by Tam Harbert Last summer, Michael Vu, a 40-year-old independent IT consultant, found himself in a wholly unexpected place midway through his career. He’d signed a three-week contract to help a major U.S. retailer with an enterprise reporting project. The initial work was so successful that the project was extended. As a consequence, Vu was […]

by Michael Swaine In July, citing a budget shortfall, the Governor of California ordered the salaries of 170,000 State employees to be cut to the Federal minimum wage. Not so fast, said the State Controller. Because California’s payroll systems are written in antiquated Cobol code, it would take six months to implement the change and […]