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My somewhat complete salary history as a software engineer

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Re: My somewhat complete salary history as a software engineer

#51

Post by wfriesen »

onetimemanytime wrote: post #48
toomanybeersies wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The pay rates for tradies in Australia is phenomenal. If I had kids, I'd be encouraging them to become electricians, not software engineers. Even a lot of unskilled jobs pay really well in Australia. I have a friend who works for Aldi in their distribution centre as a general worker, and he's on $35 per hour (only 6 hour shifts though, I think), plus when he's rostered on Sunday he goes up to $70 an hour. Anecdotally…

How much does a cup of coffee go for in Au?

Around $4.

And developers can certainly make over 100/hr, but in my experience that would mean contracting/consulting as a specialist with at least 5 years experience in a given technology.

Re: My somewhat complete salary history as a software engineer

#52

Post by hnzix »

toomanybeersies wrote: post #36
quickthrower2 wrote: post #11

Nice money at those big American companies. In Australia, you have to become a plumber to get to those levels :-)

The pay rates for tradies in Australia is phenomenal. If I had kids, I'd be encouraging them to become electricians, not software engineers. Even a lot of unskilled jobs pay really well in Australia. I have a friend who works for Aldi in their distribution centre as a general worker, and he's on $35 per hour (only 6 hour shifts though, I think), plus when he's rostered on Sunday he goes up to $70 an hour. Anecdotally…

Oz has a fairly hard and low dev salary ceiling for smaller companies, excepting maybe some Melbourne hotspots. If you want decent scratch you have to go corporate, but the content often sucks.

Re: My somewhat complete salary history as a software engineer

#53

Post by burner_121254 »

Burner account. White male working at a single US software company in the suburbs since 2007 (not anywhere near Silicon Valley). Cost of living is comparable to Minneapolis, MN.

Graduated college in 2007, Bachelor's in CS, hired to a QA team, ended up building a lot of internal web apps by myself from scratch that are used by a lot of teams. There aren't any other software companies anywhere near here, so switching companies frequently as others do to get raises isn't an easy option.

--------------

2007: $35,000

-- [incremental raises, working for the same team]

2016: $82,000

-- [Hired as a senior front-end web dev for a different team in 2016]

2017: $97,000

2018: $103,000

Re: My somewhat complete salary history as a software engineer

#54

Post by freditup »

akhilcacharya wrote: post #32
freditup wrote: post #26

I'm actually surprised that as a 'Principal Architect' he was only making $208,000 a year. Considering that entry-level positions at large companies which can have cash compensation of around $150,000+, it seems he may have been 'underpaid'. Of course $208,000 is nothing to scoff at, and money is hardly the most important thing when it comes to life. Just interesting to see that a reasonably large Bay-area company wo…

As I noted in another comment he’s for whatever reason only counting cash salary. I agree with your point though, no matter how bad it makes me feel :(

Fair points, though I don't know how high of an expected value I'd give to 50k of Box options. It's hard for me to imagine that options given that late are that valuable. I'd imagine the equity compensation at lots of other places would be better.

Don't feel bad though, these high salaries typically happen at large companies in extremely expensive areas. So, the money isn't as much as it seems, and you likely will feel like a small cog in a giant-money-making corporation. In other words, chasing the money is often not worth it.

Re: My somewhat complete salary history as a software engineer

#56

Post by RoyTyrell »

freditup wrote: post #26

I'm actually surprised that as a 'Principal Architect' he was only making $208,000 a year. Considering that entry-level positions at large companies which can have cash compensation of around $150,000+, it seems he may have been 'underpaid'. Of course $208,000 is nothing to scoff at, and money is hardly the most important thing when it comes to life. Just interesting to see that a reasonably large Bay-area company wo…

Would you be able to purchase a home or condo in the Bay area with a $208k salary? If so, what could you get (size, quality, approximity to the main tech areas)?

Re: My somewhat complete salary history as a software engineer

#57

Post by quickthrower2 »

hnzix wrote: post #52
toomanybeersies wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The pay rates for tradies in Australia is phenomenal. If I had kids, I'd be encouraging them to become electricians, not software engineers. Even a lot of unskilled jobs pay really well in Australia. I have a friend who works for Aldi in their distribution centre as a general worker, and he's on $35 per hour (only 6 hour shifts though, I think), plus when he's rostered on Sunday he goes up to $70 an hour. Anecdotally…

Oz has a fairly hard and low dev salary ceiling for smaller companies, excepting maybe some Melbourne hotspots. If you want decent scratch you have to go corporate, but the content often sucks.

I think the reason for that is American tech companies simply make a lot more money. They have a bigger market to server and USA first makes it easier to conquer the rest of the world, but Australia first normally ends up sandboxed in Australia, with some exceptions. The companies selling internationally will tend to pay more, as well as the cartels e.g. the banks, super, etc.

Re: My somewhat complete salary history as a software engineer

#58

Post by adasdf_throw »

Straight out of college (all Bay Area companies):

2015: Software Engineer (Company A) 120k + 10k signing bonus + worthless options

2016: Senior Software Engineer (Startup B) 145k + worthless options

2016: Software Engineer (Startup C) 145k + worthless options

2017: Software Engineer (Startup C) 150k + worthless options

2018: Software Engineer (Company D) 150k + 20k signing bonus + 230k RSUs/4 years + 10% performance bonus

Re: My somewhat complete salary history as a software engineer

#59

Post by Kalium »

RoyTyrell wrote: post #56
freditup wrote: post #26

I'm actually surprised that as a 'Principal Architect' he was only making $208,000 a year. Considering that entry-level positions at large companies which can have cash compensation of around $150,000+, it seems he may have been 'underpaid'. Of course $208,000 is nothing to scoff at, and money is hardly the most important thing when it comes to life. Just interesting to see that a reasonably large Bay-area company wo…

Would you be able to purchase a home or condo in the Bay area with a $208k salary? If so, what could you get (size, quality, approximity to the main tech areas)?

Yes. Well, yes if you assume decent credit and some cash saved up for a down payment. The conventional 20% wisdom can be safely ignored as a relic from the 1950s in the Bay.

It's definitely possible to buy a condo or detached house in Oakland for the 400k-700k that would likely be affordable on that salary. The condo, probably a one-bedroom might be a decade or less old, the house much more likely to be older, and probably not insanely distant from BART. This means reasonable access to SF, but annoying to get further south to the peninsula.

Re: My somewhat complete salary history as a software engineer

#60

Post by pm90 »

symlinkk wrote: post #47
akhilcacharya wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My friend is making about that as a new grad at a trading company. He writes performant React code for high-speed table rendering. I know another guy making about that much at FB as a new grad. He works on Messenger games.

So in other words it's about how rich your company is, not how good your skillset is.

It’s both. You might be able to get a great offer, but usually won’t be able to get promoted without the skills.
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