6 ms·

I think people are actually really out of touch with bigco pay scales. 250k is pretty easily achievable in a bigco. At Facebook you'll hit 250k+ in total comp a

I think people are actually really out of touch with bigco pay scales. 250k is pretty easily achievable in a bigco. At Facebook you'll hit 250k+ in total comp at level 5, at LinkedIn you'll hit 250k+ in total comp at Staff level. If you also factor in stacking allotments of RSUs, your pay can easily exceed 300k at these levels given a few years of tenure.

sbilstein 11y ago
I can corroborate this. 250k is very, very attainable.
- eecks 11y ago
  Just in the states? What about in Europe? FB, Google and others have headquarters in Dublin. I don't think they pay anything like that, do they?
  - loopbit 11y ago
    I live in Dublin, don't work for Google but I have many friends that do (as well as in London and Zurich). No, they don't pay anything close to that. Actually, AFAIK, in Dublin the salary that Google pays for developers is on the low side of the scale (they offset that, in part, with all the benefits like free food and the rest).
    - eecks 11y ago
      That's what I thought. I'm in Dublin too but not in google/fb/etc
    - LoSboccacc 11y ago
      Dublin is in a weird situation. Loads of immigrant here. I lived there couple years and worked in one of those big corps. Salaries do go quite up a while but statistics on the corporate ladder are stacked firmly against immigrants, the higher you go the less chance you have to find non local people. With soft career ceiling and continuous influx of people salaries are driven down. You can still make a fine living, but nothing compared to the colleagues on the other side of the ocean.
  - lisivka 11y ago
    $80K is top of the top developer salary I heard of in Ukraine. My own salary is $55K. With $250K, I can hire team to work instead of me. :-)
    - ldarcyftw 11y ago
      Don't forget that those 250k are pre-taxes, and salary in Ukraine is usually quoted after tax afaik.
      - deleted 11y ago
        [deleted]
  - gutnor 11y ago
    Does not appear to be the case in London. I know indirectly people working in Google around here and they are on the low side of banking salaries. Getting $250K is certainly doable in bank, but it does not follow a specific career plan. I have known senior system tester making 150K GBP and for the same job and responsibilities another was making 50K GBP. Doing it in 5 years out of school is difficult in tech. It is doable without too much trouble in finance in trading, m&a, ... the trick is that you need to survive which require more luck than skills. Overall though, in the 4.5 million workers in London, only 120K make between 100K GBP and 200K GBP, and 60K that make more than that.
  - crucifiction 11y ago
    For a BigCo the Dublin pay is going to be roughly 50-70% of the US pay for the same job.
    - eecks 11y ago
      Do you base this on something?
      - crucifiction 11y ago
        I am a hiring manager at a big software company and have worked at others in similar capacity. I have seen salary data for my employees in both Dublin and the US.
ryanSrich 11y ago
Is this only in Silicon Valley? Or are these pay scales appropriate for satellite offices as well? For example: could you hit $250k working for Google in Pittsburgh?
- logical42 11y ago
  From my understanding, they don't really recalibrate pay scales at the bigcos based on location.. but this is purely anecdotal evidence.
  - mpdehaan2 11y ago
    Well, there's really no corresponding data for many other markets . Facebook and Google don't really do Work From Home and don't have a lot of remote locations for development depending on where you are. (Amazon is another example). I don't know what they offer datacenter staff, but in many areas, recruiters are pretty adamant about people moving. From my experience, say, the North Carolina scene, you're lucky if you are going to get $120-ish with ten years of experience. There's some give or take, but includes large companies and banks. You can do a little better at something like a Cisco if you are willing to trade quality of work. Most big companies as well as startups are paying new grads somewhere in the low-high 60s or maybe 50s depending on where. I don't have hard data, but it's no where near $130k. Data from cost of living comparison sites that some companies use indicates that these companies hiring someone in the bay area may pay those people 20% more for cost of living at most. Startups pay substantially less on average, with senior level personnel getting around $100k, maybe $120k if you're excellent and the startup is well funded - but this is 10 years of experience kind of stuff. I have unfortunately had to turn down some great folks because they wanted north of that - and they were worth it. I've also seen companies where their maximum pay tier tops out at 135 for what amounts to principle engineer level positions. (I'd assume a fellow at IBM would do better, but they are uncommon and few have a chance of surviving the machine to get there). Conversely, really senior level software development positions at basically-exit-ready startups in CA aren't going to be much better than 40-50% better than the above. Some of these can be obtained remotely - sometimes. What the article states as common for Google and Facebook are absolutely not the norm, and I'm not really sure how achievable that is for most people even there. It's great if Google/Facebook can allow to pay people that, definitely. I just wouldn't say it's even remotely common and does not translate. I've heard some ancedotal completely crazy numbers from hedge funds that most people would hate working for elsewhere, but nothing nearing the numbers in this article. I don't really have hard data on the New York software scene or Texas, but .. again, this isn't normal. HN may be more of a microcosm than expected if most people do feel this is normal. To put it in perspective, this is still amazingly high compared to a lot of other positions and you'd still have it really good.

