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It wouldn't take much in terms of salaries to corner the "Europeans that choose not to go to SF" talent market. A $60k salary is still pretty normal here in Den

It wouldn't take much in terms of salaries to corner the "Europeans that choose not to go to SF" talent market. A $60k salary is still pretty normal here in Denmark. I'm ex-SV doing my own startup, but I wouldn't take a salaried position at another company. It will be interesting to see if these billion dollar exits lead to even slightly more competitive tech salaries.

msvan 8y ago
I've always been perplexed by the massive salary rift between Europe and SV.
- 0xfaded 8y ago
  There's an even bigger rift between startup valuations. Less investment, less value created or employee, lower salaries. To be fair, Europe and the more able governments are making up some of the gap through grant money. Although this leads to a cottage industry of funneling government money into others pockets, whether it be through companies that help you apply for the grants or just bullshit startups that aren't properly vetted.
- ed_balls 8y ago
  You have to normalise by purchasing power and take the quality of life into account. My 60k salary in Poland gives me similar quality of life like 100k in Denmark and 140k in SF.
  - eafkuor 8y ago
    Wait, you have a 60k USD salary in Poland? Where do you work, what do you do? I'm on 40k and I already feel like this is better than 100k in Denmark, considering their higher taxes and insane cost of living
  - TulliusCicero 8y ago
    60k is high for a Polish software developer, 140k is probably below the median for SF.
  - krakatau1 8y ago
    Yes, that's another abnormal labor market. I'm from Croatia, but I've seen similar things with colleagues from eastern and central Europe. IT salaries here are much better than western Europe compared to other professions and it's not worth migrating. I've interviewed for jobs in Netherlands, Belgium, Denmark and Germany and the highest offer was 75k € for job in Brussels region. According to online calculators thats 40k take home salary with housing and services at least twice as expensive. My 50k € Croatian salary leaves me with 33k net with vastly better quality of life. Why are western Europe's developers paid so little while living in much richer countries?
- kayoone 8y ago
  But SF in general is such a unique case because of the huge tech market and high cost of living. 70-80k EUR in Berlin get you as far as 150k USD in SF i would imagine. Also very different cultures and socioeconomics in terms of taxes, state welfare etc. It's just hard to compare. But when I see that tech salaries in expensive European cities like London/Stockholm aren't really much better than in Berlin, I am a bit perplexed too to be honest. Most of it has to come down to demand and supply in the end.
  - 0xfaded 8y ago
    Some cost don't vary by location, and whatever you have left over after living expenses is absolute purchasing power. In the SF I could (and did) fly light aircraft. Fat chance doing that on $60k no matter where you live.
- rightbyte 8y ago
  The wage statistics in e.g. Sweden is after a 31.43% "federal" (royal?) pay-roll tax is deducted. BLS, US median for programmers: 82 240 USD/y https://www.bls.gov/ooh/computer-and-information-technology/computer-programmers.htm https://www.bls.gov/ooh/computer-and-information-technology/... Engineering Union, Sweden, median for union programmers: 61 416 USD/y, as reported. 80 719 USD/y, including payroll tax. I believe other European countries could report data in a similar manner. The employer cost is similar.
  - 0xfaded 8y ago
    Only anecdotal, but $60k at a startup in Denmark is not uncommon.
    - rightbyte 8y ago
      If we assume Danish wages are similar to Swedish, the $60k bracket should be the most common, actually. I don't really trust these fantastic Silicon Valley wage statistics. There seems to be bad coverage over a wide range of companies, and it mostly seems to be self-reported in a non-organized way. BLS collects a wider range of statistics than PayScale or what not the HR departments are spamming with good reviews and salaries. https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/silicon-valley-salaries_us_56d61ee6e4b0bf0dab33ce96 https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/silicon-valley-salaries... To even base an article on those numbers is borderline fraud. For "San Francisco-Redwood City-South San Francisco, CA Metropolitan Division" BLS reports $106k mean wage for programmers. https://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes151131.htm https://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes151131.htm Swedish Engineering union reports mean wage: 69 543 USD/y in Stockholm 91 400 USD/y including payroll tax. So the difference is 1.1k USD more a month for the median Bay-area programmer compared to Stockholm in employer cost. It's not really raining VC money over the SF area programmers compared to e.g. Stockholm, where there is more or less none VC money.
