5 ms·

> My salary is 2.7x higher The original salary must have been low, no hate. Different strokes for different folks. If you're working at a company that already

> My salary is 2.7x higher The original salary must have been low, no hate. Different strokes for different folks. If you're working at a company that already pays well and you're not in the Bay Area, then your options for switching are either exciting but very risky startups (< $1 billion) or small satellite offices of big corps that have limited team options and little political influence (bad for advancement in senior positions). These would typically be lateral movements at best.

zeamaize 10y ago
> The original salary must have been low, no hate. My new salary is just much higher, I've had several major steps up. I've found salaries in major metro areas to be pretty much the same as a competitive offer in the Bay Area. > Different strokes for different folks. If you're working at a company that already pays well and you're not in the Bay Area, then your options for switching are either exciting but very risky startups (< $1 billion) or small satellite offices of big corps that have limited team options and little political influence (bad for advancement in senior positions). These would typically be lateral movements at best. The Bay Area isn't the only place with a tech sector, and there are plenty of companies whose main offices aren't in the Bay Area. Washington DC, Chicago, Austin, Denver, all have tremendous tech industries. I've even had job offers at great places that are further out there. My "one that got away" was a job offer in Portland I still think about. It was a great opportunity and a fantastic city, but I ultimately went elsewhere primarily based on the desire to bring some of my projects with me.
- hapless 10y ago
  DC, Chicago, Austin, and Denver absolutely have booming tech industries. And rising costs of living to match. It should not surprise anyone that wages in other top-tier cities match the Bay Area.
  - zeamaize 10y ago
    I'm now living in a much smaller city, and the salaries here are even higher. Good tech companies know they have to make nationally competitive offers.
    - sdflkd 10y ago
      Which city, if you don't mind me asking?
      - zeamaize 10y ago
        Sorry. I try not to give too much info. You wouldn't guess it if I gave you 20 questions is my bet. When I got the offer for an interview the wife and I almost passed entirely on the opportunity (I didn't apply for it they recruited me) because we thought "We don't want to live there" and I had a solid offer in Seattle and Portland, where we thought we wanted to move. I flew out anyway as a courtesy to the VP who reached out to me because we had a long history and he told me I needed to come see what they had to offer. Flew my wife out the next day, she was super skeptical "I'm not going to like it!" (She is also in tech). She fell in love. We bought her dream house a month later. Still in our honeymoon period with this new city, but we have never been in love with a city like this before.
        bogomipz 10y ago
        I think its odd that you keeping referring to an abstract "here" as a an alternative and standard of comparison to the Bay Area but won't say where that is. This whole discussion is about geography as it relates to career.
        woah 10y ago
        I guess the big thing we've learned from this person's posts is that it is possible to like a city that is not SF.
        user5994461 10y ago
  - kod 10y ago
    Austin still beats everything else for salary proportional to cost of living. https://hired.com/blog/candidates/where-engineer-salaries-pay-highest-standard-living/ https://hired.com/blog/candidates/where-engineer-salaries-pa...
- vecinu 10y ago
  > My new salary is just much higher Let's just talk numbers for a moment, were you earning at least $200k? I find it very difficult to believe any other metros, especially small cities, could afford to pay a non-senior engineer over $200k in total comp.
  - zeamaize 10y ago
    I'm in a "senior" position now. But I'm not talking numbers on the internet. Right now I'm head of R&D. I can tell you starting engineers on my team make about 10% more than their Bay Area counterparts. That's a deliberate decision backed by our Board.
    - vecinu 10y ago
      > I'm not talking numbers on the internet. I can respect that. It sounds like you actually were promoted a couple of times since relocating and now you're in a leadership/director position. I'm not surprised your salary increased. But honestly, I find it hard to believe you can match a senior level salary here in the Bay Area at a larger company. A standard offer for someone that is not really "gifted" is $160-$190k base + $100-$150k/yr RSUs. You're really able to pay people over $250k? And I'm not even including 401k matching, ESPP, healthcare, discretionary bonuses and annual incentive bonuses.
      - zeamaize 10y ago
        The promotions are the reason to job hop, aren't they? That's always why I moved in SFO. Wisdom I always received was every 2-3 years it's time to move out and up. It's served me well. I think now I'm "career" as we like where we live and I want to build something in my division. And yes, we easily offer that. Why is this a surprise? Our costs are lower and our clients are largely the same as they would be in the Bay Area. Our major markets are national and international. We don't discount our enterprise level systems and new tech for having been developed in fly over country, and we have a MUCH lower cost of doing business. Physical plant is CHEAP here as are our taxes. This results in more capital available for HR, and we consider human capital our single most important investment. Our entire strategy is built on innovation and we do that by hiring the top talent we can. That means offering top tier compensations.
zeamaize 10y ago
Just about everywhere else I've lived is culturally richer, DC, Chicago, Miami, London, Houston, all had better cultural and art scenes. I'm big in theater, ballet, and art. San Francisco is way too expensive for artists to live in anymore and the art scene there is very limited, inorganic, and a bit stale. Further the distance to San Francisco means it's a chore (and a drive) to get there from the South Bay where all the jobs are. Now I can take public transit to cultural institutions, and walk to a lot too. We have organic arts districts with real artists in residency, regular gallery showings and art walks, and some amazing local musicians. You might get that in Oakland these days, but even Oakland is getting prohibitively expensive.

