Finding experienced technicians to teach courses is hard. And then there’s the most surprising roadblock of all: This is an industry with cycles of boom and bust. Right now business is slow, and some companies are doing layoffs.
Brad Ailor has been warning his students at Maricopa Community Colleges that it “could take several months” to get hired. “There have been several iterations of layoffs during my time at Intel,” he said. “That’s just the nature of the semiconductor business.”
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The hiring drop-off is undermining training. The college has sharply scaled back its offerings. Last academic year, Maricopa educated over 600 students in Quick Start. That has fallen to 370 for this academic year. No courses are being offered this summer. The website now tells applicants to check back in August.
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When teens walk into the high-tech lab at West-MEC, with its robotic arms and massive machines, there’s often an aha moment. This is what happened to Allen. But many people never bother to check it out. West-MEC’s health-care courses have long waiting lists. Its advanced manufacturing program has just 44 juniors and 33 seniors, though the school is building a second high-tech lab facility that is slated to open in 2026. Companies have been eager to donate training equipment.
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What became clear to us in Phoenix is that the ideal training model in the semiconductor industry is apprenticeships. We saw how effective “earn while you learn” can be when we visited Arizona’s construction trade unions.
We could barely find a parking spot when we pulled into the Arizona Pipe Trades Apprenticeship training center. More than 1,000 apprentices are there now — almost double the number in 2022. Demand is soaring for pipe and drain systems at the semiconductor fabs and the high-rise condos, hospitals, and other businesses riding this growth wave. People eagerly sign up for the apprenticeship when they hear what they’ll be paid.
Imagine that, people don't like living in poverty. The unwillingness to keep people during slower times and the unwillingness to teach people things you want them to know so they can make money...
Imagine that, people don't like living in poverty.
The unwillingness to keep people during slower times and the unwillingness to teach people things you want them to know so they can make money for you is common, but isn't normal.
Human beings work for jobs, not robots. Human beings need to eat and sleep while they learn, and they need to eat and sleep whether or not the market is good. Having workers who know things, have homes, and are decently fed is part of having your profits be subsidized by society as common good. The fact that they have teams of people strategizing to minimize taxes and investments at every turn, and put as little of it into not just society but the humans who make them money.... It makes me angry
Being in the software industry, it’s so crazy to see hiring being almost exclusively for mid-level or senior positions. Nobody wants to train juniors to create a supply of mid-levels and seniors,...
Being in the software industry, it’s so crazy to see hiring being almost exclusively for mid-level or senior positions. Nobody wants to train juniors to create a supply of mid-levels and seniors, those positions are just supposed to magically be filled with skilled professionals materializing from the ether.
Companies can kind of get away with this for now since they can subsist on the workers trained on the last wave of tech investment (which I’m arguably part of) but that won’t last forever. This group is going to start moving into management or retiring and they’re going to have to hire and train juniors whether they like it or not.
"they" don't need to, that's the next C-class/manager's problem. T hat's the core issue within the core issue: so many companies aren't thinking with a 5-10+ year plan these days. Executives want...
This group is going to start moving into management or retiring and they’re going to have to hire and train juniors whether they like it or not.
"they" don't need to, that's the next C-class/manager's problem. T
hat's the core issue within the core issue: so many companies aren't thinking with a 5-10+ year plan these days. Executives want to get their stocks to vest, drive up the short term numbers, and jump off their golden parachute the moment things start getting slightly inconvinient. Especially with publily shared companies. No one is putting the customer first these days, they barely put competition first. There's no consequences for doing bad outside of less money, but the money they live with (and probably had for decades) is more than what many will make in their lifetimes. So even true financaial failure of a company has minimal damage to them.
Nothing's really going to change unless either shareholder priorities or cusomer awareness changes. The former is sadly much easier to sway.
I've been out of the job market a long time, but I'll point out that for software engineers, this has happened before, with the dot-com crash and the 2008 recession. Outsourcing isn't new either....
I've been out of the job market a long time, but I'll point out that for software engineers, this has happened before, with the dot-com crash and the 2008 recession. Outsourcing isn't new either.
