I can't believe HN zeitgeist cannot understand this.
Why would I hire a US employee for twice the cost when I can hire someone 95% as good remotely in a low cost area of the world and actually get an employee that sticks around for a decade vs. a year?
It's honestly not even really a decision at this point if you have the management infrastructure in place.
This is fantasy.
It's not interesting to discuss outliers. Millions are being made playing this talent/wage arbitrage as we speak. The top 1% of engineers is not interesting to discuss, and certainly is not representative of the average FAANG employee (or salary).
Edit: Direct personal experience during my entire working career. Are there bubbles of super-talent completely out of my reach for such a pleb? Absolutely. But those folks are not interesting to the vast majority of companies needing basic but competent IT talent. Many folks here seem to be under the impression they are in that pool. Time will tell.
I'm not saying there aren't some talented developers working for cheap, but most of the time you get what you pay for.
The problem with “off shoring” is that’s how it is treated.
Remote work, where people become part of your team and work with everyone else is quite different and avoids the failure cases you have likely seen.
It’s hardly controversial to say that a huge chunk of Silicon Valley talent is from migrants. So clearly the training overseas is up to scratch.
Thank you. I believe this is the point everyone is missing.
And this is new. Giant companies never did this sort of thing really. It was always the low effort outsourcing approaches I was seeing in these markets.
Today I'm now competing with IBM and the ilk in these markets for direct employees. The tides are shifting extremely rapidly and I don't think many in the US even understand what has happened underneath them in the past few years.
LOL. That's totally out of touch. It is not about them "wising up". There are quite lots of different dynamics here at play. It is a complex and competitive market.
I'm sure all the latin american developers are super hyped about this advice not to hire them.
It’s meant as a counter ti the idea of hiring them just because they’re “cheaper”
It’s always disheartening to me though that it’s just so easy for people to justify undercutting labor in just a few swift sentences like this, especially because the nuances of culture are very different, for one, and for two, there are downsides to this form of recruitment that never gets acknowledged from issues with time zones to acceptable quality standards and other things.
Maybe I’m just old, but it feels almost heartless to be compared by the numbers that someone should just “hire in Latin American because they have less leverage”.
Just treat your employees well. No you don’t need to hire in traditionally geographical Silicon Valley areas every time or by default, but you don’t have to go all the way to latam either.
I hope people in other areas of the world wise up to this and ask for 1st rate salaries and benefits