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Is developer compensation becoming bimodal?

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Re: Is developer compensation becoming bimodal?

#261

Post by projektir »

morgante wrote: post #56
stdbrouw wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think the conclusion follows from the data. It's not implausible that in computer science you need to "get" a whole bunch of things before it clicks and you start being productive, and a bimodal distribution of grades would then be indicative only of people who are further along in the learning process vs. those that have not yet reached that critical point, rather than any huge difference in intrinsic abilit…

It also requires the right kinds of insights. I know plenty of people who somehow manage to make it all the way through an undergrad degree without ever really getting programming. They then managed to get a low-skill job at a low-caliber employer, where they produce bad code, poorly. But because even bad employers need code these days, they manage to maintain a job in programming despite never really understanding i…

You provided neither evidence nor argumentation for your claims, though...?

Re: Is developer compensation becoming bimodal?

#262

Post by tboyd47 »

collyw wrote: post #252
city41 wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But isn't OmniCorp married to their devs too? Those devs probably took a while to get up to speed on the proprietary stack, and outside devs would have a ramp up time. Not to mention outside devs would be hesitant to take the job seeing as they'd get stuck learning proprietary technology making them less mobile.

Tech is a vast field. We are having trouble finding a Django developer where we are. Project managers decision to hire based on this, my opinion is we should look for a good all rounder, as Django knowledge only makes up around 25% of the knowledge that is needed. Someone that knows HTML, some JavaScript, any other framework , how to set up remote servers and use a database effectively. If your only skill is Omnicore…

Yep, and having that wide exposure to industry-wide technologies is a big factor in programmers being so marketable to other companies, I'm sure.

Re: Is developer compensation becoming bimodal?

#263

Post by Eridrus »

morgante wrote: post #66
pmorici wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

$80k in Kansas City and $150k in San Francisco is exactly the same amount of money after accounting for differences in the cost of living. https://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=$80000+salary+Kansas+C...

I hate these reductive COL adjustments. They're preposterous. Even if you assume that all your expenses are linearly multiplied (hint: Amazon costs the same no matter where you live), your savings are a lot more afterwards. If you were living on $40k/yr in Kansas City, you could move to SF and suddenly be saving $80k/yr. Would you really rather have $600k in Kansas City than $1 million in SF?

I agree that these comparisons are highly reductive, but one should also consider taxes.

150k is much less after taxes.

Re: Is developer compensation becoming bimodal?

#264

Post by pbecotte »

crispyambulance wrote: post #14
dkopi wrote: post #3

The most important thing to remember about developer compensation, especially when comparing to more "traditional" roles, is scale. A programmer working at a large internet company may be impacting millions upon millions of people. Building a feature that lets you collect (or save) a penny from a user every month is worth $240K a year when spread out over 2 million users. $120M when spread out over 1 billion users. T…

Scale is not the most important factor. It really is about supply and demand. If employers could get away with paying their developers 30K a year, they would (... and they do whenever possible). The actual scale of the work certainly informs the compensation, like it might for other jobs like journalists for example, but that is only part of the story. If you need developers, you simply gotta pay them salaries the ar…

Scale IS the most important factor, because it controls the "demand" side of "supply and demand". So long as hiring someone makes the company more than they cost, the company will be willing to pay that price. Because software is so well leveraged in creating profits, it means there are nearly infinite spots where companies could make a profit by hiring a developer at current rates. The rates will continue to rise, and the supply will continue to increase, until it has hit equilibrium.

Re: Is developer compensation becoming bimodal?

#265

Post by jstelly »

drpgq wrote: post #176
gvb wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been programming for nearly 40 years. Based on my interactions with others, programming is an intrinsic ability. People that don't have that intrinsic ability can cut'n'paste their way through simple programs, but really struggle to understand what they are doing and why their program works (or not). Anecdata: My high school got access to a computer (dialup modem). I essentially taught myself programming and the…

Isn't intrinsic ability just g in the end?

That's an interesting question. Programming is definitely a skill so study and practice certainly matter. But it's possible the limiting value is the same as g or at least something that includes a set of abilities highly correlated with g (e.g. working memory).

Re: Is developer compensation becoming bimodal?