Perhaps it's temporary this time too? It sucks for new grads entering the job market this year, though.
I just graduated and it has been really frustrating. Every 'entry' position available wants 5+ years experience and knowledge in a dozen completely different technologies. I still apply for a lot...
I just graduated and it has been really frustrating. Every 'entry' position available wants 5+ years experience and knowledge in a dozen completely different technologies. I still apply for a lot of them, it's just very discouraging and I don't understand how people get started in this industry.
I've been a hobbyist dev for a decade, but it doesn't seem like my github will make much of a difference.
It's mostly bullshit. I'm on the other end, I've written or helped draft a number of those job descriptions. A lot of the time the "5+ years experience in ___" is not actually a requirement, it's...
It's mostly bullshit. I'm on the other end, I've written or helped draft a number of those job descriptions. A lot of the time the "5+ years experience in ___" is not actually a requirement, it's someone making an aspirational description of their ideal candidate.
Best advice I can give is just, be friendly and talk to everyone you can. Once you have a certain level of skill, getting a job can more about luck and who is in your network than your actual abilities. The #1 reason I am where I am today is because of people I met 10+ years ago, some of who don't even work in my industry. I'm not even necessarily great friends with them, they just remembered me for whatever reason and clued me into a job opening.
Similar experience here, it sucks. "Entry level" demanding multiple years of experience and expertise in all sorts of technologies. One pet peeve of mine with lots of those postings is the...
Similar experience here, it sucks. "Entry level" demanding multiple years of experience and expertise in all sorts of technologies. One pet peeve of mine with lots of those postings is the requirements for expertise in development process things like CI/CD. You can certainly get exposure to those things outside of work, but unless you've worked on larger teams, you probably won't have too much depth on them.
I've mostly given up on applying to big companies because it seems like they just reject you instantly - too big a pool of people applying. Small-to-medium places where there's some small chance a real human will see your resume feel like a better bet.
Not if they can outsource the training to politicians (like "for gods sake learn to code" Biden) who will use a combo of public funds and pushing youth further into debt and unpaid internships to...
Not if they can outsource the training to politicians (like "for gods sake learn to code" Biden) who will use a combo of public funds and pushing youth further into debt and unpaid internships to make it happen.
Creating more junior engineers doesn't change the situation with many companies only hiring experienced engineers. The problem isn't unique to software engineering. Even for lower pay, it's hard...
Creating more junior engineers doesn't change the situation with many companies only hiring experienced engineers. The problem isn't unique to software engineering. Even for lower pay, it's hard to justify hiring some new graduate with 0 years of industry experience versus someone with even a couple years under their belt. Training takes a lot of valuable time.
It seems like work in cyclic industries might be preferred by foreign workers, who are interested in seeing the US and making some money, but also want to go home later? They're not going to stick...
It seems like work in cyclic industries might be preferred by foreign workers, who are interested in seeing the US and making some money, but also want to go home later? They're not going to stick around anyway.
Compare with summer jobs for teens. I'm also reminded of stories of young people who would go to Alaska to work in the Salmon fishing industry - a pretty terrible job, but the pay wasn't bad and they were doing it for the adventure.
Meanwhile, young people in the US who want to travel often get jobs teaching English in other countries.
Lately and increasingly I think about how maintaining or improving working conditions in the US is possible as long as global labor arbitrage is possible and profitable. It's difficult to demand...
Lately and increasingly I think about how maintaining or improving working conditions in the US is possible as long as global labor arbitrage is possible and profitable.
It's difficult to demand better pay and working conditions so long as there's someone's more desperate willing to stoop down for worse pay and conditions.
In the long run, when global wealth equalizes and everyone is on equal footing, this won't be a problem. But for the next, I don't know, 100? years, this is a problem.
I know I don't have insight into the entire world, but most of the people I've ever met whom have migrated to the US for work do their damndest to stay indefinitely and gain citizenship, rather...
seeing the US and making some money, but also want to go home later? They're not going to stick around anyway.
I know I don't have insight into the entire world, but most of the people I've ever met whom have migrated to the US for work do their damndest to stay indefinitely and gain citizenship, rather than just trying to make a quick buck to bring home.
