The Recession Will Be Televised

[temujin9]

From "The Brief Reign of the Knowledge Worker: Information Technology and Technological Unemployment", sadly only available from Google Cache:
Whenever productivity increases someone gains, but it is not always the worker. Labor market conditions - notably the unemployment rate - , the degree of competition among firms, and institutional factors

Comments

[crwilley]

The and/or is maybe less significant than it might be, given that right now we have neither/nor.

[temujin9]

Ah, but which is easier to fix?

[actsofcreation]

The problem is... coding is going the way of the assembly line. This not only means that you get better productivity, but it also means that you no longer need skilled craftsmen to build your code. A bunch of semi-skilled code monkeys will do. If you were a craftsman this will hit you hard, because there is a bunch more semi-skilled code labor, and it's more efficient to put them together on an assembly line than to pay you to craft excellent code

Evolution

[holly_as_mom]

Yes, it is too bad to have to abandon artistry in favor of production, and to move up to management when you'd rather do the work yourself. One advantage, though, is the opportunity to teach others, and to help make the whole system more humane, and that you can't do from the factory floor. Look for new ways to be creative.

Nate - I no longer use my English skills much, but I'm becoming a helluva problem-solver, and I have more clout than I thought I did (surprise!) Solved somebody's 6-month-festering payroll problem in half an hour of badgering people the other day, without even involving my boss.

love, Mom

Re: Evolution

[actsofcreation]

I'm actually not talking about moving up to management, but rather technical leadership, which is a bit different. Technical leadership is less about managing the people, or even the projects, and more about managing the technical aspects of the problems.

There's a lot of room for creativity in technical leadership, and a lot more scope... but it is an adjustment.

Re: Evolution

[temujin9]

Its an adjustment I'm planning to make, especially because I want to counteract (or at least, sidestep) that race for the bottom you describe above. You're spot on in terms of what the market will try to do, but I think you miss the long-term effects (horrid spaghetti code and spiraling maintenance costs) which will bite craft-less shops on the ass. Computer systems are not cheeseburgers: not every fifteen-year old is qualified to make good instances thereof, and pretending otherwise only works short-term.

And for what its worth, I've responded to price competition woes by raising my rates, and been successful every time so far. Even in this recession, I've got enough work coming in to be considering apprentices. (However, that may just be because I'm an incomparable badass, and also terribly modest: YMMV, PRNIFR, etc.)