Economics/Geekonomics

Homefinding As A Skill

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Viewpoint Telescope

We’re going to have a bit of a break from geek culture and career-specific advice to focus on a life skill that’s kind of high on my list. It all has to do with the rent and living.

I just got my lease renewal – and my yearly rent increase – I had a lot to think about. Where I was living. Where I might live. Potential roommates. How the hell high was the rent going to get in Silicon Valley?*

I think about this a lot as I’m sort of an accidental expert in living in Silicon Valley. I went through a phase where various current and potential roommates kept changing, and every change meant I had to research another place to live. I ended up learning a lot about locations and economics.

Then people just kept asking me advice due to that knowledge, so now it’s kind of “my thing.”

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How I Went In Search Of The IT Gap

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OK, we all know the story, or at least those of us trying to hire people with IT skills do – there’s not enough people out there to hire! We can’t find anyone. Dogs and cats living together, mass hysteria, and those empty desks that should be filled with busy geeks.

If you haven’t heard this complaint you’re A) lucky, B) ignorant, C) a liar, or D) better at hiring than a lot of people – a whole lot of people.

For over a year I’ve been hearing that there’s some kind of IT hiring gap. This isn’t new of course, complaint about some kind of “skills gap” goes back for years in many fields.  I think I’ve been hearing about this for about four years, even when unemployment was higher.

However among these claims I’d occasionally hear a dissenting voice. That there’s not a gap, or that these claims were ways to get in cheap H1B visa employees, or someone had no trouble in hiring and just thought this was BS.  It made me wonder if this is for real.

Let’s face it, it’s important to know what the heck is actually going on in IT.  IT is vital to the economy.  It’s  close to we geeks who are so tied to technology industries and areas. Some of us want a damn job and we’d like to know what’s going ob.  Some of us are trying to hire people and want to know why it isn’t working.  If this gap is BS then people claiming there is one are ignorant, deceptive, or both and we’ like to know.

So is there an IT Gap, where we don’t have enough people to do the IT jobs of today?

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One Third Of Americans Have Debt In Collections

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OK Econogeeks and non-econogeeks, this is interesting news.  One third of us have debt in collections, but the details on debt are fascinating and relevant to those of us who watch markets as well as careerists.

  • Consumer Debt isn’t easily distributed.
  • Mortgage debt is a huge part of debt – and isn’t evenly distributed.
  • Non-mortgage debt IS more evenly distributed.
  • Debt can correlate with income – but collection debt is also correlated with lower income.

Lots of useful information here!

 

– Steven Savage

Steven Savage is a Geek 2.0 writer, speaker, blogger, and job coach.  He blogs on careers at http://www.musehack.com/, publishes books on career and culture at http://www.informotron.com/, and does a site of creative tools at http://www.seventhsanctum.com/. He can be reached at https://www.stevensavage.com/.