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My offer numbers from big companies

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Re: My offer numbers from big companies

#181

Post by wwalser »

monaghanboy wrote: post #141
wwalser wrote: post #94

In every single thread where someone publicly discloses rates like this the comments are flooded with people who use all kinds of FUD to explain why what they've just read must be untrue. It's strange. > Are these numbers real? Yes. I'm not the author, but they don't appear at all unusual to me. SF's developer market is nearly as screwed up as it's housing market (except not really, the housing market is truly someth…

>We have a shortage on one side of the market. It will be relatively short lived. Can you support the latter claim?

Good call. I can't.

I feel unreasonably lucky and make this claim to myself in an effort to engender urgency and grace — I have what many want and few have and it is fleeting.

The other two shortage that I was aware of during my primary education seem to have been filled at this point. I was told regularly that the best paths toward success was to study law or accounting. At the time law firms were experiencing a lack of supply similar to the current state of software that has since been filled. You can still make great money but you're going to need crazy hours + prestigious education or unreasonable amounts of proof-of-awesome. Similarly, after SOX there was an immense need for accountants but that demand was filled rapidly when higher ed was successful in pushing huge numbers of degrees out the door.

Education in practical skills for software development has been slower to fill demand. I see three reasons, I'm sure there are many more: Software doesn't have the same social prestige as law or accounting — the first dot-com crash scared people — demand has grown more quickly than any other field.

Re: My offer numbers from big companies

#182

Post by sidlls »

40acres wrote: post #101

It always strikes me as odd at how much HN complanies about hiring practices in tech. Spend a few weeks with Leetcode and CTCI and you have a decent shot at salaries in this range at the BigCo's (depends on location of course). What other industry has it's interview process so transparent with such high rewards?

I complain about it because it's absurd. It's also actually not that transparent, because for all it supposedly is there is still the bias against age, gender and a number of other things that no matter how Leet your Code interview is will get you rejected.

Re: My offer numbers from big companies

#183

Post by hocuspocus »

40acres wrote: post #101

It always strikes me as odd at how much HN complanies about hiring practices in tech. Spend a few weeks with Leetcode and CTCI and you have a decent shot at salaries in this range at the BigCo's (depends on location of course). What other industry has it's interview process so transparent with such high rewards?

If you have a job and any kind of social life, going through 200~300 questions like OP is going to take you more than a few weeks.

A lot of people complain because this is the very example of cargo culting, you hire people who went through the same questions and reject those who haven't, even though it has no bearing on their ability to do the job.

Re: My offer numbers from big companies

#184

Post by ChicagoDave »

siddharthdeswal wrote: post #139
cjhanks wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They seem a bit higher than what I would normally expect for 2 year experience; sometimes a successful startup and some salary negotiations can give you a boost. But recall: $1 USD (SFO) != $1 USD (Almost anywhere else). And there are some other downsides, you work very long hours in a company of 70%+ men. I think quality of life in South Bay for most isn't as nice as much less affluent places. It depends on your cup…

Is working in a company with 70%+ men really a bad thing, or are you just leaning on existing cultural biases?

Having a work culture that matches societal norms is just a healthy practice. It makes us all better people.

Re: My offer numbers from big companies

#185

Post by adventured »

richardknop wrote: post #168
ken47 wrote: post #137

True, if big. Anyone could write up such a Blind post. And when it comes to anonymously bragging via lies on the internet, there is no shortage of prior art. To be fair, I wouldn't be surprised if the growth rate of engineering applications to these bigcos has declined over the past few years. A decline in the supply of candidates relative to demand, among other factors, could lead to an increase in compensation per…

But you get these posts on HN quite often with similar numbers. I'd assume all of them are not lying or using fake data to brag. If only some of them are telling the truth then the numbers are real which is why I tend to believe them.

The only thing about the post that seems off, is the experience level that's generating that income. It could happen though, it's not implausible. The income figures stand-alone are not abnormal for someone with several more years of experience.

We're looking at maybe 3.7% type U3 unemployment in 2018. The Fed's GDP Nowcast figure is projecting nearly 4% growth for the fourth quarter. Throw on corp tax cuts and possibly infrastructure spending in 2018, and the US economy might expand at something like 3.5% for all of 2018. There's a massive hiring rush going on around things like artificial intelligence, that is vacuuming up immense amounts of engineering talent (depleting the total pool for everything else). These salaries might get crazier yet.

Re: My offer numbers from big companies

#186

Post by krolley »

koevet wrote: post #123

These numbers should be taken with a grain of salt. I live in Zurich, Switzerland and I have a similar salary (~200K) but the high cost of living (which, I assume, is similar if not lower than the Bay Area) make my salary comparable to an "ok" salary in other European countries. Just to give you an idea: the overall cost of school + a nanny for 2 kids under 6 is around 70K year in Zurich. As other have mentioned, the…

Also living in Switzerland. I have to comment that ~200K is not "normal" salary here either. To be fair, most people also don't have a nanny for their kids (or more than 1 as you do), and do not pay for private school. Average salary for a Software Dev with >10 years experience in Zurich is somewhere around 130k - 150k.

Re: My offer numbers from big companies

#187

Post by tensor »

woolvalley wrote: post #172
shubhamjain wrote: post #29

It seems standard way to get a great compensation is to sit down and exercise all the run-of-the-mill algorithmic questions because that will matter the most in the end. Further optimisation could be made by being less fearful about negotiating the offer. Asking for 10% more would never hurt [1]. I am not a fierce critic of BigCo. interviewing practises but it seems a little disappointing that coding side-projects, c…

It's because the vast majority of candidates, including a lot of very good ones, will do none of those things.

Sure, but you need to be able to produce a work product example of some sort in lieu. Most people can.

Re: My offer numbers from big companies

#188

Post by ken47 »

richardknop wrote: post #168
ken47 wrote: post #137

True, if big. Anyone could write up such a Blind post. And when it comes to anonymously bragging via lies on the internet, there is no shortage of prior art. To be fair, I wouldn't be surprised if the growth rate of engineering applications to these bigcos has declined over the past few years. A decline in the supply of candidates relative to demand, among other factors, could lead to an increase in compensation per…

But you get these posts on HN quite often with similar numbers. I'd assume all of them are not lying or using fake data to brag. If only some of them are telling the truth then the numbers are real which is why I tend to believe them.

I disagree with this line of reasoning, because exaggerated numbers are more likely to be make it to the front page of HN. In fact, the optimal lie (wrt the probability of it being upvoted) contains compensation claims that are just on the border of unbelievable.

If such claims were non-anonymous, they'd carry much more weight.

Re: My offer numbers from big companies

#189

Post by akhilcacharya »

ken47 wrote: post #137

True, if big. Anyone could write up such a Blind post. And when it comes to anonymously bragging via lies on the internet, there is no shortage of prior art. To be fair, I wouldn't be surprised if the growth rate of engineering applications to these bigcos has declined over the past few years. A decline in the supply of candidates relative to demand, among other factors, could lead to an increase in compensation per…

Not BS at all. Just negotiation and being good at interviewing.

Re: My offer numbers from big companies

#190

Post by wwalser »

milofeynman wrote: post #132
wwalser wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The entry fee for a referral is striking up a single conversation at a conference. If someone from a big tech company is speaking at a conference, the fact that they are speaking isn't the primary reason for being present. They are there to recruit.

Hah, that assumes their current employer will let them go to conferences.

I'd take the day off for the prospect of $100k+ raise.
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