lay offs

[livinincali]

[quote=bearishgurl]
So for those who live in areas with many paid-off homes, it should be some consolation to know that your neighbor who paid off their $45K to $150K mortgage years ago likely did so after a lot of blood, sweat and tears. It was no easier for a homeowner to attempt to pay off $97K at 9-14% than it is to attempt to pay off $417K at 3-4% today, especially when factoring in the lower salaries of previous decades.[/quote]

That would be false. From 1980 to about 1995-2000 there was significant salary growth for you average working person. For example median household income went from 17K in 1980 to 33K in 1990 in san diego. So take a 70K mortgage at 10% in 1980 and the payments is 614/mo or about 40% of your income. That’s a lot initially but 10 years later that 600/mon payments was about 22% of you take home salary. Today there isn’t much expectation for real salary growth and if there were to be the case it’s unlikely rates would remain low.

San Diego may continue to become more unaffordable for the working citizens of the city but only if there’s significant migration of wealthier people into the city.

[Anonymous]

[quote=flu]Well, we will find out this afternoon. I don’t think the bulk of the cuts, if anything major will come from San Diego. I think the bulk of the cuts will come from Bay Area and elsewhere.

They bought like 3 wireless connectivity companies (Atheros, CSR, and I forget some one before Atheros). There’s probably more than one team competing against each other doing the exact same thing. kinda like we were when our company bought 3 LTE companies…. We know how that ended. 🙁

I don’t think this will drastically impact SD housing market per se, since it seems like the SD professional market is now pretty well diversified. Biotech seems to be doing very well at this moment.

A lot of the engineering households that are already able to afford north county (which itself is a problem…affordability), for example, tend to be dual income households to begin with, most likely both professionals (particularly the asian and indian households). So the difference is that a $300-400k/year household goes to about around $200k/year household. There’s probably going to be some people that relocate out (single income households, that also has the bad luck of not being able to find something else), but then there’s still these influx of other buyers (foreign and domestic) that aren’t even tied to Qualcomm or engineering for that matter.

It sucks for the people impacted, but life goes on for everyone else.[/quote]

Are you saying the average Qcom engineer makes 200K per year? Sounds a bit high to me, maybe I need to put in a resume.

Also, why are Indians not considered Asians, even though they come from the continent of Asia?

[Coronita]

[quote]

Are you saying the average Qcom engineer makes 200K per year? Sounds a bit high to me, maybe I need to put in a resume.

Also, why are Indians not considered Asians, even though they come from the continent of Asia?[/quote]

I’m saying that including base+ RSU + bonus, $200k would be about average for someone probably Staff level or higher, which wouldn’t be out of line with what other companies are paying for someone with similar experience in years and work….which is probably also the same sort of extra benefits that QCOM is trying to cut that they just announced….But again, that was before all the cuts.

And I don’t know why Indians and Asians are classified differently, when you fill out the ethnicity bubbles, but it is what it is.

[ltsddd]

15% cut….sounds like Q is in self-preservation mode. In conference call, there’s not much substance as to how it plan to grow. It’s mostly about cost reduction. Doesn’t sound like a solid strategy to right the ship. The reduction in bonuses/RSU for a total of $300 mil is going to hurt.

[Coronita]

[quote=ltsdd]15% cut….sounds like Q is in self-preservation mode. In conference call, there’s not much substance as to how it plan to grow. It’s mostly about cost reduction. Doesn’t sound like a solid strategy to right the ship. The reduction in bonuses/RSU for a total of $300 mil is going to hurt.[/quote]

$300 million reduction of assuming 25000 left, that comes out to be about $12k per person. With taxes, that’s probably an extra $7-8k people won’t see. Not earth shattering. Probably bring Q comp packages closer in line to what other semiconductor company packages are these days.

[The-Shoveler]

I think even Apple’s results indicated the smartphone biz kind of topping out.

What do you do when you cannot continue to grow 15-20% a year?

Same issue with health care (share holders want to see 15-20% growth year after year after year).

What to do.

[Coronita]

[quote=The-Shoveler]I think even Apple’s results indicated the smartphone biz kind of topping out.

What do you do when you cannot continue to grow 15-20% a year?

Same issue with health care (share holders want to see 15-20% growth year after year after year).

What to do.[/quote]

You sell medical MJ 🙂

Hardware is saturating. Software has a way to go….But the problem is, it’s not Q’s core competency (or any semiconductor company for that matter). With the lack of a direction/drive for new technology that drives hardware, all these chip companies are going to be competing on cost, which isn’t going to end well for U.S. companies, imho.

I’m pretty thankful I’ve been given the opportunity to get out…I don’t know how long the new opportunity will last, but I think staying in the semiconductor industry when you are a software guy is an extremely career limiting move. The good old days of software selling hardware are over.

