A Visa for founders, engineers and investors willing to join France • Hacker News Board

Re: A Visa for founders, engineers and investors willing to join France

#651

Post by rtpg » Tue, Jan 17, 2017, 4:14 AM UTC

morgante wrote: post #630

wwweston wrote: post #626

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> With an American tech salary of $200k/yr, I can pay for all of that (health insurance Even if you can pay for it, doesn't mean you can get it. Pre-ACA, I knew people who had the levels of income you're talking about (and higher ) who couldn't buy health insurance on their own at any price. Some of them could get insurance through employer groups, assuming they didn't want to retire, assuming a given employer wanted…

Sure, it was a lot worse pre-ACA. Thankfully, it's quite easy to purchase individual insurance these days (I pay $160/m for mine). We'll see what happens with the Republicans. More importantly, health insurances do not at all sufficiently explain the differences in salaries. Google will hire you here and give you great health insurance, even though they're also paying very well. Also, the notion that it requires real…

Other things the taxes in France pay for:

- A functioning public transportation system (I was living in a city of 100k people and could get around by bus decently. The worst bus lines still came once every 20 minutes).

- almost free access to culture

- Being able to get your passport done in a week, not six. Maybe not the nicest people, but things happen a bit faster

But I think the core reason you don't see super-high salaries is because the system makes offering absurdly high salaries very costly, instead preferring for more people to make reasonable salaries. You have things like the fortune tax so that even if you don't have a salary, if you have too much money you'll get an extra tax.

It's a feature of the system, not a bug. The glib explanation is France hates rich people. Not everyone likes it but at least everyone gets 6 weeks vacation. And if you don't have a job you can still have a place to live and not live under constant fear of eviction.

Re: A Visa for founders, engineers and investors willing to join France

#652

Post by rbobby » Tue, Jan 17, 2017, 4:31 AM UTC

reacharavindh wrote: post #606

erowtom wrote: post #510

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Update : Thanks for the feedbacks ! 1st update: Included mobile phone + Internet 2nd update: Huge update, completly forgot about one tax on the salary.. ----------------------- I'm French, I can give you some more details. I'm a full stack Ruby Developer, and I work at https://www.talent.io , the first recruitment platform for developers in Europe. (If you're looking to relocate in Paris, London or Berlin, you know w…

Just wanted to add another data point for comparison. South East USA. All numbers in USD. Gross earnings = 104000 / year Bonus + Stocks = ~12000 / year Income tax = 31986 (27.5%) (Fed + State + Social security + Medicare) Earnings after taxes = 84014 Expenses : ----------- Rent : 1 BR in the city = 800/month or 9600/year (Living by myself) Utilities = 150 / mont or 1800 / year (Phone + Internet + Electricity) 401K co…

> I'd most likely move to Denmark or Netherlands later this year

Just a tip... check out the application process for a work visa now. Work visas anywhere always take way longer than the applicant wants.

Getting married before you leave will change the type of visa you need... and might shorten the time required (but probably by not as much as you'd hope).

Good luck.

Re: A Visa for founders, engineers and investors willing to join France

#653

Post by astrange » Tue, Jan 17, 2017, 4:41 AM UTC

morgante wrote: post #644

toomuchtodo wrote: post #643

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If its a tax advantaged account, its only a 401k at that income level; a traditional IRA is off limits, and while you might be able to do a backdoor Roth conversion, rumor is that loophole is going away. So what tax advantaged account are you using to stash away the other $77500/year?

I'm not doing all my savings in tax-advantaged accounts, but I get a fair bit through backdoor Roth, solo 401k, and HSA savings. Plus, as a small business owner I can deduct a lot of my expenses.

Is your life plan for everyone to start small tech firms outside Silicon Valley and pay themselves $200k/year? Most developers don't make that much - I don't even think they do in SV.

Re: A Visa for founders, engineers and investors willing to join France

#654

Post by herbst » Tue, Jan 17, 2017, 4:51 AM UTC

morgante wrote: post #588

renaudg wrote: post #425

Regarding French salaries again : yes they are lower than elsewhere but with some exceptions, French employers are not the problem : they do pay the same price for you as in other European countries, more or less ! The difference is that your average engineer in France costs them around 1.5-2.5 times the total take home pay, because of high, compulsory labor taxes. In exchange, employees get as standard : * a top not…

I love how people trot out universal healthcare or pensions as a reason to ignore that European salaries are so much lower. With an American tech salary of $200k/yr, I can pay for all of that (health insurance, student loans, etc.) and still sock away $100k/yr in savings. That $100k is more than enough to build up a massive nest egg which will provide for me better than any pension or unemployment insurance would. If…

1. 200k are a exception not the norm

2. Quality of live is definitly higher in some parts of europe. There are public statistics for that

[1] https://www.numbeo.com/quality-of-life/rankings_by_country.j...

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Happiness_Report

[3] http://www.businessinsider.com/happiest-countries-best-quali...

There is really no reason to argue that, more money does not mean more quality of life. Especially its very different if you look below to the IT bubble.

Re: A Visa for founders, engineers and investors willing to join France

#655

Post by astrange » Tue, Jan 17, 2017, 4:53 AM UTC

josephcooney wrote: post #575

ekianjo wrote: post #547

Earlier quoted context omitted.

tokyo has way better access to public transport than Paris. And better quality transport too. Again chauvinism coming out whenever anything is mentioned about France. Paris n est pas le nombril du monde.

Everyone's public transport system looks shabby compared to Tokyo.

For a country about to have so many elderly people, I think the elevators are hard to reach and the floors shouldn't have been made of hard shiny/slippery marble. And it's actually quite expensive to get around if you start counting.

