[cletus]

There is no such thing as a labour shortage. There is only an unwillingness to pay. If you can't afford to attract talent at market rates then your business model as it is exists isn't viable.

A big aspect to this is that the equity lottery of startups is largely gone because companies going public is increasingly rare, companies stay private longer (which presents real problems for the liquidity of employee options) and there are just so many ways an employee can get screwed out of their equity value that as the time a startup is private increases the value of the equity inevitably approaches zero. Down rounds, liquidity preferences, that sort of thing.

Equity is a pretty terrible deal for employees. Great for VCs. Great for founders (mostly). Horrible for employees.

[commandlinefan]

> There is only an unwillingness to pay

I'm still waiting for somebody to try offering humane working conditions (like, not in an open airplane hangar where you can hear everybody else's conversations echoing throughout the room) as a perk. Been waiting for a long time.

[ownagefool]

Pretty much.

I live near London and get calls from recruiters on a regular basis telling me my CV is literally amazing and they have these awesome opportunities paying half of what I'm currently on.

Went for a coffee with a couple of them and they're telling me they have positions open for a year because neither the clients nor the staff will budge.

This is the contract market, and this includes both companies looking for experts with experience and just bums on seats in a team although, this is usually working for non-experts team leads.

I'm not whining, like I said, I have work. It's just interesting that the client side market hardcore trying to halt at £800 per day.

[jbattle]

> If you can't afford to attract talent at market rates then your business model as it is exists isn't viable.

That sounds kind of extreme, but I think you are on to something. Facebook can generate more incremental revenue per unit developer than company X. It's not that company X is just being cheap offering less and the solution isn't as simple as "raise salaries".

This two-tier system of compensation isn't just a matter of non-FAANG companies being too stingy. Its a matter of economics and business models.

[mattkrause]

> There is only an unwillingness to pay.

Or train!

It amazes me when places want PhD-level employees, but also insist on them having very specific experience. The one thing that a PhD indicates is the ability to quickly get oneself up to speed in an area.

[nakedrobot2]

Yes there is such a thing as a labor shortage. When unemployment is below 3% (as in the czech republic) there literally aren't any workers available. No I'm not going to pay someone $30/hour to paint my house, and i'm not going to pay $250/hour to some fresh graduate to hack some node.js.

[wool_gather]

I don't want to pay what I pay for housing, either, but I prefer having a roof over my head. Complaining about it is totally fair, but at some point you have to adjust to the facts on the ground if you want the thing.

[malvosenior]

Then it's quite possible that your house will stay unpainted and your node.js will stay unhacked. Due to the labor shortage the people who can do those things will be getting paid to do them though, so they won't have any problems with this situation.

[LoSboccacc]

> There is no such thing as a labour shortage.

bullshit. we are looking for talent as hard as we can and we pay premium rates compared to market.

90% of the people that enters the door can't code a for loop. a lot of the candidates, especially those on the younger side, have terrible work ethics, like they find hard to work in a team or under direction and to follow instructions; they won't listen to anything and they'reso set into their own way of doing things they will dismantle working software even after being directed precisely to where and how to implement/fix stuff. and it doesn't stop in the work are either, we got one that tried watching cartoons off a pirate streaming site.

there's a huge shortage of people with brain, agency and will that can fill a 10x position, leaving company that don't do the umpteen iteration of the average vertical tiered enterprisey app short and longing for employees.

[user5994461]

I'm curious in what city is this?

It's possible to find no developers in small cities and rural areas, where there are usually no developers and no companies. Having issues with work ethics is something else entirely though.

[masonic]

  we are looking for talent as hard as we can 

... and yet you neither mention details nor have any contact info here or in your profile.

[LoSboccacc]

...yes? people can talk about their situation without being living advertisement.

[NonEUCitizen]

Pay 10x $ for a 10x programmer.

[LoSboccacc]

wages aren't linear and we're paying 50% to 100% more than market depending on experience; we don't lack candidates per se either, we lack good ones.