  - isodude 8y ago
    There's really no point in climbing over 60k/y in Sweden since you start to pay upwards 50% tax on that. Perks are also taxed, so better condition/more vacation is better way of "raising" the salary. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taxation_in_Sweden https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taxation_in_Sweden
- jandrewrogers 8y ago
  Two main contributors to this in my experience, and both suggest this is unlikely to change for the foreseeable future. Part of it is cultural, in that there is still a widespread perception that software engineers are fungible cogs and that no one could possibly be worth that much more than the average technical worker in any other industry -- they value the contribution like industrial labor. I do a lot of work in Europe and many business people find it inexplicable that any software engineer could be worth a senior manager's wage. The second part is that while wages are relatively low, the cost of employment is astonishingly high in many European countries. Consequently, the fraction of employment cost that gets delivered to the worker as wages is much smaller, all other things being equal. From an employer's perspective, the employment costs are much closer than the paycheck suggests. The company only cares about employment costs, not wages per se. This is unlikely to change anytime soon because it is a manifestation of the social labor ethos common in Europe.
- CalRobert 8y ago
  Me too - though I also am perplexed by the massive "respect for other people's down time" rift too. It always saddened me when people said they'd be on vacation and then details of how to bug them with trivial issues. That being said, I suppose I'm a little hypocritical because I live in Europe and work remotely for a US company. I was already doing fairly well (not astronomical) by local standards but got a 40% raise by just being normal by US standards. It makes me wonder why there isn't more entrepreneurship here. Labour is cheap and if you fail you're unlikely to die in a gutter (at least you have health care). Hell, even commutes are better for the most part. It should be easier to start something in Europe than in California, not harder. Maybe I'll give it a shot after naturalization.
- alkonaut 8y ago
  We have 1.5 months off (paid). I never work past 5pm and most days not past 4pm (4 is when I get the kinds from school). I could probably make 50-100% more somewhere else but I’d likely be working much more. What’s the hourly pay difference?
- aluren 8y ago
  There are things like cost of living and social security nets that account for the difference, but even then there's still a gap, albeit smaller. It seems that you do have more purchasing power in the US than in Europe, if you're college- or PhD-educated. On the flip side: I know a few people who turned down opportunities to go work in the US, or who went there and came back to Europe after a few years. Having not worked outside Europe, I'm always curious about discussing the various pros and cons, and although the pros were fairly obvious (good weather all year long, astronomical salary, etc.), one of the cons listed was invariably "I have to live in the US". Exactly why this was a con changed from person to person, but it was always there, and couldn't be accounted to long distance since countries like Japan or Singapore were fine. I'm going to hazard a guess and say that there's something intangible (which could probably be best ascribed to 'quality of life', as vague as it sounds) that makes very competent people stay in or go back to Europe, and this limits the brain drain somewhat and maintains competition for lower wages on this side of the Atlantic.
  - henrikschroder 8y ago
    I'll add a +1 to your list. I'm now in the fortunate position of being able to sit anywhere in the US or the EU and work, and I'm sitting in the US. Pro: The weather is fantastic. Running a sole proprietorship is easy. Con: Everything else. I'm absolutely not growing old in this place, and I will definitely move back to Europe before I retire.
kayoone 8y ago
When I asked a Swede why salaries in Stockholm are comparatively low even by german standards (mostly because cost of living is higher in scandinavia while salaries are similar) he told me that it might have to do with the fact that in Sweden people are not supposed to rack up huge savings because they will be taken care of by the state when they retire to be able to still live comfortably. Basically you just need to earn what you need to live comfortably unlike in the US where you have to do a lot not to be poor when you reach retirement. The guy was not in tech and also a generation older than me, so i am not sure if it's fully true, but i was surprised by the low salaries in relation to the cost of living.
