Maybe tax brackets should be adjusted for inflation. Just a thought
Tech Salaries in 2022: Why the Six Figure Pay Makes Techies Feel Underpaid
501–510 of 609 posts
Re: Tech Salaries in 2022: Why the Six Figure Pay Makes Techies Feel Underpaid
#502I believe software engineers should be getting residuals from the products they help build. Like the way writers and actors get residuals for shows and movies they have worked on and are not a part of anymore. The company that owns that show or movie is still making money from licensing that and the actors and writers helped make that happen. Same with developers. Long after you leave a company that software product…
The challenge here is that once a show, movie, or piece of music is done, it’s done and can be syndicated out for decades. Software usually doesn’t work that way so you’d get into tricky situations like trying to license particular functions or code blocks, which would usually be trivial to rewrite to avoid paying royalties, etc.
Re: Tech Salaries in 2022: Why the Six Figure Pay Makes Techies Feel Underpaid
#503Earlier quoted context omitted.
Ok, time to put your money where your mouth is. In-N-Out pays its store managers over $100K/year. Their workers make around $25/hour which scales out to $50k/year for a full-time employee. And trust me, most devs I know couldn't handle flipping burgers. Dealing with customers, dealing with managers, dealing with cleaning restrooms, dealing with late nights/early mornings. So don't shit on burger flippers...
"So don't shit on burger flippers..." I'm not. I'm saying if everything paid the same (true income "equality", really equity), then why wouldn't I want to do a job , that is stereotyped as easy and typically low paid? There are tons of burnt out devs who want to quit and do something else. There aren't any In-N-Out in my state. If I could get a manager position, then I'd consider it (although the range starts below $…
I switched careers from fast food and restaurant ownership to IT. Almost every dev/engineer/sysadmin I know would last about a week before walking out. We whine about having to do daily standups. Try standing on your feet for 8 hour shifts. I think the people who are stereotyping these jobs as easy are idiots who don't know what they're talking about. The work is tedious, usually hot, with few breaks, with crappy uniforms, with bosses that generally are bad, and with few or crappy benefits.
I brought up In-N-Out because while the job is hot, and probably tedious, the employees seem to genuinely enjoy their jobs. Either that or the management has done an incredible job of brainwashing them.
But for other places, it's not that the employees are any worse than in IT. When I worked fast food in high school, one of my coworkers was the valedictorian in my class who became a doctor on the Navy's dime. Another scored a perfect SAT (in 1982) and got a full ride to Caltech. One guy was so smart, he reverse engineered the displays on some of the kitchen computers to mock the management. We had a real mix of people, both economically and socially diverse. Times have changed, and the US doesn't have as much social or economic mobility, but it was an interesting time.
The only difference I see between the people I work with now, and the people I worked with in my previous life is how much we're paid, and the working conditions. There are assholes in my current company, and assholes in fast food.
Re: Tech Salaries in 2022: Why the Six Figure Pay Makes Techies Feel Underpaid
#504Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Meanwhile for those that have the time and willpower to grind leetcode, they know they can command a 20-40% raise every few years. One thing a lot of people forget about this 20-40% number is: It's only true early in your career. It might be hard for younger folks to believe, but you will all hit a ceiling and plateau. My first job hop was for +50%! The next one was about 40%, the next one 15%, and so on. Now, with…
To be honest, I used to think developers in tech did well, then I worked with some really good sales people in tech and realized they're making WAY more on top free vacations and spiff (even more money) opportunities. It's night and day. We've heard about developers making upwards of 500K, I've seen sales people make triple on a single deal with similar deals lined up for following quarters. It is insane, and most de…
The dark side of sales is that the instant you have a good year, your sales goal gets adjusted upwards which makes it even harder for you next year. If you're selling something that will give you 6-7 figure commissions, you can bet management won't be keeping you around once you've closed that sale.
