Is learning Java still worth it in the US?

[C8WALKER]

Hi all, I really like programming and I would like to do this for aliving. My
concerns is the possibilities of me learning a craft that I can't make a living
out of it. Why you guys in the industry think, will I be able to find a job in
the future as a Java programmer.

Thank you all in advance.

(INDIANS AND CHINESE PROGRAMMERS DO NOT RESPOND, I KNOW THEY ARE PLENTY OF JOBS
IN INDIA AND CHINA, BUT I LIVE IN THE U.S.)

 

[Joona I Palaste]

(INDIANS AND CHINESE PROGRAMMERS DO NOT RESPOND, I KNOW THEY ARE PLENTY OF JOBS
IN INDIA AND CHINA, BUT I LIVE IN THE U.S.)

How's that for prejudice? I suppose according to your rules, I have full
permission to tell you all about jobs in Finland, because Finland is
neither India nor China. Of course, jobs in Finland will probably
require you to move from the USA to Finland, but that's OK, as long as
you don't have to move to India or China, right?

 

[mr_organic]

How's that for prejudice? I suppose according to your rules, I have
full permission to tell you all about jobs in Finland, because Finland
is neither India nor China. Of course, jobs in Finland will probably
require you to move from the USA to Finland, but that's OK, as long as
you don't have to move to India or China, right?

Jeez, man, reel it in! He's not (AFAICT) making any kind of derogatory
comments about Chinese or Indians; he's just asking not to be notified of
any jobs in those areas as he does not live there.

Try some Lapsang Suchong tea with a dollop of honey. It does wonders for
misplaced attacks of pique.

mr_organic

 

[Bryce (Work)]

Hi all, I really like programming and I would like to do this for aliving. My
concerns is the possibilities of me learning a craft that I can't make a living
out of it. Why you guys in the industry think, will I be able to find a job in
the future as a Java programmer.

Search the Job websites. I get a call about every 2 weeks from
headhunters. Better than it was a year ago.

 

[Joona I Palaste]

Jeez, man, reel it in! He's not (AFAICT) making any kind of derogatory
comments about Chinese or Indians; he's just asking not to be notified of
any jobs in those areas as he does not live there.

Then why did he say "Indians and Chinese programmers do not respond"
when he could have said "Non-U.S. programmers do not respond"? Perhaps
he was unaware that there are more countries in the world than the USA,
India and China?

 

[Bryan Bullard]

Hi all, I really like programming and I would like to do this for aliving. My
concerns is the possibilities of me learning a craft that I can't make a living
out of it. Why you guys in the industry think, will I be able to find a job in
the future as a Java programmer.

[snip the shit]

The trouble is that corporate America is making software engineering into a
commodity. As long as there is software there will be jobs. However, I see
more and more software engineering jobs going for half of what they would
just 3 years ago. For example in 2001 the average salary for a Java
Developer in the US was about 80k/year and now many Java developers are
taking positions for around 40k. I would expect that it is worse in the US
than in other developed nations (with the exception of Australia). You
*will* be competing with developers in India and China who are typically
have more advanced degrees and are willing to work for far less. Of course
other field in the US will be hit hard too in the coming years such as human
resources, finance, accounting, pathology, etc ...; anything that doesn't
require personal interaction and can be done remotely, cheaper.

 

[Peter Ashford]

Then why did he say "Indians and Chinese programmers do not respond"
when he could have said "Non-U.S. programmers do not respond"? Perhaps
he was unaware that there are more countries in the world than the USA,
India and China?

Given US foriegn policy, you might make the assumption that many
Americans think that way.

 

[Tim Ward]

Perhaps
he was unaware that there are more countries in the world than the USA,
India and China?

For yer average Merkin to be aware of *any* countries outside the US, let
alone being able to name *two* of them, is not bad going.

 

[mr_organic]

For yer average Merkin to be aware of *any* countries outside the US, let
alone being able to name *two* of them, is not bad going.

What say we lay off the America-bashing in this thread? Besides being
completely OT, it's offensive. Take it to the tinfoil-hat groups --
there are plenty to choose from.

mr_organic

 

[David Segall]

Hi all, I really like programming and I would like to do this for aliving. My
concerns is the possibilities of me learning a craft that I can't make a living
out of it. Why you guys in the industry think, will I be able to find a job in
the future as a Java programmer.

What are your options? Cardiac surgery is, and always has been, a more
lucrative craft than programming. There is almost certainly a branch
of IT that will be more in demand than Java programming by the time
you finish your training but it is difficult to predict what it is and
it might be really boring.

"In the future" there will only be a few Java programmers maintaining
legacy systems that are too expensive to rewrite. That does not mean
that you should not learn Java but you should be aware that it will
not be the last language you need to learn.

