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As someone about to make this decision from outside of SF and with less knowledge about the market there, I'm curious to know what you think an SF "market-level

As someone about to make this decision from outside of SF and with less knowledge about the market there, I'm curious to know what you think an SF "market-level" salary would be. Would you mind elaborating?

Bahamut 11y ago
I'd think the Google/Facebook/Netflix/etc. numbers is the market salary - it is somewhat known in the Valley that Netflix pays its engineers around $375k, mostly cash, for example. What goes unsaid though is that there's a lot of silly hoops that have to be jumped through to get that salary at many of these companies (bad interview processes, companies realizing that actually wanted X skills for a position instead of Y, etc.). It would all depend on your skills though. I once turned down a $350k-400k opportunity myself in the area and ended up taking a significantly less amount in favor of more vacation, flexible hours, and much less stress.
- go1979 11y ago
  Hmm ... I am very skeptical when people report numbers of 350-400K. Apart from Netflix, which claims it pays at the top of the market, I didn't think other companies paid this much in base salary to mid-level tech employees. Glassdoor, etc. suggest the numbers for base salary are closer to 150-170K.
  - nilkn 11y ago
    These numbers seem exaggerated or inflated to me as well. I can't find any evidence of these $375k salaries anywhere else online except a reddit post which came from the same username.
  - zeroonetwothree 11y ago
    Something like $180k base + $100k equity + bonus is more realistic.
  - arkem 11y ago
    I feel that 350k+ is an exaggeration or perhaps the top 10% of Netflix engineers. Netflix is well known for paying large salaries almost entirely in cash (though I've heard that it's at the expense of an equity package or more fully fleshed out benefits). I'd expect that a mid-level engineer at Netflix would be looking at 200-250k though I don't have a lot of data to back it up. When I worked at Google (2013) a mid-level engineer was making about 175-200k if you considered publicly traded stock and annual bonuses to be cash equivalent. The numbers grow quickly once you start ascending the ranks to Staff Engineer and beyond but again that's only about 10% of Google's engineers.

Bahamut 11y ago

I'd think the Google/Facebook/Netflix/etc. numbers is the market salary - it is somewhat known in the Valley that Netflix pays its engineers around $375k, mostly cash, for example. What goes unsaid though is that there's a lot of silly hoops that have to be jumped through to get that salary at many of these companies (bad interview processes, companies realizing that actually wanted X skills for a position instead of Y, etc.). It would all depend on your skills though. I once turned down a $350k-400k opportunity myself in the area and ended up taking a significantly less amount in favor of more vacation, flexible hours, and much less stress.

go1979 11y ago
Hmm ... I am very skeptical when people report numbers of 350-400K. Apart from Netflix, which claims it pays at the top of the market, I didn't think other companies paid this much in base salary to mid-level tech employees. Glassdoor, etc. suggest the numbers for base salary are closer to 150-170K.
- nilkn 11y ago
  These numbers seem exaggerated or inflated to me as well. I can't find any evidence of these $375k salaries anywhere else online except a reddit post which came from the same username.
- zeroonetwothree 11y ago
  Something like $180k base + $100k equity + bonus is more realistic.
- arkem 11y ago
  I feel that 350k+ is an exaggeration or perhaps the top 10% of Netflix engineers. Netflix is well known for paying large salaries almost entirely in cash (though I've heard that it's at the expense of an equity package or more fully fleshed out benefits). I'd expect that a mid-level engineer at Netflix would be looking at 200-250k though I don't have a lot of data to back it up. When I worked at Google (2013) a mid-level engineer was making about 175-200k if you considered publicly traded stock and annual bonuses to be cash equivalent. The numbers grow quickly once you start ascending the ranks to Staff Engineer and beyond but again that's only about 10% of Google's engineers.