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Random semi-related anecdote Japanese video game companies pay like 1/3rd or less what USA video game companies pay in salary. AFAIK similar things are true fo

Random semi-related anecdote Japanese video game companies pay like 1/3rd or less what USA video game companies pay in salary. AFAIK similar things are true for other industries. Maybe not as bad as 1/3rd but that's not relevant to the point below. In Japanese school (17 years ago) my teacher brought up the topic that CEOs don't get paid as much in Japan so it's more equal. My response at the time was "why do I care that my USA CEO makes 100x my salary and my Japanese CEO only 10x, the 100x CEO is still managing to pay me 2x to 3x more than the 10x CEO." How true that is overall I have no idea. I can say that video game programmers in Japan with 15 years experience make less than interns at Google.

Frondo 10y ago
What I don't get is how people can hear "the CEO makes 100x what I make" and not then think "there's a lot of money in this company, I should be paid a heck of a lot more". Cause you know it's not just the CEO that's taking a big chunk of change. Why be content with what you're given, even if it's a lot, when you could be demanding more, cause you know it's there?
- greggman 10y ago
  Actually I thought the opposite. I thought, AFAIK this Japanese company is making similar income to USA companies, why can't they pay similar salaries. I've never found out the answer. It could be an answer like taxes are high or other costs are high. It could be the fact that you can't easily get rid of bad employees in Japan and that eats up costs. It could be that they don't pay for experience, they hire out of college with no experience, especially Japanese colleges which have a reputation for not teaching anything, that would mean maybe the company costs are years of training their inexperienced employees up to western graduate levels. I have no idea and I'd love to know. But, whatever it is I think I'd like them to fix it so they start paying similar salaries to their USA counterparts.

Frondo 10y ago

What I don't get is how people can hear "the CEO makes 100x what I make" and not then think "there's a lot of money in this company, I should be paid a heck of a lot more". Cause you know it's not just the CEO that's taking a big chunk of change. Why be content with what you're given, even if it's a lot, when you could be demanding more, cause you know it's there?

greggman 10y ago
Actually I thought the opposite. I thought, AFAIK this Japanese company is making similar income to USA companies, why can't they pay similar salaries. I've never found out the answer. It could be an answer like taxes are high or other costs are high. It could be the fact that you can't easily get rid of bad employees in Japan and that eats up costs. It could be that they don't pay for experience, they hire out of college with no experience, especially Japanese colleges which have a reputation for not teaching anything, that would mean maybe the company costs are years of training their inexperienced employees up to western graduate levels. I have no idea and I'd love to know. But, whatever it is I think I'd like them to fix it so they start paying similar salaries to their USA counterparts.