The fact that you "really like programming" probably means that you
are good at it and Java is an excellent basis for learning new
languages particularly now that Microsoft has endorsed the concept.
There are thousands of jobs for Java programmers and if you are
talented and junior you will find a position. However, you should be
aware that you may have to change your job within, or even out of, IT
in the course of your working life.

Thank you all in advance.

(INDIANS AND CHINESE PROGRAMMERS DO NOT RESPOND, I KNOW THEY ARE PLENTY OF JOBS
IN INDIA AND CHINA

If this was true then they would be outsourcing jobs to the United
States! In fact, outsourcing of jobs from the United States is
profitable because foreign training is very good and only the most
talented of their programmers can get a job. Consequently, they will
work for far less money than their Western counterparts.

, BUT I LIVE IN THE U.S.)

Even this is not set in stone. Maybe you would enjoy a year or two in
Hong Kong, Sydney, London, Kuwait or Zurich.

 

[Michael Klatt]

For yer average Merkin to be aware of *any* countries outside the US, let
alone being able to name *two* of them, is not bad going.

It's equally impressive that an Englishman is posting to a newsgroup
instead of getting sitting in a pub or starting a soccer riot. Or
maybe you're using a laptop?

 

[Phillip Lord]

Michael> It's equally impressive that an Englishman is posting to a
Michael> newsgroup instead of getting sitting in a pub or starting a
Michael> soccer riot. Or maybe you're using a laptop?


How dare you say such a thing.

The English only ever start football riots. Only an American could
think otherwise.

You're right about the pub though...

Phil

 

[Guest]

You
*will* be competing with developers in India and China who are typically
have more advanced degrees and are willing to work for far less.

And increasingly, those degrees are meaningless.

In order to meet demand, Indian universities are nearly rubber stamping
computer science degrees, at least according to many of my experienced
Indian colleagues and friends. Gone are the days when you can expect to
outsource or offshore software engineering and expect a reasonable level
of quality.

There are obscene numbers of horror stories, but failures are not well
advertised as it would reflect negatively on bad decisions made by
American executives and American companies to outsource or offshore work.
The success rate is low and is not moving in a positive direction.

Buyer beware.

 

[Eric Sosman]

And increasingly, those degrees are meaningless.

In order to meet demand, Indian universities are nearly rubber stamping
computer science degrees, at least according to many of my experienced
Indian colleagues and friends. Gone are the days when you can expect to
outsource or offshore software engineering and expect a reasonable level
of quality.

There are obscene numbers of horror stories, but failures are not well
advertised as it would reflect negatively on bad decisions made by
American executives and American companies to outsource or offshore work.
The success rate is low and is not moving in a positive direction.

Buyer beware.

And reader, too. Observe that

- Not one Indian rubber-stamp diploma factor is identified,
nor its teaching and degree-granting standards evaluated.

- Not one of the writer's "many Indian colleagues and
friends" is identified.

- Not one of the "obscene numbers [sic] of horror stories"
is even told, much less substantiated.

- Not one of the "bad decisions" is identified.

- The criteria for measuring the "success rate" are not
described, nor is any actual measurement cited.

- The writer does not even stand behind her own opinions,
choosing instead to conceal her identity.

Mere assertion without substantiation, attribution, or
measurement is no contribution to a rational debate. It merely
proves that the writer is a burger-eating aggressor monkey.

 

[Tim Jowers]

Hi all, I really like programming and I would like to do this for aliving. My
concerns is the possibilities of me learning a craft that I can't make a living
out of it. Why you guys in the industry think, will I be able to find a job in
the future as a Java programmer.

C8,

Income has decreased some 10%/year for three years... extrapolate as
you wish. Generally, I think engineering is where manufacturing was 50
years ago. Auto prices have sky-rocketed since offshoring auto
manufacturing (relative to inflation) and this is probably what will
happen with software development. They key of the day for US
programming jobs is integration. Some things just cannot be done
remotely. If ever US government lowers incomes taxes anywhere near
tarriffs then jobs will come back - never.
So, if you want to retire by the time your 50 then programming is
not it. Maybe start an auto repair shop. Of course, open source really
pushes the differentiation of integration versus pure development...
there is no reason to buy OS, db, web server, source control when the
free ones are very robust and improving more rapidly than the
commercial ones. This is bad news for the countries making a living on
jobs formerly done by people in the USA.
In general, just find a hot area and keep on that. Then you can have
fun, work, and make pretty good money. Of course we can all see many,
many things in society that can be improved by software so there's
lots of work we could do.

