My somewhat complete salary history as a software engineer • Hacker News Board

Re: My somewhat complete salary history as a software engineer

#471

Post by lnkmails » Wed, Oct 31, 2018, 4:07 PM UTC

blrdev356 wrote: post #420

sures wrote: post #413

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hey! Thanks for responding to this thread. Because you have moved from Principal Engineer to Dev Manager position I want to know how the experience has been. I have remained in Principal Engineer role and do not want to climb the ladder further because I don't think I can take the meeting load of management role. What do you think about your role? Do you enjoy being Dev Manager more than Principal Engineer? Does it p…

It has been terrible in the initial few months. It was definitely out of my comfort zone and every week had been a roller coaster. But now, I kind of settled in and started to enjoy it. There are certain nuances this role needs us to learn which no one can teach and needs to be experienced first hand. I'm becoming better at small talk and ability to sell ideas which I lacked in previous roles. It may not provide fast…

All these INR numbers are making me want to come back :). As much as I enjoy working here in the US, the cost of living etc pretty much takes most of the income. I still manage to save 30% of my income but it requires good level of discipline and actively avoiding anything I think is "luxurious" (not eating out much, doing household chores ourselves.). I make a decent high six figure salary and I am not in SV but in DC metro area (not that cheap compared to SV). In India, I could probably have a maid/help and offload few of the chores and lead a far more comfortable life than here. Sure, I won't be driving a BMW but at least I will be close to family saving the exact 30% but with more happiness being around culture I am more familiar with. I am fairly Americanized but the climate here is becoming more hostile. I do walk into stores preparing for some racial comments or worst case a mindless idiot going for his gun. I didn't know how much I would be making in India because I never ever worked there but looking at these numbers, the move is at least worth contemplating.

Re: My somewhat complete salary history as a software engineer

#472

Post by mysalarythrow » Wed, Oct 31, 2018, 4:08 PM UTC

flatfilefan wrote: post #416

mysalarythrow wrote: post #339

Male, went to a top 5 CS school, US west coast 2001: BigCo $76,000/year + $20,000 signing bonus (first job out of school) 2007: Freelancing between $100-$200/hr depending on project 2012: Startup #1 $180,000/year + $75,000 signing bonus + a bit of stock that's never been worth anything (but I exercised upon leaving and paid a lot of taxes on, so I'm net negative ~$300k) 2015: Startup #2 $240,000/year + lots of stock…

Out of curiosity and a bit of jealousy :-) What is the programming field companies are willing to give MM of RSU to programmers? Do you really make a difference to their top line? I had the impression that it’s more the project management and business development that can justify that compensation.

Honestly, these companies just have so much money right now and their stock keeps on going up. They're competing for top talent, so bidding wars happen.

These were L6 offers at the time. Gets much more ridiculous the higher you go (over $1MM/year comp)

I'm not a super specialist or anything, just a solid developer (mostly front end, some back end)

Re: My somewhat complete salary history as a software engineer

#473

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Oct 31, 2018, 4:08 PM UTC

BowBun wrote: post #418

bambamb wrote: post #409

It amazes me that someone as intelligent as this guy can say something asinine as “as a white man I know I can negotiate without backlash.” Not only is there no evidence to support this, he seems completely oblivious to the fact that he is not a representative white man at all. He has written widely used books on JavaScript! Don’t you think THAT might be the reason he can negotiate without backlash rather than his ra…

At the risk of opening a can of worms, I think the author is right and you are contributing to the systemic issue by trying to deflect their mention of privilege. If you are a white male, you have privilege. I don't think OP would ever say that's the only factor to their success, but recognizing privilege and where you have taken advantage of it in life is healthy progress towards equality. http://psycnet.apa.org/rec…

[deleted]

Re: My somewhat complete salary history as a software engineer

#474

Post by mattsmith321 » Wed, Oct 31, 2018, 4:09 PM UTC

For those of us in the US, you can see your complete earnings history as reported to the Social Security Administration at ssa.gov. Obviously you have to jump through some hoops to create an account. Coincidentally to this post, I just pulled my info last weekend and put it into a chart: https://i.imgur.com/LwyljAK.png I chopped off the actual amounts for this post but I was also mainly only interested in how things looked for the past few years in my current job.

Re: My somewhat complete salary history as a software engineer

#475

Post by Bahamut » Wed, Oct 31, 2018, 4:09 PM UTC

readingnews wrote: post #444

I think the author is in fact unhumble bragging. I have been in IT for 26 years, have managed IT teams, every boss I have had would hire me back. I live in a mid sized city. I don't make close to half those numbers. I have no idea how these people get these crazy high salary jobs.

These numbers are out there - a cursory look at https://www.levels.fyi for example should open your eyes to some of the numbers big companies pay, that I can confirm with my own comp info for my company (a FAANG).

Also it should be noted that the author has some fame in the frontend web world, and is a fairly well known name.

