[ChuckMcM]

Exactly, the role of the 'IT person' as the system administrator and keeper of updates on things like the Novell server, has given way to Google Apps and Microsoft's Office 365. Small businesses who could barely afford to pay someone before can now eliminate that role and still have email, shared files, back end inventory management and accounts management, and the occasional web developer contract to keep the web site up to date.

Personal services IT is still alive and well and a number of people I know have made a living out of helping older people manage passwords, upgrade their systems, move their phone plans or transfer their data when they get a new phone etc. But to be successful at that you also need to talk to people and be able to maintain a business relationship with them, not a skill that everyone has in addition to their deep knowledge of IT.

As tm2d mentions devops is still a hot job market. But it is not the small business 'tech' role so there are fewer actual slots for that role.

There was also a comment in the article about H1-B visas and employers wanting "younger and less expensive" workers. I try to remind my older friends that if someone can spend 6 months learning to do what you do and do it well enough to meet the needs of the job, then you are only "worth" what a company would pay that person they just hired. If you want to have a larger salary and better job security, then you need to be able to do things that can't be trained in 6 months. The days of 'too few programmers to go around' are long past, there is now a surplus and they are coming fast and furious out of college.

[chrisweekly]

> "The days of 'too few programmers to go around' are long past, there is now a surplus..."

Some of your other points were insightful, but this assertion contradicts my experience and intuition, and -- I believe -- labor market statistics.

[ChuckMcM]

The last time I listed a $120K job opening I had hundreds of resumes thrown at me, over 10[1] of them were completely qualified and So perhaps it would be more accurate to say "$80K/yr programmers are scarce."

In 1999 when I was hiring programmers and offering above market starting salaries I wouldn't get any qualified resumes.

It is from that experience that would assert it is a 'pricing' issue rather than a 'selection' issue.

[1] After 10 qualified I had my first interview round, 3 were brought back for secondary interviews and one hired. I expect there were easily 20 - 30 engineers in there that could have done the job.

[ori_b]

The last time I put my resume out ( about 3 months ago), my big problem was who to interview with, since I was flooded with requests.

It seems that there might be plenty of churn overall.

[gozur88]

Mine too. We're having real problems filling contract positions. People are juggling multiple offers, and if we don't jump on a candidate right away they take another offer and we have to restart the process.

We've gone through surplus years before, and they don't look like this.

[jorblumesea]

I think there's a misconception about performance some perception issues about the ability to do the job. In 6 months of training you might get someone who can sort of do the job, but probably not very well and not at the level of a "real" professional. A good example of this is code camps. They churn out a ton of programmers but very few people that are actual engineers or can carry out actual projects.

But to management/high ups, they "can do the job" and are cheaper. It's like outsourcing. You save in costs but there are hidden downsides and risks.

I'd probably argue that very few engineer jobs can be done competently with a few months of training.

[user5994461]

> They churn out a ton of programmers but very few people that are actual engineers or can carry out actual projects.

Coding is a cheap easy skill that 15-20 years old can do.

Executing and managing a project from start to finish is a rare skill that cannot be acquired in school or the internet.

Coding Monkey => Cheap and easy to find.

Coder who has successfully led and executed projects => Expensive and rare.