Where Are The Software Jobs In The US?

I came across this blog post, based on a study by the software industry trade group, The App Association, which includes this map of where the software jobs are in the US:

software jobs

Essentially every big city in the US has a lot of software jobs. If you want to be a software engineer in Atlanta, there is work for you there. If you want to be a software engineer in Chicago, there is work for you there.

The highest per capita density of software jobs are, of course, in the Bay Area and Boston.

software jobs per capita

So if you want the highest density of software jobs, go to the Bay Area or Boston.

But if you want to live and work somewhere else and find a good and well paying software engineering job, you can find that in most of the big cities in the US.

And, I would suspect the same is true all around the world.

That’s a good thing.

#Web/Tech

Comments (Archived):

  1. andyswan

    (Density * salary) / cost of livingmight be an interesting derivative of this cool data.

    1. mikenolan99

      Minneapolis for the win…

      1. andyswan

        Forgot one element* daily avg temp

        1. pointsnfigures

          And Lutefisk. Minnesotans embrace winter

          1. andyswan

            Curling and booze are a fantastic counterpoint

          2. PhilipSugar

            Not all the ones in my office

    2. Matt Zagaja

      As Warren Buffet would say, price is what you pay, value is what you get. Big city living is NOT cheap. But the amenities and value are huge in other ways.

      1. andyswan

        Agree. Arguments to be made for all.

      2. Mark Essel

        And the ever present “aromas”.Not pleasant ones. Why do dense cities smell so bad?

    3. pointsnfigures

      Based on the plot of the points, taxes and COL don’t seem to matter.

      1. andyswan

        Unless pay is higher

  2. JimHirshfield

    Huntsville, AL?

    1. falicon

      I believe they actually have a large TelCo presence in Huntsville…I know at least one developer who lives near me in NJ and works for one of the big TelCo companies does about a week a month in Huntsville (and has been for at least the last couple of years).

      1. JimHirshfield

        Interesting

        1. pointsnfigures

          And Rockets

          1. thinkdisruptive

            Yes, very high concentration of rocket scientists left over from NASA years. http://www.nytimes.com/2007… That plus southern bbq make for interesting combo.

  3. falicon

    “software job” is a massive and broad category though…what they are generally looking for in the valley is *very* much different than what they are looking for in many of the other cities around the country.Def. work everywhere, but it’s not like it’s actually the same job (and especially pay) in all these different locations.

    1. Matt Zagaja

      Rumor is there are places outside the valley where they make people program in ASP.net. You must never go there falicon.

      1. falicon

        :-)I actually worked in ASP (pre dot net days) for a bit in the late 90s…stick around the industry long enough and you’ll end up working with almost every language/platform (and being bitter about them all for one reason or another) 😀

        1. Rob Underwood

          <% I did a bunch of ASP programming back when I worked on the internationalization team at Pandesic circa 1999-2000. We had a 3 layer solution – SAP R/3, DCOM, and ASP. With that technology stack, how did we not succeed? %>

