So long as there is a labor shortage, workers will reasonably feel underpaid, knowing they have a better deal elsewhere. Just like in a recession people feel lucky to have a job. As for causes, US work visas have been cut while pandemic fueled increased demand for online services. And India/China still have not recovered from the pandemic to the same degree as US.
Tech Salaries in 2022: Why the Six Figure Pay Makes Techies Feel Underpaid
271–280 of 609 posts
Re: Tech Salaries in 2022: Why the Six Figure Pay Makes Techies Feel Underpaid
#272Earlier quoted context omitted.
The money we make pales in comparison with the size of our contributions to the company. Especially so if you are in a value-adding position and not something like internal tooling. Management and executives are DEFINITELY underpaying us relative to what we bring to the table for them. Maybe that is one of the reason headcounts have ballooned and complexity has increased so much -- an attempt to minimize individual i…
well we all like to think we're the sole reason "the company" makes any money but there's a lot more to the equation than just the person typing out the code. Without the code there would be no value but the code is meaningless without all the other expertise required to turn it into bank deposits. The technical part is maybe 10% (if not lower) of the overall effort to get a paycheck in your hands.
Nowhere does my post indicate that I think I'm the "sole reason" the company makes any money. We are all just cogs in the machine. But, as with anyone who makes the product, we are a huge part of the reason the company is in business and it would be nice if management would stop looking down at us. Maybe they should be looking up to us instead. (And if you disagree, read into the tone of the article.... "techies"??? Ideas for paying us less?)
Not to discount other departments like marketing or operations -- they are important too. But they don't make the product, they are more numerous, and more interchangeable.
Re: Tech Salaries in 2022: Why the Six Figure Pay Makes Techies Feel Underpaid
#273TL;DR
High tech workers feel underpaid, so here's how to continue to underpay them and make them feel okay about it.
Re: Tech Salaries in 2022: Why the Six Figure Pay Makes Techies Feel Underpaid
#274There's this dynamic of pay tending to be pegged to your job title. An engineer is an engineer is an engineer. In SF bay area, entry level jobs at big tech are skewing high and experienced roles are skewing low. This doesn't come close to mapping to impact level usually and we just accept that because it's socially easy. I've worked at startups where there were clearly >10x impact differences between two engineers an…
This right here. It's frustrating when you learn that someone hired a couple months ago ("the hottest job market" tm) with 2 yoe makes marginally less than you at 10+ yoe, as an example. A higher performing Sr can expect maybe high single digit bumps yearly, but a job hopping Jr can double digit bump and make it to almost the same level in a couple years. While less important and more ego the same thing is happening…
This is known as wage compression. It is occurring (typical in hot job markets) and has many of the problems you noted. Good indicator of a distorted labor market.
Re: Tech Salaries in 2022: Why the Six Figure Pay Makes Techies Feel Underpaid
#275A solid article, but it should have commented on single family home prices. If you use the 3x salary rule, a $120k a year techie couldn't afford the median home price in America ($374k). A software engineer in San Francisco would have to make $526k a year in cold hard cash to reasonably afford the median single family home ($1.58 million). Talking about six figure salaries as if they are unquestionably upper-middle c…
Why would a single person need to buy a 3 bedroom home (the median American home size)? A household with two $120k earners can very comfortably afford a $1 million home at current mortgage rates.
Am I so out of touch that this sounds insane? Mortgages are leverage and that's a whole lot of it.
Re: Tech Salaries in 2022: Why the Six Figure Pay Makes Techies Feel Underpaid
#276>the average tech worker’s salary [will] reach $104,566 in the U.S. — a 6.9% increase since 2020, the report found. But inflation is over 11% since 2020. This isn't an increase. The average tech worker is making less than they were 2 years ago according to the Dice salary report. Why do tech workers feel underpaid? Many companies posted record growth and profits over the pandemic, but still give out paltry 3-5% raise…
Grind leetcode that's it?? All I have to do is ace every leetcode problem and I get a 20% raise every year?!
Re: Tech Salaries in 2022: Why the Six Figure Pay Makes Techies Feel Underpaid
#277Earlier quoted context omitted.
What 1980s fantasy is this 3x rule? Median household incomes to home price ratios have risen to ~8x across the US as a whole , not just crazy house price areas like SF/NYC. Canada and Australia are far worse again, pushing 15x in some cities. 3x, if it ever was a rule, has been dead for a long long time.
There's no way in hell it's close to 8x. Just crunched the numbers, and an 8x mortgage would exceed my monthly take home. I felt pretty uncomfortable at 2.5x. I feel a lot of people are probably extending out to 4 or even 5, but 8 would be irresponsible and I doubt you could even find a lender for that.
I should have provided these in my first comment:
Median-income-to-house price by state : https://constructioncoverage.com/research/cities-with-highes...
As you can see California is at a whopping 8.9x
US overall: https://www.longtermtrends.net/home-price-median-annual-inco...
Pushing 7x.
Re: Tech Salaries in 2022: Why the Six Figure Pay Makes Techies Feel Underpaid
#278"six figure", "underpaid", "random.com", medium like article about having it difficult working out of hours...
Dear author, imagine yourself in academia where this is a relaxing week but the pay is half. If you dislike your job leave, or, suck it up and build towards an early retirement. It's not a magical forumla...
Re: Tech Salaries in 2022: Why the Six Figure Pay Makes Techies Feel Underpaid
#279A solid article, but it should have commented on single family home prices. If you use the 3x salary rule, a $120k a year techie couldn't afford the median home price in America ($374k). A software engineer in San Francisco would have to make $526k a year in cold hard cash to reasonably afford the median single family home ($1.58 million). Talking about six figure salaries as if they are unquestionably upper-middle c…
Why would a single person need to buy a 3 bedroom home (the median American home size)? A household with two $120k earners can very comfortably afford a $1 million home at current mortgage rates.
In a world where property taxes, apartment maintenance fees, etc didn't exist, sure.
Re: Tech Salaries in 2022: Why the Six Figure Pay Makes Techies Feel Underpaid
#280Earlier quoted context omitted.
The money we make pales in comparison with the size of our contributions to the company. Especially so if you are in a value-adding position and not something like internal tooling. Management and executives are DEFINITELY underpaying us relative to what we bring to the table for them. Maybe that is one of the reason headcounts have ballooned and complexity has increased so much -- an attempt to minimize individual i…
> The money we make pales in comparison with the size of our contributions to the company. That’s a tautology though. They wouldn’t hire someone to break even and they wouldn’t hire someone to make a little more money since there’s work and risk in hiring.
It's really not. Start-ups routinely fail to generate value and engineers get hired by such companies all the time. All that is needed is the belief it's possible the value will be higher. The reality doesn't need to match the belief.