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Comment by aidenn0 | Hacker News Reader

I graduated from the College of Science. Since that time there has been a huge increase in software openings in the Midwest.

I was looking at software jobs, with a preference for embedded. At the time there were very low paying jobs in the Fort Wayne area and some startups in Indy.

Now Cincinnati is booming, with Indianapolis falling not too far behind. Big 10 wise, Madison and Ann Arbor both seem to have more of a tech hub than Lafayette. The company I currently work for recruits fairly heavily from Illinois and Rose Hulman. I can track down some recent grads if you want recent midwest job-hunt info.

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I think that Indianapolis' job market is much stronger than Cincinnati's is, right now, at least in the DevOps/Linux Tech space.

Most companies around the Cincinnati area don't want to pay more than 80k/year for a good, mid-to-senior linux resource (15+ years). In Indianapolis, I've had a job offers come in at 130, 140, 150, and 180K, but, I'm very hesitant to relocate to Indy because of the RFRA legislation that's in town.

I'm a Linux Sysadmin in the Indy area. I feel like Linux is growing up in the Indy area. Dev-ops positions are paying more, but there are still alot of older style Unix-to-Linux positions at more established manufacturing-centric companies. They don't pay well at all, and they tend to have much older technology, maybe 3 to 5 years behind what you see on the coasts.

When I looked last year it seemed like the midwest was mostly behind the coasts and Denver / Austin were maybe a year or two behind. When I say that, I mean that many of these midwest companies are running old RH 5/6, little cloud, operator style system admin. You have to manage your career to make sure you don't get stuck somewhere that lets your tech skills atrophy.

From talking with my friends the developer compensation and job availability is reversed from that (but not a 2x factor in pay difference; that's crazy!). Also, DBAs seem to do well everywhere in the Midwest (The only person I know who is doing really well in the KS/MO area is a DBA).

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