I'm surprised nobody has discussed the selection bias going on here. The better programmers are the ones that will stay on. IDK what the general turnover is in coding, but it makes sense that some people won't be able to hack it, appearing to boost the salaries of the "better" workers.
Developer salary growth is an inverted hockey stick
31–40 of 43 posts
Re: Developer salary growth is an inverted hockey stick
#32There is an interesting subtext in this article, which is to suggest that you take more risks as you get closer to the asymptote of salary growth, because it's the way to avoid diminishing returns for the additional skills you've learned between hitting the level of "experienced" and now. It's the opposite advice that makes up common wisdom, which is to take risks when you are young, inexperienced and without respons…
Not quite. I think this is conventional wisdom:
If you take a risk and co-found your own startup with 0 years of experience, then even if you tank 2 years later, you are likely to wind up close to the 5 years of experience point of the hockey stick when applying for a job.
Basically, the startup gives you a small chance of huge upside, and on the downside, you become a normal W-2 salaried employee but begin at a point farther along than someone who played it safe the entire time.
Whether this happens in practice is probably highly dependent on whether the risk taker demonstrated some goodness during the failed startup.
Re: Developer salary growth is an inverted hockey stick
#33Earlier quoted context omitted.
Speculation: maybe the proxy server blocked it because the domain name includes the word "hire", and the company is trying to keep people from finding a new place to work.
This Websense category is filtered: Blogs and Personal Sites.
Though that could be a lie to make you not know they are blocking you from looking at 'hire' websites.
Re: Developer salary growth is an inverted hockey stick
#34Earlier quoted context omitted.
This Websense category is filtered: Blogs and Personal Sites.
Though that could be a lie to make you not know they are blocking you from looking at 'hire' websites.
Either way, I find much of the best information on some narrow topics are on sites that could be described as "blogs".
Re: Developer salary growth is an inverted hockey stick
#35Anyone have a sense of how true this is at big places like Google and Microsoft?
One thing not taken into account in this discussion is the natural limitation of career growth. Everyone has a cap on their advancement. Some devs hit that cap after 4 years, some after ten. But a smaller and smaller percentage of employees are promoted to a higher level after the requisite amount of experience.
At Google and Microsoft there is very large percentage (~60%)of employees in the T4/SDEII bracket. This is the 2-5 year experience bracket. The percentage of employees in a level exponentially tapers off when compared against higher levels. This could be one explanation of the graph as presented.
At the companies you mention, the graph is accurate when plotted against population but incorrect when plotted against level.
Mid to higher levels see approx linear growth in salary and compensation until the top echelon. The compensation difference between two levels is approximately 10% the starting salary of a college hire. However, this highest levels including directors, tech managers and partners see clearly non-continuous bump in salary and equity (2-5x salary, 10-50x stock).
Re: Developer salary growth is an inverted hockey stick
#36There is an interesting subtext in this article, which is to suggest that you take more risks as you get closer to the asymptote of salary growth, because it's the way to avoid diminishing returns for the additional skills you've learned between hitting the level of "experienced" and now. It's the opposite advice that makes up common wisdom, which is to take risks when you are young, inexperienced and without respons…
Not quite. I think this is conventional wisdom: If you take a risk and co-found your own startup with 0 years of experience, then even if you tank 2 years later, you are likely to wind up close to the 5 years of experience point of the hockey stick when applying for a job. Basically, the startup gives you a small chance of huge upside, and on the downside, you become a normal W-2 salaried employee but begin at a poin…
If you take a risk and co-found your own startup with 0 years of experience, then even if you tank 2 years later, you are likely to wind up close to the 5 years of experience point of the hockey stick when applying for a job.
That's probably closer to the conventional wisdom around HN, but it is a far cry from conventional wisdom amongst the masses. The wisdom amongst the masses is that if you co-found or join a startup, you are playing roulette with your financial security.
But the article's point -- which I agree with -- is that even if you accelerate this process of getting to that 5 year threshold, you are doing yourself a disservice fiscally by settling in at the plateau unless you have a good reason forcing you into settling.
You're likely still learning more, and becoming more valuable, but it becomes much more difficult to extract that value through salary. So, it becomes beneficial to join companies where that only makes up a part of the total compensation package.
Re: Developer salary growth is an inverted hockey stick
#37This has created a pretty serious issue at my current job. My experience is increasing in value faster than policy lets my salary appreciate. Policy is forcing me to find a job elsewhere. I cannot rationalize continually taking a relative pay cut to stay where I am.
One inconvenience that often occurs with ambitious employees is that your skills grow faster than your employer's needs.
And if that employer isn't huge, there's not necessarily an open slot that demands your new skill level.
Re: Developer salary growth is an inverted hockey stick
#38In economics the reverse hockey stick growth is known as diminishing marginal returns. This simply means the market values the earliest years of experience as much more beneficial to a developers skill than the later. While I understand the idea behind hiring young and inexperienced, it should be noted that the wage rates are there for a reason. The training costs/possible managerial time may be greater for the avera…
In economics the reverse hockey stick growth is known as diminishing marginal returns. This simply means the market values the earliest years of experience as much more beneficial to a developers skill than the later.
I wonder which part of the market it is that champions valuing developers this way; is it the companies that value that additional experience less, or is it the developers who diminish the additional value more experience adds? They both ultimately agree, as but I wonder which side is making the harder compromise here to get to that agreement.
I can't help but see this graph, though, and get the impression that after a certain number of years, people just stop caring so much. It might be that they grow apathetic. It might also be that the asymptote is the level at which salary stops mattering, and people focus on other things. I'd kind of believe that; you can been pretty comfortable most places at $100-120k/yr, and might start worrying more about things that go beyond mere comfort.
Re: Developer salary growth is an inverted hockey stick
#39Earlier quoted context omitted.
Speculation: maybe the proxy server blocked it because the domain name includes the word "hire", and the company is trying to keep people from finding a new place to work.
This Websense category is filtered: Blogs and Personal Sites.
Strange, where I work the firewall blocked the site also, but calls it: "Dating/Personals".
Re: Developer salary growth is an inverted hockey stick
#40There is an interesting subtext in this article, which is to suggest that you take more risks as you get closer to the asymptote of salary growth, because it's the way to avoid diminishing returns for the additional skills you've learned between hitting the level of "experienced" and now. It's the opposite advice that makes up common wisdom, which is to take risks when you are young, inexperienced and without respons…
Skills don't really compound, it's not like interest where you gain 10%/year on your existing skill set.
We forget stuff, and things we learn don't always enhance/build on things we already know.