          1. falicon

            +infinity and bonus points for the code block nod! 🙂

      2. sigmaalgebra

        You have worked in ASP.NET? Good. I’ve been there, done that. My code works as intended. But I’ve got some questions …! Maybe you have some answers!My main objection to ASP.NET is that the code that write looks at best, in a word, awkward. It’s also a bit verbose. It’s like building a house not just with bricks but with tiny mini-bricks used to build the bricks used to build the house. The code also looks, say, inflexible if want to revise a Web page, maybe so inflexible that should just write new code and mostly ignore the old code.BackgroundSo, yes, for the code for my startup, I used the .NET Framework 4.0 and its ASP.NET and ADO.NET.For the work in ASP.NET, the Web pages look just like I intended. The execution seems fast. I encountered no or nearly no bugs. The Microsoft documentation was at best, call it, awkward, but there is some sense to how ASP.NET works and, once understand that, it’s easier to understand ASP.NET and how to write it.I wrote the code in Visual Basic .NET, but writing the code in C# would have been essentially the same, that is, would have used the same ASP.NET classes in essentially the same ways. In fact, Microsoft may have a translator from Visual Basic .NET to C#.Note: Visual Basic .NET is not much like the previous version of Microsoft’s Basic.When using ASP.NET, there is some cute stuff:Cute Stuff 1: I saw the Microsoft integrated development environment (IDE) Visual Studio more work to learn to use than it was worth — for the code for my startup, I still think so. So, I just typed my code, all 100,000 lines or so, into my favorite text editor.Then, when get a file of a Web page, say, file type ASPX, just give that to own favorite Web browser and cute things happen: The Microsoft Web server software Internet Information Server (IIS) receives the Web browser’s HTTP GET request, sees the ASPX file, looks at it, passes it to, in my case, the Visual Basic compiler. If the compiler sees and error in the code, the compiler puts the compiler error messages in HTML and sends that to IIS to be sent to my Web browser. If there is no error, then the compiler sends the executable code to IIS which runs it and sends the resulting HTML of my intended Web page to my Web browser. .So, the compiler is part of what is cute: In case the compiler sees an error in the code, the HTML has the compiler error messages and lots more on the code if ask to see it!Cute Stuff 2: The ASPX file for the Web page, that is, with the Visual Basic .NET code, the ASP.NET, maybe the ADO.NET code, may also have some static HTML and CSS code. Okay. Well, some of that HTML code automatically generates instances of classes with global scope for the Visual Basic and ASP.NET code! E.g., can get instances of class placeholder that way! Cute.Then a way to start to program a Web page is just to type in static HTML and CSS for just placeholders (instances of class placeholder) and then in the ASP.NET code called by, say, Visual Basic, put (use a method ADD) instances of ASP.NET classes in effect on the placeholders!Cute Stuff 3: How it works. Apparently basically what happens when some, say, Visual Basic code runs and calls ASP.NET code, a big tree is built. Each leaf is an instance of an ASP.NET class. When the tree is done, some ASP.NET run-time code does a depth first traversal of that tree, executes appropriate methods, and generates the corresponding HTML code, i.e., IIRC elements.Getting OrganizedIf a Web page has much on it, that is, uses very many HTML elements, then the corresponding ASP.NET code can look like a mess.So, better to live with that mess, stuff such ASP.NET calls into some appropriate functions and document the functions, that is, explain what the heck they are doing. So, for the main part of the Visual Basic code, to keep it easier to read and better organized, keep all that ASP.NET code in functions and out of sight.Main IssueTo me, the main issue in using ASP.NET to build Web pages is that the ASP.NET code looks awkward. The building looks inefficient. A little bit of a Web page can need a lot of ASP.NET code, and looking at the code it’s not so easy to visualize the resulting Web page.For my startup, I have only a few Web pages; as displayed by a Web browser the pages all look dirt simple and really easy to use; and the Visual Basic and ASP.NET code is written and seems fine.But I have to suspect that for any software house building a lot of real Web sites, they have much more efficient means than what I went through using ASP.NET.E.g., maybe there are some easy to use, drag and drop, GUI front ends that spit out ASP.NET code? Is this so?Or, maybe, even people using IIS and C# or Visual Basic .NET don’t use ASP.NET but use something else?Or, maybe mostly people find some Linux tools better for building Web pages than anything on Windows or IIS?What’s the real story?Thanks.

        1. Matt Zagaja

          Fortunately I’ve avoided using ASP.net in my life, though I’ve seen it in others sites. Developing software is like writing music: the notes on the sheet are the same but the orchestras all seem to sound different. Web development is not done with GUIs unless you are adding content to a CMS. The designers create the graphic artworks and wireframes and then the developers turn it into code. If you think your code does not “look” good the best thing to do is to Google “language + code smells” and you can spend a long time in a rabbit hole learning different people’s opinions on the best way things should look. Ultimately your north star should be “if another developer saw this, could they understand what the hell it is doing?” If the answer is yes your code is probably fine. If the answer is no, then maybe worth considering a different approach.

          1. sigmaalgebra

            Thanks.Gee, I’m not the Lone Ranger! The real situation is that bad! Gee! For nearly everyone! Okay.For someone to understand my ASP.NET code? Okay, I remember the oldWhen the code is written, only the programmer and god understand it. Six months later, only god.Well, since I’m not god and want to understand my code six months later, I need a solution, for me and anyone else not god.My solution: Just write some English language comments as documentation to explain what the heck is going on. So, really, in my ASPX files, the comments are more important than the code. E.g., my static placeholders are in a tree clearly described in the documentation.With the documentation and using functions to put most of the routine but big ASP code out of sight, it’s not so bad.Still, I suspected that there should be a better way.If I had hundreds of Web pages to develop, then I can think of some approaches based heavily on (A) my programmable text editor, (B) a library of chunks of code, and (C) a lot of keywords in comments in the chunks where the editor macros would look for the keywords to do the needed operations of, call it, filling in the blanks, e.g., URLs of JPGs, in the chunks.If the editor macros became a mess, then just write some VB or C# code.Really, can do a lot with some keywords in structured comments, that is, comments with some distinctive syntax easy to parse. Actually, I do quite a lot of that.

    2. Mitchell Henderson

      I agree- There is such high demand right now (and for the foreseeable future) that anyone with even some Object oriented programming will be hired.

      1. sigmaalgebra

        Nope. Not even remotely true. In fact, wildly false.

        1. Mitchell Henderson

          Haha! Not only is it true but “wildly true”!

