It is very, very divided tech market right now. As a full stack eng with lots of startup product experience and an AI product under my belt, I had no trouble landing interviews and getting a new role. 2 years ago, it took me ~300 applications for a handful of viable interviews, as the meta was FAANG or "big data experience". 2 years later, everything is different.
Most telling: I mistakenly filtered against all jobs in SF on LinkedIn and I was a few pages in before I noticed. There were just a few lawyer jobs in the mix but literally every other job was AI/backend/product engineering roles. Meanwhile, I know an experienced EM from enterprise SaaS who has all but stopped looking for work.
This remains quite the nasty storm of a job market.
* A non-zero amount of employers simply aren't opening jobs because they're all-in on AI replacing workers within the next 6 to 18 months, and have been all-in on that gambit for the past two to three years.
* Tariffs are choking out domestic tech workers in non-tech companies, as those companies try to save money by farming out to MSPs and contractors instead of retaining in-house talent.
* Interest rates choke out job growth across the economy as a whole, but the Fed can't really lower them since inflation continues skyrocketing due to tariffs and geopolitical destabilization
* The government axed 10% of the entire bodycount from the 2008 Collapse, in the span of a year, and from within its own ranks, thus increasing competition further
* The remaining folks who want to put butts in seats are being tied by their leadership into offering lower salaries for higher skills/experience, and the hiring managers still want to find a candidate that's willing to take shit pay but also not leave the second things improve
* Continued datacenter buildouts and the Nth-order effects on supply chains continue to support the narrative that AI will just replace all work(ers) anyway, so there's no point trying to deal with this crisis, but aren't displacing enough jobs to spur policymakers into actually fixing the problem through increasing taxes or passing more regulations.
* Ongoing deportations are hampering complimentary jobs for citizens. Research from the Obama era deportations show that for every 100 migrants deported, 12 citizens lose their jobs - meaning under the current regime alone, as many as 72,000 fewer jobs exist solely from deportation efforts since the start of their term.
This is bad, ya'll. There's no "easy" way out of this either, no silver bullet to make everything all better and get folks back into job roles again. If the regime capitulates on tariffs or geopolitics (which they won't), they look weak and incompetent (which they are). If the Fed lowers rates to boost job growth, inflation will take off like a rocket because that's what Capital has been trying to engineer since 2024; if the Fed raises interest rates to keep inflation in check, the job market will crater and the datacenter boom will go bust as safer investments produce good returns again. If employers keep wages low, workers will fuck off to greener pastures the literal second they find something; if they raise wages to match cost of living and promote familial growth, they'll have to hire fewer workers and thus increase competition. Hell, by some estimates it's easier to get into Harvard than land a job right now!
Shit's fucked, and until someone forces accountability and takes the L (namely the regime who started this shitshow in the first place), nothing is going to really improve.
IMHO, the easy answer is wealth taxes and massively increased social safety net in order to bring America in line with developed countries.
I mean, yeah, I'm in full agreement with you. Think Tanks, Economists, Researchers, Politicians, Philosophers, Social Workers, everyone who looks at this stuff professionally is in general agreement that our method of shoe-horning middlemen into every single transaction, forced privatization of government services, permissive attitudes towards corporate consolidation/antitrust laws, and lack of substantial taxation is what's ultimately harming our long-term growth prospects.
Try telling that to the people who have benefited from said conditions for decades and are enjoying the fruits of their harmful labors. They're the ones running all three branches of government from local to federal level and everywhere in between, and they have no intention of changing anything or sacrificing their own gains until they're dead in the ground.
In line with developed countries except, for example, Austria, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Iceland, Italy, the Netherlands, and Sweden, each of whom previously levied wealth taxes on individuals, but apparently didn't like the taste, and have since repealed.
The economies you want to copy are even more stagnant than the US economy. It isn't obvious why this would be a long-term improvement.
We need to Make Billionaires Millionaires Again.
I don't think the rich should be taxed a dime more until they route out the Fraud. What's the point of having all the rich people suddenly pay out $40 Billion next week, if that money disappears in California Homeless and Hospice crap. I don't disagree with increased safety nets but it needs to be done without people writing 50k Medicare billing lines per day.
Supposedly CA spent 800k on EACH HOMELESS PERSON over the last 5 years. They could have all gotten a free home in a suburb and developer salary for 2 years instead of fraud capture.
It needs to be a yes-and. We need to be better about fraud (digital ID + biometric proof on delivery of services) and we need a more equitable tax system that doesn't have the top .1% paying an effective tax rate lower than a school teacher.
War: 200B now, 1.5T later.
I don't want to hear anyone talk about "fraud in government spending" until the defense department passes an audit.
