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by PinguTS 156 days ago
I feel like some HN posters simply read news and don't work in the industry and have actual insights on what's happening.

Like Hydac moved some of there assembly from China to Germany.

A company in the district nearby, just moved their whole production from Thailand back to here. Yes, production costs are higher. But there is not transportation costs. They don't have long lead times anymore and can react more better to demand. So the overall costs assessment lead to the decision it is better to have production here locally.

I recommend to go to SPS, Agritechnica, and so and talk to actual people.

BTW: Even as Continental has layoff. There are other companies around that happily absorb those people. Because 2 years back, that had problems employing people.

3 comments

> that had problems employing people.

If possible I would like to know what positions and how much they were offering.

I had offerings for a manager position, 15 people, responsibility for the 15, including in house training of them, and part responsibility in the 5 different projects these people were working on. They wanted somebody with background in HW development, 10 years experience in FPGA, experience of at least 5 years Linux driver development, cryptography, at least 5 years managing people.

Wait for it… they offered 80k/year. I don’t know… seems little bit low somebody with like 20 years experience.

That's the dirty secret of "the employment shortage".

Under pay, no one takes the job, so justify off-shoring.

The truth, having talked to employees at big firms, is that in the past, entire factories were off shored to save 10 cents from one single part in a product.

Today, most jobs are not just under-paid, they are undignified. Because any job can be gratifying in the right circumstances, even a job on a factory line, it just has to:

1. Pay a fair wage 2. Be designed to be gratifying

Companies dont even care about their customers anymore, we all know it's been more than 15 years since they've cared about their employees. That's how entshittification goes.

>Under pay, no one takes the job, so justify off-shoring.

You mean to justify easy rubber stamping work visas on candidates from abroad.

Offshoring is usually last resort when costs other than labor are also much cheaper abroad like energy, or there's other incentives like government handouts or tax exemptions that high-CoL EU countries like France or Germany can't compete with.

>Companies dont even care about their customers anymore, we all know it's been more than 15 years since they've cared about their employees. That's how entshittification goes.

What solution would you suggest?

Exactly. And sometimes even very strange things happen. Currently I know of a company taking lots of positions from Germany to China, people in China are having more money in the pocket per year. The cost to the company are basically the same, but people is more motivated. Mind you, that people are not working crazy hs! Mostly 8 to 9 hs per day 5 days a week.
>Wait for it… they offered 80k/year. I don’t know… seems little bit low somebody with like 20 years experience.

In which country?

The sad thing is the state of supply and demand in the economy, doesn't really care how many years of experience you have, or how hard you worked, or how difficult the job is. It'll pay as little as they can get away with.

Sucks, but welcome to being a tax cattle in Europe, where someone on the dole with welfare and credits takes home nearly as much as you do. Thank our politicians for outsourcing everything that wasn't nailed to the ground for 20+ years in the name of shareholder growth.

> In which country?

South Germany. In a capital city. And that was “tops”

And as you say, 40% is out of the bat off. Then you have expensive energy also plagued with taxes… plus of course 19% VAT, etc, etc, etc… if somebody in USA could tell me what would you earn for that there would be nice.

If you're open to being mobile right now you might consider relocating to work in the EE industry of Linz, Villach or Graz in Austria or the aerospace/defence industry Toulouse in France.

Someone with your experience wouldn't earn much less there and you'd have much lower housing CoL than the big capital cities in southern Germany, and better food and weather.

I’m sure there is one or another company generating employment. I didn’t stated something different. Did I?

I just named a fact. I know people in at least 3 different companies in the list that lost their job last year, and many others which are in the list until 2030. The people that lost their jobs are/were more than 1 year searching. I’m talking with many “actual people” in different industries, and it is not looking very bright…

Most of the open positions is management of projects in other parts of the world. I see almost no development in SW or electronics going on here, much less production.

>that had problems employing people

Who is "that" in this context? Can you be more specific.

>Even as Continental has layoff

Not just Conti, but all major automotive suppliers, semiconductor, embedded companies spread across Europe had mass layoffs.

And not everyone was quickly absorbed. I have EE friends almost a year unemployed after the layoffs. They apply but only get rejections, not sure why. It's a bloodbath right now in industries in high-CoL regions.

And is not only automotive. Other sectors are also suffering a lot. As you said, finding a new job is not very easy, even if you are ok with 1hs commute. As far as I know, all big companies are moving work outside the EU in a hurry.