Tech compensation in 2021 • Hacker News Board

Re: Tech compensation in 2021

#281

Post by adventured » Fri, Oct 15, 2021, 1:21 AM UTC

jiggawatts wrote: post #71

m_ke wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah I know a lot of FAANG people getting 500-600K packages. Makes it hard to even think about startups.

What the... s%&#? Half a million a year for a developer or architect is bonkers. That's the equivalent of AUD 800K a year. That's more than what the Prime Minister and a cabinet member put together make here! How can that possibly make sense? For that kind of money you can easily hire 4 senior developers here! Any company "hiring local" at those prices isn't exploring their international staffing options properly...

> How can that possibly make sense?

Well, here is the operating profit for the US tech giants:

SAP is one of the primary tech giants in Europe. Their operating profit is $6.2b by comparison (they fit in Microsoft's pocket these days).

Now on top of that, throw in the US banks which are generating enormous profit compared to their European peers, and they also hire tech talent. Throw in Visa, Mastercard, American Express, Square, PayPal, Stripe, etc. Then throw in the US defense contractors. The large pharma & biotech companies. Insurance companies. Huge retailers like Walmart, Costco, Home Depot, Target, Lowes, Walgreens, CVS, etc. Big real-estate companies. Various large conglomerates and manufacturing firms. All of these companies - which generate outsized profits as well - have to compete for tech talent too. The point being, all that demand drains availability and pushes up the salaries that tech talent can command (including outside the bay area).

Re: Tech compensation in 2021

#282

Post by jiggawatts » Fri, Oct 15, 2021, 1:26 AM UTC

sharpy wrote: post #137

jiggawatts wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What the... s%&#? Half a million a year for a developer or architect is bonkers. That's the equivalent of AUD 800K a year. That's more than what the Prime Minister and a cabinet member put together make here! How can that possibly make sense? For that kind of money you can easily hire 4 senior developers here! Any company "hiring local" at those prices isn't exploring their international staffing options properly...

Yes, US tech salaries are rather crazy. But at the scale they operate at, it is also relatively easy to justify such salaries. For example, just last month, I saved the company more than a million a year of cloud costs by doing 1 week of cost optimizations for just one of our services. I will create many times that in new revenues/cost savings in the remaining 2 months of the year. My total comp for year? Barely over…

To be blunt: so what?

I just saved $500K per annum for a customer, after working on the most critical part of a merger between two 10K-user organisations, and I get less then half that.

It's not like it's impossible to get someone that knows how to optimise infrastructure or do complex projects for less than a decent chunk of a million dollars a year! Like other people have commented, they're often making just tens of thousands in Europe, despite having comparable education, experience, and English language skills...

Re: Tech compensation in 2021

#283

Post by loeg » Fri, Oct 15, 2021, 1:31 AM UTC

fhrow4484 wrote: post #270

loeg wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

350k TC sounds not bad to me if you're E5 at Facebook or L6 at Amazon. It goes up another 150-200k at the next level (E6/L6 at Facebook/Google, L7 at Amazon, or ICT5 at Apple).

One reason discussing those numbers is hard is the variable compensation section: RSUs. An E4/L4 (the level right below senior) easily makes 400k right now depending on which company they joined. Their typical offer was 160k base and let's day 82k RSU (325k over 4y). With the usual (~15% of base) bonus, that's 160 * 1.15+82=266. But now let's assume they joined 2 years ago, so they got refresher of stocks that are ro…

Sure. A somewhat good TC maximization strategy for a desirable IC is to join a company, wait a year to see how the stock does; if it went up a lot, ride out the four-year grant. If it's down, switch employers.

> That's ignoring extra (~10% of base) for on-call compensation.

What FAANG companies do this? I haven't heard of it.

> There's a company in FAANG known for their frugality famous for not offering refresh "because the stock price is doing so well",

To be clear: Amazon does this. They also value their stock packages to the expectation their stock will grow 15% YoY. It means their offers are inflated relative to the same nominal figure from other employers.

Re: Tech compensation in 2021

#284

Post by loeg » Fri, Oct 15, 2021, 1:34 AM UTC

lostmsu wrote: post #229

loeg wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

350k TC sounds not bad to me if you're E5 at Facebook or L6 at Amazon. It goes up another 150-200k at the next level (E6/L6 at Facebook/Google, L7 at Amazon, or ICT5 at Apple).

Last year I was offered almost 500k TC from Facebook for E5 in Seattle. Google did not bother to match at the same level. I guess Google is not drowning in money anymore (in comparison).

Anecdotally, last year I was offered 350k (annual) TC from Facebook for E5 in Seattle.

