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$900k Median Package for Engineers at OpenAI

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Re: $900k Median Package for Engineers at OpenAI

#181
post #28

Based on what I've seen/heard, they seem to follow a similar comp philosophy to Netflix -- pay top of market to get the best people. But it's also important to note that only $300K of that is in cash. The other $600K is in profit participation, which could take years (maybe even a decade!) to be realized. It could also be worth $6M a year when it's realized. But ultimately it's an investment of your time. Or to think…

> you're getting paid $900K a year but you're also investing $600K a year in OpenAI

It might sound simple, but I've never viewed startup equity like that; thanks for the slightly different perspective.

Re: $900k Median Package for Engineers at OpenAI

#182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This seems like a broad generalization that has little support beyond -- perhaps -- the personal experience of the commenter, who, I suspect, considers themselves one of the "good engineers" and not one of the overpaid and decidedly less competent engineers, annoying producers of technical debt. Comments of this nature would be much more informative if were they to begin with "what I've seen is in my professional lif…

I've got over ten years experience, working in "highly regarded" tech companies. Most of the time, management is both incapable of recognizing who is truly writing the best code and politically their hands are tied in terms of firing half the team. This is why startups like OpenAI can take on companies like Google. I've seen dozens of products fail because engineers making 400k+ could not handle the complexity of som…

Assuming what you say is true ("50% of team members in mature organizations are a net negative on team performance, we should get rid of them and pay more the top talent"), what I gather from your comments is that you think the problem lies in incompetent management in mature organizations -- it is a miracle that all those companies are still alive and somehow making money -- or their inability for political or reputational reasons (let's conveniently forget the very large layoffs that have occurred in the last year), to lay off incompetent people (who hired those hundreds or thousands of incompetent people, given the notoriously difficult interview process of top tech companies? ).

Personally, from my life in tech, I do not feel that OpenAI has done a great job (and rather frankly, work that has been supported by both "press" and popular sentiment, because who doesn't like the heroic effort of a group of smart people facing poor odds against the Goliaths?) because management in Google or Meta cannot recognize who is writing great code.

Think about the problem of "hallucinations" with GPT. After all, it was considered a minor hiccup on the road to the AGI, a path opened by a team of mavericks. But if Google, had it been first to market, had delivered such a product, the press would have gone from "oh, that's funny, it will get better with time" to a more worrying "Google is destroying humanity with those hallucinations."

It is much easier to be innovative when you are small, hungry, with little to lose and much to gain, rather than when you are worried about your current salary or equity or reputation. It's not just a matter of paying top talent more and getting rid of more average people; I'm sure there are enough brilliant, highly paid people who have enough capital to build small, high-IQ teams in any of the major technology companies to get to GPT-like models before OpenAI. But incentives, reputation, the nature of public companies play a role in being slower, less innovative, less risk-taking.

Re: $900k Median Package for Engineers at OpenAI

#183
post #86
post #28

Based on what I've seen/heard, they seem to follow a similar comp philosophy to Netflix -- pay top of market to get the best people. But it's also important to note that only $300K of that is in cash. The other $600K is in profit participation, which could take years (maybe even a decade!) to be realized. It could also be worth $6M a year when it's realized. But ultimately it's an investment of your time. Or to think…

Honestly, if you take 300k home, the risk isn't that high. But the reward is insane.

[deleted]

Re: $900k Median Package for Engineers at OpenAI

#184
post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I get what you're saying, but the median income for SFO is way below what tech people get paid. "barely livable" is perhaps a bridge too far for the $300k+ crowd. :)

The median person in SFO lives a way worse life than a median person in Ohio

Eh, you'd be surprised how much being able to walk to things, and generally being in a major international city improves your quality of life if that's the kind of thing you prefer...

Re: $900k Median Package for Engineers at OpenAI

#185
post #172
post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be realistic ... 300K in the bay is barely livable if you're targeting a middle class life with kids and targeting retiring at 65. First, ~46% of it is gone in taxes including federal tax (~25%), state tax (~8%), FICA (~4%), and sales tax on everything you eventually use the money for (~9%). So that's 162K left. Not a lot to pay sky-high rents, car payments, insane medical bills despite insurance, lawyers to fight…

> To be realistic ... 300K in the bay is barely livable if you're targeting a middle class life with kids and targeting retiring at 65. LOL. Do you live in Mars? If 300k is "barely livable", then how does a Starbucks barista make a living in SV?