Re: Tech Salaries in 2022: Why the Six Figure Pay Makes Techies Feel Underpaid
#505Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Meanwhile for those that have the time and willpower to grind leetcode, they know they can command a 20-40% raise every few years. One thing a lot of people forget about this 20-40% number is: It's only true early in your career. It might be hard for younger folks to believe, but you will all hit a ceiling and plateau. My first job hop was for +50%! The next one was about 40%, the next one 15%, and so on. Now, with…
To be honest, I used to think developers in tech did well, then I worked with some really good sales people in tech and realized they're making WAY more on top free vacations and spiff (even more money) opportunities. It's night and day. We've heard about developers making upwards of 500K, I've seen sales people make triple on a single deal with similar deals lined up for following quarters. It is insane, and most de…
This has always been the case. Sales is compensated based on the money they bring in. High-performing salespeople have always made way more than the engineers who built the products they're selling.
Re: Tech Salaries in 2022: Why the Six Figure Pay Makes Techies Feel Underpaid
#506I believe software engineers should be getting residuals from the products they help build. Like the way writers and actors get residuals for shows and movies they have worked on and are not a part of anymore. The company that owns that show or movie is still making money from licensing that and the actors and writers helped make that happen. Same with developers. Long after you leave a company that software product…
Isn't that exactly what RSUs are? They are a share of all the future profits of a company.
Re: Tech Salaries in 2022: Why the Six Figure Pay Makes Techies Feel Underpaid
#507Earlier quoted context omitted.
And when costs get to high, what’s stopping tech companies from just expanding their overseas presence?
Going overseas also carries risk. It could be something as irritating as just cultural or language friction or as bad as a civil disturbance or war breaking out. Never mind just the quality of workers available for the price you have set as the threshold.
I’m not talking about your everyday enterprise companies hiring one or two developers.
I’m referring to major tech companies that already have foreign headquarters just expanding overseas.
Re: Tech Salaries in 2022: Why the Six Figure Pay Makes Techies Feel Underpaid
#508It also makes us Europeans feel underpaid :) I have 20 years of experience and don't even make six figures. $350000 base pay sounds like a different world.
These threads always make me sad. Even an entry-level position in the US makes more money than I do. There doesn't seem to be much competition here. I do get a lot of recruiting emails but most of them just ignore me after I mention my current salary. Granted, I am very fortunate to make 100000€ a year (mostly stock so varies a lot)
Working remotely for a US company would be one option but there is a massive time zone difference. Also, the recruiting messages from US companies (e.g. Turing) seemed to treat Europeans as cheap labor who are not entitled to stock grants.
Re: Tech Salaries in 2022: Why the Six Figure Pay Makes Techies Feel Underpaid
#509Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why are European software engineers so underpaid?
E.g. in Germany the side costs are much higher then in the US. E.g. the cost of paying 80k€ salary is much more then 80k€ for the company. But in the end the main reason is SV/FAANG.
All these costs are capped and not that important for higher salaries. Health insurance is only paid for the first 58k. The state pension, unemployment insurance etc do not increase for salaries over 85k.
I would expect a good benefits package in the US to be more expensive for the employer than the mandatory costs for German insurances.
Re: Tech Salaries in 2022: Why the Six Figure Pay Makes Techies Feel Underpaid
#510A solid article, but it should have commented on single family home prices. If you use the 3x salary rule, a $120k a year techie couldn't afford the median home price in America ($374k). A software engineer in San Francisco would have to make $526k a year in cold hard cash to reasonably afford the median single family home ($1.58 million). Talking about six figure salaries as if they are unquestionably upper-middle c…
What 1980s fantasy is this 3x rule? Median household incomes to home price ratios have risen to ~8x across the US as a whole , not just crazy house price areas like SF/NYC. Canada and Australia are far worse again, pushing 15x in some cities. 3x, if it ever was a rule, has been dead for a long long time.
Vancouver has an average household income of ~$96000/yr and an average price of detached home of $2139200. Pushing over a 22x ratio.
This city is actively hostile to new home owners and I am moving away this year to start a family.