Are salaries in Silicon Valley declining?

US salaries declining?

I have heard two rumors from some friends in Silicon Valley that the salaries offered to prospective newly hired engineers are about 2/3 of what they were in the recent past. Does anyone have any knowledge on this? Are these drastic reduction rumors just a few special cases?

Re: US salaries declining?

HI Flatulent .. Listen is hard to say .. I've seen some postions maintain the salary cap but in TOP NOTCH areas LASER PHYSICS ,OPTICS ,MAGNETIC HEADS ,MATHEMATICAL MODELING .. Nobody is hiring that's for shure .And in the ocassional job offers some are ridicoulus ,.like ingineers contracted for 3 months .I saw one lately for and FPGA engineer offering $17 an hour .. It used to be a $100.
So there is a lot of people that are willing to take it .I even saw on one othe big TV shows like 20/20 . Companies doing OUTSOURCING here in the US .... are you well sitting .. well get this : AT INDIA PRICES !...

US salaries declining?

In company I am working with (big one, several thousands of hardware and software engineers) it is like:
- they start to Outsource sowtware and also hardware jobs agresivelly in the last 6+ months
- India's guys are frequently here, and we must teach them everything to make this outsourcing easier
- Salary increase this year is ~< inflation, bonuses are close to 0, share grants smaller then ever
- When you are talking with new guys, salaries looks significantly smaller then it was previously

So, outsourcing doesn't affect only job security, but also average salary and bonuses.

"The only job managers didn't outsource is manager job"

Re: US salaries declining?

the world economic dynamics are staggering in this field of engineering we are in.

it is so bad, people don't want to admit it and eetimes and the like minded publication pump their hype and propaganda about how great everything is and pushing technology for technology sake. during the early 90's we were so ahead of our time, that we advanced 5-10 years easily ! so we are just getting the result of that right now.. semiconductor industry is maturing also and less people are needed, more of a commodity now.

any thoughts ?

Re: US salaries declining?

More probable reason is the competition for countries where you can pay an engineers one month salary at the same value as in developed countries you pay per hour!!! or near so...

Re: US salaries declining?

yeah but it was always like that ?

in 1999-2000 during the BOOM that was true.

so what happened in the mean time ?

during the BOOM people were getting paid 2X to 5X what they should have been paid.

so what changed ? i can't buy that arguement...

Re: US salaries declining?

i have noticed a similar affect, but no so drastic as 2/3. dot-com bust, ENRON scandal (and many others), fiber optic industry bust was huge news at the time. now we see the fallout. a saturated market of engineers all over qualified for the most basic of positions. supply & demand.

i was told at a job interview exactly the following "if it had been 3 years ago you would have gotten the salary you are requesting, but the market has changed and so we will offer you {insert rediculously low salary here}". i took the job because i had nothing else, but as soon as i had a better job i dropped them from existance.

it is a cycle which is true with all industries. but here is the rub. engineering in north america will NOT recover (as it always has in the past). instead the recovery will happen in india. think of it as a wide spread layoff....

if you have a good job and you are happy you would be stupid to leave it now. become an expert as fast as you can. ......

also to the person(s) who is training their own replacements - you are an idiot and a fool. teach them nothing, all the wrong stuff, and start looking for a new job.

Mr.Cool

Re: US salaries declining?

so a recovery won't happen.

something has to happen, the question is what ?

this situation can't continue forever.

Re: US salaries declining?

Puppet1 said:

so a recovery won't happen.

something has to happen, the question is what ?

this situation can't continue forever.

Click to expand...

There is an over supply of engineers relative to the needs. An equilibrium point will be reached once the older engineers retire, middle ones switch to other fields, and new ones cease to exist by not majoring in engineering at school. This may take 5-10 years.

The other problem is that this is a world wide equilibrium. It is the total number of engineers related to the total need. It is quite possible that once equilibrium is reached, the number of engineers and jobs will not be equally divided between nations either on a per nation basis or as a percentage of population.

Re: US salaries declining?

The REAL TITLE should have been US jobs declining ??
The explaination about the low salaries is not RELATED to the OLD MODEL based on the OFFER and the DEMAND . There is always a DEMAND .But the ECONOMIC paradigm has changed .. INSTEAD of HIRING a VERY SKILLED engineer on western countries companies are willing to COMPROMISE with starters in low wages COUNTRIES .Where is think that this time it won't follow the SUPPLY and DEMAND mechanism ,Is that this time engineering work looks now like labor intensive work that was sent OVERSEAS ten years ago !. Nobody makes shoes, and most of the cloths come from Sweat shops from all over the world. These activitities never made back .And i don't anticipate to come back any time soon.
This type of SITUATION is the one that appears to me to be COOKING again !
Why a company will start bringing back those jobs in 5 years or ten .When those countries that are getting the jobs right now will be in GREAT SHAPE ..
India based companies already started applying for pattents on behalf of US corporations which means that R&D is also conducted there .To me engineers should start their own bussines and activities not to wait to much for a good paying job .. Before is too late .I myself i will certainly have to go to CHINA to get my supplies and later probably manufacture . Is not that want .But i use ball bearings
that china sells for $0.75 .In the USA they will cost me $12 .!And let me tell you the chineese quality is getting better and better!

