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Switzerland vs Silicon Valley for Software Developers

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Re: Switzerland vs Silicon Valley for Software Developers

#191

Post by kornakiewicz »

CountSessine wrote: post #99
config_yml wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

10 years ago, the rule was rent should not be more than 1/4 of your gross salary. The rule just gets adjusted, we're currently at 1/3. Same thing goes down with health care costs. People are squeezed for it, because they have no choice. Meanwhile wages are stagnating and can't keep up with the rising cost of living.

Why should wages go up to match outrageous expenses? People are being squeezed, but your pay is roughly correlated with the value of your labour. I hear this all the time in Vancouver - people blaming this squeeze on stagnant wages - as if the labour market could ever pay people enough to keep pace with supply-constrained, monopolistic markets. The rent is too damn high. And we know why, but ... somehow we just want…

> but your pay is roughly correlated with the value of your labour.

It is not. The value fire-fighters, teachers or nurses provide is much higher than, say, an enterprise developer, yet in most places the other earns more.

Re: Switzerland vs Silicon Valley for Software Developers

#192

Post by throwaway_law »

CountSessine wrote: post #99
config_yml wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

10 years ago, the rule was rent should not be more than 1/4 of your gross salary. The rule just gets adjusted, we're currently at 1/3. Same thing goes down with health care costs. People are squeezed for it, because they have no choice. Meanwhile wages are stagnating and can't keep up with the rising cost of living.

Why should wages go up to match outrageous expenses? People are being squeezed, but your pay is roughly correlated with the value of your labour. I hear this all the time in Vancouver - people blaming this squeeze on stagnant wages - as if the labour market could ever pay people enough to keep pace with supply-constrained, monopolistic markets. The rent is too damn high. And we know why, but ... somehow we just want…

>but your pay is roughly correlated with the value of your labour.

It should be but employee efficiency and revenue per employee has increased (in fact more than doubled on average in the last 20 years), but salary has roughly stayed the same.

Re: Switzerland vs Silicon Valley for Software Developers

#193

Post by kotojo »

balfirevic wrote: post #170
rmah wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

50 sq m is 500 sq ft, which is considered very small in most of the US and on the small end even in NYC. It's just slightly larger than a mobile home.

That's interesting. It is considered a very decent size for a single person or even a couple where I live (Croatia). But then again, I grew up in a family of five in a 45 square meter apartment.

Looking at places around me (Atlanta, Ga, USA), the second I filter down to < 750 sqft for any 1 bedroom apartment or condo on redfin.com I am left with about 5% of the search results. The average size seems to be about 900 sqft. Before buying a house most places I rented were also around that size, and my house 2200 sqft (204 sq m) with 3 bedrooms.

Re: Switzerland vs Silicon Valley for Software Developers

#194

Post by IdontRememberIt »

Switzerland is a complex system: instead of 1 high rate tax, you pay many low taxes. So cheating is not worth it individually (too risky/complex for a small saving). But the sum is crazy.

Exemple of taxes/mandatory ccharges a developper will pay: network tax, photocopy tax, radio tax, VAT, AHV/IV, garbage elimination tax, city tax, state tax, federal tax, healthcare (in some countries it is included in your "federal/state" tax), etc.

I just got my "final tax decision"... Switzerland is a fiscal inferno if your income comes from work (vs capital gain)...

Usually, I work 6 month per year for taxes. My grand parents were working 1 to 1.5 month in the 60s-70s to pay their taxes also as "independant".

Plus with all the crazy fix and variable costs, it is not competitive as an independant or small company.

Today, as a "personne morale" (corporation) only complex fiscally optimized structures can get a low tax rate (or as a "physical person" if you are ultra rich (3 comma club) not professionally active in the country you can negotiate a very low rate).

PS: also, can we definitively kill the ridiculous myth/reputation of Swiss data protection? (In case of criminal investigation, in many cantons (equivalent to states) a police investigator does not even need a judge warrant to have access to the data)

Re: Switzerland vs Silicon Valley for Software Developers

#195

Post by dt3ft »

googlethrow wrote: post #160
zerr wrote: post #2

Cons: no Sun and the salaries seem to be capped at CHF 120-140K. Has that old school European mindset that managers and MBAs should be paid more than individual contributors, engineers.

At Google Zürich the total comp starts at 160K chf/year for fresh grads and with counteroffers can go much higher.

What would the number be for an Interaction Designer?

Re: Switzerland vs Silicon Valley for Software Developers

#197

Post by lm28469 »

zerr wrote: post #2

Cons: no Sun and the salaries seem to be capped at CHF 120-140K. Has that old school European mindset that managers and MBAs should be paid more than individual contributors, engineers.

> that old school European mindset

Not sure in what kind of bubble you live but it's like that everywhere except if you're a tech engineer in a SV tech company.

Re: Switzerland vs Silicon Valley for Software Developers

#198

Post by reascenda »

victor106 wrote: post #89
lukeqsee wrote: post #3

I'm an American expat in Switzerland working as an independent software developer and startup founder. I can agree with a lot of the points listed in the article, but they apply universally to almost all jobs (not just to software developers). I would raise a few points it doesn't mention: - Negatively, it is much harder to find meetups close to you that apply to you. Unless you're based in Zürich (the tech hub of th…

> Positively, I work from home. I have four providers I could get 1Gbps symmetrical, unmetered, business-class FTTH for less than 100,- CHF / month. It's hard to go wrong with that. I pay 79.99 USD a month for Verizon Fios 1 gbps in nyc. That is before a $200.00 credit. Fios is FTTH. That’s a good 20-25% discount to what you pay in Switzerland. Plus I heard from several colleagues and friends who are people of color…

The CEO of Credit Suisse is a black man from the Ivory Coast.

Not to say that racism doesn't exist in Switzerland but equally you don't see policemen shooting unarmed black people in their houses either.

Re: Switzerland vs Silicon Valley for Software Developers

#199

Post by netsharc »

pergadad wrote: post #166
lukeqsee wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Technically, yes. I use the term "expat" to denote that I'm not a Swiss citizen yet; the definition is pretty broad and can include immigrants: https://www.wordnik.com/words/expat .

All expats by definition are immigrants, not all immigrants are expats. Normally refers to high qualified high earning individuals while in most places most immigrants are low skilled low wage and only a small group would be reasonably called expats.

If you google expat vs immigrant it's contentious.. https://www.thelocal.de/20140617/are-you-an-expat-or-immigra...

Re: Switzerland vs Silicon Valley for Software Developers

#200

Post by walterstucco »

greatgib wrote: post #53

Bullshit alert They start with: "Maybe it is because of the outrageous rents eating over 30% of the salary and houses you cannot afford unless you joined Facebook or Google at the right time? " Regarding the SV. Then, this is what they (proudly) say about Switzerland: 1) "In Zurich, you can rent a whole flat (50+ square meters) for something between 2500-4000 CHF " 2) "In Switzerland a Software Developer can easily e…

In Switzerland Healthcare is free.

BTW Zurich is expensive, of course it is, it's one of the most expensive cities in the world, but it's also very small, you can live in the metropolitan area surrounding it and spend a lot less.

You could live in Zug or in beatifull St. Gallen and still be 100% in Switzerland, with all the benefits of living there.

In the valley there are no rules, in Switzerland tech workers are not gentrifying the land, families (especially with kids), single moms and other categories are protected so you can't push them out with money, they will have precedence when renting a house.

And everything is very close in Switzerland.

Everything includes (in alphabetical order) Austria, Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, Liechtenstein.

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