Wait a minute. I thought your point was that I was praying on the desperate and taking advantage of people who didn't know what they're worth? I'm glad you changed your tune.
By the way I know plenty of people at startups who tell me they can't find decent engineers when they're offering 30-50% more in salary than I do. And 99% of these startups are NOT building database engines or running massive social networks. Most of them actually have web apps that are on par with the web apps we build for our clients if they are even that sophisticated.
The problem as I see it is that a lot of the management at these startups are deluded about the skill set they need and they lack the intellectual honesty to admit that their startup is not Google (yet). They can't find candidates because they are so in love with the idea of talent, too picky and don't want to invest in employee development. I mean it's not the end of the world if a candidate doesn't have experience with Git or unit testing. This stuff isn't that hard to learn and if your employees have nothing to learn from you they will probably be bored very quickly.
On the flip side all these ads for 6 figure positions and talk about salaries and talent shortages has given a lot of below average, average and good but not great engineers (which make up 99% of the labor pool by the way) the mistaken impression that anybody with a few years experience who can build a crud rails app can make a couple of phone calls and land in a 120k a year job. It's nothing but a mirage. For every 1 engineer who can get one of the $$$ jobs there are 50 who could do a dozen interviews and get no offers.
I didn't change my tune. I still think that you're preying on and taking advantage of the desperate and naive, just like the startups you mention in this comment want to do, but paradoxically expect to also be "rockstars." It's a different kind of naivete the startups are after--they're after bright, gifted engineers whom they can convince to take feel-good euphemisms ("change the way X is done" or "disrupt Y" and HAVE FUN doing it) in trade for reasonable compensation relative to the value the engineers provide.
Those startups should be hiring your developers at the rates they offer, and you should be paying those rates. But because the startups you mention think they need the CS equivalent of Einstein and Feynman to run their CRUD stack, your developers are ones they pass on (and then whine about a talent shortage), and allow you to pay the below-market rates you get away with, because in your segment of the market there is, apparently, an excess of labor available. Your description, in other words, isn't a counter to my point.
It's lovely that apparently you believe anybody who can build a crud app deserves a 6 figure job but reality is based on the supply and demand, not your utopian dream world.
The bay area is expensive but I am proud that I can provide salaries substantially above the median household income in the US with decent benefits. How many people do you provide $65-95k a year jobs to? When was the last time you hired people who had been rejected by every other company they applied to because nobody was willing to look at their potential and take a chance? What percentage of community college graduates do you think make $65k a year to start? Heck what percentage of 21 year olds you even think make $50k a year? It's easy to criticize me and tell people who don't have 6 figure jobs that they're selling themselves short but hey talk is real cheap.
By the way a ton of the startups offering those 6 figure salaries don't earn enough profit to pay those salaries. Their investors are paying those salaries. What do you think is going to happen when the money runs out and there are no more sinking ships to jump to? Will you suggest that the unemployed engineers cling to their tulips?
By the way I know plenty of people at startups who tell me they can't find decent engineers when they're offering 30-50% more in salary than I do. And 99% of these startups are NOT building database engines or running massive social networks. Most of them actually have web apps that are on par with the web apps we build for our clients if they are even that sophisticated.
The problem as I see it is that a lot of the management at these startups are deluded about the skill set they need and they lack the intellectual honesty to admit that their startup is not Google (yet). They can't find candidates because they are so in love with the idea of talent, too picky and don't want to invest in employee development. I mean it's not the end of the world if a candidate doesn't have experience with Git or unit testing. This stuff isn't that hard to learn and if your employees have nothing to learn from you they will probably be bored very quickly.
On the flip side all these ads for 6 figure positions and talk about salaries and talent shortages has given a lot of below average, average and good but not great engineers (which make up 99% of the labor pool by the way) the mistaken impression that anybody with a few years experience who can build a crud rails app can make a couple of phone calls and land in a 120k a year job. It's nothing but a mirage. For every 1 engineer who can get one of the $$$ jobs there are 50 who could do a dozen interviews and get no offers.