By instead living in the northern or eastern East Bay (exhibit 12): https://www.freddiemac.com/research/insight/20170404-service...

Or by living in someone's backyard shed: https://news.stanford.edu/2021/05/04/revealing-complexities-...

Or by sharing one-bedroom apartments to split rent, and eating as little as possible, to afford closer housing and reduce commuting costs: https://www.reimaginerpe.org/20-2/Goldman

Re: $900k Median Package for Engineers at OpenAI

#186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't understand your point - is it that people should pay different amount for identical amount of work based on how much they themselves are paid?

Vehicle registration fees, like many others, are 100% a blunt money collection mechanism imposed by the government. This has nothing to do with a poor or wealthy person buying a new Playstation 5.

Vehicle registration fees are a way of offsetting a small part of the massive subsidies the government gives to vehicles. If anything, they should be much higher for everyone.

Re: $900k Median Package for Engineers at OpenAI

#187
post #172
post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be realistic ... 300K in the bay is barely livable if you're targeting a middle class life with kids and targeting retiring at 65. First, ~46% of it is gone in taxes including federal tax (~25%), state tax (~8%), FICA (~4%), and sales tax on everything you eventually use the money for (~9%). So that's 162K left. Not a lot to pay sky-high rents, car payments, insane medical bills despite insurance, lawyers to fight…

> To be realistic ... 300K in the bay is barely livable if you're targeting a middle class life with kids and targeting retiring at 65. LOL. Do you live in Mars? If 300k is "barely livable", then how does a Starbucks barista make a living in SV?

[deleted]

Re: $900k Median Package for Engineers at OpenAI

#188
post #172
post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be realistic ... 300K in the bay is barely livable if you're targeting a middle class life with kids and targeting retiring at 65. First, ~46% of it is gone in taxes including federal tax (~25%), state tax (~8%), FICA (~4%), and sales tax on everything you eventually use the money for (~9%). So that's 162K left. Not a lot to pay sky-high rents, car payments, insane medical bills despite insurance, lawyers to fight…

> To be realistic ... 300K in the bay is barely livable if you're targeting a middle class life with kids and targeting retiring at 65. LOL. Do you live in Mars? If 300k is "barely livable", then how does a Starbucks barista make a living in SV?

They don't; it's like a whole big thing in city planning and urban development where people who work in the city don't actually live there and have to commute huge distances each day, and how that has a profound negative impact on the spaces where that happens.

Re: $900k Median Package for Engineers at OpenAI

#189
post #117
post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Honestly, if you take 300k home, the risk isn't that high. But the reward is insane.

To be realistic ... 300K in the bay is barely livable if you're targeting a middle class life with kids and targeting retiring at 65. First, ~46% of it is gone in taxes including federal tax (~25%), state tax (~8%), FICA (~4%), and sales tax on everything you eventually use the money for (~9%). So that's 162K left. Not a lot to pay sky-high rents, car payments, insane medical bills despite insurance, lawyers to fight…

To be realistic, even in the Bay, 300k is more than livable if you're targeting a middle class lifestyle with kids and retiring at 65.

If you can't retire at 65 on 300k a year, you're not living a middle class lifestyle. Not even close.

Rent: 4k/month = 48k. Car payments 750/month = $9k. Using your post-tax numbers (which are wrong) that leaves over $100k per year for all the other random stuff you've listed, which is more than most people in the Bay Area make in a year.

(Also, you're math is wrong on the taxes; the rates you use are the statutory progressive rates, not the effective rates (so, for example, the effective rate on $300k would be approx 22% at the federal level assuming standard deduction but no retirement contributions or child credits). FICA is capped at the first $160k of income (meaning you don't pay more if you make more).)

Re: $900k Median Package for Engineers at OpenAI

#190
post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I get what you're saying, but the median income for SFO is way below what tech people get paid. "barely livable" is perhaps a bridge too far for the $300k+ crowd. :)

The median person in SFO lives a way worse life than a median person in Ohio

Maybe, but the average person there isn't “barely living” either.
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