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Finance.
by fdsfsaa 10y ago
Finance.
- savanaly 10y agoThat's true if the goal is purely money. I think, though, that if you're just looking to make six figures and don't quite care if it's 150k or 500k then working at a Google or Facebook will be the far better alternative as the workplace culture is better and the hours are likely to be better. For a lot of (most?) engineers, there's not enough money in the world to offset the difference in utility from working at a finance company instead of a development/research company. It's your life after all, and you spend a sizeble chunk of every day at work either way.
- elbear 10y agoThe work in finance can also be intellectually stimulating.
- savanaly 10y agoOf that I have no doubt, but I think on average the perception is that you are giving up your quality of life for money by going to finance.
- user5994461 10y agoWorking in finance: 1) Go to finance for the money 2) Stay there because work and people are interesting
- morgante 10y agoIt's questionable whether you'll make more money as a developer in finance than at Google. It'll certainly require a lot more politics and careful planning.
- user5994461 10y agoDepends on the location. Depends on your profile. Smart techs go to tech companies. Smart & ambitious techs go to finance. If you're at Google, you certainly won't participate in conversations with coworkers about how Google just tried to poach you with an offer soooo ridiculously low it's laughable.
- ceras 10y agoAny chance you can share more info? I'm very curious. It's certainly true that almost all finance software jobs pay much less than the big tech companies, and I've yet to personally run into one that clearly paid more (at best, similar or slightly more for some but not all algo trading). So I never exactly know what these comments mean. Which are the big payers -- just algo trading? -- and does everyone get paid that much or just the high performers, or even just the high performers at the high performing firms? How does high performer compensation compare to high performer compensation at tech companies (who start at, say, $400K-$500k for what I'll call "entry-level high performer")?
- user5994461 10y ago#London SV and Wall Street in the same place = an interesting playing field. --- I wouldn't say it's fair to compare ALL finance jobs to a few big tech companies. If you're doing over $500k somewhere in the USA, you should stay there. There are very few places on the planet that offers that for engineers. (and they're probably all big companies).
- morgante 10y agoCan you throw out some numbers? I almost never hear of London developers making >$200k.
- user5994461 10y agoI'd rather not talk numbers sorry. Let's just say that if you want easy money in London, you should get into consulting. It's also very tax friendly. (200k = 1000 daily rate, don't expect that for most people). > I almost never hear of London developers making >$200k. Yeah. £150k is extremely rare (pre-brexit exchange rate) I dunno know about the costs of living in SF but it is my understanding that at $100k you can barely afford a one bedroom. At £100k in London, you're doing incredibly well.
- quotemstr 10y agoI declined an offer from Jump Trading once. The money was very good, the people were very smart, and in the end, it was mostly that I was happy where I was (at Facebook) and didn't want to move to Chicago. Under difficult circumstances, I could have seen myself taking that offer and being very happy.