Ask HN: Does working for big tech companies pay off more compared to startups?

From what I have seen (aside from the monetary argument) is the trade offs are stability vs freedom. At a larger, more established company you can benefit from the knowledge that they won't be going under any given year. They will also most likely have most of their systems dialed in already, ie: build system, performance reviews, etc. This can be beneficial for a person who is just starting in their career or somebody who doesn't thrive in an uncertain environment.

Start ups tend to have a lot more flux in all things. When there is no established review cycle you are required to advocate for your own merit increases. Additionally you may be required to hack things together, or take on many roles in order get your product to succeed. The trade off is that if you are knowledgable/confident then you won't have existing mistakes from previous generations and you can help forge the path of the company. In a smaller company your voice is much louder (yes this is good and bad).

Finally from a finance perspective, you don't end up on top if your company goes out of business or never IPO's. You're investing in the startup with hopes of seeing a payout.

Agreed, this seems insanely high. Factor of ten at least. I don't work at those three companies mentioned: maybe I just don't know the sector (and maybe I should move to CA). I'm And at the very least, there's stipulations tied to vesting and grants that aren't considered here. Or a portion of bonus is in the form of equity, which isn't accounted for, either.

Risk-adjusted returns for startup equity aren't even close to accurate ("let's assume that you're one of the lucky few" isn't a good estimation strategy).

In my experience, bad advice (though I agree it may work for some).

I made the mistake of joining startups early in my career. I still suffer because of those decisions. It is much better to work for a big brand when you are young. Yes, in startups you get to wear a lot of hats but unless you are really lucky, you never learn anything in depth. Big companies have enough good people to learn from if you are motivated enough (as I was). And worst of all, unless you are one of the founders, and the startup is reasonably successful - then they will bring a "VP of Engineering" from a big company after two years irrespective of how much you have helped them build their systems and probably deserve that role.

Wasn't too long ago Facebook was in the news for giving new hires $1m in stock as signon bonus.

I can attest to this as well.

The talk of getting something done far outweighs the getting something done. People want/need things in certain ways, and at some point someone is issuing the commands that can't be argued with anymore.

I'm often given tasks which I know how to deal with in and out, but I have to dig out all the details prior to implementation and put together specifications, just so someone who doesn't understand the codebase or how A relates to B can ignore me through a meeting and give me the ok. When I first joined the company, before it was sold, and before it increased its workforce 10x, I felt productive most of the week, and more importantly felt happy with my job.