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21 Years of Income as a Software Engineer in San Francisco
- montrose 9y agoThe graph seems related to the graph of venture funding over the same period: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:US_VC_funding.png https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:US_VC_funding.png Which is not surprising considering that salaries are the number one thing venture funding is spent on.
- dis-sys 9y agoit depends on whether you believe VC money is driving the salary change or the overall profitability of the industry reflected by salary is driving VC's investment decisions.
- zbentley 9y ago> salaries are the number one thing venture funding is spent on. Are you sure? I think that's possible, but my first guess would be rent (anywhere, not just in SF--unless you're all remote, even tiny corporate real estate is expensive), followed by salaries/benefits. Regardless, it would be interesting to see some data explaining how VC funding is spent. Even better to see how the spending percentages change over time/stage.
- falcolas 9y agoWell, if you take the WeWork style co-working spaces as a real estate cost baseline, each employee in a private office will cost somewhere around $1,000 a month for the space. In contrast, an employee making a salary of a mere $120,000 will cost the company somewhere north of $13,000 a month (salary + taxes + benefits).
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- pmiller2 9y agoI'd like to see the correlation with SF residential rents over the time period.
- chvid 9y agoI can tell you it is the same for a software engineer in Copenhagen. Salaries peeked in 2000 and have yet to catch up in real terms.
- marvin 9y agoCertainly it isn't the same in absolute terms? You can get a two-bedroom apartment in Copenhagen for $300,000 or so. I haven't heard of any place in Europe where you can expect to make anything close to this for any normal software engineering role. (I earn around, maybe less than half the average in this graph, in Norway).
- ionwake 9y agoCan you please confirm what the average salary is in Copenhagen for a senior developer ? Thanks
- fyfy18 9y agoAs someone who hasn’t even worked in the US, let alone SF, is this a typical wage for that area? I live in a small European city, earning around half this, but my outgoings are a lot less (under €1k/mo) than what I would be paying in SF, so I’m probably saving more at the end of the day. I’d argue my lifestyle is a lot better too.
- sevagh 9y ago>I’d argue my lifestyle is a lot better too. Looks like the majority of the European "better lifestyle" involves convincing people on the internet that making a fraction of a Bay Area salary is somehow a good thing.
- virtuowl 9y agoWell, you get good healthcare and pension in most european countries. You can live a lot cheaper than in the big cities in the us and there is no gangs and not as many drug addicts
- walshemj 9y agoCompare housing costs in London, Paris etc vs SV - yes health care Is nice but that is used as an excuse by employers who also benefit from the European health systems.
- albertgoeswoof 9y agoI’m not so sure, SF is nice but it’s not particularly special if you take away the high salaries and great tech connections.
- passiveincomelg 9y agoAgreed. And the "perfect weather" is also debatable. I was there twice, in August and in December. Both times it was too cold. I wouldn't want to move there, but I'd love to stay for a month or two. Too bad that's not possible for me yet (neither rich nor able to work while staying in the US). Maybe this global work permit thing that the UN supposedly looked into a while ago actually does happen one day...
- walrus01 9y agoMeanwhile, Vancouver BC boasted about the famously low salaries of its software engineers and people with similar skill sets, in a failed bid to attract Amazon HQ2: https://www.google.com/search?q=vancouver+amazon+hq+bid+salary&num=100&client=ubuntu&hs=4WZ&channel=fs&source=lnms&tbm=nws&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiWjcnCp77ZAhUG2GMKHYE3CH4Q_AUICigB&biw=1337&bih=1301 https://www.google.com/search?q=vancouver+amazon+hq+bid+sala... In my opinion a pretty stupid thing to do, considering the low probability of Amazon choosing either Portland or Vancouver as second headquarters. Too close to Seattle and still within the same regional talent pool, and regional market demand.
- kleiba 9y ago...and also perhaps not the best way to attract talented staff.
- walrus01 9y agosadly, the people who either can't or won't leave vancouver don't have a lot to choose from. I'm from there and it's really hilarious when people say something like Hootsuite is a "world class" place to work in some IT-related field. Meanwhile Seattle has things like SpaceX in Redmond developing satellites, Boeing jobs, Blue Origin, a number of tech companies that are not amazon, XKL (run by one of the founders of Cisco, over in the east side making cutting edge networking hardware), significant datacenter and telecom infrastructure that doesn't exist in BC, etc.
