Earlier quoted context omitted.
Because he's the Woz, he's immutable and immovable like the Bhudda Funny how Jobs was the 'Bhuddist.'
buddha, buddhist
Jobs was a buddhist, but Woz is the buddha.
How Silicon Valley CEOs conspired to drive down tech engineer wages
421–430 of 488 posts
Re: How Silicon Valley CEOs conspired to drive down tech engineer wages
#422Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm from Santa Clara, and "affordable" is an extremely relative notion. Silicon Valley itself isn't much cheaper than San Francisco. Berkeley, Oakland and East Palo Alto are not in Silicon Valley. And frankly, they're not as cheap now as they were even 18 months ago. It's still possible to get a one-bedroom apartment for $1000 a month if you look around hard enough, but it's almost certainly going to be small and old…
Have you looked at SF rents lately? A studio is $2,000+, and a friend just moved into a two bedroom apartment for $4,750/month.
Well, going by Craigslist you can find 2BR places for less than that -- but it doesn't look it's easy to get much under $3000, and the median seems closer to $4000. I suppose Silicon Valley is still a relative bargain, in the sense that the third or fourth most expensive place to live in the country is cheaper than the first most expensive. :)
Re: How Silicon Valley CEOs conspired to drive down tech engineer wages
#423Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm from Santa Clara, and "affordable" is an extremely relative notion. Silicon Valley itself isn't much cheaper than San Francisco. Berkeley, Oakland and East Palo Alto are not in Silicon Valley. And frankly, they're not as cheap now as they were even 18 months ago. It's still possible to get a one-bedroom apartment for $1000 a month if you look around hard enough, but it's almost certainly going to be small and old…
East Palo Alto isn't in Silicon Valley? It's close enough to the Google campus to bike from.
Hmm. I think I'd have to agree with you, actually, not just for the bike proximity. :) I've thought of Silicon Valley as running from Mountain View down toward Los Gatos -- the actual geographic Santa Clara Valley, essentially the South Bay region -- but it would certainly make sense to consider Palo Alto the northern end of it, given the importance of the city and Stanford University to all things silicon (literally and figuratively).
Re: How Silicon Valley CEOs conspired to drive down tech engineer wages
#424Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'd have to respectfully disagree. While I've never worked in the valley I have researched and interviewed with 10+ companies there. My findings were that startups there are extremely busy. They are slow to respond to emails, meetings and interviews are often missed/rescheduled, and salaries are relatively low ( Compare that to Austin, Seattle, DC, Chicago, and Portland, who all have thriving startup communities that…
I want to agree, but the scene here is really incomparable to anywhere else. There's simply too much damn VC money floating around which attracts top business people. Chicago does not have billions of dollars of VC floating around. Austin might. DC does not. Also, the wages here in SV can not be matched anywhere else. It's economically impossible to pay someone a SV wage anywhere else. Economically impossible because…
I'm not sure how reliable indeed is but doing a quick search shows that the average salary for a Web Developer in DC is $105,000. It says the average for a Web Developer in San Francisco (the most expensive city in SV) is $114,000. Now that roughly $10k difference could seem like a lot to some but they'd be mislead to think that money wont get eaten up by SFs extreme cost of living.
>...your company in say DC then why would you continue to pay your engineers SV-sized wages.
Because you value great employees? I mean think of it this way. A lot of people can't just pack up ship and move to SF. But a lot people can! Companies keep their salaries on par with the valley to keep up. Granted the numbers aren't a science. It is hard to compare salaries in different areas but It has been my experience that SV wages are not that much more than any other city in the US.
> You'd be amongst the wealthiest people in DC if you were paid what a typical engineer is offered here
This is just blatantly false. Do you know how much government workers and politician minions make? It makes engineering salaries look laughable.
1.) http://www.indeed.com/salary/q-Web-Developer-l-Washington,-D...
2.) http://www.indeed.com/salary?q1=Web+Developer&l1=San+francis...
Re: How Silicon Valley CEOs conspired to drive down tech engineer wages
#425Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm from Santa Clara, and "affordable" is an extremely relative notion. Silicon Valley itself isn't much cheaper than San Francisco. Berkeley, Oakland and East Palo Alto are not in Silicon Valley. And frankly, they're not as cheap now as they were even 18 months ago. It's still possible to get a one-bedroom apartment for $1000 a month if you look around hard enough, but it's almost certainly going to be small and old…
Sure, if you get a 1 bedroom apartment =/ There are plenty of places with decent rooms you can rent for $800-1000. I paid $825 for my old place in South San Francisco (20 min commute to SF). It was a 2300sqft house shared by 3 others.