There's nothing in the world to complain about aside from that.

Re: A Visa for founders, engineers and investors willing to join France

#656

Post by herbst » Tue, Jan 17, 2017, 5:01 AM UTC

renaudg wrote: post #330

Raw salary comparisons miss the point : you can't really compare pre-tax salaries between countries with such a completely different taxation and benefits structure. The take home pay certainly is much, much lower in France than in the US, but it comes with access to top-notch free healthcare, free university, pension contributions, 5-7 weeks paid leave and generous unemployment insurance amongst other things. It all…

IMO its hard for people coming from a country without proper social security standards to understand why we are happy to pay for those.

Personally i dont mind earning less, i am close to 30 and have no financial pillow or anything. So far i just enjoyed life and spent money as i wanted to. If i get unemployed or sick i have nothing to worry, which is something i happily pay for.

I also enjoy the fact that i know people who live in my country have mostly a good life. Have enough to eat & get taken care of. I see how a different world view makes this irrelevant, but personally i feel this is worth a lot. Makes the environment generally more nice.

Re: A Visa for founders, engineers and investors willing to join France

#657

Post by herbst » Tue, Jan 17, 2017, 5:03 AM UTC

rubber_duck wrote: post #359

renaudg wrote: post #330

Raw salary comparisons miss the point : you can't really compare pre-tax salaries between countries with such a completely different taxation and benefits structure. The take home pay certainly is much, much lower in France than in the US, but it comes with access to top-notch free healthcare, free university, pension contributions, 5-7 weeks paid leave and generous unemployment insurance amongst other things. It all…

>but it comes with access to top-notch free healthcare Does it cover stuff like cosmetic dermatology, full dental plan (implants) ? I don't live in France, I lived in different EU countries and every time I needed something the "free health care" meant I had to pay participation fee and wait 6 months walking around appointments and ended up going private clinic. I basically got 0 value out it, considering I'm young a…

> I had to pay participation fee and wait 6 months walking around appointments and ended up going private clinic.

I lived in Austria and Switzerland. I never had to wait more than a few days and private clinics are usually allowed to go to without additional costs. Please dont project your experience to whole europe/eu

Re: A Visa for founders, engineers and investors willing to join France

#658

Post by cgearhart » Tue, Jan 17, 2017, 5:19 AM UTC

morgante wrote: post #588

renaudg wrote: post #425

Regarding French salaries again : yes they are lower than elsewhere but with some exceptions, French employers are not the problem : they do pay the same price for you as in other European countries, more or less ! The difference is that your average engineer in France costs them around 1.5-2.5 times the total take home pay, because of high, compulsory labor taxes. In exchange, employees get as standard : * a top not…

I love how people trot out universal healthcare or pensions as a reason to ignore that European salaries are so much lower. With an American tech salary of $200k/yr, I can pay for all of that (health insurance, student loans, etc.) and still sock away $100k/yr in savings. That $100k is more than enough to build up a massive nest egg which will provide for me better than any pension or unemployment insurance would. If…

No one in America seems to understand how close they are to financial ruin from surprisingly common stuff. My wife has lingering complications from the birth of our last child. My statement of benefits from the insurance company for 2016 shows that they paid $97,000 for her this year, and this was at least the third year in a row at that level. Fortunately, I already had pretty good insurance when this whole mess started for us, and we aren't really at risk of losing it. But I can tell you that it is a significant factor any time I consider changing jobs.

Re: A Visa for founders, engineers and investors willing to join France

#659

Post by praneshp » Tue, Jan 17, 2017, 5:35 AM UTC

rifung wrote: post #650

morgante wrote: post #628

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd say $200k is very typical (if not on the low end) of salary + stock for big companies. Not including other things like insurance or retirement plans which are hard to attach a quantifiable dollar amount to. In terms of straight dollars, you can easily earn $200k+/yr doing contracting.

Do you have a source for this? Or can people chime in? I could see this for Google or FB which are known to pay pretty well, but is this really "typical"? And even for Google or FB, I imagine $200k would require that you include annual bonuses too. > In terms of straight dollars, you can easily earn $200k+/yr doing contracting. But.. is contracting really ever easy? I mean it's hard work getting clients and how many…

I can vouch for the 200k number, I was earning slightly lower than that 4 years into the industry (before I left to work at a place where the RSUs are worthless before IPO). It wasn't anywhere near Google/FB level.

But I disagree that there are many options to save on tax, etc though. I wasn't too bad, but there was no way I could've saved 50% of that (esp if not locked away like 401k). Just my rent for 1 bed in a average apartment was >50k a year.

Re: A Visa for founders, engineers and investors willing to join France

#660

Post by hayd » Tue, Jan 17, 2017, 5:58 AM UTC

rtpg wrote: post #651

morgante wrote: post #630

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, it was a lot worse pre-ACA. Thankfully, it's quite easy to purchase individual insurance these days (I pay $160/m for mine). We'll see what happens with the Republicans. More importantly, health insurances do not at all sufficiently explain the differences in salaries. Google will hire you here and give you great health insurance, even though they're also paying very well. Also, the notion that it requires real…

Other things the taxes in France pay for: - A functioning public transportation system (I was living in a city of 100k people and could get around by bus decently. The worst bus lines still came once every 20 minutes). - almost free access to culture - Being able to get your passport done in a week, not six. Maybe not the nicest people, but things happen a bit faster But I think the core reason you don't see super-hi…

If the local charity fete has music playing they need to pay €1k to get the right license (it's enforced), and musicians can't work for free or they could be fined.

France hates lots of things but it sure loves red tape.