- tachyoff 9y agoWhy must every tech job be SpaceX or Amazon or Boeing? No, really. Most tech jobs are not super sexy, and I’m a little irritated that the prevailing opinion seems to be one of looking down your nose at every tech job that isn’t “prestigious”.
- sampo 9y agoI think people are entitled to look down on job offers that pay only half of what they get working elsewhere.
- ionwake 9y agoDoes anyone know what the take home pay is after tax for a 200k job - a month - after typical rent - in Frisco?
- chiggins 9y agoAfter 401k, taxes, and rent, around 5-7k/mo (depends on your living situation).
- joeblau 9y agoWhen my salary was around there, it was 9k/month after tax and rent was 2600 (shared 2 bedroom apt which I paid more for bigger room). You’re looking at around 6k.
- pmorici 9y agoYou can go on sites like Zillow or PadMapper and see rental listings. $4,000 seems typical now days for a 1 bedroom or studio. If you really want to slum it or have roommates you can find situations for less but for someone who has grown out of the roommates and frat house life style those options probably aren't appealing.
- joshuamorton 9y agoWat? Try 3k for a 1br, 4k for a 2br. That said, even with a 4k/mo apartment, you're looking at 4-5k after tax, housing, and retirement savings.
- 9y ago
- jokoon 9y agoI'm French, I'm not a software engineer because I don't have the degree, but I can read every language out there, I speak English pretty well, I know how to do proper research to fix things, and as I saw in the comments, the situation here is very weird. I have been unemployed my whole life, my medical condition might have something to do with it, but when I hear that French companies put a lot of faith in a degree I'm still disappointed. There might be some hr failure somewhere. Job markets are weird. I'm still curious about working remotely for an American company. Can it be achieved? How is that done?
- hk__2 9y agoBeing a software engineer should be about what you do, not which degree you have. In the (French) company I work in, one of the lead devs doesn’t even have his baccalauréat; that doesn’t make him any less 1- talented and 2- a software engineer.
- GordonS 9y agoIt's true that a lot of places rate a degree highly, and some won't look at you without one, but it's perfectly possible to get a job as a software engineer in Europe without a degree. I started as a developer 15 years ago, without a degree. I'm an architect now, and only did my degree a few years ago (did it for myself, not because it was a requirement for my job). I imagine getting a visa to work in the US without a degree is all but impossible; for work immigrants, most countries require you to have a degree, unless you have some incredible, sought after skills.
- adventured 9y agoFocus on a particularly in-demand specialty (versus being broad). Just as an example, the demand for React developers is extremely high right now. If front-end isn't your thing, the demand for Python engineers seems to have caught the industry by surprise, thanks to the AI boom. It has drained the available Python programmer supply. I'd expect that demand to continue. There are a bunch of other specialties that can pay very well, such as ecommerce platforms. Ecommerce in the US will double over the next ten years. And given the sum involved, that's a pretty massive economic opportunity, there are not anywhere near enough engineers & developers to go around for that change. If you acquire an expertise with Shopify, Magento, Bigcommerce, etc. you can do very well in the space.
- seanalltogether 9y agoKeep in mind the data is adjusted for inflation, I'm not sure why the OP chose to do that.
- kelnos 9y agoI'm curious: why wouldn't you adjust for inflation? That seems to make it more of an apples-to-apples comparison to me.
- stfwn 9y agoInflation is a very broad trend to adjust for. Maybe a dollar was worth 2% more in some part of the country while it bought you 5% less elsewhere. The ups and downs in local cost of living are probably extreme in SF, so adjusting with a nation-wide trend (which is probably nowhere near representative for SF) might be a bit arbitrary.
- kelnos 9y agoExcellent point. I just did a quick search and can't really find figures on "regional" inflation or CPI. That's... annoying.