- expertentipp 8y ago
  > in Sweden people are not supposed to rack up huge savings because they will be taken care of by the state when they retire to still live comfortably This applies only to native Swedes. As a foreigner, even EU national, it's trivial to end up overboard of the social security net. Beware of tollerating low compensation fed by the "we'll hold your back" cliche. The same situation in Germany.
  - jlangenauer 8y ago
    In Germany, even if you are a German national, there's no guarantee that the state will be able to fund pensions as it does now, due to the shift in demographics. I love it here, but I operate under the assumption that I'll have to provide for myself in retirement.
    - cecja 8y ago
      Die Renten sind sicher! Jokes aside the thing is if you have to provide yourself for retirement there went something wrong with the core of the "Sozialstaat" and getting something on your plate to eat would be the last of your worries. As demographics shift and our society gets older and older the democratic power shifts as well so trust me when old people have the most voting count in the country your "Rente" will be save. They would rather bleed the young than lose power.
- 8y ago
fastbeef 8y ago
Things I don't need to worry about/additional perks: - No healthcare costs. Scraped elbow? Free. Brain surgery? Free. - No saving up for college for my kids. - 30 days of vacation + ~13 public holidays. - No student loans (kinda-sorta, most people borrow money to not have to work during college), tuition is free in all universities and colleges. - Goverment-paid pension savings - On top of my salary, my employer also pays for - all insurances - 31,42% payroll tax (which I never see and is paid on top of my negotiated salary) - 10-15% of my salary is put in another pension savings account. Again, this is ON TOP of my salary. - private health insurance to fast track me to a specialist.
- phyller 8y ago
  The healthcare issues in the US can be a little overblown. People in good careers get good healthcare insurance provided by the company. You often have to pay a copay to ensure you don't abuse the medical system, but seeing someone for a scraped elbow vs. brain surgery are basically the same nominal fee for the best health insurance. And you get to see the doctors you choose, when you want, often very quickly. If you can't afford healthcare at all, they will bill you but you don't have to pay and they can't turn you away from a hospital emergency room. So basically government mandated free healthcare provided by private companies. The problem is the lower and middle class, if you don't have insurance but do have something to lose, or if you have minimal insurance and a large medical issue, you can lose all your assets paying for healthcare. What you said that's really interesting to me is that the high tax rate is paid in full by your company and not counted in your salary. Is that true all over Europe, like France for instance? I am always amazed by the really low salaries but if every bit of it is what you actually keep, it's not so bad. I didn't know it worked that way.
  - mancerayder 8y ago
    All well and good about healthcare being available and not-as-bad-as-people-say provided 'good healthcare by the company.' But there lies the problem, the dependence on those variables, "good", and "company." a) What if you're self-employed? You're stuck with mediocre, expensive healthcare for the individual market. b) What if the company is cheap or negotiates poorly the healthcare options? Sometimes they're mediocre. c) Costs have been going up, and companies are finding ways to reduce costs (since someone has to pay for those padded healthcare executive salaries and healthy stock prices thanks for solid profit). Thus the same plan(s) get worse year after year. d) there's a push towards 'high deductible, self-managed / pre-tax account' type healthcare, which is smiled upon as a fantastic way to give people choice. The reality is different, now not only is the healthcare company still the middleman that keeps a chunk that gets paid out to providers, but now it's up to you to 'negotiate' what healthcare service is important to you. Oh gosh, is it expensive? I'll skip this particular service. The U.S. has got it all wrong, of course. I'm jealous of Swedish or other healthcare systems when I read through threads like these. Bottom line: the mediocre healthcare system in the U.S. and the emphasis on giving middlemen lots of money for no reason is a barrier to innovation and self-employment. Why strike out on your own and take a risk on building something if you'll lose your precious company healthcare? This problem is only getting worse and clearly has an impact on the political discourse.
