Hiring Demand for Software Engineers

Computer Application Software Engineers are a highly demanded tech job. At the time of writing, about 6,600 US employers are advertising more than 97,000 unique jobs online for this occupation – 26,000 of which have been posted in just the past 30 days. Demand for this occupation during September grew more than 23% from the same month in 2010 and 78% compared to 2009. Since the talent pool for this occupation has not grown at the same pace as hiring demand, Recruiters are facing difficult conditions. The nationwide talent pool consists of about 4 potential candidates per job ad currently online, with many areas facing talent shortages. For example, the talent pools in Seattle, San Francisco, and San Jose are smaller, consisting of about 2 potential candidates in the workforce per opening.

Hiring Scale for Software Engineers in Seattle, WA (Hard-to-Fill)

Source: WANTED Analytics

The Hiring Scale™ shows that the easiest places to recruit Software Engineers are Rochester (MN), La Crosse (WI), Lansing (MI), Wichita (KS), and Jackson (MS). The talent pools in these locations consist of more than 34 potential candidates per job ad. Since demand is lower in comparison to the available candidate supply, these locations can be great sources of hidden talent pools. Recruiters that are able to source and fill positions in these locations are likely to reduce the time-to-fill and cost-per-hire for openings.

We also took a look at average salary ranges for this position in the locations with easy and difficult recruiting conditions. The highest salary range is in San Francisco (which has also seen some of the highest demand) while the lowest range is in La Crosse, WI.

Location	Average Salary Range
National	$91,800 – $106,000
Seattle, WA	$93,600 – $100,000
San Francisco, CA	$110,000 – $124,800
San Jose, CA	$110,000 – $120,000
Rochester, MN	$72,800 – $83,000
La Crosse, WI	$57,200 – $75,000
Lansing, MI	$75,000 – $90,000
Wichita, KS	$73,000 – $95,000
Jackson, MS	$80,000 – $90,000

What hard skills are most demanded for Applications Software Engineers? Below, we list some of the commonly required skills for this occupation, along with the number of jobs being advertised online.

Java – 40,140 job ads
SQL – 31,789 job ads
.NET – 20196 job ads
Linux – 19,988 job ads
XML – 17,877 job ads
Unix – 15,874 job ads
Perl – 11,378 job ads
CSS – 9,804 job ads
ASP.NET – 7,930 job ads
Ruby – 5,282 job ads

Are there any other software engineering or programming skills that you commonly recruit for?

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