And low-skill cyclical work can work under that model. Something that benefits from years of learning and institutional knowledge is really just being hampered by beancounters terrified of having an unprofitable few years after having record profits for a few years.
The whole point of salaries was to insure workers were getting paid during downtime for cyclical industries.
I think this varies. Some people start out thinking it’s temporary and they will move back, but then change their minds later. It depends on conditions in the US and the country they’re from. For...
I think this varies. Some people start out thinking it’s temporary and they will move back, but then change their minds later. It depends on conditions in the US and the country they’re from.
Nobody in Vincent’s section had previously studied in the U.S. Almost all of them were middle class, and they often said that their goal was to complete their bachelor’s degree in America, stay on for a master’s or a Ph.D., and then come back to work in China. A generation earlier, the vast majority of Chinese students at American universities had stayed in the country, but the pattern changed dramatically with China’s new prosperity. In 2022, the Chinese Ministry of Education reported that, in the past decade, more than eighty per cent of Chinese students returned after completing their studies abroad.
That’s about students rather than people coming to work, but the Philippines a has a large workforce of overseas workers. These are people with families back home, who go a long time without seeing their children.
In some ways, yes. Thats sadly because something like 6-9 months of work before being thrown out still translates to a few year's income with family back home. It works out great if you send most...
In some ways, yes. Thats sadly because something like 6-9 months of work before being thrown out still translates to a few year's income with family back home. It works out great if you send most that money back home and rely on something like group "housing"/community to cover expenses in the states (something many Americans past their college years don't want to willingly do).
If that pay was proportionately similar for these rotating jobs, there'd be a lot less strife. Cool, don't need us around for a while? Pay or pre-pay for our vacation until we rotate back in, I guess.
Knowing folks from the O&G industry, they get the cush gigs and are laid off. That's the key point though, they're cush gigs. And they may or may not be temporary or permanent. Is that why this...
Knowing folks from the O&G industry, they get the cush gigs and are laid off.
That's the key point though, they're cush gigs. And they may or may not be temporary or permanent.
Is that why this issue exists? That is, because in some fields that's the norm, and in the other fields folks are dispensable?
From the article:
…
…
…
Imagine that, people don't like living in poverty.
The unwillingness to keep people during slower times and the unwillingness to teach people things you want them to know so they can make money for you is common, but isn't normal.
Human beings work for jobs, not robots. Human beings need to eat and sleep while they learn, and they need to eat and sleep whether or not the market is good. Having workers who know things, have homes, and are decently fed is part of having your profits be subsidized by society as common good. The fact that they have teams of people strategizing to minimize taxes and investments at every turn, and put as little of it into not just society but the humans who make them money.... It makes me angry
Being in the software industry, it’s so crazy to see hiring being almost exclusively for mid-level or senior positions. Nobody wants to train juniors to create a supply of mid-levels and seniors, those positions are just supposed to magically be filled with skilled professionals materializing from the ether.
Companies can kind of get away with this for now since they can subsist on the workers trained on the last wave of tech investment (which I’m arguably part of) but that won’t last forever. This group is going to start moving into management or retiring and they’re going to have to hire and train juniors whether they like it or not.
"they" don't need to, that's the next C-class/manager's problem. T
hat's the core issue within the core issue: so many companies aren't thinking with a 5-10+ year plan these days. Executives want to get their stocks to vest, drive up the short term numbers, and jump off their golden parachute the moment things start getting slightly inconvinient. Especially with publily shared companies. No one is putting the customer first these days, they barely put competition first. There's no consequences for doing bad outside of less money, but the money they live with (and probably had for decades) is more than what many will make in their lifetimes. So even true financaial failure of a company has minimal damage to them.
Nothing's really going to change unless either shareholder priorities or cusomer awareness changes. The former is sadly much easier to sway.
I've been out of the job market a long time, but I'll point out that for software engineers, this has happened before, with the dot-com crash and the 2008 recession. Outsourcing isn't new either.
Perhaps it's temporary this time too? It sucks for new grads entering the job market this year, though.
