Ask HN: How's the Paris startup scene? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: How's the Paris startup scene?

#61

Post by baud147258 » Fri, Aug 10, 2018, 3:41 PM UTC

sailingparrot wrote: post #32

sametmax wrote: post #17

Ok, so a lot of people here are comparing the french Startup scene to what it was before. I understand why, but it's misleading. Yes, compared to what it was before, it's booming. But it was ridiculously bad before. However compared to what's happening in the US, it's still lagging. Innovation is alright, however investment and risk taking are nowhere close to the American standard. It's still very meh. The culture o…

> even including social benefits, the salary is 2 to 3 times less Yea... no. Especially if you factor in the cost of life. Edit: Average salary in SF for tech workers is $142k vs $56k in Paris [1]. Once adjusted for cost of living, Paris is roughly 86k$ [1]. Now, you add all the social benefits, like free health care, retirements etc. And if you have/plan on having children, you can add free education as well. All in…

Man, I should really try to get that 13k € raise out of my employer! Just to point that average does not mean that every tech worker get that. And I'd bet that in Paris 56K$ is either very senior pay grade or management.

You can also add, among the benefits, the good network of public transport (even if some lines are overloaded).

Re: Ask HN: How's the Paris startup scene?

#62

Post by sametmax » Fri, Aug 10, 2018, 3:41 PM UTC

Chiminh wrote: post #57

sametmax wrote: post #17

Ok, so a lot of people here are comparing the french Startup scene to what it was before. I understand why, but it's misleading. Yes, compared to what it was before, it's booming. But it was ridiculously bad before. However compared to what's happening in the US, it's still lagging. Innovation is alright, however investment and risk taking are nowhere close to the American standard. It's still very meh. The culture o…

Depending on the preferences Paris can be a pretty poor city or the best city in the world. I clearly fall into the first category. Living 'intramuros' is very expensive when adding the fact that salaries are not on part with major tech hubs. The city is dirty, very polluted (2nd worst area in Europe by air pollution after Moscow - don't have the reference link though), people are rude, and everything so cramped it m…

Agreed. But I'll take Paris over the valley any day.

Re: Ask HN: How's the Paris startup scene?

#63

Post by sametmax » Fri, Aug 10, 2018, 3:42 PM UTC

chrisper wrote: post #56

sametmax wrote: post #17

Ok, so a lot of people here are comparing the french Startup scene to what it was before. I understand why, but it's misleading. Yes, compared to what it was before, it's booming. But it was ridiculously bad before. However compared to what's happening in the US, it's still lagging. Innovation is alright, however investment and risk taking are nowhere close to the American standard. It's still very meh. The culture o…

>but remotely work for an American company How can one find something like this?

You apply to any american job like you are next to them. And once they get interested, you negociate.

You will have a way higher fail rate than usual. But they really, really need good devs, and they are getting more rare and expensive, so some agree.

Re: Ask HN: How's the Paris startup scene?

#64

Post by sailingparrot » Fri, Aug 10, 2018, 3:43 PM UTC

sametmax wrote: post #54

mtremsal wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Rule of thumb is that half the salary amount (e.g. 120k USD to 60k EUR) in Paris will get you about the same or better quality of life as you have in NYC or SF, once you account for differences in how real estate, taxes, healthcare, and retirement work.

I don't know any dev doing 120K USD (105k EURS)__as a salary in Paris. I doubt there are many. If you want to make this figures, you need to be a freelancer, which means no job safety, looking for clients, and paying for social security and requirements yourself. French salaries for dev are in the 30k to 70k depending of your level. 70k is rare. You need to be good. To be able to negotiate or have a rare skill. Howev…

No, he is saying that if you make 120k USD in SF, you can have the same quality of life with 60k euros in Paris, not that 120k$ == 60k euros.

Re: Ask HN: How's the Paris startup scene?

#65

Post by ousta » Fri, Aug 10, 2018, 3:44 PM UTC

Chiminh wrote: post #57

sametmax wrote: post #17

Ok, so a lot of people here are comparing the french Startup scene to what it was before. I understand why, but it's misleading. Yes, compared to what it was before, it's booming. But it was ridiculously bad before. However compared to what's happening in the US, it's still lagging. Innovation is alright, however investment and risk taking are nowhere close to the American standard. It's still very meh. The culture o…

Depending on the preferences Paris can be a pretty poor city or the best city in the world. I clearly fall into the first category. Living 'intramuros' is very expensive when adding the fact that salaries are not on part with major tech hubs. The city is dirty, very polluted (2nd worst area in Europe by air pollution after Moscow - don't have the reference link though), people are rude, and everything so cramped it m…

Please give me any example of a major world city where living 'intramuros' is cheap lol....

