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I make over $200k most years, with a liberal arts bachelor degree. I work in a comfortable office with reasonable hours, no one yells at me, I don't have to get
by zippergz 11y ago
I make over $200k most years, with a liberal arts bachelor degree. I work in a comfortable office with reasonable hours, no one yells at me, I don't have to get dirty or put myself in physical danger. I take several weeks of vacation a year, I very rarely work a late night, and I have recruiters reaching out to me on a regular basis offering me new opportunities. While I don’t love all aspects of my work (who does?), I also can’t say with a straight face that I don’t have a drastically better situation than most people. If you ask me, software development is a pretty damned good field to be in.
- madengr 11y agoWhat sort of software development, and what area of the country?
- zippergz 11y agoSaaS marketing software in Los Angeles. I've also lived in Seattle and pay was in a similar range there.
- heckerboy 11y agoLos Angeles, huh? I would love to work down in LA, but I've been staying in the Bay because I assumed this was the only place I could earn ~200k. Mind listing some of the companies that pay in that range in LA?
- jaimebuelta 11y agoI don't think that $200k is a common salary among tech people. Especially out of Silicon Valley, and, even more so, out of the US (The Economist is a British magazine, after all)
- zippergz 11y agoI didn't say it's salary. That's salary+bonus+stock vesting. This is in line with the total cash comp I've seen and received from most of the major tech companies in the US.
- seivan 11y agoYou're assuming this is the norm. That's just pretty hilarious. At one point I was given a Macbook Pro as a perk (iOS dev) which was slower than my personal Air because of the lack of SSD.
- jondubois 11y agoI make that too as a contractor. This is a standard rate for doing contracting in Australia and UK. Now that the economy is crumbling I don't see why anyone would want to work for a startup.
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- pwm 11y agoNo idea about AU, but £600/d ($200K ~= £140K / 46 / 5) is not the standard rate in London let alone the UK.
- ryandrake 11y agoCongratulations, but you have to admit you are a pretty extreme outlier, even in the Bay Area. I'd guess the vast majority of tech workers in Silicon Valley are in the $80-$140K range, and the vast majority outside the valley are in the $50-90K range. $200K is eye popping and probably two or more standard deviations from the mean.
- zippergz 11y agoYou're looking only at base salary. Bonus and stock vesting (I'm talking generally about large, public tech companies you've all heard of - not startups) raise the total cash significantly.
- ryandrake 11y agoI'm considering all parts of the package. You really think a significant chunk of Valley tech workers make $200K including bonus and _sellable_ equity? Not a chance. Sure, everyone knows someone who knows someone who works at Google and makes that much. But for each of them, I'll show you 10 people who make a normal amount.
- zippergz 11y agoAnd by the way, even if you're making $120k, that's REALLY REALLY GOOD and way more than the vast majority of the people in this country make. Let's have some perspective here.