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The Programmer Salary Taboo

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Re: The Programmer Salary Taboo

#311

Post by lukejduncan »

danssig wrote: post #260
lukejduncan wrote: post #202

In Silicon Valley, is it expected that you'll negotiate an offer? If so, by how much? In general in Detroit, offers are final (clearly a generalization, but true of big co's).

This is a strange question. Of course most any company hopes you won't negotiate. What they expect is that you'll value yourself more than their initial offer and will negotiate. I'm sorry, but I don't believe you about Detroit. I believe that you believe that, I believe companies tell you that but I unless all big Detroit companies only have very junior people I don't believe for one second that this is actually the…

Maybe I should rephrase the question: In Silicon Valley do most people negotiate? Is it just part of the culture?

Re: The Programmer Salary Taboo

#312

Post by masterzora »

danssig wrote: post #298
masterzora wrote: post #294

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No one said that you should take whatever the company offers and just be happy; that would be ridiculous. In fact, as someone who's weighing multiple offers right now, step one is negotiating with these companies to see who can meet my needs and, after that's met, see who can better meet my wants. However, after I do negotiate and I decide company X's offer of $Y is plenty enough for me to be happy and then some, the…

So you, like the OP, are assuming everyone posting in this thread about getting more money are petty losers who just go "waaaah! He get's $500 more a year than I do! THAT'S NOT FAIR!". Does that sound reasonable to you? Does it sound fair? Why would you assume that instead of assuming they understand the market and that salary is simply the market value of your time?

First, as a general rule, in any sort of discussion or debate or argument or whatever you want to call it when there are multiple disagreeing with each other, please avoid any sentence of the form "So what you're saying is...." Rarely do I see such a sentence that is not a total misrepresentation of the original point, intentional or otherwise, and attacking that point constitutes a strawman. As a specific example, I'd love to see you point to a single point where I said anything like that.

A much better representation of what I am saying: Let's say that I am making $50,000 and I am perfectly happy with it. More money would be nice, but I do not consider that more money to be at all essential to my happiness. Suddenly I find out my coworker is making $60,000, or even $100,000. It is irrational for me to now be unhappy with the same $50,000 I was happy about thirty seconds ago. This is precisely what both I and junishaun are saying, where you only care about more money for the sake of more money.

If you weren't happy with the $50,000 to begin with, then you have every right to be upset when you find out you could have gotten more. However, this is not the case I've seen represented by most of the HN comments on these various "salary taboo" threads.

Re: The Programmer Salary Taboo

#313

Post by autarch »

nostrademons wrote: post #183
mcantor wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This argument is circular: "Keeping your salary private benefits you when negotiating a new salary"... which is difficult mainly because everyone's salary is private.

...which is the case with most game theoretical situations. You don't get to choose the world you live in, you only get to choose the choices you make. If you want to move from one world to another, you have to figure out how to get the rest of the world to make those choices.

Start your own company, and use a radically open compensation system, perhaps?

That's my plan, at least.

Re: The Programmer Salary Taboo

#314

Post by michael_dorfman »

InnocentB wrote: post #305
michael_dorfman wrote: post #285

Earlier quoted context omitted.

FYI: 280.000 is a pretty poor salary in Norway. Gasoline here just topped $10/gal, if that gives you an idea of the cost-of-living-adjustment necessary. In other words, your friend is not living the life that a $50k salary in the US would buy (in terms of disposible income.) On the other hand, she gets 5 weeks of paid vacation a year, full health care, and a year's paid maternity leave with each child.

Gasoline prices aren't a good indicator of cost of living. They are a factor to be sure, but their prices are too overwhelmed by political policy (ie gasoline taxes) compared with other expenses, which introduces too much noise into the data.

It was just an example; food is equally expensive, and many consumer goods are roughly double the US equivalent price.

Re: The Programmer Salary Taboo

#315

Post by rmc »

myth_drannon wrote: post #308
rmc wrote: post #245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apply for other jobs while at your current job. When you have an offer that you would like, go to your current employer and say "I have been offered a job for X". That's all. They'll either decide they want to keep you on at Xish or not.

Now the current employer will say sure we are happy to give a raise. You decline the good job offer. One week later your manager fires you.... That's what actually happened with one guy in my previous job. He actually came to an office party in the new company but then his previous manager asked him to come back with higher salary offer. He came back and was fired . He was very lucky that our company agreed to re-off…

That's why you get the new job conditions in writing, i.e. a new employment contract. If your old employeer fired you, you report them to the Labour Relation Commission (or whatever body is in your juristiction (assuming you're not in the USA, who's employement law is about as good as China's democracy laws))

Re: The Programmer Salary Taboo

#316

Post by lurker14 »

btilly wrote: post #190
madcaptenor wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Another method I've heard: person 1 picks a large random number, adds their salary to it, writes down the resulting number, and passes it on to person 2. Person 2 adds their salary to the number, writes down the new sum, and passes it on to person 3. This continues until the result gets back to person 1. You end up with the large random number plus the sum of everyone's salary. Person 1 then subtracts the large rando…

That reminds me of a technique for randomly selecting someone in a small group. Suppose that there are 6 people. On the count of 3 everyone has to hold out 0-5 fingers. Add the numbers mod 6, and that selects the person. The funny thing about it is that as long as anyone picks randomly, the answer is perfectly random. But everyone can feel some sense of control.

