2. The idea that "There is no shortage if you pay enough" is BS is just whining because employers just really want to underpay and overwork people and are defensive anytime they aren't able to accomplish exactly that.
Hence, I find the argument that "there There is no shortage if you pay enough" so entitled and arrogant. The high-tech industry is already paying salaries, that most any other professions would kill for. So what is that "magic number" when your blue-collar guy will hang up his hard-hat and switch to coding?
I am not aware of any untapped geniuses now toiling as coal miners, truck drivers or construction workers waiting for the salaries to hit a magic number for them to unleash their talents.
That's not who would be most affected by a long term trend of high salaries. It's the kids who would go to biz school or wall street or law school (or med school, but that's less of a positive, hah) instead because that's where the money has been in the past.
I think we all know the answer to that.
You do realize there's other high paying industries besides software engineering, right? It's not like your choices are learning to code or working at Arby's.
It's really not entitlement, it's simply people who believe that the labor pool has market-like characteristics. During recessions and downturns this certainly is used as a reason to do hiring freezes, cut pay, and lay people off. So if the labor pool acts like a market during a surplus, how could it be arrogant to assume it loosely follows those rules during a shortage; where wages should be pushed upward?
My own view is that there is no true technology labor shortage, just that technology companies are still in the process of figuring out how to maximize the productivity of their technology teams outside of "Make them work longer hours" Better decision making, better working environments for technology contributors, and more focus on nurturing technology manager talent could significantly increase productivity IMO.
Not trying to be snarky, as I'm generally ignorant about most career paths, but wharvelse is there paying well. Off the top of my head I cam think of finance, doctors, and, in some cases law, butnis there anything outside of that. I know that in many industries you can end up doing pretty well, but only once you've reached the very top. Whereas the aforementioned professions can pay well from that start .
There is no healthcare profession with the same or higher median salary that doesn't have at least as Master's degree as the entry-level education, and all healthcare occupations except Physician Assistants and Nurse Anesthetists/Midwives/Practitioners with the same or higher median salary actually have a doctoral or professional degree as the entry-level education.
There are no occupations in Business & Finance with equivalent or higher median pay. (Personal Financial Advisors, at $88,890, are the highest in that area.)
There are some engineering occupation with higher median pay, but only Aerospace, Computer Hardware, and Petroleum Engineers (Chemical gets close, at $104,910.)
So, no, there aren't lots of occupations in those three areas paid, on average, better than SWEs (or Software Developers).
There are a bunch of management occupations with higher pay, though, ironically enough, “Top Executives” is just a bit below Software Developers.
https://www.bls.gov/ooh/computer-and-information-technology/...
https://www.bls.gov/ooh/healthcare/mobile/home.htm
https://www.bls.gov/ooh/architecture-and-engineering/mobile/...
Pay what you need to or go out of business. Either way, stop your whining.
-there is no housing shortage in SF/NYC/any big city, just a shortage at what you are willing to pay
-there's no shortage of insulin or medications or health-care just a shortage at the price you are willing to pay.
-no affordable education crisis.... (on and on...)
You see if you don't pay the market rate for the resource, Sh_t out of luck.
sauce for the goose == sauce for the gander
Maybe not for you, but as a small business owner it's my livelihood.
Some of those industrial workers have built up amazing work habits that could really ramp up their programming skills if applied that way, as well.