[kevin42]

I have talked to hiring managers who complain about the lack of candidates. Then I ask to see their positions and what they are willing to pay and it's way too low. No wonder they can't find an experienced C++ developer for $70k/year. The companies complaining about the lack of qualified people would have no problem if they paid more.

On the other hand I've talked to an unemployed Java developer who didn't seem to want to learn anything new beyond what he learned at college 15 years ago complaining about the job market.

In my 25+ years of experience, I think that demand for software engineers has always been high. But what's in demand keeps changing. I saw COBOL and RPG IV programmers in 1992 complaining about the lack of software jobs. It'll always be hard to keep up with the jobs that are in demand unless you look at what's in demand and work on the side to stay relevant.