Well, everyone can feel some sense of chaos, since anyone can randomize the result but no one can force the result.

Re: The Programmer Salary Taboo

#317

Post by danssig »

masterzora wrote: post #312
danssig wrote: post #298

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So you, like the OP, are assuming everyone posting in this thread about getting more money are petty losers who just go "waaaah! He get's $500 more a year than I do! THAT'S NOT FAIR!". Does that sound reasonable to you? Does it sound fair? Why would you assume that instead of assuming they understand the market and that salary is simply the market value of your time?

First, as a general rule, in any sort of discussion or debate or argument or whatever you want to call it when there are multiple disagreeing with each other, please avoid any sentence of the form "So what you're saying is...." Rarely do I see such a sentence that is not a total misrepresentation of the original point, intentional or otherwise, and attacking that point constitutes a strawman. As a specific example, I…

>please avoid any sentence of the form "So what you're saying is...."

No, the point of that statement was to break down what you were saying for you because you might not have been aware (and still aren't apparently). The OP was saying the people posting here on HN were whinny people with an entitled mentality. So no, what I said was in no way a misrepresentation. Then you came on defending what he said without pointing out that you disagreed with his application of his theory to HN posters (you still haven't).

So you point out some mythical situation where you think someone would be behaving irrational. What does that have to do with this thread? No one has claimed to be mad about the money for the money's sake so this whole line is a straw man. Unless you (like the OP) are claiming other people here are behaving this way.

>et's say that I am making $50,000 and I am perfectly happy with it. More money would be nice, but I do not consider that more money to be at all essential to my happiness. Suddenly I find out my coworker is making $60,000, or even $100,000. It is irrational for me to now be unhappy with the same $50,000 I was happy about thirty seconds ago.

Again this is wrong. The mythical person was happy because he/she assumed the market rate for what they did was $50k. Now they've just seen evidence that it's actually $100k. The rational response is to take action as they're potentially leaving $50k (or more) of your value on the table. The person's happiness was based on a lie or misunderstanding and the new unhappiness is based on finding out the truth.

You're only going to live so long and you only have so much earning potential. Leaving money on the table for no other reason than some feeling of happiness is the furthest thing from rational.

Re: The Programmer Salary Taboo

#318

Post by artsrc »

barrkel wrote: post #186
watchandwait wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And on top of that the state income taxes in most states, and sales taxes that usually approach 8 or 9%, and property taxes on real estate (and autos where I live). Also if you manage to save anything after all that, you can look forward to paying dividend or capital gains taxes (a form of double taxation). It is a myth that America is a low tax nation.

Most other countries have twice that sales tax, as well as having all those other taxes. The best rough estimate of taxation burden might be proportion of government spending of GDP, which IIRC is about 35% for US, and is lower than eg most European countries.

You need to take into account what you get in addition to what you pay.

In American those taxes provide a strong military. Most of the rest of the world are very poorly equipped by comparison. Other countries get health care and education.

Re: The Programmer Salary Taboo

#319

Post by artsrc »

nopassrecover wrote: post #160
ratsbane wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A minor correction: it's not as bad as 15.3%. The self-employment tax is really just the company share of FICA withholding (6.2%) plus Medicare withholding (1.45%) If you're an employee you pay 6.2%+1.45%=7.65% and your employer pays the same. If someone else (employer) is not paying the 7.65% then you do. However, for 2011 the FICA rate for employees is 4.2% instead of 6.2%, so the self-employment tax remains effect…

As "bad" as 15%? Tax is at least 38% here in Au for that wage (was 60% not so long ago).

As other pointed out that is payroll tax, not income tax.

The differences in tax between the US and Australia are not so much in the headline rates as in the deductions.

In the US mortgage interest on a home you live in is tax deductible.

And in the US you get taxed as an economic unit with your spouse and children.

So a home owner with a big mortgage and a spouse at home looking after kids pays much less tax in the US.

Re: The Programmer Salary Taboo

#320

Post by tadfisher »

barrkel wrote: post #186
watchandwait wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And on top of that the state income taxes in most states, and sales taxes that usually approach 8 or 9%, and property taxes on real estate (and autos where I live). Also if you manage to save anything after all that, you can look forward to paying dividend or capital gains taxes (a form of double taxation). It is a myth that America is a low tax nation.

Most other countries have twice that sales tax, as well as having all those other taxes. The best rough estimate of taxation burden might be proportion of government spending of GDP, which IIRC is about 35% for US, and is lower than eg most European countries.

Keep in mind that the US is a deficit spender, so effective tax should be even lower than that figure.
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