zeamaize 10y ago

> The original salary must have been low, no hate. My new salary is just much higher, I've had several major steps up. I've found salaries in major metro areas to be pretty much the same as a competitive offer in the Bay Area. > Different strokes for different folks. If you're working at a company that already pays well and you're not in the Bay Area, then your options for switching are either exciting but very risky startups (< $1 billion) or small satellite offices of big corps that have limited team options and little political influence (bad for advancement in senior positions). These would typically be lateral movements at best. The Bay Area isn't the only place with a tech sector, and there are plenty of companies whose main offices aren't in the Bay Area. Washington DC, Chicago, Austin, Denver, all have tremendous tech industries. I've even had job offers at great places that are further out there. My "one that got away" was a job offer in Portland I still think about. It was a great opportunity and a fantastic city, but I ultimately went elsewhere primarily based on the desire to bring some of my projects with me.

hapless 10y ago
DC, Chicago, Austin, and Denver absolutely have booming tech industries. And rising costs of living to match. It should not surprise anyone that wages in other top-tier cities match the Bay Area.
- zeamaize 10y ago
  I'm now living in a much smaller city, and the salaries here are even higher. Good tech companies know they have to make nationally competitive offers.
  - sdflkd 10y ago
    Which city, if you don't mind me asking?
    - zeamaize 10y ago
      Sorry. I try not to give too much info. You wouldn't guess it if I gave you 20 questions is my bet. When I got the offer for an interview the wife and I almost passed entirely on the opportunity (I didn't apply for it they recruited me) because we thought "We don't want to live there" and I had a solid offer in Seattle and Portland, where we thought we wanted to move. I flew out anyway as a courtesy to the VP who reached out to me because we had a long history and he told me I needed to come see what they had to offer. Flew my wife out the next day, she was super skeptical "I'm not going to like it!" (She is also in tech). She fell in love. We bought her dream house a month later. Still in our honeymoon period with this new city, but we have never been in love with a city like this before.
      - bogomipz 10y ago
        I think its odd that you keeping referring to an abstract "here" as a an alternative and standard of comparison to the Bay Area but won't say where that is. This whole discussion is about geography as it relates to career.
        woah 10y ago
        I guess the big thing we've learned from this person's posts is that it is possible to like a city that is not SF.
        user5994461 10y ago
- kod 10y ago
  Austin still beats everything else for salary proportional to cost of living. https://hired.com/blog/candidates/where-engineer-salaries-pay-highest-standard-living/ https://hired.com/blog/candidates/where-engineer-salaries-pa...
vecinu 10y ago
> My new salary is just much higher Let's just talk numbers for a moment, were you earning at least $200k? I find it very difficult to believe any other metros, especially small cities, could afford to pay a non-senior engineer over $200k in total comp.
- zeamaize 10y ago
  I'm in a "senior" position now. But I'm not talking numbers on the internet. Right now I'm head of R&D. I can tell you starting engineers on my team make about 10% more than their Bay Area counterparts. That's a deliberate decision backed by our Board.
  - vecinu 10y ago
    > I'm not talking numbers on the internet. I can respect that. It sounds like you actually were promoted a couple of times since relocating and now you're in a leadership/director position. I'm not surprised your salary increased. But honestly, I find it hard to believe you can match a senior level salary here in the Bay Area at a larger company. A standard offer for someone that is not really "gifted" is $160-$190k base + $100-$150k/yr RSUs. You're really able to pay people over $250k? And I'm not even including 401k matching, ESPP, healthcare, discretionary bonuses and annual incentive bonuses.
    - zeamaize 10y ago
      The promotions are the reason to job hop, aren't they? That's always why I moved in SFO. Wisdom I always received was every 2-3 years it's time to move out and up. It's served me well. I think now I'm "career" as we like where we live and I want to build something in my division. And yes, we easily offer that. Why is this a surprise? Our costs are lower and our clients are largely the same as they would be in the Bay Area. Our major markets are national and international. We don't discount our enterprise level systems and new tech for having been developed in fly over country, and we have a MUCH lower cost of doing business. Physical plant is CHEAP here as are our taxes. This results in more capital available for HR, and we consider human capital our single most important investment. Our entire strategy is built on innovation and we do that by hiring the top talent we can. That means offering top tier compensations.

zeamaize 10y ago

Just about everywhere else I've lived is culturally richer, DC, Chicago, Miami, London, Houston, all had better cultural and art scenes. I'm big in theater, ballet, and art. San Francisco is way too expensive for artists to live in anymore and the art scene there is very limited, inorganic, and a bit stale. Further the distance to San Francisco means it's a chore (and a drive) to get there from the South Bay where all the jobs are. Now I can take public transit to cultural institutions, and walk to a lot too. We have organic arts districts with real artists in residency, regular gallery showings and art walks, and some amazing local musicians. You might get that in Oakland these days, but even Oakland is getting prohibitively expensive.