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Top Paying Tech Companies by SWE Level

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Re: Top Paying Tech Companies by SWE Level

#151

Post by nixgeek »

HenryKissinger wrote: post #52

$175,000 at Oracle for an entry-level engineer? I mean... just... wow. You could retire at 35 and not have to work for the rest of your life. How hard is it to get these jobs?

Bachelors in CS from Stanford. Pass the interview. Decent GPA. Internship somewhere interesting certainly wouldn’t hurt.

That’s not an unusual offer for smart software engineers coming in from top colleges, where you’re being hired to work at Redwood Shores or Seattle.

Having a Masters or PhD will push it up a bit higher again.

Re: Top Paying Tech Companies by SWE Level

#152

Post by [deleted] »

shantly wrote: post #136
huehehue wrote: post #53

What I'm taking away from this is that many (most) companies are grossly underpaying their engineers. I've been through the SF/NYC Senior SWE interviewing gauntlet twice in the past three years, and received 10+ offers at half this rate. Levels claims to be checking offer letters, which is great IMO. It's really hard for people to know they're being undervalued when the employers are low-balling and the self-reporter…

I think it's more that software development's divided between the maybe— maybe —5% who are looking at comp at these levels, and everyone else who's in the $70K-180K range, with a cap somewhere in lower-leadership positions that perhaps reaches $200K, maybe mid $200Ks at best as you start to move into management proper. Anything past that you've gotta really nail some niche that someone with lots of money (probably fi…

[deleted]

Re: Top Paying Tech Companies by SWE Level

#153

Post by gamesbrainiac »

chillacy wrote: post #117
gamesbrainiac wrote: post #100

Looks like us over here in Europe are getting shafted. Even if you adjust for living expenses, European engineers are grossly underpaid.

It's even worse because many of these companies have offices in Europe and pay European market rates. Same company, same level, big differences in compensation. And it's not just Europe too, same in Canada, Singapore, Israel, etc.

It is really quite sad. I know that Zurich is a little better when it comes to compensation, but I don't have any of the specifics.

Re: Top Paying Tech Companies by SWE Level

#154

Post by shantly »

rolltiide wrote: post #149
shantly wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's more that software development's divided between the maybe— maybe —5% who are looking at comp at these levels, and everyone else who's in the $70K-180K range, with a cap somewhere in lower-leadership positions that perhaps reaches $200K, maybe mid $200Ks at best as you start to move into management proper. Anything past that you've gotta really nail some niche that someone with lots of money (probably fi…

Its not a small number of positions its just a small number of companies At the moment these few companies are expanding as fast as possible and have an infinite number of positions that pay these amounts until they dont

Relative to all software development, I mean. There are tons and tons of places employing anywhere from hundreds to tens of thousands of developers each, in the US, not paying anything like this. And almost no smaller shops are, of course. All the positions at all the companies like this, even though most of them are large, I'd still be surprised if it's more than a single-digit percentage of all software positions in the US.

Re: Top Paying Tech Companies by SWE Level

#155

Post by nixgeek »

jedberg wrote: post #137
slg wrote: post #11

I have never worked in the valley, so the answer to this question might be obvious to the people working there. What happens to all the experienced engineers? According to this, the Senior, Staff, or Principal titles are generally for people with 5+ year experience? Those roles make up 30%, 10%, and 3% of companies respectively. That leaves 57% of engineers in positions listed are usually for people with 0-5 years ex…

Many go to management. You realize as you get older that the whole “you can progress up the salary chart as an IC just as well as management” is a total crock. If you want to afford a nice house in a good neighborhood with good schools in the Bay Area, you’ve got to go into management.

I kinda disagree, Oracle/HP (personal experience) and Google/IBM (extremely good friends) both have career tracks for IC which go up to ‘Distinguished Engineer’ level, and where compensation can be equivalent to a VP on the management track.

What you might be trying to say is there are more available positions at VP than DE, so your chances of making it are better? Or that being promoted to VP is easier than to DE? I think having seen how the sausage is made, would agree with both of those.

