Is the job market for software devs starting to improve?
Are y'all receiving more messages from recruiters? I'm hearing anecdotes here and there so it'd be good to hear your experiences. Don't rely on gut feeling or anecdotal evidence, there's good data you can look at. Over a few years, I came to rely on proxy indicators that I found to be reliably in sync with the strength / weakness of the job market for software engineers. One of these indicators is the business spending index (it has an official name, something about purchasing managers' sentiment index or similar). CNBC tends to show it a lot these days, you can't miss it. Another one is "US Auto Loans Delinquent by 90 or More Days (I:USALD90)" which is a very good "finger to the wind" for how the overall economy is doing, since everyone needs a car. Neither of these indicators are looking good these days. Lovely suggestion, I'll have a look at the USALD90 ticker, I'm in the EU, so I also use the PMI but "Eurozone" Manufacturing Purchasing Managers Index (PMI), anyone can have a look here and get a basic idea -
https://tradingeconomics.com/euro-area/manufacturing-pmi, just go to maximum time window. So far sadly it seems to be in deep shit. Worst i can remember and keeps getting worse. The top point in my perception was reached in late 2022 and it keeps getting worse and worse ever since. How far back can you remember? So I can put it in context. 2002 Hmm - I'm not sure I'd put the current situation up there with the dot com bomb or the 2008 recession...but its definitely not good 2002 was already past the dot com bomb, but as for 2008 recession, SURELY getting a custom dev job in 2008 was easier than now, and in 2009... well maybe about as hard as now. The dot com bomb wasn’t bad if you didn’t limit your job search to the remnant of tech companies. I had 4 years of experience in 2000 living in Atlanta and was a Microsoft developer. I was getting offers left and right from boring old profitable companies like banks, insurance companies, Coke, Delta, etc. You can see HN posting trend lines here: https://hnhiring.com/trends I have received no recruiter messages after Jan. I self submitted a few positions, two rejections, others didn't reply. I'm interviewing with 2 companies, both companies found me. One of them is not responsive after the first round, I feel that they are having a hiring freeze. (Because I know one of its competitor is having a hiring freeze). Anecdotally, yes. I've gotten about 7+ in the last couple weeks. This is the most frequent I've seen since early 2022. These are for fairly senior roles. 7 messages or offers? Recruiters spam far and wide. nono, not offers. I'm happy with where I am. I just meant I finally had some recruiters reach out with some opportunities that looked good, for a long while I was getting radio silence or the "hey we want a senior engineer to relocate to Idaho for 140k a year" Tech giants like Meta and Amazon restarted large-scale hiring in Q4 2023-Q1 2024, with software engineer roles increasing by ~18% YoY (LinkedIn data). However: Entry-level positions face fierce competition (average response rate <20%).
Senior roles (5+ years) command salaries exceeding $150K, especially for AI/machine learning and full-stack experts. Is full-stack development now considered an advancement? I always thought that it is considered less valuable compared to more specialized roles these days. (I'm a full-stack developer.) It depends on where you are competing. For a FAANG then full stack has little value because everyone must specialize. For a smaller shop, people pay more for full stack. Those kinds of shops pay less than FAANG of course. With AI, full-stack will be only on the up, especially the frontend UI nitty-gritty (my humble prediction). YMMV, but I've noticed an uptick in recruiter messages, probably get 2-3 a week since the new year. But I have no idea about the market as a whole, and I'm sure it's still terrible for new grads. Not really. Not seeing any external improvement in my area. Internally, I'm seeing some improvement, but only for very specific and higher level roles. Still way more applicants than roles. Still lots of people leaving the company with only some of the roles being backfilled. 2022. End. I don't receive any messages! I think it's back to 2019 pre-covid especially for AI/machine learning and full-stack experts.