I don't disagree with solving that too. But it seems like the answer is always "TAX MORE" but nothing in our government spending aligns with the fixing the ACTUAL PROBLEMS.
IOW, tax more must be combined with spend less. And spend more efficiently, yes.
> I don't think the rich should be taxed a dime more until they route out the Fraud.
Kindly fuck off with that repeatedly disproven propaganda, Reagan. The systemic forcing of wasting grants because the government handcuffs itself from investing in public infrastructure or regulating bad actors is not akin to fraud, and never has been.
You want homelessness eradicated? Housing as a human right, rent controls, public housing initiatives/buildouts, multi-use zoning, prohibitions on low-density housing in urban areas, all of those are things the government has known were needed for decades but eliminated wholesale due to "fraud". Now we spend the price of a literal house to keep homeless people homeless, and you want to call that fraud as well?
Seriously. Fuck off, read a book, talk to people. Just turn off the podcasts and cable news for a spell. Opinions that can be disproved by facts aren't valid opinions to hold.
> Kindly fuck off with that repeatedly disproven propaganda, Reagan.
Please don't do that, we all have opinions here.
> Seriously. Fuck off, read a book, talk to people. Just turn off the podcasts and cable news for a spell.
Then you update with Fuck off and talk to people. Am I not talking to people now?
Don't forget skyrocketing employer health care costs due to Government-endorsed monopoly and fraud that is the US Healthcare system. Robots don't need healthcare.
I'm a single issue voter: who is protecting the american tech worker?
We should dismantle the H1B program if we are struggling to find roles for American youth.
Dismantling H1B (imo) will lead to a more globally distributed tech market and that would harm American workers an order of magnitude more than the competition from H1Bs. You want to keep jobs in EST..PST, you want IRL collaboration to matter, you want concentration of jobs in tight geographies like SF.
Work is not charity, each H1B that comes to the US will bring twice or triple its income as US GDP.
It’s a net positive for America.
Given the civil unrest during the Covid lockdowns, I’d say robust domestic employment is good policy
The price that has to be paid for robust domestic employment got Trump 2 elected. You can’t have a tight labour market and expect to only pay pennies on the dollar for your burrito taxi.
even when they make 6 figures, live in a tiny apartment with no furniture, and send back their whole paycheck in remittances each month?
or do you mean the old motel in the scenic locale you used to go as a kid, that has since been bought up by immigrants, has AI art peeling off the walls now and has gone without basic maintenance for 30 years?
Tax for this bracket approaches 50% all in. These are money-generating people.
But more generally H1B and immigration in general is America’s edge. If people stop coming expect us to lose leadership position in most markets
People don't realize the alternative to importing skilled labor is to not have someone do that job here. The idea that so many US citizens are qualified and sitting on the sidelines while an H1B takes a higher paying job than they currently have is a fiction.
Yeah, even then.
The world without them getting remittances every month from the USA is infinitely worse. War/problems abroad that didn't happen because of that remittances are worth trillions of dollars. There's no better form of "FDI" than remittances. Those who think remittances are bad for America are ontologically evil and may they reincarnate as durian fruit or cockroaches.
There’s no solid evidence of that. In some aspects they can be a net positive sure but it’s modest.
We have the most important tech market in the world, extremely over represented by both usage and revenue just because of our ability to attract top talent from everywhere else, and that seems modest to you?
Tons of evidence for it:
> The average H-1B household contributes $30,050 net annually — 2.6 times the $11,530 contribution of a typical U.S. household. At the state and local level, governments see a net average fiscal gain of $5,040 per H-1B household, with H-1B workers generating positive fiscal balances in 49 states. The fiscal benefits of the H-1B program are not exclusive to high-income states. The low-income state of Mississippi, for example, nets $4,600 per H-1B household — a figure that is higher than those of 21 other states.
https://eig.org/fiscal-impacts-h1bs/
> Despite its relatively constrained scale, the H-1B program has delivered economic returns far exceeding its original scope. Even under severe capacity limitations, estimates suggest the program generates $7.5–$31.8 billion in annual net benefits. Native workers experience wage gains rather than losses, while companies winning H-1B lotteries achieve higher job growth, productivity, and profit margins compared to similar firms denied visas.
https://www.csis.org/analysis/practical-h-1b-reforms-serve-u...
The fact is H1B workers are often more educated and better skilled than US citizens. In tech we care less about things like masters degrees and phds but the fact is H1Bs are more likely to have those and more likely to be appropriately skilled for jobs than US citizens. In general they are also richer than the avg US citizen in their society (that's how they can afford to move here for an advanced degree despite the currency exchange working against them)
"America" doesn't pay bills, buy houses, raise kids, form communities. People do.