Re: US salaries declining?

and this was the same for the textile, steel, railway, car industries.

imagine being in the automobile industry -- it's just like the semi industry now.

Re: US salaries declining?

Yes to the above. Ford invented low cost automobiles and now they are shrinking and lowering their sales forecasts.

Re: US salaries declining?

I strongly feel that an individual's salary is a true reflector of his capability.If you are good enough with your deeds and strong in your concepts you can even make it exacting.If the organisation feels that one's grades and reputation belies one's true capacityas an engineer,only this engenders cutting down one's salary.

Regards
Drdolittle

Re: US salaries declining?

The main reason for outsourcing of North American jobs to India and China is of cheap labor. In southern part of India alone, there are more than 100 privately managed engineering colleges and each year over 20 to 30 thousand engineering graduates pass out of college. Like us, these engineers are also desparate for jobs and a main source of cheap labor. For the time being we have R&D here but manufacture our equipments in the far east. Hold on to your jobs till you can.

Re: US salaries declining?

DrDolittle - you make a good point. even if many jobs are outsourced there will still be room for a few engineers in north america. government jobs (nasa, CSA, national research council etc), defense contract jobs and service jobs. if you are a *good* engineer you will always find a place. this is my belief.

the problem of course is that 9 out of 10 engineers are just workers (yes even in north america), and don't use any *real* engineering skills at all. they avoid responsibility where ever possible and when presented with a problem before unseen - can not solve because they do not have the skills, but instead point the finger at someone else and say "its your problem". pathetic really, but these people make the majority of the engineering work force. i remember in school how i graduated with people that would cheat on all tests/exams copy projects couldn't finish their thesis without someone else basically doing it for them. i should stop before i get too angry..

Mr.Cool

Re: US salaries declining?

A SALARY a real mesure of SKILL?? NO WAY JOSE
There are plenty of skilled people that CAN'T SELL themselves and they get what they can get .Because in desperate NEED. Here are two activities .one is your technical skill as an engineer .The other is the COMERCIAL aspect of it . You also need to be a good salesman . This is exactly the same situation as with ARTISTS.Some are great creators and ended their lives poor ( POE,VAN GOGTH etc) .Some are crappy and good salesguys,well they are all over ...
I think that engineers should also take management classes,to take care of their own carriers.

Re: US salaries declining?

mr. cool,

that is because that is how the educational system in the USA is set up and else where.

there are top tier 1 schools, tier 2 schools and tier 3 schools.

there must be about 1000 universities in the usa -- how many publish papers in IEEE ?

10-15 ? if you are lucky !

this is how it is set up right now most USA companies are hiring berkeley and MIT grads because they know the rest suck

the rest of the people in engineering want money like you said and can't think.
but that is a problem in the whole world today, a lack of discipline and willingness to work hard at something. too many distractions.

US salaries declining?

yes i do agree with elton john.all of us should start taking management courses .this would also do us a world of good bye helping us when we would be starting our own organisation and cannot depend on others for management skills,also one should not only be talented at his work but also should be able to market ones work.what is the use of a product which is not marketed ,it will only result in it being thrown away ,even though superior in quality to a well marketed product,we do know so many real world examples.

regards
amarnath

Re: US salaries declining?

the old notion of work is changing

not about big companies now but smaller ones with more innovation, more temporary work, contracts etc.

read a good book on this "end of work"

Re: US salaries declining?

flatulent said:

I have heard two rumors from some friends in Silicon Valley that the salaries offered to prospective newly hired engineers are about 2/3 of what they were in the recent past. Does anyone have any knowledge on this? Are these drastic reduction rumors just a few special cases?

Click to expand...

Dear flatulent!

Have you heard what Michael Moore (the one who made "Farenheit 9/11") said in Jay Leno's show? I tell you what he said, He said: "If you can not beat them, you better look like them."

There are plenty of jobs coming in intelligence. Money is going to be poured. They did a documentary how sweat-shirts in WalMart were made in India paying the indian women $1 per hour, and women were very happy they had a really good-paying job.

What happens. Corporate headquarters are in USA. In rise of what happens now, intelligence bill etc, they need experts, engineers. Look for engineering job openings in NSA, CIA, FBI. I bet they pay good. There are hundreds of thousands Century21 researches/projects to be initiated.

Again what Michael Moore said: "If you can not beat them, you better look like them."