Ask HN: Do you make more than $200K? What did you have to do? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: Do you make more than $200K? What did you have to do?

#21

Post by toephu2 » Sun, Feb 26, 2017, 10:07 PM UTC

throwaway198511 wrote: post #14

Currently making ~$300k/year in total comp. 31 years old. 5 years of experience as a hardware engineer, and 2 years as a software engineer (back-end). Master's degree from Stanford. Practice hackerrank, cracking-the-coding-interview, read a programming/architecture book every few months, till you can ace programming interviews and understand your field really well. Living in NYC, where the financial companies have dr…

what's your base salary?

Re: Ask HN: Do you make more than $200K? What did you have to do?

#22

Post by colinbartlett » Sun, Feb 26, 2017, 10:07 PM UTC

bsvalley wrote: post #5

First off, are you talking base salary or full package? There is no such thing as $200k base salary for 10 years exp in java. You'd have to specialize. $170k/y base salary for an eng manager is right where you want to be. If your talking about base salary + bonus + annual sotcks/RSU's then you're way below market.

I think you vastly underestimate the disparity in salaries in the marketplace, even when comparing experience and job description. A hiring decision is often more about paying what's needed to in order to get the people they want, and less about what an expected or average salary is.

Re: Ask HN: Do you make more than $200K? What did you have to do?

#23

Post by adventurer » Sun, Feb 26, 2017, 10:07 PM UTC

hackerboos wrote: post #13

I'm at $95k Canadian. These threads make me feel bad.

Location? If you're cracking $200k, you are likely in a major city, silicon valley, etc, and the cost of living is pretty outrageous. Either that, or I am severely under-paid.

Re: Ask HN: Do you make more than $200K? What did you have to do?

#24

Post by rodrickbrown » Sun, Feb 26, 2017, 10:07 PM UTC

I'm an SRE (Site Reliability Engineer) for a Fintech startup based in NYC my base is $190000, with options + bonus my total compensation is probably closer to $300k. I've mostly worked in financial for large firms such as Lehman Brothers, Bank of America, Citi, and Morgan Stanley. I now solely work for fintech startups. My career started out as a traditional system administrator working on large Sun Solaris servers (2000 - 2006), I transitioned over to Linux (2007+) then picked up some Java, Python, SQL and I'm now learning Go and big data (Spark) and have a strong background in networking. I primarily get paid to automate and scale infrastructures these days -- my background is that of Google's definition of Site Reliability Engineering, 40% Code 60% infrastructure.

Re: Ask HN: Do you make more than $200K? What did you have to do?

#25

Post by throwlondond » Sun, Feb 26, 2017, 10:10 PM UTC

hackerboos wrote: post #13

I'm at $95k Canadian. These threads make me feel bad.

less than $70k. London, UK ;/

Re: Ask HN: Do you make more than $200K? What did you have to do?

#26

Post by tsunamifury » Sun, Feb 26, 2017, 10:10 PM UTC

I make about $275k (145 base, 35 bonus, 90+RSUs) as a designer with strong technical and product management skills. For example I can write you a basic Android front end and also a PRD while tangling through legal and security.

I am an individual contributor and just about to begin managing. However I unofficially lead a team of 20. There are still 4 levels above me that can be paid upwards of low millions dollars before entering executive titles like VP.

I'm 30 and it took running a startup, then pushing high profile products in a big 3 company then launching net new products and running as a solo entrepreneur within the company.

At the upper end, it's not about just being a manager or even being good. It's about how well you can create new opportunities that are strategically valuable for the company.

Honestly, I think of myself as just getting started, as I aim to reach 1m+ total comp per year.

Re: Ask HN: Do you make more than $200K? What did you have to do?

#27

Post by deepnotderp » Sun, Feb 26, 2017, 10:11 PM UTC

From the other side of the table, anyone who is a big name in Deep learning will fetch big bucks (if we can afford it).

Re: Ask HN: Do you make more than $200K? What did you have to do?

#28

Post by samsonradu » Sun, Feb 26, 2017, 10:11 PM UTC

hackerboos wrote: post #13

I'm at $95k Canadian. These threads make me feel bad.

Makes me feel bad also, until I think of the living costs in US big cities. I would really like to see an European version of this thread. Probably the bar would be set somewhere around EUR 100k?

Re: Ask HN: Do you make more than $200K? What did you have to do?

#29

Post by DDerTyp » Sun, Feb 26, 2017, 10:12 PM UTC

200k US$? I am from Germany, currently working in a company and studying at a university (both in the fields of computer science). To be honest, I never thought about how much I wanna earn in 5 or 10 years, but 200k US$ is super high.. Or am I missing something? I don't know how the US tax system works, but is this, what you can spend? Or is it 200k US$ minus taxes? I am kinda confused right know, can somebody help me please? :D

Re: Ask HN: Do you make more than $200K? What did you have to do?

#30

Post by adventurer » Sun, Feb 26, 2017, 10:12 PM UTC

DDerTyp wrote: post #29

200k US$? I am from Germany, currently working in a company and studying at a university (both in the fields of computer science). To be honest, I never thought about how much I wanna earn in 5 or 10 years, but 200k US$ is super high.. Or am I missing something? I don't know how the US tax system works, but is this, what you can spend? Or is it 200k US$ minus taxes? I am kinda confused right know, can somebody help m…

Yes, I assume we are talking about gross earnings before taxes.