In Europe they've probably gone down the past decade I'd say.
Oof, European salaries are absurdly low. When I first left the USA I was thinking "OK I'll get a nice job in Amsterdam or Denmark" .. Then I saw the cost of living and the low salaries, and waved away that dream.
Ask HN: Have tech salaries been stagnant for the past decade?
331–340 of 345 posts
Re: Ask HN: Have tech salaries been stagnant for the past decade?
#332Earlier quoted context omitted.
> it's quite grim to live in Western Europe on regular dev salary No it's not. We still earn above average and (very) generally life in Europe are not grim.
it is not grim but getting a family-home with a dev salary is out of the picture for many western europeans. it wasn't the case one generation ago. american dev can definitly afford a house even in HCOL cities. for a similar job at AWS or Google you getting 550k+ in NYC vs 200k in London or Paris. just looking at real estate (which is number 1 cost) it is worth moving to NYC. just to give you an idea: MIDTOWN next to…
Re: Ask HN: Have tech salaries been stagnant for the past decade?
#333Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is all a "you" problem. You have made the choice to work in shitty startups, you have made the choice to work 60 hours per week, and you have made the choice to accept jobs that would pay you below market rate. Being a bitter old man is not the attitude problem mentioned here, being someone that refuses to see that their unsatisfactory situation is 100% due to their own actions (or rather, lack of action) is you…
I would rather have a garbage resume, than be a garbage human being like yourself.
Re: Ask HN: Have tech salaries been stagnant for the past decade?
#334Earlier quoted context omitted.
I would rather have a garbage resume, than be a garbage human being like yourself.
Ok but then don't come complaining that your salary is stagnant and that you were unemployed for 90% of the past 3 years. It is your own doing.
People like you are why San Franciscan locals like myself hate techies.
Re: Ask HN: Have tech salaries been stagnant for the past decade?
#335Earlier quoted context omitted.
They probably have a rich, well connected daddy. For normal people, $250k is probably as high as you can possibly go. I also have experience with distributed systems, worked 80 hours a week for 10 years straight and built several popular open source projects and I can't get past $80k... Almost feels like a conspiracy against me at this stage but I suspect it just comes down to not having a rich daddy who is connected…
> Almost feels like a conspiracy against me at this stage but I suspect it just comes down to not having a rich daddy who is connected to politicians and corporate execs. I don't know where you live but there is no way this is the case. 80k is less than starting salaries for new grads. Maybe you meant 180k? In which case, that's still around the level for a second level employee at a big company (a few years of exper…
This is just one story I have among many. My resume is stellar, my communication skills are great, the interviewers always seem impressed while I'm taking to them, my colleagues always treat me with respect wherever I go... But somehow all these weird things happen to me whenever I deal with big corporations or startups backed by big VCs.
Ironically, before that, I had an experience on the other side interviewing candidates at my previous company but somehow none of the really good candidates which I recommended got in. Instead, they hired only mediocre developers.
Re: Ask HN: Have tech salaries been stagnant for the past decade?
#336Earlier quoted context omitted.
They probably have a rich, well connected daddy. For normal people, $250k is probably as high as you can possibly go. I also have experience with distributed systems, worked 80 hours a week for 10 years straight and built several popular open source projects and I can't get past $80k... Almost feels like a conspiracy against me at this stage but I suspect it just comes down to not having a rich daddy who is connected…
It honestly seems like you have an attitude problem.
Re: Ask HN: Have tech salaries been stagnant for the past decade?
#337Earlier quoted context omitted.
> This isn't really a problem with IR35 in principle though. It is, because the situation would have not happened before the changes. Basically now, thanks to the legislation, the client has the power to force a legitimate business into employment. If you are not a skilled worker you don't have any position to bargain, so it's umbrella or nothing. > it can't be normal for them to go after someone who honestly believe…
Basically now, thanks to the legislation, the client has the power to force a legitimate business into employment. But clients always had the option to do that. They could just decide not to work with contractors and only hire permanent staff instead. In fact that is the alternative that many of the biggest companies apparently decided to choose after the IR35 changes came into effect instead of adopting some kind of…
Actually the parliamentary group that also deals with Loan Charge scandal is aware of the problem of umbrella companies pulling fraud with impunity. They called for a reform, highlighted the issues to no avail. HMRC is dead set on this to continue. There is nothing one can do. After all who cares about some care worker getting screwed, she should have known better...
Re: Ask HN: Have tech salaries been stagnant for the past decade?
#338I suspect that most of the extra cash reported by people is stock, which was dependent on massive QE injected by the world's central banks and really low interest rates making future revenues more attractive.
Being able to give out $100k+ RSUs probably had something to do with record breaking profits and growth quarter after quarter for 10+ years. The government reducing the purchasing power of the currency is certainly needed for the nominal figures, but so are the stellar bottom lines relative to other businesses.
Re: Ask HN: Have tech salaries been stagnant for the past decade?
#339No. FAANG and their wannabe competitors started paying more over the past 15 years. But all other tech jobs have been stagnant that’s correct. It’s because companies view engineers as code monkeys. And they’re right for the most part because that’s how our profession behaves. Unfortunately you take a group of smart (sort of) people with below average social skills, and they WILL get exploited to the max. Even FAANG u…
Yep, the average engineer including the mediocre ones are often leagues above your average white collar worker in terms of hard skill, but sorely lack (collective) social skills.
Re: Ask HN: Have tech salaries been stagnant for the past decade?
#340Earlier quoted context omitted.
>US tech salaries are good for only one reason, the largest tech companies went the path of public stock valuations and paid employees with stock. That's a reason for first-generation employees to get paid highly, not a reason to continue to pay that highly to new employees joining today. The real determinants of tech company salaries are the same old boring ones that govern salaries in most lightly regulated industr…
Can you please define the difference between average and marginal productivity?