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Ask HN: What has been your experience with bigger tech companies in London?

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Re: Ask HN: What has been your experience with bigger tech companies in London?

#31

Post by phphphphp »

colinmhayes wrote: post #13
phphphphp wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A few years ago FAANG salaries in London were pretty weak, but they’re much better now and even within the startup ecosystem — traditionally much lower than FAANG salaries here — £90k is a reasonable base expectation and £100k at a minimum for FAANG (>150k TC is normal). On £100k London is pretty affordable, so I’m curious, how much were you making in London and what do you consider to be a required salary to start a…

£150k is much, much less than non entry level FAANG engineers in the US are making.

Adjusting for benefits etc. it's not that different but my point is that £150k in London is a great salary on which someone can live very well, regardless of what you can earn in the US.

Re: Ask HN: What has been your experience with bigger tech companies in London?

#32

Post by Balero »

tennis_sort wrote: post #16
phphphphp wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A few years ago FAANG salaries in London were pretty weak, but they’re much better now and even within the startup ecosystem — traditionally much lower than FAANG salaries here — £90k is a reasonable base expectation and £100k at a minimum for FAANG (>150k TC is normal). On £100k London is pretty affordable, so I’m curious, how much were you making in London and what do you consider to be a required salary to start a…

£100k London as a single person could definitely buy a flat somewhere. Maybe not a great area but it's doable. A house with a garden, kids, private school etc. 100k won't cut it unfortunately. For some reason I thought FAANGs in London were paid really well but seems like contracting or finance is the only way to get a reasonable income. I have a buddy who was working for a DeepMind and now works for Google (UK). His…

I agree with everything you said aside from: "For some reason I thought FAANGs in London were paid really well but seems like contracting or finance is the only way to get a reasonable income."

Even in London £100k is above a reasonable income for one person. It's not enough to buy a house and provide for a family on one income and still have no worries, but expecting that is unreasonable. It's really easy to get stuck in a bubble where we forget that six figures is crazy out of the ordinary for an average person.

But as to your main point. Yeah finance and contracting really is the right way to go to get a high income. Though I think this might be changing with the contracting as there were some recent changes that make contracting less efficient tax wise, and could push high performers to either ask for more, or just move to being an employee.

Re: Ask HN: What has been your experience with bigger tech companies in London?

#33

Post by Dave3of5 »

mettamage wrote: post #4

If you're European it's one of the few options you've got. I find it odd though that people make so much less compared to their US counterparts. Does anyone know why that is?

Mostly money, there's plenty of start-up's in europe but the funding is much less than that from USA VC's.

There are exceptions to this rule but overall funding is less.

Re: Ask HN: What has been your experience with bigger tech companies in London?

#34

Post by pooya72 »

djohnston wrote: post #3

You make way less money than your peers in California and everything is still as expensive. It's a financially horrible decision if you can work in the US. If you want to work in Europe though it's pretty good. I've worked at FAANG in US and UK and am currently going back to the US for non-financial reasons. I don't regret being here but I find London to be impossibly expensive to build a family in.

It's interesting that you have lived in both and can do a fair comparison. There was a reddit thread a while back that compared US and UK salaries.[1] The consensus seemed to be, that if you compared the cost of living, you would need a considerably higher income in the US to have the same standard of living as the UK. One person said that 130K USD salary in the Bay Area would be equivalent to 50K GBP in London.[2] Another person said that 100K USD in the Bay Area is equivalent to 50 GBP in London. [3]

It would be great to get your feedback on this.

[1]:https://old.reddit.com/r/UKPersonalFinance/comments/nhe8v1/w...

[2]:https://old.reddit.com/r/UKPersonalFinance/comments/nhe8v1/w...

[3]:https://old.reddit.com/r/UKPersonalFinance/comments/nhe8v1/w...

Re: Ask HN: What has been your experience with bigger tech companies in London?

