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If this data is anywhere near reliable, then a large number of engineers are taking positions in the Bay Area with a horrible financial outlook. The median one

• optimusclimb 11y ago
  What's unspoken is that their list is probably all startups. If you work at established companies, or late stage startups, the total equity package is going to be higher. That is, I'm pretty sure that if you work for Uber, Twitter, FB, Netflix, etc, you will be making well north of 200k+ a year if you are senior+.
  • eropple 11y ago
    Just one data point, but when I spoke most recently to one of the companies on your list, I was quoted $170 for a lead software engineer role, "but only in our [Bay Area] office". Big companies don't want to tilt the market against them, either.
    • icelancer 11y ago
      I received a similar offer from one of the companies on the list to work in Data Science, which was quoted as a senior-level role.
  • timr 11y ago
    I think you're right that it's mostly startups, but that's also the job market in SF right now. They far outnumber the established companies. Also, from what I know of (fairly experienced) friends and acquaintances working at larger companies in the bay area, the financial trade-off is still pretty sketchy. A salary of $250k a year will support you well in a decent single-guy lifestyle, but it won't go much further than that.
    • cm2012 11y ago
      Even with rents of $4000 a month, $250k is a fantastic salary. The median average family income in NYC, btw, is $50,000, and the average rent is similar to SF.
      • pavlov 11y ago
        Yes. Many of the comments here speak of a growing disconnect between the elite engineer class and the regular people. This can be dangerous to our profession over time. $250k / year will only support a "decent single-guy lifestyle"? That's just insane anywhere in the world (except maybe if your last name happens to be Al Saud). For comparison, that is significantly above the average salary of a European prime minister. German Chancellor Angela Merkel makes slightly more than $250k / year.
        • eropple 11y ago
          No kidding. I basically quit working and just consult part-time (in Boston, itself not exactly cheap) because I can live comfortably as a single guy for part-time rates. I'm as guilty of chasing the "high score" at times in my career, but to pretend that it's necessary is just...gross.
        • timr 11y ago
          There is a disconnect: between people in SF, and people in most of the country who are paying less than a quarter of what SF residents pay for housing. That's a big deal. Stop looking at the top-line number and exaggerating the lifestyle in your head. The costs here are insane. Someone earning $250k here is probably doing about as well, financially, as an engineer earning market-rate in any other part of the country.
  • ryandrake 11y ago
    This comes up time and time again on HN. Due to the demographic here, everyone seems to know at least SOMEONE who makes $200K+, but there's no evidence that these compensation packages are anything but outliers (even including equity), no matter the age/vintage of company.
    • sjg007 11y ago
      I thought Netflix was the outlier company.. but then again it is only ~500 engineers or so..
    • usaar333 11y ago
      There's plenty of evidence. Just look at glassdoor: Google senior eng total comp is $252k annually: http://www.glassdoor.com/Salary/Google-Senior-Software-Engineer-San-Jose-Salaries-EJI_IE9079.0,6_KO7,31_IL.32,40_IM761.htm http://www.glassdoor.com/Salary/Google-Senior-Software-Engin... Google Staff engineer is $350k annually with base salary over $200k: http://www.glassdoor.com/Salary/Google-Staff-Software-Engineer-San-Jose-Salaries-EJI_IE9079.0,6_KO7,30_IL.31,39_IM761.htm http://www.glassdoor.com/Salary/Google-Staff-Software-Engine...
      • ryandrake 11y ago
        Outlier employees of an outlier company Editing my curt response: The original poster asserted that he/she was "pretty sure" that if you work for [established companies], you "will" be making well north of 200k+, as if it was a certainty or at least a high probability. I don't deny that some outlier companies have some outlier employees that make that much, I'm just questioning the claim that it's usual to make that in these companies.
        • deleted 11y ago
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• jessedhillon 11y ago
  A) That $3500 figure (I've seen $3200) is across all SF neighborhoods, and the various neighborhoods experience enough variation to render a median figure less than useful for planning. B) Anecdotally, many people do take roommate, especially junior engineers (early- to mid-twenties) at least to start with. The reality of living in an expensive city is that you will have to make certain accommodations to your lifestyle if you also want to enjoy the benefits of city living. Living in the city isn't for everyone, but I think most people are aware that the tradeoff on commute is that you get a shorter one if you take a smaller house.