          1. sigmaalgebra

            Lots of good US citizen US college and university computer science graduates can’t get jobs in computing, and that’s been the case for many years. Lots of highly qualified US citizens with 15+ years full time in software development in the US can’t get jobs in computing. Lots of US citizens with jobs in computing are not paid enough to buy a house and support a family, or with the husband in computing and the wife working and no children still can’t afford to buy a single family detached house in a safe neighborhood. In the US, essentially no US citizen over 45 with 20 years of full time software development experience can get a job in software development.For US citizens in the US, to make money enough for financial security for self and family with a stable career in computing essentially the only option is to be a successful, self-employed software entrepreneur.All across the US, a lot of computer science graduates and other STEM field graduates, really, nearly any college graduates, would be better off swapping their sheepskins for an electrician’s license.For anyone 18 in some safe suburbs, for the question of college and a job in software or grass mowing, they will likely be better off skipping college and starting a grass mowing service, working up to several crews, etc. The grass will keep growing, and the grass mowing business has a rock solid geographical barrier to entry.The claims that there are lots of unfilled jobs in software development is like the handbills handed out in Oklahoma in The Grapes of Wrath that claimed that there were lots of unfilled jobs picking fruit in California.Software development is regarded as a trade and not as a profession. Except in a software house, software development people are resented by others in the organization. Nearly all software development people have to report to a management chain that has little to no understanding of software. It is common to hire just for short term for just single projects.Nearly all software development projects are regarded by the sponsoring organization as dirty work that unfortunately is needed but, still, is not wanted and is regarded as of low value in the organization.Quite broadly in business, advanced software is just too darned difficult for businesses to understand, appreciate, or fund; even when there is very high value available, those organizations are not ready, willing, or able to see or pursue it. So, what is left is low grade activity for all concerned.To be hired, software development people are required to have recent expertise in just the particular combination of software development tools the hiring manager wants to use, and the employee has to arrive with that training accomplished, mostly be self-teaching.BTW, we all know that you don’t have even as much as a weak little hollow hint of a tiny clue what the heck you are talking about because “object oriented programming” was an over-hyped, quasi-religious, often awkward fad of 10, 20, …, 45 years ago. E.g., IBM had object oriented (OO) software in microcode in Future Systems in about 1970. There was more in OO in Smalltalk 80, right, of 1980.The big push for OO was via C++, just a pre-processor to C and, due to dangers of absurdly poor memory management, is just not suitable for usual applications software. For more on C++ and OO, pulling from some of my collected old notes, seehttp://www.fefe.de/c++/c++-…https://medium.com/@brianwihttps://news.ycombinator.cohttps://medium.com/@cscalfahttps://news.ycombinator.cohttp://harmful.cat-v.org/sohttps://news.ycombinator.co…Tough to read Stroustrup and conclude that Stroustrup himself really understood Stroustrup. Thus, long C++ was missing a solid, natural language specification.It’s possible to write some really good, complicated, large software projects in C++, but it’s also possible to do that in assembler, C, etc. For such projects, need some excellent, additional tools for the software writing and software project management, tools to patch the severe problems with C++.But, again, that is, without all those additional tools, C++ is just not suitable for usual applications software.By now nearly everyone who went through those years of OO hype sees OO as okay and helpful in small ways and otherwise a lot of false promises. E.g., inheritance, polymorphism, information hiding — rarely worth the botheration. Again, for more on OO, see the links I gave here.More generally, software is on a long walk on a short pier. The field just doesn’t know what to do for a bright future for software. The academic leadership for software is academic computer science, and that field doesn’t know what to do for a bright future for computer science or software and doesn’t have the prerequisites for inventing a bright future.OO? I was on a small team that did some OO stuff: So, it had an OO hierarchy, right, standard. But our OO hierarchy was dynamic, that is, could change fully during execution! The software was for multi-cores with multiple threads. Then, the data in the objects was handled with full transactional integrity, that is, with automatic deadlock detection and resolution, with roll back and roll forward. We exploited cross-memory where code in one address space manipulated data in other address spaces. The system also executed an AI language; I won an award for my contribution to that language.The system was for real-time system monitoring and management, and for the monitoring, that is, problem detection, I invented, and published, the world’s first collection of statistical hypothesis tests that are both multi-dimensional and distribution-free. Our work was shipped to high end sites around the world.Yup, I did some OO work. For my startup, I’ve typed in 100,000 lines of typing, 80,000 lines for the real time part and the rest for occasional execution. All the code, OO, runs, appears to be correct, and is in alpha test.You have some significant technical contributions to OO software techniques?

          2. Mitchell Henderson

            In addition to the data provided on this blog post, I would add a specific example, albeit anecdotal, that any computer science engineer (or even a bachelor of arts in computer science) can get certified as a developer on heroku or force.com and would immediately make him/herself “hire-able”. There is vast opportunity and in fact a dearth of computer science talent right now.

