331–334 of 334 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Total comp. TC of most L4+ was >50% RSUs, it doesn't make much sense to discuss only base+bonus
> TC of most L4+ was >50% RSUs In the US, during a period of insane stock price appreciation, yes. People who joined in Dec 2022 got massively screwed though, so it's not really reliable cash.
Employers don't reward long-term employees because they don't need to. Even though everyone knows you make more by job-hopping, companies are following a rational strategy because too few people "walk the walk" despite wanting more salary. Arguably unethical, but rational. At the cost of losing a minority of job-hoppers they retain the cheap majority that: - finds job interviews exhausting, or is anxious about being…
Remote vs. non-remote seems like a huge factor here. Sure, many people when they're young are geographically flexible. But that's less true as you age and are tied down by a house, spouse's job, kid's school, daycare, etc. If you have to come into work, then all those details depend on your job location. You can't just change job locations. Again, this works for some single young people who rent apartments in NYC or…
The average cost of living for a 4-person family in SF is ~$350k [1] (I'm guessing that's pre-tax, and probably the job is also paying for 100% comprehensive medical & dental insurance for the entire family) and my spouse wouldn't be able to work (and even if she could, low chance of her also getting a $200k job offer at the same time!), and I'm not gonna willingly decrease my standard of living and my savings rate ...
I mean, I don't mind if that's their budget, I always mention that it probably makes more sense to hire someone local, but ... why even bother interviewing senior non-SF-based candidates in the first place?
[1] https://www.cnbc.com/2024/03/27/how-much-money-family-of-4-n...
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The primary reason for having an employer in your life at all is for them to pay you, so the primary measure of a good employer is good pay. Yes, there are other factors, but many of those factors (read: benefits) have known monetary values which are effectively equivalent to pay. There is no such thing as a good employer who doesn't pay their workers competitively. While this may not be your intent, your post sounds…
I never suggested that there are good employers who don't pay their workers competitively. I instead suggested that there are bad employers who pay above market rates as a way to compensate for problems with employee retention. Sure, they'll run out of money doing that eventually, but you'd be surprised how long a business can cover up their mistakes with such a strategy, especially with the right funding partners be…
Agreed. I don't think I accused you of saying that--I just think that what you did say is easily twisted to support that narrative.
> I instead suggested that there are bad employers who pay above market rates as a way to compensate for problems with employee retention. Sure, they'll run out of money doing that eventually, but you'd be surprised how long a business can cover up their mistakes with such a strategy, especially with the right funding partners behind them.
> If you have not had the misfortune of working for such a business, that's great, but I believe there are plenty of comments here on HN to support the notion that such businesses not only exist but are fairly common in any industry touched by Venture Capital or Private Equity, and I have seen many even suggest that their higher financial compensation ends up not being worth it in light of the added psychological and physiological toll.
I'm not saying this situation doesn't exist. I'm saying it's far less common than the situation where you find a job that pays better because your current job is underpaying you.
A friend of mine did work for such a company. He stayed there for 9 months, and then quit without a job lined up, and it took him 4 months to find a job (partly because he was being much more selective about jobs). He a) still made more money in 9 months than in the previous year, and b) leveraged the higher pay history to obtain higher pay at all companies he worked for in the rest of his career. Having talked to him extensively about it at the time (and advising him to quit) I think he'd maybe work there a shorter period, but it doesn't seem like he regrets doing it.
So sure, these companies exist, but working for one is not necessarily a critical mistake as long as you keep your option to quit open (which I think is critical in any job, no matter how good--the ability of either party to walk away from the table is a key component of any free transaction in a free market).
Job hopping works if you're already in the top 10% of engineers and really talented when it comes to... interviewing. I suck at leetcode so maybe that's why I'm just not cut out for this. As long as I'm making $150k+ and can WFH I'm not exactly confident I could go out and interview and get something better. My work history isn't great because I tried job hopping and was a co-founder at a few startups. I quickly foun…
Even for a shitty interviewer like myself, it does work. It just takes me more interviews to finally get the offer. I've tried doing a good job and asking for raises, they never match market rate.