The profile of visa workers in tech is very different from a fresh graduate.
What this statistic tell us is that there is
a. A shortage of senior developers in the USA. This fan be a good sign. It may mean that the industry is growing faster then the pace that junior developers can senior. It can also mean that senior USA developers are over paid.
b. That the USA universities are misaligned with the markets. Graduates are not equipped with the right tools to fit in the market.
I believe it means companies are not willing to invest in young engineers, because they are disrespected as commodities and temporary workers. Not that they "require senior engineers," but they are accustomed to hiring and firing engineers first, and they do not view them as key human assets, core to their product identity, as they should.
As someone who hires tech engineers I can testify that that is not the case.
There are two main reasons why not to hire a junior.
1. It takes a lot of time to get to a point we're you see a return of value. The team needs to invest a lot in juniors and it affects the delivery of the team.
2. The risk is always high hiring. It's hard to know if the person is really good and really willing to put in the effort. With juniors it's even higher since they haven't done this before so there are less references.
I've been hiring engineers in the US for 20 years, both native and foreign. I can attest that juniors are indeed high maintenance and low skill. That isn't my point.
Yes, when you "need more engineers" it's always when you need someone with skills NOW. The way you bring up juniors is to give them peripheral tasks, things where they can learn the ropes, understand the process. My concern is these "junior tasks" are being filled with foreign workers, and this is why so many of the "high demand" senior engineers happen to be foreign. They were given the opportunity over native engineers. This is very very bad as a policy.
With %45 of the workforce being in STEM, and none of them can start a family and buy a home until they are too old to have children, we have a serious policy problem, and everyone can see it plain as day.
Wondering if you've noticed the trend (at least in software) of roles in which only a naive college grad would accept? Something that requires excessive responsibility, overworking, putting out fires, all nighters, etc.
Been searching for work recently (13 years exp) and 5-6 years ago I don't really recall this being the case, but I'm noticing it even in shit companies now. 4-5 rounds of interviewing, leetcode algorithm memorization...all that fun H1B stuff
I am not in the USA, but when I hire it's usually a senior because in the end a junior will be to expensivento train.
