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People are not rude here in my opinion, though they aren't as friendly as people in Raleigh (where I lived for 9 years) and I'm guessing they won't be as friendly as people in Atlanta.
It is really hot, you kind of have to plan your life around the heat in the summer, but you know, we all manage.
The terrain is far from boring, especially compared to the southeast. There are beautiful mountains in every direction. I have no idea what those people were talking about, Phoenix the most scenic place I've lived, and for whatever reason landscaping is taken very seriously here.
As for jobs, I can only really comment on my own field (engineering). There are plenty of jobs for people with 4 year degrees, but not a lot of companies are looking for people with PhDs. The factory operator jobs where I work, which go to people with no college degree, tend to be really easy to fill.
There will never be a lot of companies looking for people who have PhDs because companies generally do not do intensive research unlike universities and government does (where most PhD holders go). The skill of being able to research and write academic papers to share your work doesn't fit into the whole profit-motive thing. Most companies hire PhD holders for their title and not their actual research capabilities.
However, master's yes (I got a master's and was hired over the phone without an interview and given a sign on bonus).
The medical industry in AZ is HUGE, you will not have a problem getting a decent job. It's easy for you to research jobs from where you are and see what the average wage is. The cost of living is lower than most places and racism is not as much of an issue here as people tend to have a live and let live attitude.
$10-$12 doesn't sound good to me, but it's better than temp services here that only pay $8. Those type of wages are only acceptable to try to supplement income if all else fails when finding professional jobs.
Arizona at best is a retiree and service state. I've lived in this state for 30 years and I can say with utmost certainty that if you want professional white collar jobs that are NOT in medical, law, and corporate finance look elsewhere. There might be a need for engineers or tech, but it's super rare. If you're in the northern part of AZ it's even harder. Lots of old people flock here due to the heat, quietness, (hence the stereotype that old people hate the cold) and lower COL.
I've lived in Phoenix, and most temp agencies do blow. Some will get you to rework your resume over, and over, and over, and over because they're paid to. Most can't find work for you since you're still technically at the mercy of the employer. Temp agencies are the middlemen but sadly in this economy it's the best we have unless you can network.
Lots of low wage jobs around, but between the college kids, illegals, and everyone else struggling to make ends meet it can get cutthroat. Don't settle for call center jobs either, they're awful.
Obviously your experience differs from many people's experiences here. I, for one, have never had a problem finding a position in AZ and they have never been "low wage, Temp agency" jobs. Up your skill set and get out of the "service" industry. Plenty of jobs in AZ and it is only growing.
Obviously your experience differs from many people's experiences here. I, for one, have never had a problem finding a position in AZ and they have never been "low wage, Temp agency" jobs. Up your skill set and get out of the "service" industry. Plenty of jobs in AZ and it is only growing.
Agreed this sounds more like a personal issue than a city problem. Our company is almost always seeking skilled labor, get the skills that are in demand and suddenly a world of opportunity will open up.
I love the hiking and the mountains, and the desert flowers the pop up in March and April. Strangely enough I love Sky Harbor (the airport) because it's just so freaking efficient. I love getting on the freeway and having a beautiful view of mountains, and the mountains behind those mountains, and then mountains behind those mountains. I love going out to the Superstition Mountains and going to the lakes in the middle of nowhere, and paddling along until I find a little quiet cove to take a rest. I love how you can be on some random dirt road and it has the most incredible view of the most incredible canyon, and not only do you not know the name of the canyon, you didn't even know you were going to be driving through a canyon today. I love how much space there is, and how blue and clear the sky is. I love getting on a trail in the morning/evening and climbing to the top and watching the sunrise/sunset. I love that I can afford a house here, and one in a safe, clean, well-landscaped neighborhood, and even a house with a view. I love all the flowers planted along the sides of the freeways, and I love all the palm trees and cacti that get planted in medians. I love that I can drive up to Flagstaff, or Sedona, or down to Tuscon for a day trip. I love that the beach (while in Mexico) is only a few hours drive away. I love that I can see a bunch of museums for free courtesy of the Phoenix Public Library. I love swimming in the pool after the sun goes down. I love Quiktrip (that probably makes me sound trashy, but I don't care, it's a gas station/convenience store in case you're wondering). I love that ice cream cones at McDonalds are only 59 cents. I love all the fancy restaurants in Scottsdale and all the ethnic restaurants in Tempe and Chandler. I'm sure I'll find more things to love, but I've only been here about six months.
