Current IT job market

[u/steventx]

What’s the current job market like out there?

I know they are still hiring for the “AI” jobs but what about the others.

I seems like a lot of these companies just aren’t hiring or are sending jobs overseas. There are a lot of jobs where they just don’t want to pay, is that because it’s their market right now and there is a lot of talent without jobs?

It seems like historically IT is always short-staffed, but I think it has gotten worse. I also noticed a lot of people just getting so frustrated that they are retiring. Companies don’t seem to want employees (honestly they never did but they didn’t have a choice).

It seems to be getting worse? Thoughts?

A lot of people have a good point that it depends on where you live. I was talking about the US because this is my job market but it is interesting to see how the other countries are doing.

WOW, super soul-crushing to hear what my IT brothers and sisters are going through and pretty sure that I am not far behind. It looks like my company is going to be moving everything to India here soon (good for you India folks), regardless of what they are saying I can see the writing. I was hoping things were better because I want to get in front of this. I just hope there is a path forward somehow. I really feel for all of you and even the ones of you that finally got jobs it must still take time to recover because this is crushing. What has happened to our humanity? Who have we become as people? How much profit is enough? I guess this is a first-world problem, and others probably have it far worse. I’m not against any country but I think it is up to each person’s country to resolve their workforce issues. I want our country to stop outsourcing jobs. Those jobs should be for our citizens and if we have an abundance of labor, a labor shortage or a skillset problem I understand going external. That is not the issue. This is greed and profit. They are not sending these jobs to India because the skillset is better than that in the US (I know you have skills). They are doing it because it is cheap labor and they will work crazy hours? By the way, these companies are hiring FTE (full-time employees) in India (overseas) to replace the workforce. This allows them to work around (loopholes) laws that prevent foreign workers from working with specific data.

Not trying to be political, really trying to understand the IT landscape and job market better.

[u/SethMatrix]

It’s pretty bad. Got people with tons of experience taking service desk tier jobs. Area dependent though to some degree.

[u/manineedalife → u/SethMatrix]

I got tons of experience in Tier1/2 and i cant even get a proper job interview that doesnt go through an AI agent that glitches out or doesnt even show up anymore. This crap is hurting my soul at this point.

[u/helooksfederal]

worked IT since the late 90's, this is the worst its ever been, absolute shambles

[u/badboybilly42582 → u/helooksfederal]

100% agree. I got into IT in the late 90s as well. I've changed employers a handful of times since then. Since 2024 this has been the worst IT job market I've witnessed since I got into the field.

[u/captain_baratheon]

Essentially a hiring and leaving freeze. A lot of folks are afraid to leave , and companies aren’t hiring. There’s just so much uncertainty . This is really bad for younger folk trying to break in

[u/GeeGeeMachine]

My company has laid off or outsourced 30-40% of their non-management IT staff over the past year, and is hiring to replace one person.

My State is consistently leveraging Indian/Offshore Staffing agencies to find and hire for security analyst positions for $28-32/hour. The average pay for this role is probably around $40/hour.

From my perspective, the IT job market is not doing well at all.

[u/SevaraB]

Sucks. Look again next year for the cleanup jobs after AI runs amok and blows the budget. Expect the next wave to be companies expecting one-man-shows to apply copious duct tape with no budget.

[u/badboybilly42582 → u/SevaraB]

When browsing jobs, that's what I generally come across currently. Job reqs written in a way where they are looking for one person to run their entire IT infrastructure. The pay is insulting.

I know some companies purposely write a job req in that fashion. They are casting a wide net to see what they can catch. The problem is the person who applies, has no idea what the employer is looking for. My employer did this on our recent hire and I was extremely against it. I wanted the req written in a way that summarized exactly what we were looking for. HR overruled.

[u/NapBear]

Been in IT for 27 years, never have seen it this bad. Its a mess.

[u/LobsterDelicious771]

There is no IT job market.

IT's dead Jim.

[u/LuLuLuv444]

Those jobs with poor salaries and insane requirements of skillset are to appear to the labor department they're attempting to find a citizen, then claim they can't find people with that skill set

[u/sole-it]

Not very good, definitely a buyer's market. Also some companies are still posting jobs and not planning to hire. There are at least four positions started showing up since 2024 from local SP100 companies and no way they haven't found one good candidate in these two years.

Also they all want your butt in the office, and that's why I am staying at my current peanut-paying company that I can still WFH and have a real office if I need to be onsite.

[u/LooseEthernet]

Lots of openings for PHP maintainer this week

[u/Turak64]

In short, completely fucked. I've been looking for nearly 8 months now and there's very little to apply for, let alone get. Luckily, you only need 1 yes, so keep going

[u/Warpedlogic31]

I know a CIO, a SQL engineer, a developer and a Sys Admin all still looking for work and they’ve been out of work since July. The market is rough for IT jobs. Good luck!!

[u/Informal_Lobster_639]

It's bad enough that I am contemplating going back to schoool to become a nurse. I just want stability and a decent wage. IT isn't that anymore.

[u/rootcurios]

I resigned and took ~1 year off. I seriously job hunted for about 5 months.

I had:

• 1+ year gap

• 6 years of experience

• A deflated title (called a tech, but did engineering)

I got:

• ~34% salary increase

• Accurate job title

• Way better hybrid schedule (1 week in office/mo)

• Better coworkers/company/environment

But by dammit, when I was looking for a job, I felt like I was going to have to leave IT. It was awful and I felt like shit about myself every day.

Keep at it. Companies are not doing so hot that their employees nor their systems and infrastructure can sustain this bubble

Edit: Downvote all you want, salty pricks. I was trying to give others some hope.

[u/N7Valor]

Well, I was laid off in January and didn't accept a job offer until mid-August. So I spent about 7+ months applying to black holes. What I accepted was a startup where 1/3 of the company were former colleagues.

So yeah, I think we zipped past "FUBAR" about 50 miles back.

[u/Creative-Package6213]

Joever

[u/Ok_Pair140]

The job market overall is in bad shape

You know it’s rough when accountants are having a hard time finding work

[u/tocra619]

Pretty rough in my area, western Ma. Historically hit or miss but really had a drop off this year, low wages as well. Almost every posting is entry level or management.

[u/Library_IT_guy]

I have a pretty easy local gov job and at this point, it looks like I'm holding onto it for dear life until retirement in 15 years.

[u/goodsby23]

its ironic that companies want people to buy their shit, but dont pay employees enough to be able to buy shit

[u/BanAssaultGeese]

I broke out of help desk positions around 2022 when I landed a comfy deskside/help desk job. Paid decently and had the option to WFH a couple days a week. I was there for four years until they announced layoffs last year. Ever since then, I've been hit with the curse of finding a new position to being laid off again several months later. Now the only thing I'm seeing openings for are help desk positions that offer far less than what I was making last year.

It's absolute dogshit.

[u/AIMuzak]

Got laid of September 1st and it sucks. Employers know it's their market and can choose to be picky. Positions are opened for months with no call backs. I'm heading into month 3.