[The-Shoveler]

I think even Microsoft’s Cortana is going to give Apple’s Siri a run for the money (and it’s going to give it away in 10).
I think Siri probably sells half Apples phones LOL.

[bearishgurl]

[quote=livinincali][quote=bearishgurl]
So for those who live in areas with many paid-off homes, it should be some consolation to know that your neighbor who paid off their $45K to $150K mortgage years ago likely did so after a lot of blood, sweat and tears. It was no easier for a homeowner to attempt to pay off $97K at 9-14% than it is to attempt to pay off $417K at 3-4% today, especially when factoring in the lower salaries of previous decades.[/quote]

That would be false. From 1980 to about 1995-2000 there was significant salary growth for you average working person. For example median household income went from 17K in 1980 to 33K in 1990 in san diego. So take a 70K mortgage at 10% in 1980 and the payments is 614/mo or about 40% of your income. That’s a lot initially but 10 years later that 600/mon payments was about 22% of you take home salary. Today there isn’t much expectation for real salary growth and if there were to be the case it’s unlikely rates would remain low.

San Diego may continue to become more unaffordable for the working citizens of the city but only if there’s significant migration of wealthier people into the city.[/quote]

Your calculations are way off and not based upon reality, livinincali. SD County homebuyers putting 10% down and taking out a $70K mortgage in 1980 (for a $77K purchase) faced buying in zip codes that *you* likely would not, sorry to say. I purchased a 2/1/1 (each side) duplex in that same era for just over $73K and it was off 47th Street in SE SD (total <1900 sf). By 1981/82, sub-1000 sf dry-rotted crapshacks in OB were listed from $88K to $97K, while the prevailing fixed mortgage interest rate soared to over 15%!

In 1980, the prevailing fixed mortgage interest rate was 11.78 to 13.15%, NOT 10%, as you posted. 10% fixed-rate mortgages did not prevail until mid-1986. here are the rate changes of that area coinciding with their respective Fed announcements:

1986
Announcement Date/Index Month/ Index Value
13-Jan-87 Dec-86 9.29
12-Dec-86 Nov-86 9.48
12-Nov-86 Oct-86 9.59
14-Oct-86 Sep-86 9.71
11-Sep-86 Aug-86 9.88
11-Aug-86 Jul-86 9.88
11-Jul-86 Jun-86 9.83
11-Jun-86 May-86 9.8
12-May-86 Apr-86 10
10-Apr-86 Mar-86 10.24
12-Mar-86 Feb-86 10.46
10-Feb-86 Jan-86 10.4

1982
Announcement Date/Index Month/ Index Value
12-Jan-83 Dec-82 13.44
14-Dec-82 Nov-82 13.74
13-Nov-82 Oct-82 14.37
13-Oct-82 Sep-82 14.71
13-Sep-82 Aug-82 15.03
12-Aug-82 Jul-82 14.96
13-Jul-82 Jun-82 15.01
11-Jun-82 May-82 15.57
12-May-82 Apr-82 15.39
12-Apr-82 Mar-82 15.07
12-Mar-82 Feb-82 15.22
12-Feb-82 Jan-82 15.37

1981
Announcement Date/Index Month/ Index Value
12-Jan-82 Dec-8 15.53
14-Dec-81 Nov-81 15.8
12-Nov-81 Oct-81 15.47
13-Oct-81 Sep-81 15.38
14-Sep-81 Aug-81 15.03
12-Aug-81 Jul-81 14.77
13-Jul-81 Jun-81 14.4
10-Jun-81 May-81 14.19
12-May-81 Apr-81 13.99
10-Apr-81 Mar-81 13.91
12-Mar-81 Feb-81 13.73
11-Feb-81 Jan-81 13.24

1980
Announcement Date/Index Month/ Index Value

13-Jan-81 Dec-80 13.15
11-Dec-80 Nov-80 12.85
10-Nov-80 Oct-80 12.31
10-Oct-80 Sep-80 12
11-Sep-80 Aug-8 11.89
11-Aug-80 Jul-80 12.23
11-Jul-80 Jun-80 12.88
11-Jun-80 May-80 13.74
21-May-80 Apr-80 13.21
7-May-80 Mar-80 12.56
7-Apr-80 Feb-80 12.3
3-Apr-80 Jan-80 11.78

see: http://www.erate.com/mortgage_rates_history.htm

(scroll down for historical conventional fixed rates)

The devil is in the details …

It doesn’t matter about perceived “wage growth” when determining a (mortgaged) SD homeowner’s accepted present lifestyle. It only matters what their income was at the time they signed up to pay the mortgage note they agreed to take on. I feel that many homeowners today (esp first-timers) take on way too much mortgage debt than is wise for their families because they can’t possibly fathom themselves living in what they perceive as a “starter home” or in a “working-class area” or both, G@d forbid! Yes, these new millennial homeowners may have banked upon (perceived) “wage growth” in SD County at the time of taking out their huge mortgages, which, historically speaking, has not EVER kept up with the rest of the nation’s coastal markets and never will, IMO.

