[xox]

What I find remarkable about the chart is the volume of tech jobs in D.C. relative to the population:

D.C. has a population of about 600 thousand versus about 8 million in NYC and yet tech hiring seems to be roughly on a par in these two cities.

That's mind blowing (to me at least).

If that's correct, it must be virtually impossible to be an unemployed programmer in D.C.

[matrix]

Ah, but there's a catch: many of the jobs require security clearances. You need to be a US citizen, and usually need to be cleared already. If you're cleared though... it's a license to print money (heck, you might just BE printing money).

[bd]

Is it because of government related jobs?

"So you lived in the imperial seat in the US, the one are where 75% of people are working for the government (directly or indirectly), and the one place that actually GREW during the current recession."

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1271560

[elblanco]

There's over 5 million people in the D.C. area (D.C., Southern MD and Northern Virginia). Coupled with a highly educated workforce, plentiful higher education options, and a rapidly modernizing federal government, and you actually see very very few unemployed developers. Most places I know in the area get the vast vast majority of their resumes from incoming immigrants looking for an H1-B sponsor or a Green Card sponsor.

D.C. proper by comparison has very little going on.

[GFischer]

Do you know if they eventually go for it? (H1-B sponsoring?). I'm a wannabe immigrant, and I wouldn't mind an H1-B sponsor :)

[elblanco]

Some places are. It's difficult because the biggest employer in the area is the U.S. Federal Government. So it's hard to hire non-citizens. But there is a relatively healthy private sector as well. You just have to try and find those smaller employers. Most of the resume's I've seen also seem to be coming in through a recruiting agency if that helps.

[shawndrost]

DC's metropolitan area population is more than a quarter the size of NYC's, so it's as much of a surprise. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Washington_Metropolitan_Area http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_metropolitan_area

[harpastum]

It could also mean that it's still relatively hard to find a programming job in NYC, or that a greater proportion of DC companies use dice.com than NYC companies.

[Glide]

I was reading an unemployment report the local Fairfax county paper (in northern VA if you don't know). During this recession the unemployment rate was 5.6%. I think it normally hovers around 4.6% or something.

This isn't to say that the housing bubble did not affect the area. It did. But the unemployment rate is still very close to "normal."