#35

Post by phphphphp »

tennis_sort wrote: post #16
phphphphp wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A few years ago FAANG salaries in London were pretty weak, but they’re much better now and even within the startup ecosystem — traditionally much lower than FAANG salaries here — £90k is a reasonable base expectation and £100k at a minimum for FAANG (>150k TC is normal). On £100k London is pretty affordable, so I’m curious, how much were you making in London and what do you consider to be a required salary to start a…

£100k London as a single person could definitely buy a flat somewhere. Maybe not a great area but it's doable. A house with a garden, kids, private school etc. 100k won't cut it unfortunately. For some reason I thought FAANGs in London were paid really well but seems like contracting or finance is the only way to get a reasonable income. I have a buddy who was working for a DeepMind and now works for Google (UK). His…

The downside of contracting though is that the work is typically the work full-time employees don't want to do. You gain in flexibility, but lose in enjoyment -- enjoyable contracts are a minority. Specific to the point on finances: there's typically 250 billable days in a UK year so £600/day is £150k/year. There are tax benefits to contracting, so it's not a one-to-one relationship, but £150k/year salaried is better than £600/day for most people.

Re: Ask HN: What has been your experience with bigger tech companies in London?

#36

Post by onlyrealcuzzo »

Balero wrote: post #32
tennis_sort wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

£100k London as a single person could definitely buy a flat somewhere. Maybe not a great area but it's doable. A house with a garden, kids, private school etc. 100k won't cut it unfortunately. For some reason I thought FAANGs in London were paid really well but seems like contracting or finance is the only way to get a reasonable income. I have a buddy who was working for a DeepMind and now works for Google (UK). His…

I agree with everything you said aside from: "For some reason I thought FAANGs in London were paid really well but seems like contracting or finance is the only way to get a reasonable income." Even in London £100k is above a reasonable income for one person. It's not enough to buy a house and provide for a family on one income and still have no worries, but expecting that is unreasonable. It's really easy to get stu…

It's really out of the ordinary when you're in the top 1% and can't afford a decent life - meanwhile lower middle class people who bought before QE (15 years ago) can afford a decent life.

We shouldn't be lowering our "unreasonable" standards. If you're in the top 1% in income - you should have an complementary lifestyle. Not just be grateful that you're not in complete financial misery like everyone else your age.

Re: Ask HN: What has been your experience with bigger tech companies in London?

#37

Post by phphphphp »

pawelwentpawel wrote: post #19
djohnston wrote: post #3

You make way less money than your peers in California and everything is still as expensive. It's a financially horrible decision if you can work in the US. If you want to work in Europe though it's pretty good. I've worked at FAANG in US and UK and am currently going back to the US for non-financial reasons. I don't regret being here but I find London to be impossibly expensive to build a family in.

I wonder, is moving from UK to US easy within a FAANG company? Is that something people do?

The level you're working at matters too for visa reasons. If you can qualify for an L-1 visa, it's one of the easiest ways to get from the UK to the US: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L-1_visa

Re: Ask HN: What has been your experience with bigger tech companies in London?

#38

Post by dbetteridge »

MrRiddle wrote: post #24
colinmhayes wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

£150k is much, much less than non entry level FAANG engineers in the US are making.

150k after tax, pension and healthcare or before?

UK/Australia/NZ tend to talk about Base salary (excludes bonus/health care/before tax).

Is that different elsewhere?

Edited to note this is "Base" not "Total" Salary

Re: Ask HN: What has been your experience with bigger tech companies in London?

#39

Post by tasubotadas »

dbetteridge wrote: post #9
tasubotadas wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lack of competition and venture funding

Also different employer expenses per employee, I don't know them off the top of my head but the UK tax levels are pretty high.

45% tax

Re: Ask HN: What has been your experience with bigger tech companies in London?

#40

Post by [deleted] »

bakuninsbart wrote: post #27
mettamage wrote: post #4

If you're European it's one of the few options you've got. I find it odd though that people make so much less compared to their US counterparts. Does anyone know why that is?

Here in Germany an employee costs substantially more due to various laws and regulations. For example, assuming an employee has a salary of 4000€/month before taxes, the employer is required to pay 7.3% to health insurance, 1.3% to long-term care insurance and 1.5% to unemployment insurance. There are also substantially more bank holidays (on average 10), and an additional minimum of 20 days of paid leave. Sick leave…

[deleted]
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