Quik Trip is AWESOME! There are QT stores where I moved here from so I was happy that they were here as well. I will drive past 6 Circle K's to find a QT and pay more for my fountain drink! it's worth it for the clean stores and fast efficient staff.
I think McD's ice cream cones are 59 cents pretty much everywhere, no?
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Arizona at best is a retiree and service state. I've lived in this state for 30 years and I can say with utmost certainty that if you want professional white collar jobs that are NOT in medical, law, and corporate finance look elsewhere. There might be a need for engineers or tech, but it's super rare. If you're in the northern part of AZ it's even harder. Lots of old people flock here due to the heat, quietness, (hence the stereotype that old people hate the cold) and lower COL.
I've lived in Phoenix, and most temp agencies do blow. Some will get you to rework your resume over, and over, and over, and over because they're paid to. Most can't find work for you since you're still technically at the mercy of the employer. Temp agencies are the middlemen but sadly in this economy it's the best we have unless you can network.
Lots of low wage jobs around, but between the college kids, illegals, and everyone else struggling to make ends meet it can get cutthroat. Don't settle for call center jobs either, they're awful.
Absolutely false. Do you work in the software industry? Do you have a Computer Engineering/Computer Science Degree? Metro Phoenix has some of the best embedded software jobs in the entire country. Amazon is hiring a ton of techies at very high wages which is bringing up the entire wage base for software devs, right now it is probably the best it's ever been to be a techie in phx metro. I probably field close to 2/3 calls a month from other software companies in phx looking for software devs. I am very connected in the industry not only in phx but all over the US,. Phoenix punches above it's very large weight when it comes to attracting high quality software/hardware engineers. We have multiple high quality talent accepting reloc packages from California/Washington/Colorado. Not to be harsh, but if you can't get hired in phx in the tech industry at this moment, you were never meant to be a techie.
Now the rest of arizona in the tech field is struggling somewhat, and that is pretty well known. Raytheon and a couple other companies are hiring in Tucson, but it is very sparse compared to metro phx.
Wife and I "snowbird" between Green Valley (twenty miles due south of Tucson) and Cape Cod. Really like living in AZ. Nice friendly folks (in my experience at any rate), beautiful countryside, live and let live attitude.
I'm not a city person (this from a guy that was born in Brooklyn NY and spent 20 years as a NYC cop...) but find Tucson a pleasant place to shop and go into for restaurants. Of course, my wife and I can travel at non-traffic intense times, so keep that in mind.
We plan on eventually selling our Cape house and moving here permanently. The only reason we haven't done so is, as others have pointed out, the summers are brutal and we'd have to get away to someplace cool anyway.
Best of luck,
Rich
Rich, I grew up in Massachusetts and love the Cape! I miss it and try to get back there every summer.
I do medical billing. How is the job market in Tucson? Is the job market really that awful in AZ? What do you do?
You'll be fine, medical is huge in AZ, no shortage of those kind of work. Nursing homes, hospitals, doctor's offices, everyone gets billed.
Quote:
Absolutely false. Do you work in the software industry? Do you have a Computer Engineering/Computer Science Degree? Metro Phoenix has some of the best embedded software jobs in the entire country. Amazon is hiring a ton of techies at very high wages which is bringing up the entire wage base for software devs, right now it is probably the best it's ever been to be a techie in phx metro. I probably field close to 2/3 calls a month from other software companies in phx looking for software devs. I am very connected in the industry not only in phx but all over the US,. Phoenix punches above it's very large weight when it comes to attracting high quality software/hardware engineers. We have multiple high quality talent accepting reloc packages from California/Washington/Colorado. Not to be harsh, but if you can't get hired in phx in the tech industry at this moment, you were never meant to be a techie.
