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

Programmers' salaries at Google $250k (and up)

jacquesmattheij.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

141–150 of 280 posts

Re: Programmers' salaries at Google $250k (and up)

#141

Post by lunaru »

stef25 wrote: post #130
raldi wrote: post #37

Speaking as a Google engineer: There are three components to compensation here. Base salary, annual cash bonus, and stock grants. When he says he "takes home" $250k, he probably means the sum of all three. When the author says he thought the average Google salary was $130k, he might be referring just to the base. Most of the comments in this thread are similarly ambiguous. If you post a comment, please be clear about…

Without wanting to sound stupid, when you talk about salaries do you always mention the amount before or after tax? Here in Europe it's almost always after tax.

In the states all salary numbers are before tax unless stated otherwise.

Re: Programmers' salaries at Google $250k (and up)

#142

Post by stuntprogrammer »

Selvik wrote: post #132
veyron wrote: post #48

I have no clue why people are obsessing over 250K. If you care about money as a programmer, you are better off working at a hedge fund. My programmer friends at hedge funds (all between 22 and 26) are averaging 500K salary with 100K bonuses (note: as a programmer, base is much higher but bonus is lower). So if google isn't paying those types of numbers to people, then money cannot be the only factor at play.

What kind of backgrounds do they have? CS or STEM degrees at ivy league or similar schools? Does people with liberal arts degrees and a finance MBA get those kinds of jobs? (Assuming they can program.)

CS/STEM. Need not be Ivy League but it certainly doesn't hurt-- though I know a team or two in the top tier that almost have a preference for non-ivy league :-)

To be a quantdev or quant, an MFE is far more useful than an MBA.

Re: Programmers' salaries at Google $250k (and up)

#143

Post by impendia »

keiferski wrote: post #13

Another effect this will have on the start-up scene is that if you build your company in 'The Valley' that companies like Google will be competing with you for talent. You may have an upside from being in the SV eco-system in the first place, however you may find yourself paying a lot more for developers than if you were in a place where parties with pockets as deep as Google are rare. Headquarters in Silicon Valley,…

> Any thoughts on this? Can a small startup compete with the Googles and Apples in the Valley?

They can and do!

Re: Programmers' salaries at Google $250k (and up)

#144

Post by wtvanhest »

Selvik wrote: post #128
fake_handle wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Adding to the data pool: I'm also an under-30 engineer making ~250k in the Bay Area (at a publicly-traded gaming company, not at Google). My company has six pay grades for pure engineers; I'm at the second highest. My 2011 comp breaks down as follows: * 166k base * 45k bonus * 35k stock grants (RSUs) Note this does not include 401k matching, stock purchase plan, healthcare, or any other quantifiable perks. When I too…

Isn't a perfect math score very hard to get, something like the upper 1%ile? Do you know your IQ? I'm scandinavian and could do a traditional finance/consulting/management/accounting thing in my home country but the software industry seems far more fascinating. I'm afraid my 120 to 125 iq means I'm too stupid to do well in SV though.

IQ is a good test, but at 120-125 you are still far smarter than most people on earth.

Just look at the normal distribution of IQ scores: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:IQ_curve.svg

Sure, a lot of people are in the 120+ range on Hacker News, at top management consulting companies etc. but if you are 110+ IQ you are probably smart enough to do almost any job on the planet.

I'm not a programmer, but I imagine that like business, there are plenty of terrible programmers with 140 IQs that believe they are entitled to not working hard or being good with people.

They will always make less and even their high IQ will not allow them to figure it out.

Re: Programmers' salaries at Google $250k (and up)

#145

Post by zem »

veyron wrote: post #48

I have no clue why people are obsessing over 250K. If you care about money as a programmer, you are better off working at a hedge fund. My programmer friends at hedge funds (all between 22 and 26) are averaging 500K salary with 100K bonuses (note: as a programmer, base is much higher but bonus is lower). So if google isn't paying those types of numbers to people, then money cannot be the only factor at play.

i think what's happening here is that no one really envies hedge fund programmers. sure, they make a lot of money, but the job itself is perceived as unpleasant, unfulfilling, boring, stressful, or some combination of those. google, on the other hand, is a standard[1] software job - the type that most people in the hacker news demographic are probably doing, so it is seen as directly comparable.

[1] i don't mean that in a dismissive sense - i work there and it's the best job i've ever had, but the work is not qualitatively different from what you'd do in other software-focused companies. hedge funds are not software-focused.