I am far beyond sick and tired of the pretense that higher national metrics somehow magically mean better quality of life for the citizenry.
If "America" doesn't deliver for its citizens, it will come to an ignominious end sooner than might be expected.
>US will bring twice or triple its income as US GDP.
That is predicated on the assumption that "hurr GDP go up!" is good for America which is questionable at best and I take issue with far more than any specific point of immigration policy.
Net positive for the rich elites and a net negative for the working class. And considering the crap conditions H1Bs are often forced to work in under the threat of deportation, not really a benefit for them either.
If you believe this, then your foe is not the revenue producing H1Bs but the rich elites.
Of course. HB1s are doing what they think will give themselves and their families a better life, I would do the same, all ire is directed at politicians and governments and corporations.
Yes, so reform the H1B program entirely, since it has been abused by the elites.
[dead]
Probably 90% of my coworkers in a US tech company are on a work visa. Now that there is pressure on the H1B program, my company is investing in a permanent engineering team in India. Whether this will pay off for them in the long term is a matter of debate, but it seems like the near-term future of the US engineering team is in serious doubt.
You can't just "dismantle H1B" and expect it not to backfire.
I don't disagree. My observation of at least one major large company is that rather than rely on h1bs they are instead building out offices in other countries and dramatically increasing hiring there. I doubt they are the only company doing that, but I don't see anyone talking about it.
Why only the youth? After the economy recovers we have ageism to look forward to.
That will do absolutely nothing at all - like nothing. If you want to be a single-issue voter you need to find candidates that will outlaw outsourcing (or make it financially prohibitive). problem is of course, you won't be able to find any.
Democrats slogan for upcoming elections should be "Americans First" with outsourcing being a key part of the platform - "while our opponents are pitching 'America First' that has miserably failed for Americans, we will change that." (they won't but good pitch :-) )
this article said nothing at all besides the blatantly obvious.
it's the usual elastic job market. yesterday BE was down because clueless employers thought saas and cloud would be good enough. it wasn't
today FE is down because employers think slop react is good enough. it clearly isn't.
and cycles goes on.
The more useful way to think about this is competition density rather than raw job count. A market with 10% more jobs but 2-5x times more candidates isn’t a better market, it’s a harder one wearing a better outfit.
We need to cancel the H-1B visa program. It is not helping Americans.
If more Americans knew how much money was being funneled to non-Americans they would be outraged.
> If more Americans knew how much money was being funneled to non-Americans they would be outraged
The folks being hurt are, broadly, earning more than the average American. Generating outrage around H-1B, specifically, has always been difficult because it comes across as a champagne problem to the electorate. This is why broader anti-immigration messaging succeeds where targeted proposals have failed.
I have worked in offices where half my coworkers were not American.
The average American doesn't get to peek inside these offices and so they don't realize how bad the problem is.
They see non-Americans working in taxi cabs, in landscaping, in food trucks, but they haven't seen how many white collar positions are being taken over by non-Americans. High salary positions. Management positions.
It's a disgrace we're letting this happen to our own country.
I'm American, and I've been working alongside a professional staff that is ~90% brilliant foreign researchers and software developers for 15+ years of my career. I would not characterize this as "a problem." It's only a problem to Americans who feel they are somehow owed these jobs due to where they were born.
I’ve been unemployed for years now and am “brilliant” compared to most people in tech. You might feel differently if you experienced that and have also have seen entire floors of foreign nationals working at a tech company twenty years ago.
I don’t begrudge individuals but the system is broken. Refusal to train is another facet.
Thank you for saying this - foreign people who come to the US generally speaking seem much more willing to work hard than Americans who were born there.
I’d hope that average American doesn’t care about jobs they aren’t qualified for being filled by people paying taxes into their communities.
> The average American doesn't get to peek inside these offices and so they don't realize how bad the problem is
Right. They don't care how bad the problem is in an office they will never be offered a job in.
> They see non-Americans working in taxi cabs, in landscaping, in food trucks, but they haven't seen how many white collar positions are being taken over by non-Americans. High salary positions. Management positions
Uh, the right has been railing about Indian and Chinese born tech CEOs for at least twenty years now. It didn't land until the message was broadened. (And even then, it was cheap to discard.)
If anything, the average American is feeling a lot of schadenfreude after being lectures to “learn to code” for the last two decades.
Its really quite impressive how massively ingrained fixed-pie thinking has become in the American public discourse and your comments show this very well. The idea that these jobs would still exist if companies were only allowed to hire Americans is delusional frankly.
The pie is open during times of plenty, not during the down times.
Great way of moving the jobs to London!
[dead]
> tech jobs that come with relocation support for foreign candidates.
So this is only measuring people who live outside the US and want to take jobs in the US?