Now the rest of arizona in the tech field is struggling somewhat, and that is pretty well known. Raytheon and a couple other companies are hiring in Tucson, but it is very sparse compared to metro phx.
If you're a recruiter and this is how you go off on people for expressing frustration, then I feel sorry for you. Not every programmer is created equal, not everyone is from Silicon Valley and can be coding rockstars, it's real grinding work and takes lots of man hours and years to master and you're ALWAYS learning. You don't discourage people like that because it's only your opinion and nothing more.
To answer your question though, yes, I do have a CS degree. Since late 2008. Why am I not employed in my field? Back in 2008 there weren't that many jobs out there in PHX. I was expecting this degree to be my ticket out of AZ since the dream was to work in CA, which didn't pan out. It's also a little bit ironic because I started there and finished my degree online when it was just called "Web Development" instead of "Front End Developer" (And in my defense I learned HTML, CSS, PHP, a tiny bit of Javascript, C#(School added fluff), graphic design since it was assumed back then web developers needed to learn Photoshop, Dreamweaver, Flash, etc.)
You may be asking yourself, why the long gap? Well? Life happened. Mom was in her declining years and had a sibling who became a drug addict and after mom died she was all I had. Also, this is the lofty part, I was pursuing game development over web design, spent the next few years as an independent game developer and worked on an android game, and another for Steam, both deployed and coded by myself with a little help from a graphical interface. Game development takes years and I figured the more I do the better chances I have at getting a gig right? At the same time I kept up with Web Development. Guess you could consider me a Front End Developer, that wasn't a thing years ago. HTML5 is what I made my Steam game with, it was... interesting, and had some frustrations, but I also learn how cool it is working in this and it's more fun that Javascript. Too bad when Chrome changes things up it creates more bugs. Also had to relearn Javascript and PHP since I didn't want my skills to get rusty. These next few months after my move I plan on committing to add more projects under my belt and posting some code on GitHub. All I have for "job experience" are the two games, a gig doing a Wordpress website, and a webcomic website that was my own from 2003-2009. Yeah, it's not "professional" but remember, the jobs just weren't there at the time.
Fast forward to recent, I've been handing out resumes and CV on Linkedin, Indeed, etc. Had a couple programming interviews out of maybe 100 submissions, some were in the PHX area, and maybe it's that many employers don't use one or the other, but my basis on saying there aren't much jobs is because I don't see many postings as opposed to say... Texas, or Utah, or Colorado. See where I'm going at with this? I live in the upper part of AZ, hardly an IT job around since all the tech happenings are in big cities
Look, I'm glad PHX is finally embracing the 21st century. I'm not ashamed to admit I made some dumb choices with my degree, now I'm paying the price. Even applying to jobs in PHX and Tuscon I've met with many rejections, the ones that did respond openly admitted that they didn't consider me because I'm not a local resident. (in the city limits) Yet I can't move without a job lined up, which would be financial suicide. Thanks to my student loans, it's even harder. So after my move I'm going to commit myself once more to expand my online portfolio and Github with some projects. I'm still entry level I guess, but I have enough experience on the Front End side to make up for it. Back End is where I need to focus on next.
Also, relocation packages usually only apply to senior devs, at least according to many companies I had the luxury of speaking to which I probably don't apply.
Hey CS- Those are some really hard times you fell on, I'm sure I'm not the only one who can relate. Life happens and we're all human, I personally have had to apply for jobs from outside of an area before and can attest to how challenging that can be. I'd highly recommend you find a bigger city that works for you and take an evening or weekend job to get by, freeing up your days to focus on a job search. I've met a lot of Uber and Lyft drivers doing just that for example. Best of luck to you, if Phoenix is where you want to be I'm sure it can work if CA is your dream then go for it! I think we've hammered the job topic, there's a lot of opportunities in every big city but finding the right opportunity for a single person out of millions doesn't always fit into a stat or general metric.
Hopefully you can line something up sooner than later.
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