Re: My somewhat complete salary history as a software engineer

#476

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Oct 31, 2018, 4:10 PM UTC

sures wrote: post #103

I am a brown male working in India. The salaries are rounded to the nearest 100000 INR. USD values are rounded to the nearest 1000 USD. These are salaries per year . Need to emphasize this because when you see numbers like 3000 USD you may think this is per month. No it is indeed 3000 USD per year. When there are stocks involved, only the stocks that vest per year is included as part of the yearly salary. 2003 - 0 YO…

[deleted]

Re: My somewhat complete salary history as a software engineer

#477

Post by cm2012 » Wed, Oct 31, 2018, 4:11 PM UTC

dajohnson89 wrote: post #311

cm2012 wrote: post #46

Here was my path - first three of the below were during college, then I dropped out before number 4. 1) Unpaid internship (3 months) 2) $10 an hour assistant marketing role (1.5 years) 3) $14 an hour marketing role (1.5 years) 4) $30 an hour marketing role (8 months) 5) $35 an hour marketing role (Much bigger budget, lots of opportunity to learn) (1.5 years) 6) $50 an hour (promotion from the above role, 2 years) 7)…

Could you describe what exactly your consulting role is like?

Helping growth oriented companies scale sales on FB and Adwords.

Re: My somewhat complete salary history as a software engineer

#478

Post by megustapaycheck » Wed, Oct 31, 2018, 4:13 PM UTC

I grew up in Moscow, Russia; but have lived my entire adult life in NYC. I'm a US citizen. No education.

2002-2005: As a teenager, I've done odd jobs here and there, never adding up to more than a few thousand per year. Built some websites, set up some networks. Nothing serious.

2005: My first real job at a startup that sold whitelabel music stores to radio stations paid me $40k/year. No benefits, no bonuses, no equity.

2006: My second real job at the technology arm of a major sports league paid me $60k/year + benefits + a nominal annual bonus. There was a good pension plan too.

2009: After becoming a father, I begged for a pay increase to account for the costs of raising a kid in NYC. Got raised from $60k to $90k. Management called it a "salary correction".

2010: I left the sports league at $112k and joined a fintech startup where my salary went up to $120k.

2014: The fintech startup was amounting to nothing. My "very generous" option grants were turning out to be worth zero. There were occasional end-of-year cash bonuses that after taxes paid single-digit thousands. I left the company at a base salary of $140k and took three months off.

2014: Joined a major financial/media firm owned by a certain former NYC mayor. They paid me $150k in base salary, full benefits, and a promised annual bonus of $35k. I joined in September, so I got a teeny tiny prorated bonus for that year, but the following year I was forced to leave in December and wasn't paid the annual bonus.

2016: Joined a boring Canadian investment bank here in NYC at a base salary of $160k. No bonus, no equity. Terrible benefits. Stayed there for 4 months and didn't write a line of code for work because they didn't know what they wanted me to work on.

2016: Joined a startup that sold home security cameras. I ran a team of a dozen people there, and got paid $170k in base salary. Lots of equity was promised, but they never wrote my equity grant. Great benefits though. After a year at this company I had been forced to lay off some people from my team and had to help some others to find new jobs because they were worried about job security. The company was doing very poorly, so I left too because I have bills to pay.

2017: Joined a $20B hedge fund at base salary of $200k, promised annual bonus of $100k. After two months, the fund began a scary nosedive, and laid off myself and my boss and two other engineers.

2017: After a frantic job search I joined the adtech firm where I currently work. I get paid $180k in base salary, okay benefits, and an annual bonus of about $20k before taxes. I work mostly from home and really like it. I've been here for a year and don't plan to leave.

Re: My somewhat complete salary history as a software engineer

#479

Post by scarface74 » Wed, Oct 31, 2018, 4:15 PM UTC

friedman23 wrote: post #460

scarface74 wrote: post #454

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's low compared to FAANG, but it's much higher, even adjusting for COL, than most of the "perfectly normal" lower salaries in these comments. That's not good: those lower salaries should be considered abnormally low; mine should be considered on the high end of average These are the "average" salaries across the industry in different metro areas: https://www.matrixres.com/salary-surveys As far as $200K being high…

>As far as $200K being high adjusted for COLA, in the burbs where I live. $330K gets you a house - brand new build in a top rated school system with five bedrooms, 3.5 baths, 3000 square feet with a yard, two car garage, and a separate nice size office. What does that get you in SV? Nobody actually plans on retiring in SF. When I'm done working here for 10 or 15 years I'll have enough to move and own a mansion in wha…

Speaking in general, not about me in particular...

I'm going to give up 15 years of my life -- the time that most people spend getting married, having 2.5 kids, etc. to live in SV -- when I could spend those fifteen years living in the burbs in a big house with the white picket fence in almost any other major city in the US?

Especially if you are a two parent household, the general MO is that the second smaller income can go straight to savings. It's quite easy for a dual income earning household to make 200K if one is software developer and the other just makes an average income for a college grad of $60K-$70K,

Re: My somewhat complete salary history as a software engineer

#480

Post by blrdev356 » Wed, Oct 31, 2018, 4:15 PM UTC

tata2020 wrote: post #463

sures wrote: post #103

I am a brown male working in India. The salaries are rounded to the nearest 100000 INR. USD values are rounded to the nearest 1000 USD. These are salaries per year . Need to emphasize this because when you see numbers like 3000 USD you may think this is per month. No it is indeed 3000 USD per year. When there are stocks involved, only the stocks that vest per year is included as part of the yearly salary. 2003 - 0 YO…

Can u tell me which company offers such package i am really surprise as to wat role and company and wat skills ll get such package. can u share any way to connect with you?

Most of the American companies with head count I can answer your questions here.