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Comment by Pepe1vo | Hacker News Reader

The cognitive dissonance I'm getting from reading the comments here is pretty staggering. Where I live (The Netherlands) me and every IT person I know is getting absolutely hounded by recruiters. As an additional anecdote I'll add that I've just switched jobs to a start-up on very favorable terms and the recruitment process basically amounted to being cold called and asked "hey you wanna work here?".

Can anyone here comment on whether this horrible job market is a US specific situation or whether I'm living in some kind of weird bubble?

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It's many things. For example in Europe the bubble hasn't been so massive and not solely based on VC money. It's still also true for US that full-stack developers with 20 years experience in every technology are in high demand. For two years it was the same for almost every beginner as well, but not any more.

I'm in Australia and I get recruiter calls all the time. I've said I'm interested to all of them, and then they just stop talking to me. No idea what's going on. Seems like recruiters are just spamming out first contact messages and then selectively picking the replies they want to respond to.

They’re gathering data points for their “Robert Half IT Job Market Q4 2023” report and also keeping their call quotas up.

In my experience as an American working with people in the EU (particularly the UK/Western Europe), the developers there are every bit as capable as Americans and get paid less than half of what an American would - seems like quite a deal to me.

You’re not including all the taxes that need to be paid and that employment bonds are far more difficult to break.

But yeah, EU engineers are very good in my experience.

In the US there are also taxes and a huge expense in the form of private health insurance - my employer says costs increased 9% this year. I don’t know that it balances, but there are additional costs to employers in the US as well.

Indeed - they’re much higher in EU though. Also until recently you could deduct 100% of a USA employees salary for tax reasons and that has recently been changed.

As an European consultant it feels like Netherlands isn't also super remote prone. Most dutch companies I've seen recruiting want you hybrid and possibly dutch speaking.

With such restrictions you're obviously gonna encounter issues hiring and will hammer the restricted pool.

Think of it as a wave. Right now, the EU is getting a slightly smaller version of the hiring peak of 2 years ago in the US. EU wages are considerably less but the quality is nearly the same. Productivity is a bit lower, but the cost is still advantageous. The goal is to find the cream of the crop before the competition, so a ton of hiring, then assessment and in a year or so reducing the workforce and the wave moves on the next frontier to find the most valuable employees.

> but the quality is nearly the same. Productivity is a bit lower

Slightly insulting to European developers?

Though I suspect a lot of European developers would say the same about their US colleagues…

Don’t Europeans typically work less hours than Americans and do so as a point of pride? I’ve spent over a decade lurking HN, Stack Exchange, later Reddit - and I always seem to see Europeans coming in with the “We work 32 hours at most in my country” or “We have a 35 hour standard here.”

Wouldn’t that necessarily imply a reduction in productivity?

No that’s a false equivalence. More hours ≠ more done.

Nope, because productivity is output divided by hours worked, so working longer can decrease productivity.

I think youre just using a different definition of productivity. Hourly is valid, but yearly is too.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Total_factor_productivity is my definition, as it's the one that actually gets talked about in the press (as opposed to the nebulous "productivity" beloved of tech people (including me)).

I've worked in the UK, Europe and the US. From my personal experience I haven't seen any difference in the amount of effort, productivity or skill level.

Maybe I've just been lucky with the people I've worked with. In one company we had a representative of pretty much every major European country working there along with quite a few guys from the US. Everyone worked hard to get stuff delivered.

Maybe, but not really, obviously any one individual can have high variance. On a macro level though it's pretty easy to identify trends. The most ambitious European devs will come to America to get the much high salaries. The hiring standards for EU devs are considerably relaxed because of the reduced salary requirements. As a result many of the actively employed EU devs would be in a lesser role than their equally skilled American counterparts which results in the reduced metrics.

It's certainly not something any one individual should take personally.

A bartender makes same as a software engineer in NL

To be fair, I probably make the same as a bartender here in the US. Blows my mind that people are easily making $120,000+.

The amount of money people give in tips is insane.

Yes, that's what economic equality means.

"But but but but my CV enlarging JS framework wankery for the spotify of deli meats is obviously so much more valuable to people than a bartender!"

I mean bartenders are unironically useless. If there was a machine that dispensed highballs I would much rather prefer that than leaning over the counter for 20 minutes waiting for my drink while the bartender flirts with some girl.

Well, you're going to the wrong bars!

Last weekend I got free beers for knowing the band on a bartender's shirt. We shot the shit about music while I waited for my friends. Made my day.

Pubs started as "public houses". What's the point if you don't know the regulars? Why go out?

Imagine Cheers with robo Ted Dansen. (Actually, that might be awesome, for very different reasons...)

Absolutely. I get comped drinks a lot at the places I go. In the past seven days, I have gotten five free drinks (three of them were mocktails) across four places.

I sit at my usual wine bar and chuckle watching across the street, people standing in line for 30 minutes to get into a loud club with mediocre drinks. Then again, that club is hugely profitable.

Being a regular (at any local business but especially bars) is an extremely fulfilling feeling. Also very good for ones social health to be active in their community.

A good day's work in software development delights the end-user to at least the extent of a well made craft cocktail. That seems like a good standard to hold for yourself. There just tend to be just a few more users for a software product than the capacity of a neighborhood bar on a given evening.

if I could make IT-level money bartending in the US I'd jump back to that tomorrow.

I am senior developer/data engineer based in Poland. 2021-2022 I was getting remote work offers from all over Europe, some from quite interesting places. Today I am still getting offers but mostly from Poland, lower rates or not disclosed, more boring 'build an ETL' type. There is a definite change but looks like it would still be possible to get a new job quickly, possibly at lower rate.

A lot of US companies prioritising hiring in EU don't need to pay for medical insurance or it's way cheeper plus wages are way lower.

Here in Canada it's pretty hopeless. Basically no prospects on the horizon at all even willing to work on-site.

The job market isn't uniformed across all experience level and roles.

You didn't specify, but I'm going to assume you're not new in your career. It's just fine in the US for staff engineer+ experience level also. New engineers? Mid levels? Probably less so, and probably similar in The Netherlands.

I had maybe 3 emails from recruiters in the last year. Used to be a couple every other day. I'm between West coast and Midwest of the US and it seems like hiring is picking up quite a bit in Midwest. Or maybe it's just less competitive and jobs aren't flying off the market like they do on the coasts. With that said I still know a good number of people who have been looking for months and are getting desperate.

I would assume many of the comments are anecdotes based on their situation.

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