This problem is not restricted to US projects. I recently was contacted for an Austrian banking project with specific mainframe skills plus agile experience (SCRUM master) plus JAVA development. This skill set is rare - the recruiting firm offered EUR 60/hour. This is ridiculous - on the other hand this bank's software keeps crashing very often. So they will have cheap people, but not the necessary skills.
And I agree, most - but not all - recruiters have no clue what they are talking about. IBM does not really help to keep the mainframe business - instead of promoting the stability of mission critical infrastructure, everything is AI. It is good to have at least some people who know what they are doing, instead of having to ask ChatGPT for every task. Regards Mike -----Ursprüngliche Nachricht----- Von: IBM Mainframe Discussion List <[email protected]> Im Auftrag von Steve Thompson Gesendet: Donnerstag, 5. Februar 2026 17:55 An: [email protected] Betreff: Re: Cross Posted Before anyone starts arguments on supply and demand and capitalism, free market and the like, (again) understand this: What Steve and I and others like us are running into is a large number of recruiter/ing firms who are all trying to get the same contracts. So to get the account, they quote low. Then on DICE, INDEED, Monster and the others (some of these are being bought and merged), but the end effect is offering rates that are below what we were making about 1990 and that is NOT adjusted for inflation. Add to this that the majority of the people contacting me do not know how JES2 or JES3 is pronounced. They don't know most of the acronyms we use in the industry. They can't read a tech based resume to understand that one is not a sysprog, but is a software developer. Just wanted to get us on a level playing field before the noise starts. -- Regards, Steve Thompson On 2/5/2026 10:43 AM, Steve Beaver wrote: > For the US people, I have been beat to death looking for zOS DB2 Systems > DBA’s and people that know ACF2, RACF, and TSS > > These skills are RARE. Doing my research Recruiters at offering $60 per hour > where the honest labor rate should be $150 per hour or higher > > My suggestion is that if you have any of these skills. Tell the Recruiter > $150/Hr or go away > > As a data point. They pay you $60 per hour and they charge the customer $150 > per hour > > > > Sent from my iPhone > > No one said I could type with one thumb > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- > For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, > send email to [email protected] with the message: INFO IBM-MAIN ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to [email protected] with the message: INFO IBM-MAIN ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to [email protected] with the message: INFO IBM-MAIN