Salaries are on part with major tech hubs (NYC OR SF are WAY MORE EXPENSIVE than paris and salaries match at the end)

Paris is the 15th most polluted city in europe and not the 2nd...

"People are rude" - is a generalization and racism toward parisians. plus if you feel like everyone is rude start asking yourself some questions man....

Plus in terms of dirty you never lived in SF or NEW York or any part of China I guess.

Re: Ask HN: How's the Paris startup scene?

#66

Post by cassandrajam » Fri, Aug 10, 2018, 3:44 PM UTC

nrjames wrote: post #11

cassandrajam wrote: post #4

Hi, French here but I don't know much about the Paris scene, more the Lyon scene but they're probably close. Regarding the French language: you don't need to be good at it. Just learn enough of it so you can show the locals you tried, and soon they'll be ok speaking to you in English. All coding languages are English-based so everybody knows enough to work efficiently with non French-speaking people. Like the other u…

I know this is unrelated, but I thought you might be interested. It's an Arabic programming language, by Ramsey Nasser: http://nas.sr/%D9%82%D9%84%D8%A8/

Indeed it's pretty cool. Thanks :)

Re: Ask HN: How's the Paris startup scene?

#67

Post by sametmax » Fri, Aug 10, 2018, 3:44 PM UTC

sailingparrot wrote: post #49

sametmax wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

French working for an American company. Yes.

Yea sure, and a French working for a Dubai-based company would make 5 times more, but that's not really representative of the average case is it?

30% of the french salary goes to social security and retirements.

American salaries are 2 to 3 times higher.

The cost of life is NOT twice higher.

Do the math.

Also remember we are talking about tech. Not all salaries.

Re: Ask HN: How's the Paris startup scene?

#68

Post by Jonas_ba » Fri, Aug 10, 2018, 3:45 PM UTC

ousta wrote: post #59

Jonas_ba wrote: post #58

Expat who moved to Paris here. The tech scene is definitely very active, lots of events and meetups to join and some very active companies with good products around as well as active VC's in the city. Add Station F and The Family and you got a nice place to start a company. Salary wise, I guess you are looking at 40-70k range, depending on experience and role. The part where Paris is not that great is moving into the…

please give me one example of a major city where renting an apartment as a foreigner is not a nightmare lol.. in USA you need a credit score....

I guess any other city than US. I'm fine with paying up front for multiple months, but I was asked multiple times to provide details of my salary for the last 3 months, working for the company that employs me, a FR guarantor (which not coming from France is not that easy to find, I was lucky my company helped me here) + your salary needs to be 3x rent and there's about 20 people looking to move in to every apartment 1h after it's posted on any apartment board.

Re: Ask HN: How's the Paris startup scene?

#69

Post by baud147258 » Fri, Aug 10, 2018, 3:45 PM UTC

Dannymetconan wrote: post #19

kjullien wrote: post #13

I live in Paris, am french, and have been working at the same startup for more than a year and some months now. The scene is very active, any new company these days will always brand themselves as a "startup" no matter how they function behind the scenes. So alot of "false advertising" when you postulate, "we're cool and all, we SOMETIMES allow a day of remote work a week" and typical bs like that. Your french will n…

Just a comment but 30k for 2 years full experience seems low. I'm working in another European capital and I'm at 40k for a similar full-stack dev role.

It's low for Paris too. I'm doing mostly back-end, at 2 full years of experience (discounting internship, though) and I'm at 36k€.

Re: Ask HN: How's the Paris startup scene?

#70

Post by sailingparrot » Fri, Aug 10, 2018, 3:45 PM UTC

baud147258 wrote: post #61

sailingparrot wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> even including social benefits, the salary is 2 to 3 times less Yea... no. Especially if you factor in the cost of life. Edit: Average salary in SF for tech workers is $142k vs $56k in Paris [1]. Once adjusted for cost of living, Paris is roughly 86k$ [1]. Now, you add all the social benefits, like free health care, retirements etc. And if you have/plan on having children, you can add free education as well. All in…

Man, I should really try to get that 13k € raise out of my employer! Just to point that average does not mean that every tech worker get that. And I'd bet that in Paris 56K$ is either very senior pay grade or management. You can also add, among the benefits, the good network of public transport (even if some lines are overloaded).

> Just to point that average does not mean that every tech worker get that.

Well, no. That's the point of having an average.

Would be good to have stats for median salary as well