TimJowers

 

[Mladen Adamovic]

Wow, Eric, your contribution to rational debate is unquestionable.

Buyer beware.

And reader, too. Observe that

- Not one Indian rubber-stamp diploma factor is identified,
nor its teaching and degree-granting standards evaluated.

- Not one of the writer's "many Indian colleagues and
friends" is identified.

- Not one of the "obscene numbers [sic] of horror stories"
is even told, much less substantiated.

- Not one of the "bad decisions" is identified.

- The criteria for measuring the "success rate" are not
described, nor is any actual measurement cited.

- The writer does not even stand behind her own opinions,
choosing instead to conceal her identity.

Mere assertion without substantiation, attribution, or
measurement is no contribution to a rational debate. It merely
proves that the writer is a burger-eating aggressor monkey.

 

[Michael Klatt]

Michael> It's equally impressive that an Englishman is posting to a
Michael> newsgroup instead of getting sitting in a pub or starting a
Michael> soccer riot. Or maybe you're using a laptop?


How dare you say such a thing.

The English only ever start football riots. Only an American could
think otherwise.

Sorry for the confusion.

 

[Guest]

And reader, too. Observe that

- Not one Indian rubber-stamp diploma factor is identified,
nor its teaching and degree-granting standards evaluated.

- Not one of the writer's "many Indian colleagues and
friends" is identified.

- Not one of the "obscene numbers [sic] of horror stories"
is even told, much less substantiated.

- Not one of the "bad decisions" is identified.

- The criteria for measuring the "success rate" are not
described, nor is any actual measurement cited.

- The writer does not even stand behind her own opinions,
choosing instead to conceal her identity.

Mere assertion without substantiation, attribution, or
measurement is no contribution to a rational debate. It merely
proves that the writer is a burger-eating aggressor monkey.

If you would like me to do your homework for you, I'm open to compensation
negotiations. Until such an agreement comes to pass, I don't feel obligated
to spend weeks gathering all the information that would make you happy. I'm
quite confident no amount of information would meet your requirements.

 

[Eric Sosman]

And reader, too. Observe that

- Not one Indian rubber-stamp diploma factor is identified,
nor its teaching and degree-granting standards evaluated.

- Not one of the writer's "many Indian colleagues and
friends" is identified.

- Not one of the "obscene numbers [sic] of horror stories"
is even told, much less substantiated.

- Not one of the "bad decisions" is identified.

- The criteria for measuring the "success rate" are not
described, nor is any actual measurement cited.

- The writer does not even stand behind her own opinions,
choosing instead to conceal her identity.

Mere assertion without substantiation, attribution, or
measurement is no contribution to a rational debate. It merely
proves that the writer is a burger-eating aggressor monkey.

If you would like me to do your homework for you, I'm open to compensation
negotiations. Until such an agreement comes to pass, I don't feel obligated
to spend weeks gathering all the information that would make you happy. I'm
quite confident no amount of information would meet your requirements.

Let's just agree that zero information counts as
"no amount."

 

[Scott Ellsworth]

I really like programming and I would like to do this for aliving.
My concerns is the possibilities of me learning a craft that I can't
make a living out of it. Why you guys in the industry think, will I
be able to find a job in the future as a Java programmer.

Languages change with time. 12 years ago, I was a C++ programmer, and
had to hunt a bit to find jobs where they wanted to do real C++, not
"C/C++". That latter usually meant C with C++ line comments. In the
course of that job, I worked with Maple, Python, shell scripts, DOS
batch files, but the majority of the work was C++.

Five years ago or so, I started doing Java full time as a consultant.
It has paid pretty well, and I have gotten to do some really neat
things. I have, though, used Perl, Python, bash scripts, tcsh scripts,
a bunch of SQL, XSLT, and several template languages to get the work
done.

Judging by the past, I will probably start looking at the up and coming
languages again in about two years to see what the big language is going
to be. I doubt anyone can pick it out with certainty now, but
linguistic change is a fact of life in the field.

The lesson? Learn the most approrpriate language for what you want to do
_today_, and be ready to learn new ones as needed for the tasks you face
tomorrow.

If you like programming, then make your best guess as to the language
you want to work in, and learn it. Right now, I would say Java is a
pretty good all around bet, but I might consider C# were I solely a
Windows guy, or Perl and C were I solely a Linux guy. Objective C seems
reasonable for Apple-only folks, though I tend to work entirely in Java
in that space.


If a new language appears to offer something you need, learn it - it
won't kill you, and you might just learn something good out of it.
Python got me to understand Maps/Associative Arrays/Hashes, where C++
had not. Perl got me to think in low level terms again, after half a
decade of working at a higher level.

Scott