My offer numbers from big companies • Hacker News Board

Re: My offer numbers from big companies

#261

Post by sctb » Mon, Dec 04, 2017, 4:20 PM UTC

holydude wrote: post #73

chrisper wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Switzerland my salary is a lot less (in terms of numbers only). However, I feel like my quality of life is much higher here than it was in the US. You could pay me 300k a year and I'd never want to go back to the Bay Area ever again.

Yeah and I would never want to work in Switzerland. Switzerland is such a hypocritical country it is not even funny. Everyone and their dog is such a rude creature that you cannot even shower at 2.00 am when you arrive from a business trip because it annoys your neighbors. Sure there are quadrillions of other positive things in Switzerland but not all of us would change money for "european social equality lalaland"

Do you mind not posting off-topic rants on Hacker News?

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Re: My offer numbers from big companies

#262

Post by monaghanboy » Mon, Dec 04, 2017, 4:36 PM UTC

wwalser wrote: post #181

monaghanboy wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>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 lac…

Thanks for elaborating, was genuinely curious.

Re: My offer numbers from big companies

#263

Post by monaghanboy » Mon, Dec 04, 2017, 4:37 PM UTC

ec109685 wrote: post #133

monaghanboy wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's good, but a huge chunk of this will be lost to taxes because he's in SV (I know because I live and work here as well, have been in a similar situation, and his numbers are plausible). So it's something to marvel at, but the actual amount going in the bank is much smaller.

Huge as in like 7-9% of their sign on bonus for living in SV.

Mine was sadly much more...

Re: My offer numbers from big companies

#264

Post by thebiglebrewski » Mon, Dec 04, 2017, 4:44 PM UTC

NiklasMort wrote: post #215

krolley wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Couldn't you have negotiated that in your offer e.g. I'll take the 140k bonus but my phone is off from 6pm to 8am, only covering night shift on certain days etc. If they say no that's OK, but if they say yes, great.

There were other issues which the new company didn't agree on. But I wanted to leave anyway. In the end I followed this: "You can always earn more money but you can never make more time"

I think you made the right decision! Enjoy your life friend :)

Re: My offer numbers from big companies

#265

Post by ChicagoDave » Mon, Dec 04, 2017, 5:26 PM UTC

softawre wrote: post #256

scarface74 wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We just bought a 5 bedroom, 3-1/2 bathroom house with a nice size separate office in the northern suburbs of Atlanta with about 2800 square feet. Brand new build for $335,000 with all of the niceties. I've looked on Zillow, the same square footage, much older home, would be around 2-4 million at least in San Francisco.

Yup, this is the major difference. The COL numbers can be explained away, but if you want space now and a retirement later then you can get by with much less work outside SF.

In Chicago, it's fairly common to take a regional 50 to 75 minute train ride into the city from a distant suburb. Is there anything like that for Silicon Valley? Can you get an hour away by train and lower housing costs?

Re: My offer numbers from big companies

#266

Post by koevet » Mon, Dec 04, 2017, 5:27 PM UTC

s3nnyy wrote: post #251

koevet wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Zurich, there are no public kindergarten. The monthly fees ranges from 2.500 to 3K+ a month. A nanny is necessary, when both parents have a full time work and family is not around (like in my case).

I think what you are talking about are "Kindergrippen" (when kids are 2-3 years old). Kindergardens are public and free. This Kindergrippen-age is really the only moment when kids in Switzerland cost you significantly more than in the rest of Europe. Think it this way: From the actual kindergarden age (4 years old?) you won't pay anymore. It's even free to send the kid to the best technical university in mainland Eur…

Yes, my mistake, I meant kindergrippe (I have actually used the right word in a previous comment).

In any case, kindergartens are not entirely free. If the kids have to stay after 12.00 it gets very expensive.

Re: My offer numbers from big companies

#267

Post by woolvalley » Mon, Dec 04, 2017, 5:41 PM UTC

hawski wrote: post #211

woolvalley wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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

Work will have much more in common with said open source efforts than with all those algorithmic challenges though.

A good chunk of these people will be good engineers that cannot talk about or show the stuff they worked on at their previous job. And those places specifically ban them from making apps or working on open source and they will be hard workers that work 40-50+ hours a week. Maybe they have kids too.

How do you interview these people?

I agree, algo interviews are annoying and I wish it wasn't there. If it wasn't it would make switching jobs a lot faster. But thats what it is. The suggested alternative of portfolio work has it's own problems, the same with homework problems.

Unfortunately, even places that have you write code with the internet still have an algo inteview or two.

Re: My offer numbers from big companies

#268

Post by electrograv » Mon, Dec 04, 2017, 5:44 PM UTC

richardknop wrote: post #232

doktrin wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One of my biggest surprises when moving to Europe was that engineers earn less (and are IMO less respected) than all types of managers, including but not limited to PMs.

That shouldn't be surprising. You will find this much with little research. Engineers are treated as blue collar workers in majority of world. There are couple of exceptions such as notably Silicon Valley and most big metro areas in US (New York for example), perhaps London in Europe. But these are just anomalies, prevailing consensus around the world is that engineering is blue collar work, just instead of shovel yo…

Well, I guess I’m glad we proved that “consensus” wrong.

I suppose this goes to show that just because the majority of the world has consensus on something non-scientific, does not make it the best decision or mindset.

Thankfully science is mostly immune to political and social biases when done correctly.

Re: My offer numbers from big companies

#269

Post by scarface74 » Mon, Dec 04, 2017, 5:48 PM UTC

ChicagoDave wrote: post #265

softawre wrote: post #256

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yup, this is the major difference. The COL numbers can be explained away, but if you want space now and a retirement later then you can get by with much less work outside SF.

In Chicago, it's fairly common to take a regional 50 to 75 minute train ride into the city from a distant suburb. Is there anything like that for Silicon Valley? Can you get an hour away by train and lower housing costs?

I can only speak for Atlanta, but the state of public transportation is abysmal from the burbs. True the train system is great to get to certain parts of Atlanta - and I use the park and ride any time I'm going to the airport or going downtown, but people in the burbs fight tooth and nail against an easy transfer system that will allow "them" to come up here.

And don't let me get started ranting about why the majority of white collar workers even need to come in to work as often as we do just for appearances.

Re: My offer numbers from big companies

#270

Post by bdcravens » Mon, Dec 04, 2017, 6:07 PM UTC

aroundtown wrote: post #169

bdcravens wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where are you in Texas? I'm in Houston, and those numbers don't jive with my experience (since 2000, making $30 an hour in the lowest paying jobs, and making well more than that on a regular basis)

The 45k was in Houston. Worked 10 months before the company decided to offshore everybody but sales. Took that job because I had been looking for a year and this was the first reasonable offer. Didn't negotiate cause I really needed the job, found out after a promotion that I was lowest paid employee in the shop by 20k.

What languages do you work in? I'm not trying to belittle you, but at the same time, I'm trying to understand how you've received such small offers. Your experience is EXTREMELY atypical for Houston/Texas.