Eh, this is not always and everywhere true. I have friends at Google here in London and some of the salary figures I've heard are shockingly low. As in, sub-or-around-100k low. Though admittedly these are people who I'd guess are below, say, L5.
That 'low' salary may put them in the top few percent of the whole country for their age bracket which means they can live quite nice lives. Everything is relative.
That's true, and I'm aware how lucky we are in this profession. But I'm talking relative to the software engineering job market at large.
I really think people who leave software engineering altogether mostly failed to find a company that respects engineers/pays well. If you are good at the algorithms interviews, you can make ~400k with 5 to 8 years of experience. Do that for a decade, and with some saving and basic investing, you are basically done working. On the other hand, fail to pass the algorithms interview, you are essentially stuck at 140-170k…
> stuck at 140-170k
Is this amount of pay considered being "stuck" now?
People always look at me weird when I call software dev digital plumbing. Then they come back the next day and say, “actually I was thinking about it and you’re totally right!…”.
Software engineer can be similar to plumbing, an maybe for most jobs it is. But it can be so many other things as well. Writing a game isn't much like that at all for example.
Depends on what part of the game you’re working on, I imagine. Building a game (or any software product) is probably more like building a house. You need architects and designers and painters and carpenters and masons and electricians and plumbers. If you do frontend stuff you’re more like a mason or carpenter. Backend more like electrician and plumbing. Systems design -> architect. Interaction/UX design -> designer.
“ For instance, I could be fulfilling any of these roles: …kitchen helper…” Has developing software really gotten worse in the last 10 years, have expectations gotten higher, or what? I’ve been around 20 years and (anecdotally) for me it’s better than it ever has been. I’m a mobile developer and not a web dev though, how much does language matter in job satisfaction?
> how much does language matter in job satisfaction?
I think it depends. I hate JavaScript and Python. My coworkers don't care about language. They are working on the product, the goal is a fully functional service with a huge DAU. I can't complete product-specific tasks. I had been writing low-level software for networks, Linux kernel patches, eBPF helpers/tracers and now I'm working on hardware virtualization. In my free time, I'm prototyping devices on my FPGAs. It's really interesting. I can't imagine that I will drop my current job and will start cooking or guiding.
Indeed... I'm beginning to believe that I exist in an alternate universe (colloquially known as "Europe") where insane software engineering salaries aren't normalised.
Don't feel bad. In the alternate, alternate universe (colloquially known as "the USA outside of Silicon Valley, Seattle & NYC") they aren't normalized either.
Agreed. $150k is a commanding salary in most parts of the U.S. outside the bay area.
Google Switzerland pays the same as the main campus in California.
Oh, interesting. That's news to me, but then again, my source is quite old. Target total compensation? Not total compensation after stocks went up a ton?
Stock component is slightly lower in CH so if anything it would bias the result in the opposite way.
I agree with the author. I've also quit my job as a software dev. early this year, after about 10 years in the industry in various companies (so I can say it's not just a local issue) Having some savings, I'm looking to reorient into something else, also technical, but more hands on - literally. Also, as an added note I think that a large part of software written today makes the world a worse place to live in (I'm thinking social platforms and cloud computing - one taking away the realness and empathy in interacting with each others and the other taking away the ownership of anything). Also, don't get me started on ads system and the crap list of apps/games/software in general that gets pushed down people's throats due to big advetising budgets. If the people working in the industry as software devs doing the above would instead use their creativity and skills in other fields of work (ie. actual science and engineering) we would have a better world. I truly loathe the software development industry in all aspects, as it unfolds today. Not the software dev. activity itself, mind you. But the current goals, players (corporations) , environments, values and trends of the industry as a whole!
Many fang companies have offices all over Europe. The pay is not quite as high as the US but it is much higher than average dev European salaries.
Eh, this is not always and everywhere true. I have friends at Google here in London and some of the salary figures I've heard are shockingly low. As in, sub-or-around-100k low. Though admittedly these are people who I'd guess are below, say, L5.
Right. It's not always true. Which is why I said on average...
Eh, this is not always and everywhere true. I have friends at Google here in London and some of the salary figures I've heard are shockingly low. As in, sub-or-around-100k low. Though admittedly these are people who I'd guess are below, say, L5.
Right. It's not always true. Which is why I said on average...
No, you said FAANG pay is higher than average European dev pay, not that average FAANG pay is higher than [average] European dev pay
What qualifies as a "higher standard of living" to you, that isn't culture specific?
It's not just cultural, it's personal too. I've worked with (and still work with) many Americans, let me give you an idea. I get paid 174,000 USD per year I take 6 weeks off (vacation) per year to sail in the Mediterranean and to SKI in the French and Swiss alps. This is fully paid and it would be highly abnormal if I did not take this time off. My wife was paid her full salary for 6 months to have a baby. The govern…
If you live in the UK and have been in your job for less than two years, you don't have the protection from being fired you think you do. Our laws protect you from being fired for discriminatory reasons but not much else