toxik 8y ago
One thing that should be emphasized when comparing salaries between Sweden and other countries is how there is a secret tax baked into the Swedish salary -- arbetsgivaravgiften. Basically, in all other nationalities (to my knowledge), you are quoted how much the company will pay for your salary. Then tax is applied, and whatever is left is what you take home. In Sweden, you are quoted an in-between number. If you are offered $100k before tax in Sweden, that means the employer is _actually_ paying something like $143k. You will still not be getting $100k, but rather that is the "taxable income", so you end up with about $70k, but your employer paid $143k, but you agreed on $100k. Makes no sens.e
- asmosoinio 8y ago
  This is the way salaries are quoted in Finland as well. I suspect it's the same for many countries - though with different percentages. And yes makes comparisons very hard. Update: looking at this comment - this is not unique - same in Croatia: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17941203 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17941203
- NullPrefix 8y ago
  Isn't most of the Europe like that? Salary on contract is halfway between before-all-taxes and take home pay. Some taxes are paid by the employer, some others deducted from the employees salary. Way too unintuitive, but it is what it is.
  - toxik 8y ago
    I didn't know that! But it seems difficult to me to justify this system. Cost incurred for paying an employee is tax, anything else is make-believe -- the market forces are decided on cost to the employer, not quoted salary.
- nopzor 8y ago
  It's the same in the USA. The percentages are just different. In the USA, if you are quoted $100k salary, it costs the company about $120k+ (depending on how you account/include things). Yes, it complicates things, and makes comparisons a bit more difficult. But it makes sense. In the USA, depending on the company, you will have to add in healthcare as a "cost to company". That's basically included in the Swedish taxes. Plus you have to normalize culture and employee protection/rights. In the USA it's not abnormal to get 2 weeks of vacation per year, less than a week of "paid parental" leave, and be expected to be available to answer emails while you're on your paltry vacation. You can be fired at any time for any reason or no reason (in most cases and states you are an "at will employee") In Sweden, this work:life balance would be preposterous. Employees get 6+ weeks of vacation a year, over _1 year_ of _paid_ parental leave, working healthcare, subsidized childcare, etc. You cannot be fired without cause and notice. In the USA, other than social security (which is another topic), employees get very little back for their taxes. But we have a lot of wars to pay for. You need to look at the big picture when you compare these numbers.

msvan 8y ago

I've always been perplexed by the massive salary rift between Europe and SV.

0xfaded 8y ago
There's an even bigger rift between startup valuations. Less investment, less value created or employee, lower salaries. To be fair, Europe and the more able governments are making up some of the gap through grant money. Although this leads to a cottage industry of funneling government money into others pockets, whether it be through companies that help you apply for the grants or just bullshit startups that aren't properly vetted.
ed_balls 8y ago
You have to normalise by purchasing power and take the quality of life into account. My 60k salary in Poland gives me similar quality of life like 100k in Denmark and 140k in SF.
- eafkuor 8y ago
  Wait, you have a 60k USD salary in Poland? Where do you work, what do you do? I'm on 40k and I already feel like this is better than 100k in Denmark, considering their higher taxes and insane cost of living
- TulliusCicero 8y ago
  60k is high for a Polish software developer, 140k is probably below the median for SF.
- krakatau1 8y ago
  Yes, that's another abnormal labor market. I'm from Croatia, but I've seen similar things with colleagues from eastern and central Europe. IT salaries here are much better than western Europe compared to other professions and it's not worth migrating. I've interviewed for jobs in Netherlands, Belgium, Denmark and Germany and the highest offer was 75k € for job in Brussels region. According to online calculators thats 40k take home salary with housing and services at least twice as expensive. My 50k € Croatian salary leaves me with 33k net with vastly better quality of life. Why are western Europe's developers paid so little while living in much richer countries?
kayoone 8y ago
But SF in general is such a unique case because of the huge tech market and high cost of living. 70-80k EUR in Berlin get you as far as 150k USD in SF i would imagine. Also very different cultures and socioeconomics in terms of taxes, state welfare etc. It's just hard to compare. But when I see that tech salaries in expensive European cities like London/Stockholm aren't really much better than in Berlin, I am a bit perplexed too to be honest. Most of it has to come down to demand and supply in the end.
