Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Tech Salaries in 2022: Why the Six Figure Pay Makes Techies Feel Underpaid

toolbox.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

101–110 of 609 posts

Re: Tech Salaries in 2022: Why the Six Figure Pay Makes Techies Feel Underpaid

#101

Post by eru »

np- wrote: post #55
rocketbop wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> ...a 6.9% increase since 2020, the report found. But inflation is over 11% since 2020. This isn't an increase. The I have heard this point made a couple of times recently. Is there any reason why these two values should be the same? It is a point of concern for those on very low incomes who spent all their income and are not able to save anythiny, but if you are on a six figure income and only a portion of that inc…

The employer is the one taking that extra value, so why wouldn’t the “you already have enough money” argument cut both ways? I also assume management is wealthier than the previous year.

Management is employees, too..

Re: Tech Salaries in 2022: Why the Six Figure Pay Makes Techies Feel Underpaid

#102

Post by user_named »

Layke1123 wrote: post #9
bigcat12345678 wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where does 3X salary rule come from?

Early America when homes were steady at about that price.

Pre-zirp. Monthly housing cost should not exceed a third of take home.

Re: Tech Salaries in 2022: Why the Six Figure Pay Makes Techies Feel Underpaid

#103

Post by eru »

quickthrower2 wrote: post #82
silisili wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be clear, I do quite a bit better than that... I'm not complaining. But using 120k as an example...a person went from making 4x the typical full time salary to 2x the typical full time salary in a very short period.

And that is not just keep up with jones syndrome: getting services done like building work, cleaning, etc. gets more expensive. I am all for equality of that nature if everyone is joining in!

If only America's productive cities did not ban building more housing..

Re: Tech Salaries in 2022: Why the Six Figure Pay Makes Techies Feel Underpaid

#104

Post by gambiting »

Thorrez wrote: post #52
adhesive_wombat wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

5.25 joint salary, though, so that could be as high as 11.5 times one person's salary for one house if you're buying together (they may have a slightly different calculation when combining salary). And indeed my house, but not the mortgage, was well over 10 times my salary when I bought it. The mortgage was around 8 times my (entry level UK) salary, but about half that if you counted both of us. Which is one route to…

What percent of people have fixed vs variable rate mortgages?

In UK you always get a fixed rate for X number of years, then it automatically move to variable(but at that point you'd just remortgage again). Like we're on a 1.29% 5-year fixed mortgage, but the whole thing is 20 years long. But after 5 years we'll just remortgage again on new terms.

Re: Tech Salaries in 2022: Why the Six Figure Pay Makes Techies Feel Underpaid

#105

Post by eru »

Melting_Harps wrote: post #81
silisili wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be clear, I do quite a bit better than that... I'm not complaining. But using 120k as an example...a person went from making 4x the typical full time salary to 2x the typical full time salary in a very short period.

> To be clear, I do quite a bit better than that... I'm not complaining. But using 120k as an example...a person went from making 4x the typical full time salary to 2x the typical full time salary in a very short period. This is what I will never understand about most established tech people, they see all the widespread misery and poverty in SV and they still have the capacity to feel sorry for themselves for not mak…

> This is what I will never understand about most established tech people, they see all the widespread misery and poverty in SV and they still have the capacity to feel sorry for themselves for not making X times more than 'that other guy.'

Out of sight, out of mind? What does it matter whether the misery and poverty is in your neighbourhood, or in the third world?

Re: Tech Salaries in 2022: Why the Six Figure Pay Makes Techies Feel Underpaid

#106

Post by jokethrowaway »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #67
alexchamberlain wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're a senior delivering 10x the value of a grad, does it not feel fair to offer more than 2x the salary? I'm torn tbh - there are various ways that a salary can be set, including the value people are delivering, market forces and in reference to others in the career ladder. There's a balancing act to be had, but I can see where the GP is coming from.

> you're a senior delivering 10x the value of a grad Not arguing one way or another. But an alternate hypothesis would be this skill gap has closed. Education might be better. Or tooling may have improved such that the tangible benefit of experience has, for most current applications, depreciated. Assuming the reduced innovativeness of the average tech worker today versus ten years ago, the equation balances. Test mi…

It's not, juniors are as bad as they were 2 years ago. Generally it's politically easier to nerf better paid employees than cheap ones.