Re: Tech compensation in 2021

#285

Post by Infinitesimus » Fri, Oct 15, 2021, 1:34 AM UTC

jiggawatts wrote: post #282

sharpy wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, US tech salaries are rather crazy. But at the scale they operate at, it is also relatively easy to justify such salaries. For example, just last month, I saved the company more than a million a year of cloud costs by doing 1 week of cost optimizations for just one of our services. I will create many times that in new revenues/cost savings in the remaining 2 months of the year. My total comp for year? Barely over…

To be blunt: so what? I just saved $500K per annum for a customer, after working on the most critical part of a merger between two 10K-user organisations, and I get less then half that. It's not like it's impossible to get someone that knows how to optimise infrastructure or do complex projects for less than a decent chunk of a million dollars a year! Like other people have commented, they're often making just tens o…

There are also people who do the thing you do who likely make much more. Just as there are folks who did what GP did and make much less.

If $$ is what you optimize for, you can probably find the top 1% of compensation for businesses in your field and work there. For a lot of office workers, there are firms that value their skills and firms that do not. Remember that the comp numbers for Bay Area tech salaries are legit the top 1% globally or some very small percentage.

Consider the difference between an comp "analyst" at a local bank and an "analyst" at an extremely profitable hedge fund.

It's just money in the end and if you make enough to be happy, then the rest doesn't matter. If you want to compete for the top < 10% of compensation locally/globally in your field, then things have to change and it comes at some cost.

Re: Tech compensation in 2021

#286

Post by greenie_beans » Fri, Oct 15, 2021, 1:35 AM UTC

rsuelzer wrote: post #239

Waterluvian wrote: post #226

The beauty of remote work: I make, let’s say somewhere between 100-200k. But because of where I live, this is enough to fill two college funds, pay off a mortgage, let my wife follow her dream of being a full-time mom, and retire by 50. Absolutely need more remote work in this world. There’s so many wonderful places to live that aren’t ridiculously priced.

I've been remote for 5 years. I have been happy to take a 50% reduction in what I could be making. In the past, I would wake up in the morning and find myself willing to pay more money than I would make that day in order to not have to go into work. The economics of that didn't work out. I also work for a mission driven organization that is on a tight budget. I make enough money, but more importantly, I have not had…

Same, it’s hard reading about these outlandish compensations compared to mission-driven work. But then I remind myself of this.

Re: Tech compensation in 2021

#287

Post by zz865 » Fri, Oct 15, 2021, 1:36 AM UTC

azinman2 wrote: post #33

gpt5 wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's crazy to me that you can basically make a lifetime of earning doing the same job in Silicon Valley for one year

Except the cost of living is wayyy lower

An iphone costs more, a Corolla costs more, gasoline costs more, a washing machine costs more, a vacation in Thailand costs the same.

Re: Tech compensation in 2021

#288

Post by [deleted] » Fri, Oct 15, 2021, 1:39 AM UTC

I_AM_A_SMURF wrote: post #260

theshadowknows wrote: post #223

I’m wondering if I’m just not worth as much money or if I’m not paid as much because I don’t work in California or both, lol. I work for an enormous company. I’ve got about 8 or so years experience. As of right now I’m a sr architect and I work on enterprise-level systems - either designing or enhancing existing processes and platforms. I don’t really code much these days, though I do write a lot of sql, build lots o…

Just for comparison, I'm a staff ~ level engineer not at FAANG, not in California, similar experience to yours and this year I will make about $400k.

[deleted]

Re: Tech compensation in 2021

#289

Post by pjot » Fri, Oct 15, 2021, 1:40 AM UTC

plorkyeran wrote: post #98

bpodgursky wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There may be cases I'm missing, but afaik you never *have* to suffer ruinous tax liabilities from stock comp if you're willing to just eat the gains as raw income (making the (often smart) gamble to hit LCTG is what will get you in trouble).

It is very difficult to run into ruinous tax problems with publicly traded companies, but it's possible. There's a delay between the vest date and when you can actually sell your shares. Normally this is just a few days, but if something dire happens your stock can still tank in this window. If $100k of RSUs vest and then drop to $0 in value before you can sell, you have $100k of income to pay taxes on, and can only…

There’s also the 83-b election. Which allows prepaying tax on the value of the stock at the time of grant.

https://www.investopedia.com/terms/1/83b-election.asp

Re: Tech compensation in 2021

#290

Post by WoahNoun » Fri, Oct 15, 2021, 1:40 AM UTC

throwaway2016a wrote: post #90

20 years experience, two books under my belt, and lead architect (with a CTO title) on several good sized projects and most I have ever gotten in $175k... every time I see an article like this, I think I am doing something "very wrong" I live about 40 miles outside of Boston. Edit: Looking at levels.fyi for Boston that actually puts me above the median[1]. Why the heck is Boston so low compared to other markets? Edit…

You should have negotiated for equity. That's where all the real money is. RSUs/ISOs/NSOs whatever. If you were CTO of a revenue generating project and didn't get a % of the business, that is what you did wrong.