to be made fun of or talked about behind your back. I was in shock at how stupid the situation was and how much i truly hated working for that company so i quit.
The job paid well below standard wages hell temp agencies pay more per hour for the same work with less experience and expectations.
Moral of the story is this a-hole had the same type of reasoning you did ie other people just are not as good as me therefore I understand and except when my boss hires people below the asking price for the work, Its ok for me to put other co-workers down as less skilled while they are learning the job.
Also its ok for my boss to basically slave drive these underpaid workers who require the job to keep their hb-7 visa. I'm not saying your anything like the a-hole i worked with but I would be lying if i told you i didn't hear the same reasoning in your explanations

originally posted by: jobless1
Moral of the story is this a-hole had the same type of reasoning you did ie other people just are not as good as me therefore I understand and except when my boss hires people below the asking price for the work, Its ok for me to put other co-workers down as less skilled while they are learning the job.

I'm better than many, I am however not anywhere near as good as I believe I should be to do the job properly, the list of stuff I can't do is far longer than the list of stuff that I can, but I've "coached" enough people through their programming tests for jobs they later got that I know how bad a large portion of the people doing these things actually are. Perhaps part it that is that I put very high expectations on myself (and no, I don't put those expectations on others). My philosophy to anything that's team related is that you should do what you can do, I should do what I can do, and we plan the outcome to match up with our respective abilities. I do a lot of hobby programming on the side to try and get better, much of it with others and that's how I go about it. My writing style has me come across as an asshole, it's always been that way but it's not what I'm trying to convey.

Being realistic about the field though, while it's possible to get hired somewhere without being very good (it happens all the time), a company being successful is directly proportional to how many people they hire that are extremely good. Companies that hire the average workers are almost certain to go out of business within a couple years, thus the smart ones stick to the top few percent of the field. Thanks to globalization and the hugely overproduced degrees from India that means that as an American you need to work extremely hard to get good. Being average or even above average is not good enough, they have more people who graduated in the top 1-5% of the field than we have total graduates and most of them are coming to the US for work.

It's common for many to talk about the wonders of markets and the competition they bring, that it makes better products cheaper, and this is no different. Competition just looks a lot more ugly at the individual level. It means you have to work much longer and harder on building skills, and then ask for less in compensation which in turn is a better product, cheaper.

originally posted by: Aazadan

originally posted by: jobless1
Moral of the story is this a-hole had the same type of reasoning you did ie other people just are not as good as me therefore I understand and except when my boss hires people below the asking price for the work, Its ok for me to put other co-workers down as less skilled while they are learning the job.

I'm better than many, I am however not anywhere near as good as I believe I should be to do the job properly, the list of stuff I can't do is far longer than the list of stuff that I can, but I've "coached" enough people through their programming tests for jobs they later got that I know how bad a large portion of the people doing these things actually are. Perhaps part it that is that I put very high expectations on myself (and no, I don't put those expectations on others). My philosophy to anything that's team related is that you should do what you can do, I should do what I can do, and we plan the outcome to match up with our respective abilities. I do a lot of hobby programming on the side to try and get better, much of it with others and that's how I go about it. My writing style has me come across as an asshole, it's always been that way but it's not what I'm trying to convey.

Being realistic about the field though, while it's possible to get hired somewhere without being very good (it happens all the time), a company being successful is directly proportional to how many people they hire that are extremely good. Companies that hire the average workers are almost certain to go out of business within a couple years, thus the smart ones stick to the top few percent of the field. Thanks to globalization and the hugely overproduced degrees from India that means that as an American you need to work extremely hard to get good. Being average or even above average is not good enough, they have more people who graduated in the top 1-5% of the field than we have total graduates and most of them are coming to the US for work.

It's common for many to talk about the wonders of markets and the competition they bring, that it makes better products cheaper, and this is no different. Competition just looks a lot more ugly at the individual level. It means you have to work much longer and harder on building skills, and then ask for less in compensation which in turn is a better product, cheaper.

The place i worked paid one tenth of what they charged per hour " that's called being cheated not profit" hell even if they paid 20 percent it would have been acceptable. the skill required to do the job requires years of knowledge in an ever changing field.
First thing i noticed was the boss had a new boat parked in the warehouse, Bought a brand new Cadillac and had a 4 bedroom house in an expensive neighborhood with a 200,000 dollar RV parked next to it.
after he bought the car our monthly bonuses vanished amazingly.
Not only that they deducted your pay to and from the job which they called "drive time" so not only did they pay nothing even close to the average they also dropped your wage to minimum wage while driving to the job. They had health insurance but it cost me 300 a month just for my self so I'm not even sure how much they paid into it.

the average for that field is 28 per hour he was charging $110 per hour to the customer.
he worked us 60 hours a week which would normally get you 1,680 per week how ever he paid $660 and that's not even counting deductions for drive time actually a two week check was around 800 after taxes that means this guy collected 5,320 dollars per month by paying well below average. one worker working a 60 hour work week would total 40 hours of actual work which would equal =17,000 in profit and he had 7 people doing the same thing. which means this guy was pulling in 119,000 per month just in hours worked not including marking up materials used. Even if he payed 15 per hour it would only cost him 21,000. and if he get the average he would have made a profit of 71,960 per month.

Extreme greed and a market built for employers allow a-holes like him to survive and thrive in the market. Hell his client list was stolen from a previous employer.

a reply to: jobless1

I've found that to be extremely common. Like I said before, if you work for someone else you will never be paid what you're worth. In some cases it's due to malicious owners but in others it's just simple economics and the difference between the two is only the degree to which you're being under compensated. In your example, the owner realized the customer would pay X for the product/service and then paid you Y to deliver it, then kept the difference. If you were paid that full value of X the owner wouldn't make any money and would have no return on his investment, a business simply cannot be run that way.

If you were an independent contractor offering that service yourself, you could have charged the full value of X. Of course there are other things that possibly go into it such as equipment you would need to purchase or other barriers to entry like having a full product to sell in the first pace.

It's not an easy question to resolve and I don't think it has a definitive answer, but I do know that if you're bringing in say $200/hour for your employer and they're pocketing $100 of that in profit, that it's wrong to only feed $10 of that back to the employee.