You can have the socialist argument of "hey senior engineer, take a salary cut / no raise for the common good, to avoid layoffs of junior engineers - which btw would be the first to go as they're not as productive as you are" and I've seen plenty of senior engineers accept that. Their livelihood are not as stake so they'll take one for the team, forgetting that it's a for profit company which can't find the money.

In the above scenario, I refused and I wasn't fired - but I also started looking for a job and switched 2 weeks after the above episode happened.

Re: Tech Salaries in 2022: Why the Six Figure Pay Makes Techies Feel Underpaid

#107

Post by zece »

AnotherAsprin wrote: post #61

Are six figure salaries an american thing? I see people saying "Entry level jobs are paying up to 60k" which is just crazy money! I have worked for the past 7 years as IT within the UK education sector and expect my salary to be lower than that of industry but I am not even making half that!

Yes, outside London the six figure salaries only start appearing when you have a particularly senior role in a company that's flush with cash.

Re: Tech Salaries in 2022: Why the Six Figure Pay Makes Techies Feel Underpaid

#108

Post by emteycz »

Melting_Harps wrote: post #81
silisili wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be clear, I do quite a bit better than that... I'm not complaining. But using 120k as an example...a person went from making 4x the typical full time salary to 2x the typical full time salary in a very short period.

> To be clear, I do quite a bit better than that... I'm not complaining. But using 120k as an example...a person went from making 4x the typical full time salary to 2x the typical full time salary in a very short period. This is what I will never understand about most established tech people, they see all the widespread misery and poverty in SV and they still have the capacity to feel sorry for themselves for not mak…

> This is what I will never understand about most established tech people, they see all the widespread misery and poverty in SV and they still have the capacity to feel sorry for themselves for not making X times more than 'that other guy.

I don't understand this opinion. Why are the two feelings in conflict? I can be concerned for the people around me AND be concerned that I'm making less than X times more than the average.

I really don't think there's anything good about equality if it means a programmer is making the same as the unqualified people - to me that signals a completely broken world that can't function. This kind of equality has been tried and failed spectacularly, and I live in a place that still feels the catastrophe today, 30 years post-facto, and it will be felt for the next 30 years at least, too.

Overall, equality seems to me to be a misguided goal. We want people to have comfortable, healthy lives - I don't see how that relates to financial equality at all. Life needs to get cheaper so even the poor people can afford it - making everyone an equal millionaire will never work, that would just cause the prices to rise so much nobody could afford it and the meme of "equal misery" would become a reality once again. Let's talk about financial equality again once machines can do all the work.

Re: Tech Salaries in 2022: Why the Six Figure Pay Makes Techies Feel Underpaid

#109

Post by eru »

silisili wrote: post #74
brabel wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a strange concern you seem to have... why does it bother you that fellow programmers are getting salaries close to yours? Do you think it would feel better if your salary could be 5x higher than theirs? Why? That will not actually affect you negatively in any way! Unless you're being actually underpaid compared to your peers with the same experience and skills, there's only good things about people with lower…

> why does it bother you that fellow programmers are getting salaries close to yours? I wasn't referring to programmers, but unskilled labor such as specifically, package sorting. Even some fast food jobs are approaching that number. > That will not actually affect you negatively in any way Absolutely untrue. When everyone has more money, money is worth less. See also, our current (underreported) inflation rate. I'd…

What makes you think the inflation rate is under-reported?

Do you see any concern with other people making more money that would not be reflected in an (accurately reported) inflation rate?

Re: Tech Salaries in 2022: Why the Six Figure Pay Makes Techies Feel Underpaid

#110

Post by mstipetic »

alexchamberlain wrote: post #46
brabel wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a strange concern you seem to have... why does it bother you that fellow programmers are getting salaries close to yours? Do you think it would feel better if your salary could be 5x higher than theirs? Why? That will not actually affect you negatively in any way! Unless you're being actually underpaid compared to your peers with the same experience and skills, there's only good things about people with lower…

If you're a senior delivering 10x the value of a grad, does it not feel fair to offer more than 2x the salary? I'm torn tbh - there are various ways that a salary can be set, including the value people are delivering, market forces and in reference to others in the career ladder. There's a balancing act to be had, but I can see where the GP is coming from.

This is why I went into freelance. It’s not about being a junior, there are people that put in so little effort they basically bring negative value, and I’m being paid comparable to them
Post reply on HN