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Babel is used by millions, so why are we running out of money?

babeljs.io

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Re: Babel is used by millions, so why are we running out of money?

#541

Post by hiram112 »

19h wrote: post #393
nicolo-ribaudo wrote: post #254

Babel maintainer here (one of the two contributors going from $2k/month to $6k/month). It's the first time I write on HN. I saw different comments (here and on Twitter) about how Henry was getting $11k/month from our funds but wasn't doing much for the project, and so I want to share my view of the story. Be careful when you try to evaluate how much someone is working: even if Babel is open source and almost everythi…

To me $72k for a non-full-time project per year is still insane. The median senior engineer pay in Italy is around EUR 38k - up to EUR 78k if you have around a decade of experience.

> The median senior engineer pay in Italy is around EUR 38k - up to EUR 78k if you have around a decade of experience

I see these salaries in places like Spain, Italy, and even Germany outside of Frankfurt / Berlin, and I'm flabbergasted. I've lived in the EU and travelled quite a bit, too. If anything, the prices for food, electronics, sundries, etc. are MORE expensive than the US because of VAT.

Housing, I'm sure, varies just like in the US, but I wouldn't imagine it's all that different. A small 2BR "condo" (i.e. not a single house with yard) in a mid-tier city in the US can now easily be $300K and probably similar in Italy, Spain, or Germany, at least in urban areas where all the jobs are located.

How do you guys live?

Re: Babel is used by millions, so why are we running out of money?

#542

Post by abxytg »

Touche wrote: post #464
wussboy wrote: post #401

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When that “carpenter” is also answering the phone and doing quotes for work, apparently. If Henry is also the community manager and main fundraiser (which from the sounds of other posts he is), I’d argue that the last thing you’d want him spending time on would be code.

It's like having a startup with 1 full-time salesperson and 3 part-time engineers. It would never work unless you already have a product (which Babel does). I sort of get the idea of spending your money trying to sale an existing product but it doesn't seem to have worked in this case. That doesn't mean allocating the money differently would have worked either (arguably it would have been better for current patrons t…

This is what happens when you spend your eng career working at a company that doesn't have to sell products.

Re: Babel is used by millions, so why are we running out of money?

#543

Post by mindfulmore »

endisneigh wrote: post #532
mindfulmore wrote: post #520

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure what you're taking issue with here.

$130K is objectively not a joke of a salary in the United States. That's roughly 90th percentile.

Of course, it's not a joke of a salary in the United States. Is $130k a joke of a salary for an NBA player even though it's 90th percentile? Context matters.

$130k is barely over the median pay for a Senior Software Engineer in the United States. A lot of the people stewarding and maintaining these projects are talented enough to be earning wages that are much further into the outliers (i.e. FANG compensation of 300-400k+/year).

That's all I'm saying. What's much more likely to be happening here is that the maintainer of Babel took a much harder job that cannot be summarized by output metrics like GitHub activity tracking.

Attacking him and essentially tossing around accusations of embezzlement when you've just received VC funding for a competitor is just wrong.

Re: Babel is used by millions, so why are we running out of money?

#545

Post by andrew_ »

olingern wrote: post #540
andrew_ wrote: post #470

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It actually is correct. He's routinely dogged the project and team after leaving the project: https://twitter.com/sebmck/status/1176534097881006080 , and was a founding member: https://engineering.fb.com/2016/10/11/web/yarn-a-new-package...

Having worked on both projects, I can tell you that it's more complex than what you're making it out to be.

This is where anecdotal evidence is difficult - hard evidence that we can reference points to the contrary and supports my reply. I have further anecdotal evidence I could cite, but it's not trustworthy.

Re: Babel is used by millions, so why are we running out of money?

#546

Post by tarruda »

endisneigh wrote: post #532
mindfulmore wrote: post #520

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure what you're taking issue with here.

$130K is objectively not a joke of a salary in the United States. That's roughly 90th percentile.

It seems a common trend that software engineers think their high salaries are something they can take for granted forever.

I prefer to think that we are riding in a bubble that can pop any minute now. This line of thinking allows me to be more responsible with spending and save more for rainy days.

Re: Babel is used by millions, so why are we running out of money?

#547

Post by 29athrowaway »

david_allison wrote: post #351
dsr12 wrote: post #316

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Creator of Vue.js Evan You's perspective: "Working on a project" doesn't only mean pushing commits. It also means deciding what to do, syncing with committees, running a team structure, thinking about how and where to get funding, and handling the mental pressure of "I'm responsible for this". https://twitter.com/youyuxi/status/1392088730438090756

Evan You[0] has over 4x more contributions than Henry Zhu[1] this year. Evan's absolutely correct, there's a lot of 'invisible' community activity, but in my experience of OSS, it's typical to have a 'contribution' on GitHub every day, which is missing in the case of a Babel maintainer who's being paid $130k/y Let's compare to the other maintainers: [2][3][4][5][6]. Contribution counts aren't and shouldn't be everyth…

You can send a PR with 1 million lines of code, or 3 lines of code.

You can send PRs updating typos in documentation, or PRs affecting the core aspects of a project.

You can send 100 PRs full of tech debt or 1 that makes the thing run 100x faster.

PR counts suck as a way to measure work.

Re: Babel is used by millions, so why are we running out of money?

#548

Post by asidiali »

WORMS_EAT_WORMS wrote: post #516
mindfulmore wrote: post #513

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Neither is people piling on the maintainer of Babel based on GitHub activity and someone essentially accusing them of embezzlement. Sorry if that makes me upset. $130k for a senior developer in the United States is nothing. People at FANG are making 3-4x that annually.

> $130k for a senior developer in the United States is nothing. People at FANG are making 3-4x that annually. Right, hence my out of touch comment. This just doubles down.

open source maintainer salary !== FAANG total comp package

E5 engineers at FB are making an avg 200k base [1]. That is not that far off what you would expect the difference to be between open source maintainer and senior engineer at Facebook.

That is not 3-4x. Even if you include stock, that will put the FB eng around 350k. You may have an argument for the 2-3x range but basically only at the very top level companies and senior roles, not mid level contributors. And by including stock or other forms of TC besides base, you begin inflating the impression of cash flow. Stock grants don’t land in your wallet like paychecks do. Your QoL or vested net worth will take time to be impacted. It’s not like all of a sudden you can now afford X% more in your daily life.

IMO HN likes to exaggerate compensation levels.

[1] https://www.levels.fyi/company/Facebook/salaries/Software-En...

Re: Babel is used by millions, so why are we running out of money?

#550

Post by endisneigh »

mindfulmore wrote: post #543
endisneigh wrote: post #532

Earlier quoted context omitted.

$130K is objectively not a joke of a salary in the United States. That's roughly 90th percentile.

Of course, it's not a joke of a salary in the United States. Is $130k a joke of a salary for an NBA player even though it's 90th percentile? Context matters. $130k is barely over the median pay for a Senior Software Engineer in the United States. A lot of the people stewarding and maintaining these projects are talented enough to be earning wages that are much further into the outliers (i.e. FANG compensation of 300-…

yes, context does matter. So why are you comparing a full time OSS developer with FANG? ridiculous. I don't have any opinion on the babel drama, but 130K isn't a "joke" even for a OSS developer who is "senior".
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