          3. sigmaalgebra

            So, let’s see: Someone has a CS degree from a good college or university and 10 years experience in software, and now to get a job and support a family he need only “get certified” in yet another, simple, easy to use, for non-programmers, click and drag and drop, interactive, graphical programming environment?I’ve heard that bedtime story before.

          4. Mitchell Henderson

            Correct. Although development is not drag and drop. But again this is just one of many examples playing out in the data laid out in the blog post above. It’s a fantastic time to be a developer!

          5. Mark Essel

            Modernish c++11,14 etc has quality of coding improvements (but I haven’t used it in a few years ;)”statistical hypothesis tests that are both multi-dimensional and distribution-free.”I worked briefly with a smart musician/mathematician in the late 90s who built a distribution-free classifier. It wasn’t quite stable but ran fairly well.

  4. Marcelo Calbucci

    Isn’t it interesting that despite globalization, Internet, and free-trade around digital content, software engineers are primarily a “local” workforce? Both by this report and by your blog post. If you asked experts 15 years ago, most would have said that remote work would be the predominant workforce for software engineers.

    1. Matt Zagaja

      I think you raise an interesting point, but one of the data points missing is how many of the people in these locations are working remotely for a company elsewhere. Some companies (GitHub, Basecamp, Heroku, even the federal government’s 18F division) are completely or almost completely remote/distributed.

      1. Marcelo Calbucci

        My guess it’s a tiny amount. The largest concentration of software engineers are at the big companies, not startups. Microsoft, Amazon, Google, Apple, IBM have 50K+ engineers each.

  5. Rob Underwood

    I am glad to see some dots up in my home state of Maine. There can and will be more software jobs there — just as soon as Maine gets rid of its disastrous bigoted governor, Paul LePage, hopefully as soon as today. Maine has a wonderful quality of life and many of the assets to be a very competitive market for software and startups.

  6. William Mougayar

    I wonder what the breakdown is between startups vs. big companies. My guess is 70% are in big co’s.

    1. awaldstein

      you consider all the big platforms from Facebook to Uber big cos I presume?is startup a matter of size or funding stature to you?

      1. William Mougayar

        Maybe another way to cut the data is : Tech companies vs. non Tech companies

        1. awaldstein

          I think that one is just as squishy.What’s a tech company?

          1. William Mougayar

            Their products are totally based on technology.

          2. awaldstein

            The most general statement from the most specific person I know.Couldn’t make a list based on this.

          3. William Mougayar

            Ha, i was in the go.How about include Uber & FB in that camp, but not the likes of BestBuy or a bank for example?

          4. awaldstein

            Having fun with this. There is no real answer but it is a fun discussion.Ecommerce platforms have become so simple, so data driven, so customer focused that the simplest ones like Mack Wheldon are simply changing how we buy everything from socks to underwear to performance workout clothes to jeans. All online.

          5. William Mougayar

            Interesting i checked them out, and they ship to Canada. How is the quality, compared to other brands half their prices?

          6. awaldstein

            I like their boxers and tees.Been buying socks, jeans, orthopedic compression stuff. Some great companies, some a nightmare but mens and sports clothing online is in a bit of a new stage as they figure out how to acquire customers, make returns super simple, figure out fit guides and get photos and videos so that they really work.Love ecommerce as a model and always have. Hard to do well. A wonder when it works.To me this is fun and work at the same time.

          7. William Mougayar

            Their mobile web experience was really good, as if you’re inside an App but without the App.

          8. awaldstein

            It’s crazy how shipping is a non issue.There’s a jean company online (searching for name) that when you buy a pair, you get to choose another pair one size smaller or bigger that they send to you free.You keep the one that fits, send the other back. Or send both back instant credit to card.Imaging budgeting this?They are getting that once you have jeans that fit, you buy often for a lifetime.Great tech. Great UI. Personal support (almost entirely through chat). Easy shipping at no cost.This is exciting to me along with the clothes!

          9. Vasudev Ram

            The ones that call themselves that?

          10. awaldstein

            I’ve been a tech startup guy my entire career with a few corporate turnarounds thrown in.Cross games and hardware(Atari), cross multimedia (Creaf), cross movies (RLD), cross pure communities(EC), cross auction algorithms for supply chains (Moai), cross web performance (Keynote) and on and the many that vanished without a trace.All could not have been built with out innovating in tech. None could have been successful with a community as the channel and all in different segments.Tech companies–sure!

    2. thinkdisruptive

      More like 90% +. But all those big companies were startups not that long ago. One begets the other.The percentage of breakout companies (I hesitate to use the pop term unicorns) relative to the total number of startups is a similar stat, but you can’t have unicorns without the little guys who are trying to change the world. The big companies also give a rich source of employees + founders for future spinoffs, as well as job security when your startup fails. Concentration matters for lots of reasons.

