Washington, D.C., Has More Tech-Job Openings Than Silicon Valley | Hacker News Reader

Washington, D.C., Has More Tech-Job Openings Than Silicon Valley

wsj.com

I loved living in DC, but most of the engineering roles were low pay and old tech. The biggest DC tech employers are government contractors that charge for butts in seats so talking about the volume of jobs in DC doesn't mean much.

Hopefully Amazon's HQ2 will improve things.

Or alternatively, high pay and old tech working for military contractors in roles that require security clearance. In some cases tech employers must pay a premium to get someone to perform extraordinarily tedious work.

So much “butts in seats” and not as much concern for Productivity.

DC is also fighting reason to make everyone return to stuffy offices. As the city has clearly created an even more hostile environment for commuting with speed cameras, dramatically higher fuel costs, ancient traffic signals, and variably disjointed bike lanes, people need to be on time for work commutes to low paying jobs where no one in mgmt understands the difference between a devOps and an IT Architect role...

As someone who lives in the area, I dread recruiter calls because 98 percent of them are for roles nowhere near everything I have in my resume and work requirements profile.... Ugh. At least we rarely get earthquakes. :P

I'm sure but housing situation is out of control. Paying 2K a month for a 1 bedroom apartment where your roommates are mice and roaches.

I think it's likely that there is a higher concentration of tech (esp. software engineering) jobs in some of the further flung suburbs than in DC proper, which yields some more affordable options (sometimes at the cost of some urban amenities).

This is not a lot cheaper than what you quoted, but for ~$2k/mo you can rent a 1 BR apartment in one of those relatively new, relatively fancy condominium-style medium-rise buildings at Reston Town Center (essentially the "downtown" area, or at least one of them) which puts you in very short walking distance of a bunch of tech offices and even a good number of nightlife and entertainment options. You could easily live the "15-minute city" life there. It would be a little bit like living in a large outdoor mall, but it's a very walkable "neighborhood". (EDIT: the DC metro system is also within walking distance.)

There are a handful of other "tech hubs" like that scattered around the DMV.

It's of very little surprise that places with poor compensation and fundamental disagreements about ethics are having trouble hiring.

Government recruiting is not subject to the same pressures as the commercial sector, broadly speaking.

not if you smoke weed

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