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> As an example, interns at Google in the US earn about $7000 a month, while in London they get about £2000. That's because of market rates in London are far lo
by klipt 10y ago
> As an example, interns at Google in the US earn about $7000 a month, while in London they get about £2000. That's because of market rates in London are far lower than in the US. Ideally, tech companies in Silicon Valley would really love it if they could have the same employees as they do now for half the price.
Just speculating, but I imagine for Google the real estate cost of moving their headquarters to London would far outweigh the small amount they'd save on labor.
- ThePawnBreak 10y agoI seriously doubt it. Is London even more expensive than Mountain View? They could also move to a different european city, wages are low everywhere in Europe. Ironically, the largest engineering site of Google in Europe is Zurich, where employees are as expensive as in Silicon Valley. Google has about 40000 engineers. If they paid $70k less per year per engineer (median total compensation for a Google engineer is probably around $200k), that's a saving of about $3 bilion a year. I cannot understand why so few US companies open engineering sites in Europe, and when they do, they are much smaller than in the US. It's really easy to get good engineers in Europe.
- brianwawok 10y agoI too have wondered this. If all else is equal, why wouldn't Google and Microsoft and the other tech giants get founded in Europe for less money and more profit? What is the secret sauce that makes SV work?
- klipt 10y agoI think companies in Europe pay a lot in compensation that doesn't show up as salary. E.g. pension contributions, longer vacation, higher payroll taxes. So while there appears to be a large salary gap, the total cost to employ someone isn't quite as divergent.