Such was not the case when SD boomers, for example, were buying homes to raise their families in. Part of the reason for this is that boomers did not ever have very much new construction to choose from which wasn’t too far away from SD’s major workcenters of the era and SD County’s freeways were not as wide or numerous as they are today.

Livinincali, what the median household income in SD County today?

[svelte]

[quote=flu]

I’m pretty thankful I’ve been given the opportunity to get out…I don’t know how long the new opportunity will last, but I think staying in the semiconductor industry when you are a software guy is an extremely career limiting move. The good old days of software selling hardware are over.[/quote]

It probably is a smart move to get to a sw-focused company, not a hw focused company.

However, there are still some opportunities in hardware – at least in the Bay Area.

Indications are very very strong that both Apple (mostly a hw company) and Google (mostly a sw company) are posturing themselves to enter the automotive business.

I’m looking forward to it. With the exception of Tesla, it has been a long long time since the US has had a successful new car company come along. And the jury’s still out on whether Tesla will survive.

My son is a car nut and in the bay area – he’s salivating at the opportunities arising all around him up there.

[Coronita]

[quote=svelte][quote=flu]

I’m pretty thankful I’ve been given the opportunity to get out…I don’t know how long the new opportunity will last, but I think staying in the semiconductor industry when you are a software guy is an extremely career limiting move. The good old days of software selling hardware are over.[/quote]

It probably is a smart move to get to a sw-focused company, not a hw focused company.

However, there are still some opportunities in hardware – at least in the Bay Area.

Indications are very very strong that both Apple (mostly a hw company) and Google (mostly a sw company) are posturing themselves to enter the automotive business.

I’m looking forward to it. With the exception of Tesla, it has been a long long time since the US has had a successful new car company come along. And the jury’s still out on whether Tesla will survive.

My son is a car nut and in the bay area – he’s salivating at the opportunities arising all around him up there.[/quote]

I think there’s a huge market for IOT devices and great opportunities for both software and hardware guys/gals. But I think to expect them to come out of a semiconductor company is unrealistic. Chip companies aren’t usually good at coming up with customer end user products. I’m not going to a pure software company. I just don’t want to work in the semiconductor industry anymore, where you’re at the bottom of the food chain in what is given to a customer.

The way it works is you have a customer like a cell provider that screams at at a phone OEM to deliver a phone cheaper and sooner. And then you have the OEM scream at the chip suppliers to deliver things faster and cheaper. Being at the bottom of the food chain, well, sucks.

[flyer]

Over the years we’ve all seen various industries ebb and flow, come and go, so it’s not too surprising to see whats going on at QC.

That, along with the extreme cost of living in most cities that support tech makes life very volatile, and it must be really difficult for families to plan their lives.

I read that many people today may need to plan to change jobs 5-7 times in their lifetime, so that definitely makes it more difficult to get ahead–long term. Hopefully, things will work out well for those who have to make a change.

[an]

[quote=ltsdd]15% cut….sounds like Q is in self-preservation mode. In conference call, there’s not much substance as to how it plan to grow. It’s mostly about cost reduction. Doesn’t sound like a solid strategy to right the ship. The reduction in bonuses/RSU for a total of $300 mil is going to hurt.[/quote]
I called this a year and a half ago when Paul stepped down. Sad that I’m right but not surprising.

[Coronita]

[quote=AN][quote=ltsdd]15% cut….sounds like Q is in self-preservation mode. In conference call, there’s not much substance as to how it plan to grow. It’s mostly about cost reduction. Doesn’t sound like a solid strategy to right the ship. The reduction in bonuses/RSU for a total of $300 mil is going to hurt.[/quote]
I called this a year and a half ago when Paul stepped down. Sad that I’m right but not surprising.[/quote]

I don’t think Q’s problem though are unique to Q. Every chip company in the U.S. is getting squeezed. Q’s fall might just feel like it’s a bigger deal, because up until recent times, Q has been pretty much immune to the pricing pressure from increased competition, and so for the majority of the times that every other chip company was fighting for a piece of the pie, Q breezed through those rough waters. I guess it also has finally caught up Q as it already existed in every other semi company in the U.S.

[dumbrenter]

[quote=deadzone]

Are you saying the average Qcom engineer makes 200K per year? Sounds a bit high to me, maybe I need to put in a resume.

Also, why are Indians not considered Asians, even though they come from the continent of Asia?[/quote]

Cultural reasons. Just because they are physically from the continent of Asia does not mean culturally they are considered Asians (unlike in EU).
A similar example is the word “white”. It has very different connotations in other parts of the world as opposed to here.
Just an example… I would hate for this to go OT from the main topic of this discussion.

[Author]

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