Laid off in the City (employment, college, income)

[Chroy]

Originally Posted by siobhandem

I.T is DEAD in America. All you students go into pharmacy, nursing, anything other than I.T.!

What about computer programming/science?

[009]

Here's a .pdf file with a list of occupations that are in demand: http://www.nyc.gov/html/sbs/wf1/downloads/pdf/quarter_growth.pdf (broken link)

[NYC0820]

Originally Posted by arangoa79

It's sad that it takes these tough economic times to wake people up an realize that without a proper education you are playing Russian roulette with your future. This may be the one good thing about the sad state of the economy, more people are starting to see the value of an education. Going into debt to better your education is one of the best moves you can make, it's considered good debt vs. the debt you have from buying a car you don't need. Good luck to you all, I wish you the very best.

I already have my 4yr college degree in Psychology- but I was young and wasn't sure what I wanted to do with my life when I finished college.
I made very good money working as an Executive Assistant and Business manager and finally figured out what I REALLY love to do.
I've also saved my pennies for a rainy day....think it's raining now...LOL

A few of my co-workers are also going back to school for a 2nd career.

Times are rough right now but things will get better.
Just keep a positive attitude

[I_Love_LI_but]

Originally Posted by NYC0820

I already have my 4yr college degree in Psychology- but I was young and wasn't sure what I wanted to do with my life when I finished college.
I made very good money working as an Executive Assistant and Business manager and finally figured out what I REALLY love to do.
I've also saved my pennies for a rainy day....think it's raining now...LOL

A few of my co-workers are also going back to school for a 2nd career.

Times are rough right now but things will get better.
Just keep a positive attitude

The disadvantage of a bachelors degree in Psychology is that you also need a post-graduate education to do anything with it.

[NYC0820]

Originally Posted by I_Love_LI_but

The disadvantage of a bachelors degree in Psychology is that you also need a post-graduate education to do anything with it.

I had other dreams to fulfill when I finished college.....

[pflau]

Originally Posted by Biskit

I had to get a job (project) in LA because there isn't anymore work in my field in NYC. (enterprise resource planning software implementations). I feel for everyone getting laid off right now and kids just graduating from college - it's a really tough job market and it could take years instead of months to find a job. I'm just glad they fly me back to NY every weekend. Save up those pennies everyone!

How is it possible that the market in LA is better than in NY???

[Biskit]

It's just for my specific field, which is highly specialized. Everything else is really bad of course. 1 in 10 people are unemployed in CA right now, which is absurd.

[gichicago]

Originally Posted by Biskit

I had to get a job (project) in LA because there isn't anymore work in my field in NYC. (enterprise resource planning software implementations). I feel for everyone getting laid off right now and kids just graduating from college - it's a really tough job market and it could take years instead of months to find a job. I'm just glad they fly me back to NY every weekend. Save up those pennies everyone!

Do you work for a consulting firm or an Independant contractor? I was an IT consultant 2 years ago before moving to IT dept for a large corporation. People I know at my old firm are taking projects whereever they can, for fear of being laid off by being on the bench too long.

At least you can use those miles towards a nice vacation. Just make sure to use them before the airlines render them worthless

[cityboy2]

Originally Posted by pflau

How is it possible that the market in LA is better than in NY???

Apparently, New York numbers won't be much better in the not so distant future. Top economists/financial advisers Krugman & Schiff believe more banks are going to go under, which means more layoffs on Wall Street.

Large TV series' which are currently shooting here (Fringe, In Treatment...etc..) are now looking elsewhere for better tax breaks, since our state is tapped out.

100 + construction sites are on hold (or canceled), leaving many half built buildings and holes in the ground.

[bx718]

Originally Posted by siobhandem

I.T is DEAD in America. All you students go into pharmacy, nursing, anything other than I.T.!

I.T has changed but it is NOT DEAD; gone are the days when people got paid very well for performing relatively trivial tasks. If you're just the typical "web developer" or the help-desk "guru" aka glorified lab assistant, or your "job" can be accomplished by a code generator, then of course your job is being shipped to a location offering the same services at a much lower cost. Lower your costs and increase your profits right? If your skills were easily acquired, then your job might be easily disposed of - quite simple.

Originally Posted by Chroy

What about computer programming/science?

It will never die but it doesn't neccessarily imply that once you have a CS degree, you're set in life. CS is one of few majors a new graduate can walk onto the job with a much more extensive skillset than the "chief architect". This because best developers/architects are usually self-taught.

* MAKE SURE you're fundamentally sound - if you're thinking of becoming a developer for example, you cannot be weak in OOP.

* Join your school's programming-competition team

* Get real life experience while you're in school. If you learn how to develop web applications for example, you can build a decent data-driven application for your local non-profit organization. You won't get paid then, but the thrill of the completed project, and the experience you gain is invaluable. Some people started like this and became entrepreneurs

* Get certified - For $200 and a few months of studying, you can become certified in your area of choice. You can pick up the test-kit PDFs online for a few dollars. Certification is a good way to ice your experience-cake i.e. it is more valuable when accompanied by experience. It is also a comprehensive way to learn technologies.

* Get familiar with technologies people are most reluctant to learn like distributed application development, network/multithreaded applications, ASYNCHRONOUS development, SOA, IPC, Java Web services etc. For example, according to Microsoft learning, for the .NET 2.0 platform, the ratios of Certified Web : Certified Windows : Certified Distributed-Apps developers are approximately 4:2:1 (39,357 :18,387 : 9,445). These are worldwide numbers so just guess which of the 3 has the highest job security?

As long as you don't graduate with just lab-assistant experience, you're fine. CS is still one of the hottest technical majors today. M.I.S/C.I.S is another story....