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Mike Lee on why he can charge $1,000/hr for iPhone development

le.mu.rs

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Re: Mike Lee on why he can charge $1,000/hr for iPhone development

#51

Post by rortian »

laut wrote: post #44
rortian wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Marginal tax rates being high is a great idea. I'd be with you if people with high salaries spent all, or virtually all, of their salary. But they don't. In this economy we need more money being spent. When things are doing well again, you could try to make a case for the rich being richer, but it's a strange cause to take up.

Societies don't get wealthy by consuming. They do by producing. As a rule, if something is taxed there will be less of it. High marginal taxes decreases high value work. It is a terrible idea. Immoral too.

>Immoral too.

Classic. Moral claims don't get you too far. I could start going on about gentiles eating shellfish, but I'm one of those gentiles.

>They do by producing

Sometimes. These things are complicated. But if you've already got it figured out, no need to discuss it I guess.

Re: Mike Lee on why he can charge $1,000/hr for iPhone development

#52

Post by rbranson »

xenophanes wrote: post #30
rortian wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Marginal tax rates being high is a great idea. I'd be with you if people with high salaries spent all, or virtually all, of their salary. But they don't. In this economy we need more money being spent. When things are doing well again, you could try to make a case for the rich being richer, but it's a strange cause to take up.

> In this economy we need more money being spent. Economic activity is not economic productivity . Spending money doesn't make us richer. Producing does. Encouraging people to work more would help the economy; encouraging to people to spend more would only help to the extent that it stimulates people to produce stuff for sale.

Actually, you are both wrong. Production and consumption by themselves do not yield productivity. Both producers and consumers play equal roles in economic productivity. Without active consumption, producers would be completely unproductive, regardless of efficiency. Productivity comes when people are able to increase their economic leverage through efficiencies, but also able to complete transactions in the market. For instance, despite all of the hate of partial-reserve fiat banking systems by pseudo-economists, they are extremely efficient at getting the most productive value out of the money supply. This is also why the Internet creates economic value, because it's able to more efficiently pair producers and consumers.

Re: Mike Lee on why he can charge $1,000/hr for iPhone development

#53

Post by petercooper »

Even if he doesn't get $1000/hr in the end, his statement is likely to be already doing some work in the form of anchoring. That is, $1000/hr seems ridiculous but you might now, as a client, feel like $250/hr isn't ridiculous.. yet if he'd said $250/hr at the start, that would have also seemed as crazy as $1000.

This effect of price anchoring has been demonstrated a lot and it works, sadly.

Re: Mike Lee on why he can charge $1,000/hr for iPhone development

#54

Post by JoachimSchipper »

loboman wrote: post #49
xenophanes wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think you're supposed to hire him to build a whole app. You hire him to give advice for an hour or two so you get pointed in the right direction, or review some code, or fix one bug your team is stuck on, or he can help you find the right cheaper person to hire.

He should say he's offering iPhone consultancy then.

The list of options he offers does look like consultancy.

Re: Mike Lee on why he can charge $1,000/hr for iPhone development

#56

Post by petercooper »

mrshoe wrote: post #25

That’s a little like hearing what Brad Pitt got paid for his last movie and wondering why the producer didn’t instead hire Brad Pitman for scale. Oh you’ve never heard of Brad Pitman? You’re not familiar with his work? But you are familiar with Brad Pitt’s work, right? After all, he’s an experienced actor and producer with not one, but two, Academy Award nominations and a portfolio full of household names. Bzzzt. Hor…

He commands his rates because he is a household name. [..] You, however, are an iPhone app developer. App purchasers have never heard of you. They will not turn out in droves to buy an app just because you worked on it.

I think his conclusion is wrong but the analogy is good. It's unnecessary to be literal with the term "household." Most of the world's top scientists, lawyers, and bankers aren't household names, yet they can command extremely high levels of respect and, often, grants or income due to being a "household name" in their field.

I'm not arguing Mike is a "household name" amongst developers - he's not, IMHO - but there's no reason why a "household name" developer couldn't get the Brad Pitt treatment. John Carmack would have his arm bitten off if he were available at $1000/hr. Is Mike Lee the iPhone equivalent of John Carmack? No. If he were? His analogy seems OK to me.

Re: Mike Lee on why he can charge $1,000/hr for iPhone development

#57

Post by kenshi »

alexkiwi wrote: post #16
andreyf wrote: post #2

Wow, he might be good at programming, but from his writing, he sure seems like a jerk (Zed Shaw's long lost twin?). I've known many professionals who, being very good at what they do, charge both less and more than $1k/hour, but none of them would ever mention their rate in public, much less feel the need to explain why they deserve it. On the other hand, this is great PR for software engineers: a couple more posts l…

I'm not so sure I would want to work with this guy, Zed Shaw on the other hand was one of the nicest people I've ever gotten an e-mail from

I've met Mike Lee, and he really is an all round top bloke. Would I want to work with this guy? You bet.

Don't be too quick to judge character based on what is clearly a marketing blog post.

Re: Mike Lee on why he can charge $1,000/hr for iPhone development

#58

Post by xenophanes »

rortian wrote: post #46
xenophanes wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are ignorant of libertarian economic views. You are also ignorant that they are common place here, and held by Paul Graham. It's rude to intrude on a community and call status quo views "crack pottery" just because you've never learned anything about them. It is your view that people can't produce things of value unless there's enough money being spent that is truly bizarre. New markets can be created. Value driv…

Wow. Libertarians are here, sure. However, I'd love to see how many people would really march in lockstep with doctrinaire libertarianism. I'm not ignorant of libertarian views. Nor, am I unused to tantrums such as your own. I'll leave the vocabulary boot camps to you and Richard Stallman. I have that freedom.

Could you try saying something substantive instead of following your crack pot insult with a tantrum insult?

Re: Mike Lee on why he can charge $1,000/hr for iPhone development

#60

Post by rortian »

rbranson wrote: post #52
xenophanes wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In this economy we need more money being spent. Economic activity is not economic productivity . Spending money doesn't make us richer. Producing does. Encouraging people to work more would help the economy; encouraging to people to spend more would only help to the extent that it stimulates people to produce stuff for sale.

Actually, you are both wrong. Production and consumption by themselves do not yield productivity. Both producers and consumers play equal roles in economic productivity. Without active consumption, producers would be completely unproductive, regardless of efficiency. Productivity comes when people are able to increase their economic leverage through efficiencies, but also able to complete transactions in the market.…

I'm down with what you suggest. The problem with the economy now though is that we have excess capacity. I'm down with going around and blow up factories to solve this (only kidding fbi) but I think it would be easier if we could stimulate demand.

>This is also why the Internet creates economic value, because it's able to more efficiently pair producers and consumers.

I would say that is one reason why but I whole heartily agree.

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