#266

Post by vonmoltke »

mafribe wrote: post #41
deanCommie wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually doesn't your experience hint at the opposite trend in the working sector? If everyone (roughly) either fails programming, or aces it, then the working professionals are the ones who passed AND excelled.

This is an interesting suggestion. However, it is very easy to cheat your way through college and obtain good grades. My assessed coursework regularly shows up on rentacoder.com and similar. There is an industry out there for writing dissertations. Group work is another mechanism that weak programmers use to avoid getting better: they let the good programmers do all the programming and then do documentation, or UI de…

My degree program must have been unusual, then, because my senior project class was the only one where less than 80% of my grade came from in-class tests. Many professors didn't even give a crap whether you actually did the homework or not, because you'd bomb the test anyway if you didn't.

Re: Is developer compensation becoming bimodal?

#267

Post by vonmoltke »

jasode wrote: post #10

If there's a pronounced bimodal distribution, it seems like the biggest driver of it would be the lumping of various programmer specialties into one giant bucket. It seems like the 2 sub-buckets would be: 1) $100k or less: backoffice programmers where software itself is not the product sold. Also known as enterprisey/LOB/CRUD developers working outside Silicon Valley. (E.g. programmer working on mortgage servicing so…

Where are programmers working for a "tech" company that is not in Silicon Valley?

Re: Is developer compensation becoming bimodal?

#268

Post by vonmoltke »

morgante wrote: post #66
pmorici wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

$80k in Kansas City and $150k in San Francisco is exactly the same amount of money after accounting for differences in the cost of living. https://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=$80000+salary+Kansas+C...

I hate these reductive COL adjustments. They're preposterous. Even if you assume that all your expenses are linearly multiplied (hint: Amazon costs the same no matter where you live), your savings are a lot more afterwards. If you were living on $40k/yr in Kansas City, you could move to SF and suddenly be saving $80k/yr. Would you really rather have $600k in Kansas City than $1 million in SF?

> Even if you assume that all your expenses are linearly multiplied

Problem is, they aren't. Income taxes are regressive, so your percentage income to taxes goes up as you get paid more. Everything else should scale linearly.

> (hint: Amazon costs the same no matter where you live)

I spend maybe 3% of my annual salary on Amazon and similar websites. It's a non-factor.

> If you were living on $40k/yr in Kansas City, you could move to SF and suddenly be saving $80k/yr.

Only if your expenses go up by the same scaling factor as your salary. As soon as they get out-of-whack even a bit in favor of expenses the math starts to break down. It also breaks down if you are saving a small-ish portion of your salary to begin with.

Re: Is developer compensation becoming bimodal?

#269

Post by vonmoltke »

dismantlethesun wrote: post #115
work4beer wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well the first rule in developing is 'lifestyle', I agree with you 100% that if you willing to work in a shit-hole be that east-coast or houston, or any shit-hole in USA, sure there will be a job, But if you want to live in a nice place, say San Franciso, and make enough to own a house and eat out every night, then its not what you know, but who you blow. I agree with you, but say your FORTRAN programmer, chances are…

> Well the first rule in developing is 'lifestyle', I agree with you 100% that if you willing to work in a shit-hole be that east-coast or houston, or any shit-hole in USA, sure there will be a job Did you just call an entire continental coastline a 'shit hole'? An entire coastline of 112.6 million people, dozens of cities and weather ranging from cold-temperate to near-tropical? Well, I must say I'm surprised. I kne…

> near-tropical?

Nitpick: South Florida is a legit tropical climate zone.

Otherwise, yeah, that post rustled my East Coast jimmies.

Re: Is developer compensation becoming bimodal?

#270

Post by EduardoBautista »

vonmoltke wrote: post #267
jasode wrote: post #10

If there's a pronounced bimodal distribution, it seems like the biggest driver of it would be the lumping of various programmer specialties into one giant bucket. It seems like the 2 sub-buckets would be: 1) $100k or less: backoffice programmers where software itself is not the product sold. Also known as enterprisey/LOB/CRUD developers working outside Silicon Valley. (E.g. programmer working on mortgage servicing so…

Where are programmers working for a "tech" company that is not in Silicon Valley?

Amazon and Microsoft are two off the top of my head.
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