Relocation to where? The substack is called The Global Move, so possibly everywhere.
The linked report has data: https://relocateme.substack.com/i/186720111/where-the-jobs-a...
Germany leads by a wide margin with 1,218 jobs, roughly a quarter of all listings. In the July report, Germany had 564 jobs, so the country has more than doubled its share. Berlin alone accounts for 696 positions (up from just over 300 previously). This makes Berlin the single most active city for international tech hiring. Hamburg (195) and Munich (186) follow. This is somewhat unsurprising, since Berlin is often praised as one of the most expat-friendly and English-speaking cities in Germany and Europe.
The report is from February 2, so too early for the TDF searching LibreOffice devs to show up. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47718764 Spain comes in second:
Spain holds second place with 657 jobs, up from 254 in my 2025 analysis. Barcelona (326), Madrid (97), and Málaga (92) are the main hubs. Spain’s 2023 Startup Law continues to bear fruit, and the cost of living remains lower than in Amsterdam, London, or Paris. With 8,580 active tech companies that generate €14.8 billion in annual economic impact and employ over 108,000 people, Spain has become a serious destination for tech workers who want a European lifestyle without Northern European prices.
We are not allowed to discuss the underlying factors. So we won’t.
What are the underlying factors? That capital within the tech industry is horribly mismanaged and that maybe we should let the public decide how technology is shaped in this country rather than a small group of people that unironically believe in monarchies and hold deeply anti-democratic views?
are you talking about the same public that voted in our current clowns? no thank you
Don’t blame the public. If only BOTH sides didn’t give us clowns to vote for. I hope the dems prop up some solid candidates next time because the past 8 years has been a total joke.
A large root of that problem is that Americans have been successfully sold on the false idea that getting to choose every few years between one of two candidates chosen by wealthy donors is democracy (or even government as a public trust).
And please don't say 'third parties'. The two major parties enjoy overwhelming structural advantages. Third parties are crippled even before they get started, and sabotaged if they show any signs of life. For example, in 2024, the No Label movement, whose sole intent was to provide a reasonable alternative to the major party nominees for President, was targeted and in the end never even got a nominee.
https://www.reuters.com/world/us/biden-allies-plot-thwart-th...
Public should be blamed.
A rock that sits on the ground and does nothing would have been a better President than Trump who campaigned on actively harming our economy with tariffs then did exactly what he said he'd do and look where we are now
I use to blame voters too, then I started organizing for a decade and now I rarely blame voters. I always blame the politicians and political parties instead.
When the democratic party was the party of workers (the new deal coalition), they had super majorities in both houses of Congress for multiple lifespans (1930s to 1990s for the House of Reps alone) but for the last 50 years the party has slowly become more corporate and corporate politicians campaign a certain way. A certain way that ignores the material needs of people, by ignoring these material needs they're left to campaign on culture issues. Culture issues are very finicky. For example, it's not hard to find people that like solar panels, believe in carbon taxes, want a green new deal, but also believe in abortion and are evangelical. Since both parties no longer cater to workers, they're left to chase after cultural issues.
Not going to write a whole blog post out but hopefully you know where I'm going with this: the only way to truly win back sustainable power is provide real systematic needs for every American. Needs like providing medicare for all, universal childcare, universal college/vocational training, public housing, and a public jobs programs. All these issues poll at well over >60+%, across party lines too; but they all require more taxes against corporations + elites.
Once you build a party for workers, you can do actual sustainable systematic change; but you lose this contract once you betray the workers.
Last time we did this we put a man on the moon, imagine what we could truly do with the public backing you with todays advances?
If you can't convince people to vote for you, you have to change your platform. People don't really care about neoliberalism so repackaging it as abundance just means every election is a coin flip; it also doesn't help that the democratic party leadership is just as unpopular as Trump because party members, myself included, see how weak and useless they are but somehow always have enough muster to provide corporate welfare or engage in imperialism.
This kind of vague innuendo, excused by a belief that you're under threat of censorship, adds zero value to the discussion.
Just look at /pol/ as an example of what happens when you censor too much and they go into their own dwelling. Most memes including trump/trump 2 started as a direct result of /pol/, the killing of Harambe, and gamergate. Zoey Quinn got trump elected twice. Let them say what they want to say here or they get meme magic which literally destroys human civilization over time.
There is an argument that the VC-class is actually not a very good way to direct socially productive capital deployment and it'd be better to tax the LPs and direct the research using a public (but meritocratic) process.
For example China (not without its flaws) largely skipped over the digital drug phase and went straight into funding socially beneficial things like energy and materials production, AI and robotic enabled manufacturing, and large scale infrastructure build out. So ten years later they have a lot of socially productive things and we have a lot of socially unproductive things.