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Comment by MichaelCrawford | Hacker News Reader

It would be helpful to me if I had the option to disable posts from third party agencies like Yoh and Kforce. I prefer to apply directly to the employer.

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Michael, I hear you but haven't you noticed that most employers use third party agencies these days? Don't know about OR, but it's very true for NY and NJ (and probably CT). That's why there are threads about jobs being difficult to find. On one hand there are plenty of jobs, on the other hand there are none (or too few).

We're very sympathetic with all the job seekers but right now there are just too few jobs in our database. Eventually we may introduce a special keyword to omit staffing agencies from the search results or something like that.

And thank you for your input too! Good luck with your job search!

> haven't you noticed that most employers use third party agencies these days?

I have not noticed this in MA, and companies that do this go to the bottom of my response list. I had the same reaction as the grandparent poster, and something that tries to foist those sorts of things off on me is an immediate "nope, I'll look elsewhere."

I understand you very well. We're from NYC and most jobs here are in the financial industry. They pay really well but it's hard to go through all those staffing firms and, later, interviews.

My co-worker says "there's life outside of financial industry" but, somehow, we get to stick to "financial" jobs.

Well, that's been my experience for the past 15 years or so.

There's a reason why I only chat about consulting opportunities with fintech companies. =) Ain't got time for FT for them.

Still, financial industry has lots of high paying jobs as well as bonuses to neglect it.

Would you resist making 140K on a base full-time? Keep in mind benefits and bonuses too.

I get offered quantitative investment jobs all the time, as I have substantial experience with finance.

I eventually came to regard it as unethical, so I turn those jobs down.

And if you're good you can make $140K base outside of finance (and outside of NYC and SF, too) without too much digging, too.

In most places $140K is about the ceiling. In NYC it's not. Plus finances pay bonuses.

Furthermore, what does it mean to be good? If you're smarter than your interviewer or know more, they'll reject you. In general, I would say selling yourself has nothing to do with your programming skills.

My total take-home at my last job was about $180K. I'm 27. I'm not top-of-market in Boston; top-of-market is around $220K and that's assuming an average-ish bonus situation. And, no, I tend to be better prepped and, usually, more knowledgeable than my interviewers, because that's what they would be paying me for. Because I am good at what I do, I have a deep and wide base of knowledge and have significant successes in my past, and they know it.

You're digging a real deep hole and making your project seem remarkably unserious. I would suggest that you stop.

Ok, thanks! Let's stop.

Do you get actual offers or do you get asked to interview with them? There's a difference.

Yeah, a lot of my co-workers including myself don't like it because we're helping the rich get richer plus associated consequences.

Here are some leads for you:

http://www.warplife.com/jobs/computer/united-states/oregon/m...

http://www.warplife.com/jobs/computer/united-states/washingt...

http://www.warplife.com/jobs/computer/united-states/californ...

None of them are staffing firms.

Michael, we'll do our best to attract direct employers to our site. To be honest, it is difficult to attract (and satisfy) both job seekers and employers. We're still an early stage start-up.

Read the book "Successful Cold-Call Selling". It doesn't have to do with tech but is very food.

Then call each of the companies that I list. If you think they're a big company, ask for their HR manager, otherwise ask for their software engineering manager, then pitch your job board.

Will do. By the way, we all can help each other if we tell our employers about this site (yeah, I know I need it more than you).

Yesterday a couple of direct employers signed so hopefully we'll have more jobs but don't expect a lot at this stage.

Keep checking once in a while. We're not a social network and therefore don't want you to spend a lot of time on our site.

Here's what I find amazing. Nobody seems to like staffing agencies. Yet there are plenty of them, they have lots of jobs and employees. Mystery.

It's not that a staffing agency couldn't find me a job. It's that I regard staffing agencies as an albatross around the neck of the economy. Consider how much more could be invested in new products and services, were staffing agencies not to receive their commissions.

I agree with you. There are many problems with staffing agencies and this is one of them.

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