sbilstein 11y ago

I can corroborate this. 250k is very, very attainable.

eecks 11y ago
Just in the states? What about in Europe? FB, Google and others have headquarters in Dublin. I don't think they pay anything like that, do they?
- loopbit 11y ago
  I live in Dublin, don't work for Google but I have many friends that do (as well as in London and Zurich). No, they don't pay anything close to that. Actually, AFAIK, in Dublin the salary that Google pays for developers is on the low side of the scale (they offset that, in part, with all the benefits like free food and the rest).
  - eecks 11y ago
    That's what I thought. I'm in Dublin too but not in google/fb/etc
  - LoSboccacc 11y ago
    Dublin is in a weird situation. Loads of immigrant here. I lived there couple years and worked in one of those big corps. Salaries do go quite up a while but statistics on the corporate ladder are stacked firmly against immigrants, the higher you go the less chance you have to find non local people. With soft career ceiling and continuous influx of people salaries are driven down. You can still make a fine living, but nothing compared to the colleagues on the other side of the ocean.
- lisivka 11y ago
  $80K is top of the top developer salary I heard of in Ukraine. My own salary is $55K. With $250K, I can hire team to work instead of me. :-)
  - ldarcyftw 11y ago
    Don't forget that those 250k are pre-taxes, and salary in Ukraine is usually quoted after tax afaik.
    - deleted 11y ago
      [deleted]
- gutnor 11y ago
  Does not appear to be the case in London. I know indirectly people working in Google around here and they are on the low side of banking salaries. Getting $250K is certainly doable in bank, but it does not follow a specific career plan. I have known senior system tester making 150K GBP and for the same job and responsibilities another was making 50K GBP. Doing it in 5 years out of school is difficult in tech. It is doable without too much trouble in finance in trading, m&a, ... the trick is that you need to survive which require more luck than skills. Overall though, in the 4.5 million workers in London, only 120K make between 100K GBP and 200K GBP, and 60K that make more than that.
- crucifiction 11y ago
  For a BigCo the Dublin pay is going to be roughly 50-70% of the US pay for the same job.
  - eecks 11y ago
    Do you base this on something?
    - crucifiction 11y ago
      I am a hiring manager at a big software company and have worked at others in similar capacity. I have seen salary data for my employees in both Dublin and the US.

ryanSrich 11y ago

Is this only in Silicon Valley? Or are these pay scales appropriate for satellite offices as well? For example: could you hit $250k working for Google in Pittsburgh?

logical42 11y ago
From my understanding, they don't really recalibrate pay scales at the bigcos based on location.. but this is purely anecdotal evidence.
- mpdehaan2 11y ago
  Well, there's really no corresponding data for many other markets . Facebook and Google don't really do Work From Home and don't have a lot of remote locations for development depending on where you are. (Amazon is another example). I don't know what they offer datacenter staff, but in many areas, recruiters are pretty adamant about people moving. From my experience, say, the North Carolina scene, you're lucky if you are going to get $120-ish with ten years of experience. There's some give or take, but includes large companies and banks. You can do a little better at something like a Cisco if you are willing to trade quality of work. Most big companies as well as startups are paying new grads somewhere in the low-high 60s or maybe 50s depending on where. I don't have hard data, but it's no where near $130k. Data from cost of living comparison sites that some companies use indicates that these companies hiring someone in the bay area may pay those people 20% more for cost of living at most. Startups pay substantially less on average, with senior level personnel getting around $100k, maybe $120k if you're excellent and the startup is well funded - but this is 10 years of experience kind of stuff. I have unfortunately had to turn down some great folks because they wanted north of that - and they were worth it. I've also seen companies where their maximum pay tier tops out at 135 for what amounts to principle engineer level positions. (I'd assume a fellow at IBM would do better, but they are uncommon and few have a chance of surviving the machine to get there). Conversely, really senior level software development positions at basically-exit-ready startups in CA aren't going to be much better than 40-50% better than the above. Some of these can be obtained remotely - sometimes. What the article states as common for Google and Facebook are absolutely not the norm, and I'm not really sure how achievable that is for most people even there. It's great if Google/Facebook can allow to pay people that, definitely. I just wouldn't say it's even remotely common and does not translate. I've heard some ancedotal completely crazy numbers from hedge funds that most people would hate working for elsewhere, but nothing nearing the numbers in this article. I don't really have hard data on the New York software scene or Texas, but .. again, this isn't normal. HN may be more of a microcosm than expected if most people do feel this is normal. To put it in perspective, this is still amazingly high compared to a lot of other positions and you'd still have it really good.