    3. Mac

      William, did you happen to look nine articles below this post on Quartz that Fred has linked to? An interesting article on Bitcoin. Curious what your take is on the positions they took.

      1. William Mougayar

        Hmm, no didn’t see it. Do you mind pasting it here again?

        1. Mac

          I hope the link below works. Using a new Android tablet for the first time. Let me know if you have a problem.

    4. Vasudev Ram

      Recent HN thread referring to some article says 90 or 99.

      1. William Mougayar

        Ah, thanks.

  7. awaldstein

    Development and creative teams by definition work well decentralized and honestly most of the work I put out for hire in both areas usually have remote spurs and HQ where the customers are.A bit tangential but connected to the post.

  8. mikenolan99

    There are great boot caps around the US that offer “zero-to-coder” educations in three months or so.I’d like to do a “shout out” (do the kids still call it that?) to the Flat Iron School of programing. A few years ago I read Seth Godin’s post pointing me to this new start-up school. At that time, my son was disenchanted with his Bachelors degree program at the University of Minnesota. He interviewed with Flat Iron, and was in their first cohort – and lived through the New York hurricane in a buddy’s apartment in Harlem.Fast forward, he had a great two years with an awesome Minneapolis start-up – Code 42 – and was recently hired by one of the Fortune 500 companies here in Minneapolis with a six-figure starting job… with lots of leadership potential.

    1. Matt Zagaja

      My roommate is a teacher with General Assembly and many GA and Launch Academy alumni in Boston come to participate in the Code for Boston meet ups that I now serve as a project manager at. Lots of good people with interesting varied backgrounds. More often than not they hit a ceiling in their old career path and decided it was time for a change. Some local startups like Wayfair even have a dedicated onramp program for bootcamp grads they hire.

    2. pointsnfigures

      And 10% personal income taxes!

  9. Ana Milicevic

    It’s interesting that we still think of physical, geographic location for jobs that can be performed just as well if not better remotely/location-agnostic. Software engineering is the prime candidate here: with video conferencing tools and a reliable connection it doesn’t really matter much if you’re in San Jose or Timbuktu (and your HQ is not).

    1. pointsnfigures

      Sometimes having that face to face makes a fifference

      1. Jess Bachman

        Isn’t hat what video conferencing is for?

        1. thinkdisruptive

          no, it isn’t the same. things that are planned can work this way, but very little that is spontaneous can.

      2. thinkdisruptive

        It makes a huge difference being nearby. People working on tasks can work anywhere, but a very high percentage of great ideas come from chance meetings in the halls for coffee, or overhearing a discussion that others are having nearby. The smaller you are, and the more disruptive potential you have, the more it matters to have people in close proximity for the germination of new insights and great ideas.

      3. Ana Milicevic

        That’s why my frequent flyer miles tend to be in the >> 100K region pretty consistently 🙂 But we have clients now with whom we conduct almost all business over video which is not trivial for strategy, product, and go-to-market development.

    2. Elia Freedman

      I’m amazed at how many developers I talk to that don’t want remote jobs. At the end of the day we are all social creatures and the Internet, while it fills in the social gap some, is not the same as actually seeing and talking to human bodies, I guess.

      1. Paul Sanwald

        I like to come in to an office to work every day, and don’t like working from home.

      2. Ana Milicevic

        It’s good to have options 🙂

    3. kevando

      Developing software requires communicating rather complex concepts and it turns out that is very difficult for most people, so it still does matter that you’re physically in the same location.

      1. Ana Milicevic

        The first software company I started back in the day was based on the premise of being location agnostic. We made sure we were aware of common communication challenges and worked around them. Video calls, when done right, are a great substitute and it sure made our in-person time more focused.

    4. DJL

      Has anyone else noticed the correlation between great programmers and musicians? I swear that I never hired a top-notch developer that didn’t play an instrument. I think the two disciplines share a lot in common.Not sure if it is cause or effect, but these map dots also correlate with musical centers. Hmmm.

      1. Matt Zagaja

        Hire a musician and you too can have the edge in software development.

      2. Vivek Kumar

        I also observed the correlation between people playing musical instruments and excellent coders but assumed due to our company Dolby attracting musicians who code.

      3. thinkdisruptive

        Music educators do a poor job of marketing their value. Studying music programs the brain to excel at math, engineering, programming — all the STEM areas, and also improves performance in liberal arts, languages, etc. https://www.psychologytoday… Students who have studied music average almost 100 points higher in standardized testing (e.g. SAT), and you could argue cause or effect (the smarter students choose to study music, or does music improve cognitive and thinking skills?), but it is clear there is a correlation. In the tech companies I’ve been associated with, there has always been a very high concentration of extremely skilled musicians.So, using musicianship as one of your filters for selecting great techies isn’t a bad idea. Not all techies are musicians, but those that are tend to be the best.

