Ask HN: Typical Startup or Abuse?

ABUSE. Here's how it works in a /real/ startup (I know, because I just went through this):

At hire, I ask founder "what do you think your exit looks like?" He puts it in terms of equity meaning for employees, "I am aiming for at least enough for each employee to purchase a nice home in this area."

A month after hire, at the first scheduled board meeting, I am granted options worth 0.5% of equity in the company, vesting over 4 years (I'm around the 12th employee). I am paid a salary commensurate with the rest of the industry in the area, as well as given full health coverage.

After about 2 years, the company is sold, making my 0.5% worth almost exactly what he said it would be worth, enough to purchase a nice home with cash outright.

Your founder is exploiting you. Don't dawdle dealing with this until you are no longer essential. You should lay it out for him, exactly as-is: you get your equity grant and a pay raise immediately, or you are walking.

Keep in mind, your founder might be trying to exploit you another way, too: he may not be planning an exit at all, or for a very long time. Meaning, equity is worthless (as long as he retains ownership). If he's making a lifestyle business out of this, equity is a big 0. Don't let him grant you equity but keep your wages at stupid levels.

I'm not an expert in your local area, so I won't try to advise you on specific rates. However, your point about time and experience is entirely reasonable: the job you have been doing, apparently quite successfully, sounds like a technical team lead. That is probably about the same as "Senior Software Engineer" in the pay stakes at most businesses, if they're big enough to distinguish the roles.

One other point that I haven't seen mentioned is that you don't have to try to fix your entire career in a single jump. There is nothing wrong with taking a respectable job at a respectable pay rate with a decent company as a first step, even if it's not immediately at the level of responsibility you were on before. You'll still get a lot more money and better working conditions. If it's a decent company they'll see your potential and grow your career rapidly anyway. Crucially, you'll also have another group of coworkers to ask for references down the line, if you do decide to move on again in a year or two rather than move up in wherever you go at this point. Don't assume you have to try to jump from an awkward position right up to the manager at Google/Facebook that someone else mentioned all in one go: you probably won't make it, and you'll be ruling out a lot of potentially useful opportunities.

You sure about that 35k? In any region I've ever lived in (midwest, southwest, bay area), entry is more like twice that.

You need to have a new job. In so many ways. I got a sysadmin "internship" right out of college with a studio art degree (painting) and was make $3K a month. And for a company that I feel is extremely exploitative of its workers. I completely agree with everyone. You can feel completely entitled to making 4-5 times what you are, salaried with benefits. Also, your boss is obviously just an ass. Only someone on the megalomaniac end of the personality spectrum would be calling you to task for showing up a few minutes "late", especially when you are a contract worker.

Just a thought, but have you considered that in your freelancing you might be aiming at the wrong market?

You say that people expect to pay $200-500 for a web site, and I'm sure a lot of places do, but that's the same everywhere. Some places want a cheap site that a college student could do or that they can outsource to someone they'll never meet in a low-paying country. Naturally, the quality of what they receive will usually reflect the price.

On the other hand, you seem like a diligent person and you seem to have some real skills in this area. You might want to consider aiming at the higher end of the spectrum, businesses who see a web site as a serious investment, and will pay accordingly for someone who is going to do the professional job that a typical kid won't. Look for the projects within reach of one person (give or take outsourcing any areas where your expertise is lacking) over a few months, and with the five- or six-figure price tags.

You don't need a lot more hours or a large team to take on these medium-weight jobs, but you do need a professional approach as well as the technical chops, and awareness that web development involves things like usability, accessibility, branding, etc. as well as just hacking on HTML. It sounds like that's exactly the sort of wider awareness and business-like approach that you have, but you'll never make the most of it picking up jobs for peanuts.