I just graduated and it has been really frustrating. Every 'entry' position available wants 5+ years experience and knowledge in a dozen completely different technologies. I still apply for a lot of them, it's just very discouraging and I don't understand how people get started in this industry.
I've been a hobbyist dev for a decade, but it doesn't seem like my github will make much of a difference.
It's mostly bullshit. I'm on the other end, I've written or helped draft a number of those job descriptions. A lot of the time the "5+ years experience in ___" is not actually a requirement, it's someone making an aspirational description of their ideal candidate.
Best advice I can give is just, be friendly and talk to everyone you can. Once you have a certain level of skill, getting a job can more about luck and who is in your network than your actual abilities. The #1 reason I am where I am today is because of people I met 10+ years ago, some of who don't even work in my industry. I'm not even necessarily great friends with them, they just remembered me for whatever reason and clued me into a job opening.
Similar experience here, it sucks. "Entry level" demanding multiple years of experience and expertise in all sorts of technologies. One pet peeve of mine with lots of those postings is the requirements for expertise in development process things like CI/CD. You can certainly get exposure to those things outside of work, but unless you've worked on larger teams, you probably won't have too much depth on them.
I've mostly given up on applying to big companies because it seems like they just reject you instantly - too big a pool of people applying. Small-to-medium places where there's some small chance a real human will see your resume feel like a better bet.
Not if they can outsource the training to politicians (like "for gods sake learn to code" Biden) who will use a combo of public funds and pushing youth further into debt and unpaid internships to make it happen.
It's a shifting of the burden
Creating more junior engineers doesn't change the situation with many companies only hiring experienced engineers. The problem isn't unique to software engineering. Even for lower pay, it's hard to justify hiring some new graduate with 0 years of industry experience versus someone with even a couple years under their belt. Training takes a lot of valuable time.
It seems like work in cyclic industries might be preferred by foreign workers, who are interested in seeing the US and making some money, but also want to go home later? They're not going to stick around anyway.
Compare with summer jobs for teens. I'm also reminded of stories of young people who would go to Alaska to work in the Salmon fishing industry - a pretty terrible job, but the pay wasn't bad and they were doing it for the adventure.
Meanwhile, young people in the US who want to travel often get jobs teaching English in other countries.
Lately and increasingly I think about how maintaining or improving working conditions in the US is possible as long as global labor arbitrage is possible and profitable.
It's difficult to demand better pay and working conditions so long as there's someone's more desperate willing to stoop down for worse pay and conditions.
In the long run, when global wealth equalizes and everyone is on equal footing, this won't be a problem. But for the next, I don't know, 100? years, this is a problem.
I know I don't have insight into the entire world, but most of the people I've ever met whom have migrated to the US for work do their damndest to stay indefinitely and gain citizenship, rather than just trying to make a quick buck to bring home.
And low-skill cyclical work can work under that model. Something that benefits from years of learning and institutional knowledge is really just being hampered by beancounters terrified of having an unprofitable few years after having record profits for a few years.
The whole point of salaries was to insure workers were getting paid during downtime for cyclical industries.
I think this varies. Some people start out thinking it’s temporary and they will move back, but then change their minds later. It depends on conditions in the US and the country they’re from.
For example, see How Chinese students experience America.
That’s about students rather than people coming to work, but the Philippines a has a large workforce of overseas workers. These are people with families back home, who go a long time without seeing their children.
In some ways, yes. Thats sadly because something like 6-9 months of work before being thrown out still translates to a few year's income with family back home. It works out great if you send most that money back home and rely on something like group "housing"/community to cover expenses in the states (something many Americans past their college years don't want to willingly do).
If that pay was proportionately similar for these rotating jobs, there'd be a lot less strife. Cool, don't need us around for a while? Pay or pre-pay for our vacation until we rotate back in, I guess.
Knowing folks from the O&G industry, they get the cush gigs and are laid off.
That's the key point though, they're cush gigs. And they may or may not be temporary or permanent.
Is that why this issue exists? That is, because in some fields that's the norm, and in the other fields folks are dispensable?
Mirror, for those hit by the paywall:
https://archive.ph/kH3DJ