Re: Programmers' salaries at Google $250k (and up)

#147

Post by brianm »

Selvik wrote: post #128
fake_handle wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Adding to the data pool: I'm also an under-30 engineer making ~250k in the Bay Area (at a publicly-traded gaming company, not at Google). My company has six pay grades for pure engineers; I'm at the second highest. My 2011 comp breaks down as follows: * 166k base * 45k bonus * 35k stock grants (RSUs) Note this does not include 401k matching, stock purchase plan, healthcare, or any other quantifiable perks. When I too…

Isn't a perfect math score very hard to get, something like the upper 1%ile? Do you know your IQ? I'm scandinavian and could do a traditional finance/consulting/management/accounting thing in my home country but the software industry seems far more fascinating. I'm afraid my 120 to 125 iq means I'm too stupid to do well in SV though.

No, you are not. The more damning trait would be believing you are not qualified because of a test administered when you were 8 years old (or worse, believing the results of any IQ test administered after that).

There are certainly brilliant folks around in the valley, who can grasp concepts faster and more deeply than seems human, but they are a significant minority.

The prime requisites for success as an employee in the valley are still:

1) Good judgement (which tends to come from accurate self-reflection and critique)

2) Love of learning (so it takes you a couple hours or even days to grok redis's failure modes instead of 20 minutes, who cares -- the question is are you going to learn it (and every other useful thing that comes along, for years))

3) Basic sociability (the valley is a small world, everyone knows each other, if you are a jerk life will get more difficult).

For a much more eloquent description of how to thrive as a programmery type in the valley, consider http://www.cs.virginia.edu/~robins/YouAndYourResearch.html but translate research into "generally useful skills for building stuff."

"You and Your Generally Useful Skills for Building Stuff." :-)

Re: Programmers' salaries at Google $250k (and up)

#148

Post by [deleted] »

stef25 wrote: post #130
raldi wrote: post #37

Speaking as a Google engineer: There are three components to compensation here. Base salary, annual cash bonus, and stock grants. When he says he "takes home" $250k, he probably means the sum of all three. When the author says he thought the average Google salary was $130k, he might be referring just to the base. Most of the comments in this thread are similarly ambiguous. If you post a comment, please be clear about…

Without wanting to sound stupid, when you talk about salaries do you always mention the amount before or after tax? Here in Europe it's almost always after tax.

[deleted]

Re: Programmers' salaries at Google $250k (and up)

#149

Post by tptacek »

xiaoma wrote: post #135
tptacek wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Any company that treats you like shit because you negotiated a 5k bump over their first comp offer is a company you are better off not working for. And, please, read that sentence again. The worst case scenario is that you accept their first offer and don't find out until you've spent a year and a half of your life working there that the company isn't worth working for. That is the worst case.

There's a difference between giving someone extra work, likely "shit work" and treating someone like shit. More than one employee at excellent companies has been assigned more work due to having a higher salary than colleagues at the same grade. This is an easy, even somewhat logical rationalization for a manager to make. The "worst case" you put forward is still far from convincing. In work, black swans are generall…

I don't know how much more simply I could have said it, but I'll take a shot:

If your employer treats you more poorly because you negotiate a better comp package, you shouldn't be working for them; they are a bad employer.

If negotiation costs you a "once in a lifetime" opportunity, the opportunity is "once in a lifetime" in the "boiler room pump and dump" sense, or the "late night infomercial" sense. A year of your life, however, is priceless.

Re: Programmers' salaries at Google $250k (and up)

#150

Post by joe_the_user »

patio11 wrote: post #47

HN has a curious relationship to money some of the time. a) Many of us watched our classmates go into management consulting, investment banking, finance, medicine, law, etc. These are all fields where $250k is not exactly outlandish for a 29 year old. b) We have a lot of friendly, accessible fellow posters who write computer code and are financially very successful. c) We talk about $X million valuations and $YY mill…

Uh yeah...

HN has lots of readers. Most probably make less than $250K even though quite a number make more. Still, most of those who make less than $250K probably aren't venture capitalists.

A million dollar deal doesn't get anyone chiming in with "but my deals aren't million dollar" 'cause they don't have deals of any sort. $250K salaries, on the other hand, do get exactly that reaction.

Is there anything here that isn't screamingly obvious?

Post reply on HN