  • icelancer 11y ago
    Then these companies are not adequately compensating employees regarding cost of living. Which is fine, but it's not wrong to point that out.
    • jessedhillon 11y ago
      How do you arrive at that conclusion? Where does this assumption that your company should be paying you enough to rent a 1BR in one of the most competitive markets in the country come from? This is as baseless as the complaining from the people who claim that tech workers are displacing them (from SF) by paying market rents. They don't have an unlimited right to rent in whichever neighborhood they want, and neither do tech workers. If you work for a tech company in SF and want to save money, live in the suburbs: that compromise has always existed. Or if living in SF isn't your thing, go live in Minnesota and take a $90k job, but spend $1,000 on rent. Nobody's saying living in SF is unilaterally better here, but I really don't understand why it's considered inadequate for a company not to peg its compensation to the price of a 1BR rental, regardless of market conditions!
      • deleted 11y ago
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• jlarocco 11y ago
  I noticed the same thing. The salaries are about 1.3-1.5x mine, but a quick search on Trulia shows rent prices 2.4x mine. Seems like a losing deal.
  • gdix 11y ago
    Not necessarily. If you're making $100K but your rent is $1000 your salary minus your rent will be $88,000. If you're making 1.3x ($130K) but your rent is 2.4x ($2400), your salary minus your rent will be $101,200. Obviously, this ignore taxes but the increased salary can more than make up for extremely high rents.
    • jlarocco 11y ago
      But that's just rent. The apartments 2.4x mine appeared to be in worse neighborhoods with higher crime, worse schools, etc. than my current neighborhood. And commuting is expensive. I have a 10 minute bike ride right now, there's no way I could afford to live close enough to SV to bike to work. It's almost enough to erase the rest of the cost difference. http://www.niallkennedy.com/blog/2006/03/silicon-valley-commute-costs.html http://www.niallkennedy.com/blog/2006/03/silicon-valley-comm...
      • gdix 11y ago
        I'm not saying "Bay Area is still definitely better because, hey, look at my math". I'm just saying that a 1.3-1.5x salary increase can more than offset a 2.4x rent increase. Obviously there are other factors that are too numerous to list such as commuting costs.
    • oso2k 11y ago
      They don't pay taxes in Bay Area? $100K/year - 35% - $1K/month = $53K/year $100K/year - 35% - $2.4K/month = $36.2K/year $130K/year - 35% - $2.4K/month = $55.7K/year
      • sgeop 11y ago
• aetherson 11y ago
  You rather blithely move between talking about "San Francisco" and "the bay area," but they're different, and the ultra-high rents are much more a San Francisco thing than a bay area thing.
  • icelancer 11y ago
    Presumably he knows that. Even still, traffic and commute from "the bay area" to San Francisco where most of the startups are located are not reasonable there compared to other parts of the US, even tech-heavy ones.
    • jessedhillon 11y ago
      > other parts of the US, even tech-heavy ones This is not comparable. SF is unique among other "tech-heavy" environments around the US in that we reward employees with significant pre-liquidity equity here, and the chances are significantly above zero that those shares are worth something in many cases. When you factor that in, compensation comes out to ~$300-500k/yr. In other areas of the US, even where you have a density of tech startups, the culture is entirely different -- compensation is attractive to a more conservative profile. Likewise, the companies that inhabit those economies are not targeting the same kind of aggressive growth that companies in SF+SV. So to say that there is a choice between working in SF and, say, the research triangle, disregards crucial differences.
  • timr 11y ago
    I'm not being blithe. Last I checked (maybe a year ago), the rents in the valley weren't substantially better than the city. You might get more space for the same amount of money if you're willing to live in Burlingame, but the monthly nut is similar. You also have to factor in the cost (and time!) of the commute, which sucks. You can do a little better in the east bay, but rents for anything convenient to BART are going up faster than rents in SF. Basically, the bay area is an efficient market for housing, modulo the cost of commuting to the major job centers.
    • x0x0 11y ago
• s73v3r 11y ago
  "If you're starting a startup in San Francisco...well, don't do it. Unless your customer base is here, you should go somewhere cheaper." The money is in SF, though. And the money has shown no interest in moving.
