Computer Engineering Major--Worried About H1Bs/Offshoring

College Majors Engineering Majors
1

I am a Computer Engineering major at a University in Kansas.

I keep hearing H1Bs and Offshoring are depressing wages and displacing IT/STEM workers. Furthermore, Congress has been lobbying aggressively to raise the cap on Visas.

I have also heard it’s hard to find a job after you turn 40.

Is this a problem in the Midwest as it is in Silicon Valley or New York?

This is concerning me enough to consider switching majors. Otherwise, I guess I could go into something that uses my skill set indirectly (e.g. Sales Engineer, Actuary, Patent Attorney, Consulting, etc.). However, I really enjoy my EE/CS classes and would really like to do that when I get out.

2

http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parent-cafe/1830294-how-outsourcing-companies-are-gaming-the-h-1b-visa-system-p1.html discusses the actual nature of H-1B visa use.

Bottom line, avoid working in an easily outsourced role like IT (which in most companies is more of a semi-technical “business” function rather than a technical one). Try to stay in design and development of core intellectual property of your employer, which (a) the employer is less likely to want to outsource, and (b) the low end outsourcing companies are less likely to be able to do effectively anyway.

3

The age thing is likely in part due to the confluence of the societal expectation of rising pay levels with experience, the tendency of productivity to stop rising as much as pay levels after the early stages of one’s career in the computer field, and the wide variation in productivity among different employees in the computer field. The people who are not in the upper ranges of productivity may eventually encounter the crossover point where their expected pay levels exceed their productivity, resulting in difficulty finding jobs (and willingness to take a lower then expected pay level for the amount of experience may result in employers viewing the candidate as a less productive one). Being at the top end of the productivity range reduces the risk.

Of course, there can be actual age discrimination as well.

4

It is NOT nearly the problem in the Midwest as it’s in Silicon Valley.

As for protecting your job, if you are pursuing Software Engineering as a career. Learn the business aspects of the software you are developing. Try to sit in on requirements meetings and make customer interaction part of your job. You need to make an effort to expand your role beyond just writing code. Communication skills and business acumen aren’t things that can easily be replaced by an H1B from Infosys.

5

Most engineering is just as replaceable as IT (*). My project right now has people in Eastern Europe and India (both company development centers), plus us chickens in the Midwest. Plus we have a bunch of H1B’s from a body shop. It has worked SO WELL. I can’t get sound output from the DSP but my colleague in Bangalore can. The guy who coded the DSP and sits next to me tells me the code does NOT work and all I get from the DSP is zeros, LOTS of them. We spend hours every day IM’ing and emailing and Lync’ing each other just to accomplish basic stuff.

Ten years ago it was just us, and a few brilliant H1’s to Green Card kids. With horrible software tools and horrible hardware we accomplished miracles. Today, we have good tools, phenomenal hardware, agile processes, and can’t get as much done because every project has to involve low cost work.

There’s a reason neither of my daughters is going to engineering school.

(*) if you’re designing sewers or what not, or nuclear reactors, or military stuff, probably not. All else…

6

“It is NOT nearly the problem in the Midwest as it’s in Silicon Valley.”

I respectfully disagree. I’m in the Midwest and the outsourcing started twenty years ago. Even for engineering.

7

Being at the top end of the productivity range reduces the risk.

Absolutely - be that person who works hard AND gets things done AND gets along with others.

Or be a manager that can through true leadership or sheer aggression get a lot of work out of your team. Please be the first type so your employees are happy and productive and creative …

Of course, there can be actual age discrimination as well.

I think there is a perception that if you are over 50, or maybe even 40, that you do not know modern tools. To be fair, many people really don’t want to learn modern tools (And I include even Excel beyond typing in formulas) or feel they have learned enough to retire. (My husband who is a software engineer tells a funny story about colleagues in the 80s/90s who refused to attend a free in-house UNIX/C class because … they knew VAX Fortran …and that was good enough). But, if you keep learning when you are 20, you can keep learning when you are 30, 40, 50 + …

Salaries are a double edged sword, work too cheap and you may not be respected and if you are laid off anyway, you don’t have much saved up because you haven’t made any money. Get too expensive, and you may have trouble finding work, but at least you have a pile of cash (stop leasing Escalades now!) and ironically, people may think you actually do know something.

I think computer engineering may be a better field than software or CS, since there is a core skill and physics that is less likely to change (EE is even less likely to change) …

Also - what magical field does not have the risk of outsourcing or cost cutting gone amuck ?

There’s a reason neither of my daughters is going to engineering school.

I have heard this, but honestly engineering is a good job, lots of creative work, not so much hovering by your managers as some fields … and it really does pay pretty well.

My daughter is studying engineering because lots of the pure science PhD routes are even less stable, can’t even get that first job … and you are almost 30 …

Engineering also needs more women, not less …

If you have a really crappy job, there is always the option of changing … and at least with an engineering degree you have a transferable piece of paper (see it says ABET right there on my diploma from NWSE Podunk U).

Recession, greedy short-sighted companies, lack of loyalty to your 50-year old employees who have worked hard, demographics (too many people in their 50s,60s right now working), off-shoring, high pension health care bills for older employees, lack on investment in R&D causing lack of jobs requiring lots of skills and experience, stockholders demanding profits now rather than 10 year off products … really low new hire salaries (60K was a salary in the 90s!) making young people 2-3 times cheaper than experienced people, underfunded projects requiring cheap labor and hope the dang things works or you bring in the dream team to fix it … but odds are you can 2 or 3 out of 4 done cheap …

none of this is limited to engineering … it’s just an unfortunately state of affairs right now.

Also - I think a new graduate now really has to be more entrepreneurial (The days of 30 year careers with one firm have gone), has to build up savings to survive a lean year or two, self-fund their retirement, the rules are different … but lots of things are different … you can work in your PJs in your home.