I don't think that there is a shortage in skilled IT Professionals. It is true that the companies always repeat it, but when you are really applying for a job you will see the reality...

I fixed this for you..

This is everyones nightmare and why I support the quotas in CH and Europe, cheap labour imports are destroying IT especially and unfortunately you get what you pay for.

Shame management don't see this.

Yeah I heard there was a shortage before I came here.. now I am here and thus far (been looking about a month) barely even a response to my many job applications (IT, databases to be exact) despite over a dozen relevant years experience. Its seems there may be a shortage in Zurich as I have had people ask me if I would relocate to Zurich but not much of anything in Geneve/Lausanne area. Plenty of recruiting agencies wanting your CV so they can get a piece of the pie but very little real jobs or responses to applications yet.

I'm not saying it to brag but I had a decent list of companies trying to hire me in the USA when I wasn't looking for a job or applying or anything. So either the job market is not so rosy in Geneve for IT right now or there is a strong anti-non-eu prejudice (or both). Honestly I think its because the job market for my skills is not so hot right now as back in August (when I was first entertaining the idea of moving here to follow my wife's job) at least I was getting a call back when replying to adverts. And I don't have my nationality on my CV but my B permit is at the top (people always know when looking at the job history where I am from). I'm sure there are some that saw non-EU and threw out my CV (one told me so) but mostly there is not strong demand right now.

That's the difference between America and the EU. Labour mobility is a lot easier in the States then in the EU. This is due to having a common language and a currency union. Even though EU has free labour movement, it's much easier for someone to move and settle from one State to another, then for an Eu-er to move from one country to another.

had a chat with a senior IT mgr at a large global co with huge presence in CH. As they are now focusing on expanding in the BRIC countries they are working hard on re-alligning their costs in order to compete in those markets. Same company had some bad press recently due to some well publicized layoffs. Based on some additional comments I heard from him it is clear that quite a few people lost their jobs and were replaced by some at lower salaries. It is becoming quite a trend here and I think it is safe to say that salaries offered 2,3 or even 4 years ago are a thing of the past.

Even without local hires etc they are destroying the market due to outsourcing (at least in the US - I am not in the labor market here yet to see if companies here are outsourcing).

In all my years of working (15 or so) I have yet to see a SINGLE outsourced IT development project to a "cheap IT market" such as india or china that was a success. Always the manager(s) tout it as a huge cost saving success and quickly gets promoted to another area or leaves to climb the ladder at another company before all the crap happens with unsupportable poor buggy code that is not what the end customer wanted. Which then to save face management sweeps it under the rug only to hire yet another exec who does something similar. I have seen this time and time again and its frankly sickening. You'd think companies would wake up by now. Same with governments - they don't get tax income etc from outsourcing and their citizens lose jobs so you'd think countries would have heavy taxes on outsourcing (but then the big companies are the ones donating to campaign funds so you'll never see that).

Companies are always trying to impress their shareholders, justify the giant exec paychecks etc. There are only 2 ways to do that, increase income/sales or cut costs. With the global economy right now its very hard to increase sales/revenue... but with high unemployment in many countries the cut cost carrot on a stick seems easy. That might be very shortsighted for companies to do since they may lose high quality workers but that seems to be the nature of most companies since they don't look long term.

I wonder what is going to happen, the salaries I have heard talked about for my skill set here are only the same as I was making in the US... and my rent is double for a place that is around half the size. Its interesting to think what will happen if this continues (wages dropping and housing same or increasing). Wages, for non-execs, dropping in the first world nations has been the norm for last 5 yrs but most places the housing followed suit (but lagged by a few years). Hard to see that happening here with all the demand for housing but people thought the same in california as they had high demand for housing.

what is happening already is that there are fewer jobs existing/or being created for way too many available and skilled workers. Wages will continue to drop, unemployment will rise and as result pretty much everyone will need to live with earning less. IT or overall technology unfortunately is to blame as it makes a lot of jobs obsolete or enables someone in dev country to do your job for a fraction of your salary...future does not look promising..just wait for the oil to really start hitting new heights..its gonna be a hard ride..

Interesting discussion Jaro.. So basically while everyone cheers about "developing nations" in reality its not in a vacuum, in order for their economies to improve it has to come from somewhere because they need copper, oil, etc to "develop" (thus raising prices) and part of their development creates a workforce that wants to do your job for less. Not saying its right or wrong its just what is happening everywhere. Add on top of that we have the countries with financial problems like Greece (and many more countries which have budgets bigger than their income since their tax revenue is declining in light of lower wages etc). Its definitely going to be a hard bumpy ride. Its very interesting to think about whats going to happen from here - too bad it affects our lives so much or it would be quite entertaining. Good news is I think it effects switzerland less than most other nations.

CH is not going to be immune to the overall decrease in standards of living...EU and US will continue to put pressure on banking secrecy, demand tax info etc and Europe as well as rest of Western World will stagnate while BRIC countries boom..to compete European companies will set up shops in lower cost countries and push wages downward in the home countries..taxes will rise to support all these failing economies and unemployed...CH is no longer what it was in the past and will increasingly fall in line with the rest of Europe etc..that's just how I see it

do you work at the Tagesanzeiger by any chance? They recycle similar viewpoints to yours almost every week.