Renting just a room isn't always feasible, depending on how much baggage you have in both the literal and figurative sense. When I moved out here 11 years ago from a one-bedroom apartment in Tampa Bay, I did indeed rent just a room from a friend -- and I had to sell a lot of furniture. I've since bought new furniture, and I would not be particularly inclined to give it up. I realize this is my choice, but it's one that you're more likely to face once you get into your 30s (or at any point if you get a family, of course).
And, I think my larger concern about prices still stands. That $825 a month could get you a 1BR place with W/D included in many other cities. Actually, it could get you at least a 1BR/1BA place with W/D in many other cities, and we're not talking "middle of nowhere" type places, either. There are still certainly reasons to live in the Bay Area rather than those other places, but we're paying an awful lot for the privilege.
Re: How Silicon Valley CEOs conspired to drive down tech engineer wages
#426Jobs' comments: >OK, I’ll tell our recruiters they are free to approach any Adobe employee who is not a Sr. Director or VP. Am I understanding your position correctly? >if you [Brin] hire a single one of these people that means war. Chizen's comment: >if I tell Steve [Jobs] it’s open season (other than senior managers), he will deliberately poach Adobe just to prove a point. Knowing Steve, he will go after some of ou…
It's hard to say, from just this snippet. You forgot to mention that Chizen tried to slime his way out of the problem by claiming he was only hiring junior-level staff. So Steve responded, rather sarcastically, "Okay, so everyone is open game then?", and then Chizen goes "No I was just kidding! Let's just be friends! Tee hee!". I mean, Steve was a douche for a lot of other reasons. But this is savvy business right he…
"he exploited that to keep his top talent where they were" ... rather than pay them market rate wages.
Savvy business and being a "douche" seem to overlap here.
Re: How Silicon Valley CEOs conspired to drive down tech engineer wages
#427Engineers should make more money than what they are making now. The largest number I heard lately is $240k for a data scientist from Apple. That's too low! That person can make Siri better and make millions for Apple. Why aren't we getting paid like lawyers? If they win $20M they will get paid at least $2M. But if we make a product that generates $20M profit, at best we get $20K bonus. This has to change!
Are you actually complaining about 240k? If that isn't myopia, idk what is. Most people would kill for that salary.
Compared to what other members of the professions make, yes, it is reasonable to complain.
How come when a lawyer charges $400/hr or a surgeon makes $800K/year nobody bats an eyelid, but when an engineer gets $240K he should be deliriously happy, because it is more than the median salary in the USA. Most of us are very smart men/women, who typically have college degrees in hard sciences - why do we compare our salaries to median wages?
BTW, in the Boston area, senior people make $160-$170K, not even close to $240K.
Re: How Silicon Valley CEOs conspired to drive down tech engineer wages
#428Re: How Silicon Valley CEOs conspired to drive down tech engineer wages
#429Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's not entirely valid, that's a subjective judgement. I live in Chicago and I hate the outdoors. Just a simple back of the envelope calculation tells you Chicago software developers make about the same or more ( because trading companies pay more ) as SF developers yet cost of living is 2.5-3 times higher in SF. It's hard to explain this as a mere correlation with the known fact of illegal collusion.
Cost of living or the cost of housing? Because they aren't the same. Sure, rent/mortgage payments take a huge toll, but it isn't like that Ramen costs 3x as much or that you pay 3x as much for gas or a new car. I'd wager the costs of goods are not even close to 1.5x. I broke down some numbers awhile back comparing Seattle to SF, because a guy claimed that 80k in Seattle is the same as 200k in SF. Clearly not. Even af…
My guess is everything is SF is more expensive than in Chicago. Housing is 4X more expensive and other things as a result, are somewhat more expensive. Of course, you can still spend the same amount on housing in SF by living in a much smaller place, but that's besides the point. per square foot it is still more.
Re: How Silicon Valley CEOs conspired to drive down tech engineer wages
#430Earlier quoted context omitted.
the figures he referenced are straight salary. A typical 30 year old investment banker at top firms will make 400k salary, but could easily be over 7 figures with bonus. Startup equity is rarely, if ever, worth that much on a risk-adjusted basis.
Not just startups, but even big companies like Google and Facebook have seen significant stock growth that have resulted in 2-3x compensation increases -- even if you joined post-IPO.
Ah, yes the "get rich through stock options" myth again. It is funny how everyone uses Facebook and Google as examples not realizing that they are pretty much unicorns. The truth is that 7 out 10 start-ups fail, and your options will be close to (or completely) worthless. Even if your start-up does well, are you really going to get rich with your 0.05% share of the company? Except for VP Eng or CTO positions, it is rare that anyone in development gets more than 0.5% of shares. Which are diluted at every round of subsequent VC round.