Ask YC: What are starting salaries for CS grads this year?

#1

Post by iamelgringo » Thu, May 01, 2008, 4:47 AM UTC

I'm curious to find out what grads from CS programs are getting offered. The last post by Spolsky seemed to say that MSFT is offering starting salaries close to 6 figures.

s this accurate? Can anyone corroborate? If you're graduating and have offers on the table, would you mind posting a ball-park figure of what you're getting offered? I'd love to hear it.

Re: Ask YC: What are starting salaries for CS grads this year?

#2

Post by rms » Thu, May 01, 2008, 4:53 AM UTC

A friend of mine just took a menial enterprise programming job (in Pittsburgh) that is paying 55k. And I mean menial, it's converting legacy systems from Cobol to Java.

Re: Ask YC: What are starting salaries for CS grads this year?

#3

Post by itay » Thu, May 01, 2008, 5:09 AM UTC

rms wrote: post #2

A friend of mine just took a menial enterprise programming job (in Pittsburgh) that is paying 55k. And I mean menial, it's converting legacy systems from Cobol to Java.

I've seen offers from 75k to 95k (though the 95k was an outlier). Most were in the 80-85k for first tier companies.

Re: Ask YC: What are starting salaries for CS grads this year?

#4

Post by donw » Thu, May 01, 2008, 5:11 AM UTC

$85k +/- 5k seems to be the average here out on the West Coast. I'm curious as to what the difference is for people with masters degrees or doctorates, though.

Re: Ask YC: What are starting salaries for CS grads this year?

#5

Post by nuggien » Thu, May 01, 2008, 5:18 AM UTC

I've seen it vary greatly here in the SF bay area. I've seen offers as low as 65k and as high as 95k. The two most important factors that decide where in the range you fall are the company making the offer, and the school you graduated from. You probably have a lot more leverage in asking for 5-10k extra if you are graduating from a place like stanford/berkeley as opposed to sjsu. But then again, 5-10k is nothing to a company if you are an impressive candidate.

Re: Ask YC: What are starting salaries for CS grads this year?

#6

Post by csmajorfive » Thu, May 01, 2008, 5:40 AM UTC

donw wrote: post #4

$85k +/- 5k seems to be the average here out on the West Coast. I'm curious as to what the difference is for people with masters degrees or doctorates, though.

Masters is +10 in my experience.

Re: Ask YC: What are starting salaries for CS grads this year?

#7

Post by menloparkbum » Thu, May 01, 2008, 5:49 AM UTC

$80K +/- 5K at GOOG for Stanford grads and $85K at Amazon for a Berkeley grad.

Re: Ask YC: What are starting salaries for CS grads this year?

#8

Post by natch » Thu, May 01, 2008, 6:14 AM UTC

For anyone wondering the other question, what about salaries for experienced developers, keep in mind the numbers others are sharing here are just what was asked for, -starting- salaries. After a few years, the salaries are much higher, but still under $150K. $130K plus options is pretty standard in the West Coast for an experienced developer with or without any degree. Seems to have jumped up some in the last couple years along with gas prices. Google, though, pays less.

Re: Ask YC: What are starting salaries for CS grads this year?

#9

Post by cperciva » Thu, May 01, 2008, 6:21 AM UTC

donw wrote: post #4

$85k +/- 5k seems to be the average here out on the West Coast. I'm curious as to what the difference is for people with masters degrees or doctorates, though.

I haven't seen anyone even suggest less than $100k for a newly minted doctorate in CS from a good university, and I've seen numbers in the $120k - $140k range thrown around. It sounds like East Coast hedge funds are even more generous.

Re: Ask YC: What are starting salaries for CS grads this year?

#10

Post by menloparkbum » Thu, May 01, 2008, 6:28 AM UTC

cperciva wrote: post #9

donw wrote: post #4

$85k +/- 5k seems to be the average here out on the West Coast. I'm curious as to what the difference is for people with masters degrees or doctorates, though.

I haven't seen anyone even suggest less than $100k for a newly minted doctorate in CS from a good university, and I've seen numbers in the $120k - $140k range thrown around. It sounds like East Coast hedge funds are even more generous.

I have. HR knows that CS PhDs will work for peanuts because they've had their financial self-esteem slowly beaten out of them over the past five years. East Coast hedge funds mostly hire physics and applied math PhDs. Masters +10 PhD -30 but YMMV.