      4. Corey Butler

        I’ve noticed this. I come from a a musical family, and even though I’m the least musical, I’ve always been partial to this idea. It wasn’t until I started hiring that I realized how often musical people exceeded expectations, especially composers. My team is small, but most of them have released their own albums.Most people hear the latest over-produced single on the radio and only think of those people as musicians. Most folks don’t know people who’ve gone through music theory or composition, and too many people see composers as just some hippy poet writing lyrics… when in reality these people understand how to use structure to create something beautiful. Most people don’t realize how much math there is in music either. When it comes to composing algorithms, it’s not that unlike composing a song.I’ve had the best experiences with drummers and bassists.

        1. Paul Sanwald

          I’m a musician and technologist, and I briefly dropped out of college (studying CS) to take a gig touring with a band. My advisor told me at the time that IBM used to hire music majors to work as programmers (before there were a lot of CS programs) because there was such a strong correlation.I also think you are spot on in relating programming to composing and arranging specifically. I think there is really is a very close correlation there, whereas performance for me is a bit different, since it’s time constrained, you can’t go back and change it. Whereas arranging for a string quartet feels very very similar to coding to me in so many ways.

          1. DJL

            I think there are two areas of strong correlation: Composing and playing music bridges the gap between the brain hemispheres. Which enhances performance. Also, both disciplines have a certain level of structure (notes, commands) but to put them together into a song (program) requires creativity around and within the structure. I’ll bet scans during these activities would be very interesting.

    5. K_Berger

      There is still something to be said for seeing people face to face. It helps build teams, helps managers get to know their people (and vice versa), etc.I’m not against working remotely, but all other factors being equal, I prefer people who are in the office most days.

      1. Ana Milicevic

        Sure – but a lot can be achieved w/ video calls, too. It has to be built into the culture though and for most companies some type of hybrid of in-office and remote (e.g. 3 days on premise, 2 days remote) may be the best option.Being in the office is the best fit for some type of activity (e.g. planning, pair programming, achieving consensus) and remote for others (e.g. high intensity/high output work, spec design, etc)

  10. KJ Singh

    Would be better to look at absolute # of software jobs in various locations to get a sense of where there are more jobs available vs. per capita jobs.

  11. Kent Karlsen

    Seattle and Austin has much lower cost of living than SF, NY and Boston. If you plan to start your own business or work for someone else, you should consider how much money you have after rent is paid.

  12. creative group

    CONTRIBUTORS:A blog cited software jobs are moving away from Silicon Valley in Fortune Magazine Data Sheet this morning by Erin Griffith.————Fortune Data Sheet By Adam Lashinsk August 30, 2016There’s a Silicon Valley backlash bubbling up. Not against the idea of Silicon Valley or what it represents, but against the actual geographic location.“Startups Try to Spread Outside of Silicon Valley,” the Wall Street Journal reports. “Tech Workers Are Increasingly Looking to Leave Silicon Valley,” Quartz writes. “The Case for Working in Silicon Valley and Living in the Rust Belt,” Bloomberg argues. “Bay Area Startups Find Low-Cost Outposts in Arizona,” The New York Times reports. Senior Writer of Fortune Magazine Erin Griffith.—————The theme of good weather seven months out the year and no natural disasters in Arizona.

  13. jason wright

    Will the temperature requirements of green data centres lead to the emergence of an Arctic Circle metropolis, populated by engineers and a supporting cast of technicians et al?

  14. Tom Labus

    No NYC? All the Banks and traders?

  15. pointsnfigures

    Grow pie. Make pie bigger. Don’t fight over slices of pie

  16. bfeld

    It always intrigues me to see Boulder on lists like this. However, Lowell is the most interesting one.

    1. DJL

      I was looking at the map and noticing how size does not seem to correlate much at all. Huntsville? We have that problem in Houston. 4 million people and a shoddy ecosystem for startups.

    2. thinkdisruptive

      There were lots of minicomputer companies in that area back in the 70s and 80s (Wang, Digital, Prime, etc) which spawned a number of software companies. Lowell was an old textile town, close enough to Boston to attract great people, but had great cost of living, fantastic old housing stock, and really interesting old buildings that could be converted from the textile days. All those companies are gone, but the area is still a tech hotbed. Anything close to 495 beltway is part of Boston’s tech corridor now.

      1. DJL

        Whatever happened to the original DEC building? Haven’t been there in ages. What a great co-working space!

