HK IT Market

[3willows]

My wife has a job offer in Hong Kong which we're considering. I'm a java/javascript programmer, U.S. born Chinese, fluent in Mandarin, with 10 years of experience. I don't think it would be hard to get a job, but what's the market like? Is there some place I can find information on the distribution of salaries like:

$60,000+ (735)
$80,000+ (550)
$100,000+ (198)
$120,000+ (97)
$140,000+ (36)

from http://www.indeed.com/jobs?q=java&l=21044

[Boris]

An American job site with estimated US rates of pay would be pretty irrelevant here.

Start here
http://tech.co/3-startups-for-findin...g-kong-2011-09

[Claire ex-ax]

You could look at this:
http://www.ctgoodjobs.hk/english/new...page.asp#graph

Try a few periods.

[jimbo]

An American job site with estimated US rates of pay would be pretty irrelevant here.

Start here
http://tech.co/3-startups-for-findin...g-kong-2011-09

Pretty irrelevant is an understatement

Java programmers are a dime a dozen here though.

[ewankho]

Pretty irrelevant is an understatement

Java programmers are a dime a dozen here though.

And in some companies with China offices you'd be competing with mainland-level salaries.

[100LL]

Expect to be paid peanuts and be begging for a job as java/javascript programmer. You will be competing with a quadrillion of local 'specialists'.

The dilemma is that as employer I actually never met or interviewed a local programmer that was up to the job on an international level (I am not talking very specialized programming, just normal programming). so I had to import programmers and apply visas etc (had to play the language card with the immigration department and pay high salary, provide housing, etc).

I guess networking is everything. Geo is a good place to start. Probably the best would be a western employer or somebody that has to go by western standards.

In worst case you can always let the Mrs. do the work and join a hiking club (you wouldn't be the first, lol)

[mid_gen]

Depends if you are any good really. I was pretty shocked at the standard of candidate when i was hiring last year....have read a few articles saying there is an IT skills shortage here....i would say they are pretty accurate from the experience I've had.

[3willows]

I'm confident that I have the skills and interview well, but I'm just not sure that the market for the skills is there. So 100LL's reply where he said he needs to import programmers is good news to me, but what would reassure me is if there is a lot of this talent importing going on.

Another piece of information that would be useful to me is whether it is common practice for HK companies to outsource their development as opposed to developing in-house with HK island talent. If companies prefer outsourced development, then the market for IT skills is not in HK itself.

From my casual scanning of sites like jobsdb.com, most of the development jobs I see are low-paying, low-responsibility website maintenance jobs. I don't see a lot of either large enterprise software development or small agile team development.

[lazyexpat]

Say for eg with 5 yrs experience you would be looking at around 30-50k HKD
And that is if you can speak Caton and good Eng + very good at what you are doing.

[jimbo]

Programmers are usually outsourced to India with Vendors such as Genpact or Infosys.
The IT contract market here is minimal.