Location might be useful information. I'm assuming most of the folks responding here are in Seattle. If so, all the salaries listed in this thread seem shockingly low to me.
Ask HN: How much do you make at Amazon? Here is how much I make at Amazon
21–30 of 717 posts
Re: Ask HN: How much do you make at Amazon? Here is how much I make at Amazon
#22Ex amazonian here, but in Ireland, I left (thankfully) at the end of 2015.
I was a systems engineer in Dublin and the only significant payraise I got was after I left the company for 4 months to then rejoin, my salary was bumped up 12k euros, for a total of 62k/yr, with 150 shares over 4 years (sorry I do not remember the vesting scheme).
The HR department in AMZN has the tendency to screw internal employees upon promotion. The way it was unofficially explained to me by a low-level buddy in HR is that there are salary ranges for each corporate level, and during a promotion you get just over the lower bound of the salary range for your new corp level, that's the policy, that's what happens.
New hires instead have negotiation margin and, while the hiring manager can't offer a salary higher than the approved salary range, more often than not the offer will end up in the upper bound of the range, to lure the candidate in.
Furthermore, there are huge differences between salary ranges in job roles, a Systems Engineer will always be paid 15 to 30% less than a Software Development Engineer at the same level, despite the fact that the skills and duties are not that much different, why? Again unofficially "because Amazon values more people that write software". Except the fact that in my ex-team, we all wrote software and the expectations were all the same regardless the job title (there was however a difference between levels).
So yeah, as internal promotion you have absolutely NO leverage regarding salary, if you want a salary increase and your organization is hungry for people but is having trouble in hiring (like it happens frequently in Dublin where the job market is quite competitive), I'd suggest you start looking around for a new job, accept the offer and then come back to your same team 4 months later. If you leave the company for less than 6 months and your position hasn't been filled in the meantime, the hiring manager is able to extend an offer without sending you through an interview loop, you'll get your old job back but with a nice pile of money on top.
Re: Ask HN: How much do you make at Amazon? Here is how much I make at Amazon
#23You gave enough information that they could find you without using any links in your profile or your online handle.
Another thing that could be interesting is your accent. My eyes were recently opened about the discrimination that happens based on that.
Re: Ask HN: How much do you make at Amazon? Here is how much I make at Amazon
#24I worked for Amazon (Audible.com) from 2011 to 2014. 1 - Full-time freelance audiobook editor. $30/hr 2 - Post-Production Associate - Level 6/4 $50,000/yr 35 shares of AMZN per year for three years 3 - ACX Production Coordinator - Level 7/5 $65,000/yr Additional 20 shares of AMZN per year for three years I am no longer ashamed to write these figures out to the public because I now make more than twice the salary that…
Full-time freelance audiobook editor? I didn't realize that was a position. What exactly does this entail and how did you get started with it?
I got my education in audio engineering at a leading music conservatory, so moving into audiobook editing was a pretty easy sell for me.
An audiobook is made in four basic steps:
1. A voice actor records the narration for the book.
2. The editor takes the raw audio recordings and edits these files for pacing, flow, and aesthetic flavor. The editor also makes note of any errors in the narration which require a re-record.
3. After making all re-records and inserting the new audio, the audio is listened through one more time. They call this a "QC pass."
4. Finally, the QC'd audio is mastered and encoded for delivery.
I was the owner of step two for all Audible Studios productions.
Re: Ask HN: How much do you make at Amazon? Here is how much I make at Amazon
#25I hope this takes off. I always thought it was weird hiding how much you make -- this only helps employers, and not employees.
I am not sure whether keeping salaries confidential is good for the employer, employee, neither, or both, but you are stating what appears to be the most common belief. Different people have different preferences, and some managers probably have mistaken beliefs about what is good for them and their employees.
It seems to be simple economics and negotiation tactics to me. Backed up by the fact that it's such a taboo subject among coworkers, almost always for reasons of 'don't want to rock the boat' and 'don't want to get fired'.