  • timr 11y ago
    By "the money", I assume you mean "the investors". Most customers are not in the bay area. Anyway, here's a startup protip: make a business that is growing revenue like crazy, and investors will give you money no matter where your offices are. Move to SF without a business that is growing revenue like crazy, and they probably won't give you money. ...but you'll be able to take a zipcar to Sand Hill Road for the rejection. That's worth something, right?
    • dsfhsdfjkfsd 11y ago
      >make a business that is growing revenue like crazy ...so your protip basically amounts to "make money to make money"? Thanks, underpants gnomes.
      • deleted 11y ago
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    • MCRed 11y ago
      I think at this point those who locate in the bay area see getting VC money as success, and whatever comes after as resume padding. Anyone who is ready to build a real fast growing business is not going to go to the one place in the world where the costs are astronomical (except maybe for a small titular HQ with the CEO while the rest of the company is in cleveland or something). Everything is super expensive, and to be honest, there's a lot of investor money, but most of it I wouldn't touch with a 10 foot pole-- the cost of that money is astronomical as well.
    • s73v3r 11y ago
      Depending on what your startup is, a lot of your early customers are probably going to be in the Bay Area. But yes, I was referring to the investors. "Anyway, here's a startup protip: make a business that is growing revenue like crazy" Really? That's all? And I'm sure that to make my product better, all I have to do is write code with less bugs!
• seattle_spring 11y ago
  I would think that most engineers renting 1br apartments are doing so with a significant other. That brings the per-person cost down to $1750, or a minimum of $75k / year.
  • deleted 11y ago
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• mratzloff 11y ago
  This is exactly what I was coming here to say. All this tells me is that San Francisco engineers are woefully underpaid. Whenever a recruiter calls and I (accidentally) answer and they proposition me with a job in SF I tell them I would need to be paid twice as much as I'm earning now (in Seattle) to consider it. And I'm compensated well. It's true, and as a side benefit it usually ends the conversation quickly.
  • bertil 11y ago
    Paying engineers more will most likely increase rent prices accordingly. The solution seems to match recruitment objectives with available rooms.
    • MCRed 11y ago
      Lower rent will come with increased capacity. Part of the reason rents are so high tis that california does not add capacity very quickly because the permitting process is very burdensome and californians are the original NIMBYs-- yes even about housing developments. Thus there are rows and rows of 3-4 story buildings instead of high rises full of apartments.
      • timr 11y ago
        The conversation on this is incredibly hypocritical. The area where there are "rows and rows" of 3-4 story buildings is the 2/3 of SF where tech people don't want to live. Places with names like "the Sunset" and "Ingleside", that consist mostly of single-family construction. No, when tech people talk about "building up", they're almost universally talking about replacing tenement buildings in the Mission with high rises. This has the unique property of displacing extremely poor people, and allowing tech people to live in luxury buildings in a small neighborhood that has recently become trendy, but was historically desirable only to poor people. The problem isn't permitting or NIMBYs...it's that a relatively entitled population of recent arrivals have lost their fucking minds, and expect to be able to cram into the same 20 blocks of SF and not have to pay for the privilege. When they don't get what they want, they blame the laws for not allowing them to get what they want. The "real" solution is for the city to "incentivize" tech companies to locate elsewhere, but given that our local politicians have fallen in love with this bubble, I don't see that happening.
• paulsutter 11y ago
  I moved to Cupertino in 1989 from the east coast, to work at Apple. I was shocked that houses in Cupertino cost $400,000 (yes the same ones that cost $2M today). The pay wasn't nearly in proportion to the relative costs. A friend pointed out that the high costs reflect the opportunity and that it was all worthwhile. And he was absolutely right. It's true that the long work hours and high costs in the Bay Area can mean delaying a family and other such things. And that's a tradeoff that should be made carefully, whichever direction you choose. It's important to acknowledge that both choices are perfectly legitimate and a matter of personal preference.
  • deleted 11y ago
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• dllthomas 11y ago
  'To keep that at 30% of gross income (which is still pretty bad)' I don't see why the percentage is what matters. I'd rather pay 50% of $140 than 10% of $70. Of course, taxes change the numbers, but that still doesn't make "percentage of income" be what matters...