- dragonwriter 9y agohttps://www.bls.gov/cpi/regional-resources.htm https://www.bls.gov/cpi/regional-resources.htm
- andrew_wc_brown 9y agoI live in Canada and its quite upsetting to see salaries just a skip over the border that are 120K USD for remote positions but they won't even entertain hiring a Canadian, meaning in Canada the remoting range is 55-70 CAD USD. Going above 70K is possible but in my experience those jobs can only be acquired through personal networking in the GTA which is self-defeating because it keeps you tethered to the GTA. Imagine if I could live somewhere like Thunder Bay and make a 120K remote. The only possibility has been freelancing and I was successful for a while remoting though running your own company came with downsides which led to my eventual decision to work back full time for a company.
- farnsworthy 9y agoWhere are you looking? I think most remote posts I see now are open to people in North America, or one of its time zones.
- falcolas 9y agoHiring someone across a national border adds a lot of complexity and cost to the employment process. A few companies I have worked for which did have foreign employees ended up with an umbrella company paradigm, with individual corporations in each country to help ease the complications and reduce the costs.
- hota_mazi 9y ago> Hiring someone across a national border adds a lot of complexity and cost to the employment process It's not really true for the US and Canada thanks to Nafta.
- bzbarsky 9y agoYou have different tax withholding procedures, differences in labor law and what sort of employment contracts are allowed, differences in mandated benefits (e.g. parental leave). This is an issue even if you want to hire in more than one US state. The question is whether all that adds up to "a lot", which is a value judgment.
- sureaboutthis 9y agoNever, EVER use reddit as a reference for ANYTHING!
- Wh1zz 9y agoWhy is that?
- akhilcacharya 9y agoIs this salary or Total Comp? I’ve seen new grads with equivalent total comp or more.
- Kephael 9y agoThis is very low compensation for experienced work in the Bay Area if it's total compensation. Yes, new graduates do regularly make ~200k/yr total compensation.
- Jemaclus 9y agoHe explains in the comments that it's wages that count toward Medicare via the SSA website. So not total compensation...
- j45 9y ago$150k in 1997 would be a little higher than 150K today. Sharing on average dollars of income available to save after taxes per year would be interesting. At the end of the day it's not just what you make, but what you are in a position to save.
- steeeeve123123 9y agoHow much do you save per paycheck? What is the average?
- j45 9y ago150,000 in 1997 is about $230,000 in 2017 dollars based on an average inflation calendar. Which would you rather have had to save with? Saving as much of salary as possible is rarely a bad thing. With salaries this high - it could be between 40-70% depending on where you live (maybe even more) and if you co-habitate with someone.
- lilsoso 9y agoHe may have been better off as a federal government worker, if you include pension and benefits into the equation, which I find discouraging.
- 5555624 9y agoI don't think so. If he didn't go into management and the working level was a GS-13, he'd eventually max out at a GS-13, Step 10, which is $133,967 a year in San Francisco. His pension, under the current system, would be his "high three" average times 1% times years of service ($133,967 * .01 * 21) = $28,133.
- metaphor 9y agoAlso worth noting that retirement after 21 years in industry isn't a financially sensible consideration for most federal civilians: assuming 27 years old in 1997, minimum retirement age would be 57 (9 years shy after 21 years), and even 2 years short of satisfying early retirement age requirement of 50[1]. [1] https://www.opm.gov/retirement-services/fers-information/eligibility/ https://www.opm.gov/retirement-services/fers-information/eli...
- lnrdgmz 9y agoWhy is this, if true, discouraging? Do you think government workers (a pretty broad term which can encompass a wide range of positions and levels of expertise) should not be well paid?
- nugget 9y agoI don't know how true it is, but my understanding is that Federal workers often work fewer hours and enjoy better job security than their private counterparts. If so, wouldn't you expect these benefits to be offset by lower compensation? On an hourly basis it could net out to be similar and simply appeal to folks who want a different type of career or work life balance.
- toomuchtodo 9y ago
- telltruth 9y agoThis is quite shocking and I am sure it’s not a pattern. My compensation has doubled roughly 6 years over similar period in inflation adjusted dollars and I have considered it as slow growth. Note that most of this is without climbing up management ladder. Most of my friends have also experienced doubling every 5-7 years as far as I can. There are few folks who haven’t moved much but that’s usually because they didn’t kept up with tech or kept chasing next startup or find non dev roles where they can excel. Living in SF/bay below $200K is quite unimaginable these days.
- botskonet 9y agoI see people with lower salaries complaining and I feel bad and then I see people saying $200-300k is normal for their region and I complain.