Re: Top Paying Tech Companies by SWE Level

#156

Post by syedkarim »

tlb wrote: post #138
burfog wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm willing to relocate for better pay so that I can afford nice things. I want to have a place where I have room for a chicken coop (30 chickens) and a 1-acre fish pond. I'm willing to commute by car for a maximum of 15 minutes. A slightly longer commute might be OK if I can afford to commute by horse and the employer doesn't mind. Which tech hub should I move to?

You can find this in many places around the Bay Area outside SF. I have 5 acres and keep chickens in Woodside, and it's 15-20 minutes drive to several big tech companies in Palo Alto and Redwood City. Some people keep horses here.

5 acres that is 15 minutes from Palo Alto/Mountain View? How much does that cost?

Re: Top Paying Tech Companies by SWE Level

#157

Post by nucleardog »

HenryKissinger wrote: post #62
tempire wrote: post #5

If this is for real, _everyone_ I know is getting completely screwed. I have a hard time believing any of these numbers. If I earned any of these amounts for 2-3 years, I could live off the interest for the rest of my life.

Here in Canada entry level SWEs are getting paid 60k-70k CAD (45k-55k USD). It's worse in Europe. These numbers are absolutely mind boggling. Even with a higher cost of living and California income taxes, you still have at least 100k of free money to invest. It's no wonder so many people apply for jobs at FAANGs. A job at a FAANG is practically a ticket to early retirement.

Average senior software engineer salary in Vancouver is apparently $80-130k, median at $100k even.

The manager from a FAANG company that called me up the other day said the engineer position they're hiring for in Vancouver (senior-ish, but nothing exceptional) has a compensation package ranging from $200-270k.

It's not just the location. I think these companies are just really good at extracting value out of engineers and scaling to make good use of engineers, so it's worth it for them to pay well above market to acquire as many people as they can.

And to the rest of your message -- yes. I love the company I'm at right now and am being compensated fairly well for the market, but with a wife and a new baby on the way there's no way I can not follow up on a job with that kind of pay. For us that's the difference between never affording to enter the Vancouver real estate market and being able to buy a house for cash before we're 40.

Re: Top Paying Tech Companies by SWE Level

#158

Post by TomVDB »

tempire wrote: post #5

If this is for real, _everyone_ I know is getting completely screwed. I have a hard time believing any of these numbers. If I earned any of these amounts for 2-3 years, I could live off the interest for the rest of my life.

If you want to know the lay of the land in terms of compensation in the Bay Area, put your house on the market as a rental. You'll get to see the offer letters from Google, Facebook, Apple etc.

It was enlightening, and made me go to my manager to ask for more.

The number on levels.fyi closely match what I saw in those offer letters.

Re: Top Paying Tech Companies by SWE Level

#159

Post by itsmefaz »

The article is a so great and shocking at the same time.

I understand the rant and a sense of discomfort us engineers are facing looking at the dataset. I would definitely want to get more context out of these numbers like -

> Why these engineers are paid so much and why others are not?

> Is education/college a factor in this pay gap?

> If one wants to earn this much. What are the required skills to achieve this goal?

It is a very good sign that a level of awareness is being developed about the pay gap not in among different genders but also within the same organization/experience levels.

Re: Top Paying Tech Companies by SWE Level

#160

Post by vonseel »

dehrmann wrote: post #133
thatsenough wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I started working at FANG recently, after spending 15 years in a different field. The very first thing I noticed was how young the average employee is. It was a little startling. I've heard different theories: * Today's big tech companies are still relatively young, so the workforce is young. * The companies have grown exponentially in recent years, and they've hired many new grads to meet hiring targets. This would…

Looking at this (hopefully someone can find longer-term data), the number of CS graduates was in decline until 2009. https://i1.wp.com/danwang.co/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/bach...

I'm surprised it started growing even that early. When I attended school (2007-11), we thought CS jobs would be outsourced to India/China/etc. (we were wrong).
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