From a negotiation standpoint, the employer (generally) wants to hire, or give raises to, the employee at the lowest possible total cost. Whereas the employee (generally) want to be hired, or get a raise, at the highest possible total cost. Where the cost analysis may not be the same for each side.
Now assume that that all other things being equal, and no information about salary rates are known, the employer's range for salary is $80-$100k, and the employee's range for salary is $70k-$90k. In this situation, the employer would love to hire at $70k, which they may be able to do if the employee doesn't know any better. Now, imagine that the employee had information about the employer's salary range, then the employee would smartly shift their salary range knowing that the employee was 'low'.
The same applies to raises. If an employee has no information about other coworker's salaries, then the 'standard' raise of 3-4% might be acceptable. However, if another coworker has a significantly higher salary, with similar responsibilities, then the employee may ask for a higher raise. They may or may not get that raise, but it's at least a possibility. One which the employer is likely to not want to have the employee know about.
The worst case scenario for the employee is to find out they are making significantly more money than their coworkers, in which case they have no further bargaining power.
So really, the question of whether or not it's a good idea to share salary information to other current or future coworkers comes down to whether or not you're on the 'employer' side (where additional salary information can only move your costs upwards), or on the 'employee' side where having no transparency about salary can prevent you from getting the best salary possible.
Since the difference between having salary transparency or not is so high, it behooves most employers to subtly discourage salary talks. So you end in a place where it is a possibly a violation of federal law (for the federal government), or possibly state law[0], to prevent people from talking about salaries, but at the same time people will almost always only post their salary information anonymously.
Re: Ask HN: How much do you make at Amazon? Here is how much I make at Amazon
#26Position: Senior SDE
Tenure: 6 years
Job Level: 6
Base Pay: $141,000
2016 Stock Vest: 162 shares
Review Score: Exceeds
Gender: F
Native English Speaker: Yes
Re: Ask HN: How much do you make at Amazon? Here is how much I make at Amazon
#27While this doesn't have as much information as you listed, Glass Door ( https://www.glassdoor.com/Salaries/index.htm ) has information on job title/salaries at many companies. It's a "share your info and we'll let you see ours" set of rules, so be prepared to make a profile.
Funny that you mention this, because the character limit forced me to cut this out: Sites like Glassdoor are useful, but what they don't provide is company-specific detail. I can view Amazon's average SDE salary, but is that figure for a job level 4 or job level 5? (At Amazon, pay is based on job levels. Two people can hold the same position but have different job levels. For example, Area Managers who are promoted f…
While it doesn't help for all of that, looking at H1B data on a site like http://visadoor.com/ helps fill out some of the picture. You can see specific numbers instead of just ranges while also adding some context about national origin.
Re: Ask HN: How much do you make at Amazon? Here is how much I make at Amazon
#28I worked for Amazon (Audible.com) from 2011 to 2014. 1 - Full-time freelance audiobook editor. $30/hr 2 - Post-Production Associate - Level 6/4 $50,000/yr 35 shares of AMZN per year for three years 3 - ACX Production Coordinator - Level 7/5 $65,000/yr Additional 20 shares of AMZN per year for three years I am no longer ashamed to write these figures out to the public because I now make more than twice the salary that…
> I am no longer ashamed to write these figures out to the public because I now make more than twice the salary that I was making before I left the company.
You should be ashamed for thinking that money is this fucking important.
Re: Ask HN: How much do you make at Amazon? Here is how much I make at Amazon
#29I hope this takes off. I always thought it was weird hiding how much you make -- this only helps employers, and not employees.
I am not sure whether keeping salaries confidential is good for the employer, employee, neither, or both, but you are stating what appears to be the most common belief. Different people have different preferences, and some managers probably have mistaken beliefs about what is good for them and their employees.
One mechanism by which it's good for the employer is information asymmetry. The employer knows all of the employees' salaries, but the employee does not have this information.
Re: Ask HN: How much do you make at Amazon? Here is how much I make at Amazon
#30Position: SDE 2
Joined: Last year
Base Pay: 145,000
Native English Speaker: Yes