    3. Matt Zagaja

      The articles that are linked to each other conflate the idea of working and living somewhere. The actual data set does not map where people work, it maps where they live. I have friends that are software developers that work in Kendall Square but they purchased real estate in the Lowell area because the market around Boston is crazy. So the answer is probably http://www.mbta.com/schedul

  17. Vladimir

    Great Post!Makes me wonder though: All these post revolve around developers (programmers and designers). Probably justifiably so, but where are the team leaders, project managers and their bosses? Is there a multitude of jobs for them too?Reason I’m asking is, I was a developer once and moved away from coding etc to become a “boss”. Had my own company (with two partners) with numerous developers etc etc for 20+ years. For me there is no going back to coding (I wouldn’t do anyone a services by trying to). I have more than 500 projects (large and small) under my belt, almost all (>99%) on time and within budget. You would think that that is a valuable asset to an organization in an industry crippled by budget overrun and notorious late delivery.To make a long story short: Are people like this also wanted? ;-)Curious about your comments!

  18. DJL

    I have noticed a growing trend of “on-shoring” software jobs. While massive amounts of programming talent exists overseas, corporate America has being bringing some back. There is still a HUGE demand for tech leads in the US that are actually doers with real experience. In fact, it is getting harder to recruit them to startups unless you have lots of cash – because the big companies are ponying up.

  19. LIAD

    69/1000 in San Jose.BROverdose.

  20. LE

    This data presented by “The trade group ‘The app association'” may very well be bullshit actually.I did a spot check and saw (attached screenshots) that Atlantic City has 334 software jobs while (as one example) Miami Fl has 521. Now if you know anything about AC you know there are not 334 software jobs there. No way. [1] And if you check Indeed.com even the 32 jobs listed there include companies that are located elsewhere that are just listing geographically to attract remote talent. Hence they are cross posting in many locales and the figure of 223k ‘job openings’ is almost certainly widely inflated. [2][1] So what other data is grossly wrong?[2] Based upon a quick check and gut….

    1. PhilipSugar

      Not sure about your comment on Atlantic City. There still are lots of casinos there. We just hired a developer from one (he wanted to get away from AC)

  21. Corey Butler

    These charts don’t show where companies are hiring, so the title of the post is a bit misleading. It shows where people have already been hired, and it highlights the concentration of tech worker population compared to non-tech population within a locale. The question these charts answer is “Which populations are tech-heavy?”, but it says nothing about hiring capacity (it leaves that up to reader assumption).The charts are based on collections of BLS data, glassdoor, and other sources of historical data (per the original blog post).Recently, I’ve been working on assessments of CURRENT job listings for a career management/people analytics service. Our most recent micro-study found nearly 10% of current job titles misrepresent the actual job… which we found by collecting job listing data from StackOverflow for the past 6 weeks (roughly 4K listings). My data scientist posted details of his experimental process at http://loveofdatascience.bl….Just as an example, we found a series of jobs titled “Software Developer”, for a university. Reading the description, they were actually hiring people to manage a Cognos web reporting portal…. no coding, no real data work. They were basically analyst jobs, not software development.Too many HR departments use job titles as click-bait. So, unless you can filter the data set to real software jobs, the results are going to be skewed.

  22. Mac

    Thank you, William. It came across as somewhat of a cheap shot but I figured you could cut to the chase. I’m not familiar with this site and was curious how much credibility to give their opinions. I knew you’d be the resident authority to turn to.

    1. William Mougayar

      QZ is a good site, but now everybody is writing about blockchains, and the quality of investigative journalism is thin.

  23. Jess Bachman

    Do tell of the glitz in this place you call Bloomsburg.

  24. PhilipSugar

    I hire out of Bloomberg. The best one I ever knew graduated from there

  25. LE

    Just a few minutes ago the shoe shine boy [1] told me he was learning to program python as well. What a coincidence.[1] He lives in Berlin NJ, it’s like Marlton but w/o the glitz.

  26. LE

    As well as companies that service those gov contract companies.

  27. sigmaalgebra

    Yes, I started my career doing relatively advanced technical work in that area line of business. At one time my office was in a nice office building near the end of Key Bridge on the VA side. I always lived in MD, Gaithersburg, Bethesda, and Laurel.At one time, my annual salary was six times what a new, high end Camaro cost and a little over four times what I’d started with a few years before.I should have stayed there!In nearly all of the US, the rest of applications software is nowhere NEAR as technical as the more technical software within 100 miles of the Washington Monument. Essentially all other applications software are silly, trivial, baby talk in comparison.My wife and I were having good times. We were living really well and saving money rapidly. So, lots of times, get a nice box of fancy French pastries, some chilled Asti Spumanti, some of our nice tulip Champagne classes, some pretty dessert plates from a wedding gift, a nice picnic basket, and head for a concert at Wolf Trap Farm Park! Fourth celebration at the Washington Monument with ashes from the fireworks falling on us! Lots of nice concerts at the Kennedy Center. My wife liked the theater performances. Good tables at several of the best restaurants, French and Italian. Samples from, let’s see, the Haut Medoc, Pommard, Beaune, Corton, Chambertin, and more! Lots of soft cheese, mostly from France. Once I got a case of a really nice Macon Chardonnay — poached a lot of scallops! And went to a lot of family style seafood restaurants, pigged out on fish, scallops, shrimp, french fried, coleslaw, beer! There was a place by a guy who served world-class outrageous sandwiches — IIRC, Roy’s Place. And there was a Chinese place, beyond belief, never saw anything comparable since. It had opened in 1947 by apparently some really good Chinese cooks who ran away from the wars. Sometimes saw some of the big TV anchors there. Then, the museums on the Mall. Sometimes sat in on hearings in Congress.I was taking in applied math out of a fire hose. Good times.I should have stayed there, e.g., not come to NYS.

  28. creative group

    Josh Habdas:Has the engineer definition evolved over the years or is it similar to Motorola, Intel, United Technologies and Honeywell designating valued employees as Engineers without formal University training? (A question)——————Simple Definition of engineer. : a person who has scientific training and who designs and builds complicated products, machines, systems, or structures : a person who specializes in a branch of engineering. : a person who runs or is in charge of an engine in an airplane, a ship, etc.——————–

  29. creative group

    Josh Habdas:Elance was our go to for developing websites, coding issues, etc.

  30. Lawrence Brass

    Delicious description, now I am hungry.I visited Washington DC for the first time autumn last year, it is a beautiful city and a pleasure to walk. We had such a good time that we decided to extend our stay for a week.At a museum, I saw a giant monkey paw knot in a room. It was amazing for me that I could recognize the knot. I had read about it in JLMs blog and, as the post had an image, I could recognize it.I would like to visit again to see the places I missed.Have you thought about going back?

  31. sigmaalgebra

    Jessica at YCombinator now has up an interview about startups. Her main advice is in one word — focus. That’s what I should do. So, for ‘cation at DC, that is not part of such focus!If my startup works and there is time for a ‘cation, then, sure, take a road trip! Of course, most people would say that when a startup is working, there will be zero time for ‘cation!For my startup, I’m not 100% sure that will be true: My production code is supposed just to run without my doing anything. Or, maybe about the time my server farm gets up to 10 servers or so, just move all the software and data to Amazon or some such cloud provider, get it all nice and smooth, get to where I could monitor the thing with just a laptop, and go on ‘cation with the laptop, a backup laptop, lots of batteries, etc.Then for ‘cation, where to go? DC would be one alternative. Working there again, not such a good idea: As good as DC was for me for some years, actually it is better outside of DC if, and that is the huge IF, if have a successful startup. Writing applied math software for the US DoD, NASA, etc. around DC was a nice living early in my career, but won’t get rich. My startup, if it works at all well, will give me a lifestyle business with a nice lifestyle at least. Basically if the common man in the street likes my startup, then I’ll get nicely rich. Why? Because my startup solves nicely a problem currently solved at best poorly, a problem regarded as important enough for maybe an hour a week at my Web site by nearly everyone in the world with Internet access. I can do some quite different and especially good ad targeting. Might have my Web pages with a single pixel JPG from each of Facebook, Linkedin, etc. that is, a way for them to place a cookie on the computer of each of my users and do some user tracking and, thus, ad targeting and pay me for their pixels.Whatever, if the startup works, I get the server farm all smooth, maybe in the cloud, etc., then I should have both the time and the money for ‘cation. So, maybe go for DC. But also, maybe more, I’d like to go for the US NE. I could go to the little town a little south of Buffalo where Dad grew up. I could rest for a couple of days at a nice place in the Finger Lakes. I could look at the mountains in New Hampshire. I could go to Boston for its orchestra, food, MIT, and Harvard — maybe some lectures on mathematical physics. I could be talked into crossing the border into Canada. And I could be shopping for a patch of real estate — lots of trees, some elevation for a nice view, an architect, and a builder. So, get a nice house, modern on the inside but with traditional US NE architecture on the outside. E.g., get a nice cherry spiral staircase!For now, just do the obvious, routine stuff to take my existing software live.Nonsense for today: My development computer will no longer send simple flat ASCII async to my old daisy wheel printer I use to address envelopes. Need to see why, do more checking of the cable, just standard telephone wire, I built years ago — I ran it under the carpet and walked on it so may have broken the wires or insulation inside. So, get out my volt-ohm meter and do continuity testing.Apparently one common reason for ‘cations and traveling is getting away from daily reality. I’m not big on doing that! I’m trying to make my reality better, but I’m not trying to get away from it.