- 0xfaded 8y ago
  Some cost don't vary by location, and whatever you have left over after living expenses is absolute purchasing power. In the SF I could (and did) fly light aircraft. Fat chance doing that on $60k no matter where you live.
rightbyte 8y ago
The wage statistics in e.g. Sweden is after a 31.43% "federal" (royal?) pay-roll tax is deducted. BLS, US median for programmers: 82 240 USD/y https://www.bls.gov/ooh/computer-and-information-technology/computer-programmers.htm https://www.bls.gov/ooh/computer-and-information-technology/... Engineering Union, Sweden, median for union programmers: 61 416 USD/y, as reported. 80 719 USD/y, including payroll tax. I believe other European countries could report data in a similar manner. The employer cost is similar.
- 0xfaded 8y ago
  Only anecdotal, but $60k at a startup in Denmark is not uncommon.
  - rightbyte 8y ago
    If we assume Danish wages are similar to Swedish, the $60k bracket should be the most common, actually. I don't really trust these fantastic Silicon Valley wage statistics. There seems to be bad coverage over a wide range of companies, and it mostly seems to be self-reported in a non-organized way. BLS collects a wider range of statistics than PayScale or what not the HR departments are spamming with good reviews and salaries. https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/silicon-valley-salaries_us_56d61ee6e4b0bf0dab33ce96 https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/silicon-valley-salaries... To even base an article on those numbers is borderline fraud. For "San Francisco-Redwood City-South San Francisco, CA Metropolitan Division" BLS reports $106k mean wage for programmers. https://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes151131.htm https://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes151131.htm Swedish Engineering union reports mean wage: 69 543 USD/y in Stockholm 91 400 USD/y including payroll tax. So the difference is 1.1k USD more a month for the median Bay-area programmer compared to Stockholm in employer cost. It's not really raining VC money over the SF area programmers compared to e.g. Stockholm, where there is more or less none VC money.
- isodude 8y ago
  There's really no point in climbing over 60k/y in Sweden since you start to pay upwards 50% tax on that. Perks are also taxed, so better condition/more vacation is better way of "raising" the salary. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taxation_in_Sweden https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taxation_in_Sweden
jandrewrogers 8y ago
Two main contributors to this in my experience, and both suggest this is unlikely to change for the foreseeable future. Part of it is cultural, in that there is still a widespread perception that software engineers are fungible cogs and that no one could possibly be worth that much more than the average technical worker in any other industry -- they value the contribution like industrial labor. I do a lot of work in Europe and many business people find it inexplicable that any software engineer could be worth a senior manager's wage. The second part is that while wages are relatively low, the cost of employment is astonishingly high in many European countries. Consequently, the fraction of employment cost that gets delivered to the worker as wages is much smaller, all other things being equal. From an employer's perspective, the employment costs are much closer than the paycheck suggests. The company only cares about employment costs, not wages per se. This is unlikely to change anytime soon because it is a manifestation of the social labor ethos common in Europe.
CalRobert 8y ago
Me too - though I also am perplexed by the massive "respect for other people's down time" rift too. It always saddened me when people said they'd be on vacation and then details of how to bug them with trivial issues. That being said, I suppose I'm a little hypocritical because I live in Europe and work remotely for a US company. I was already doing fairly well (not astronomical) by local standards but got a 40% raise by just being normal by US standards. It makes me wonder why there isn't more entrepreneurship here. Labour is cheap and if you fail you're unlikely to die in a gutter (at least you have health care). Hell, even commutes are better for the most part. It should be easier to start something in Europe than in California, not harder. Maybe I'll give it a shot after naturalization.
alkonaut 8y ago
We have 1.5 months off (paid). I never work past 5pm and most days not past 4pm (4 is when I get the kinds from school). I could probably make 50-100% more somewhere else but I’d likely be working much more. What’s the hourly pay difference?
aluren 8y ago
There are things like cost of living and social security nets that account for the difference, but even then there's still a gap, albeit smaller. It seems that you do have more purchasing power in the US than in Europe, if you're college- or PhD-educated. On the flip side: I know a few people who turned down opportunities to go work in the US, or who went there and came back to Europe after a few years. Having not worked outside Europe, I'm always curious about discussing the various pros and cons, and although the pros were fairly obvious (good weather all year long, astronomical salary, etc.), one of the cons listed was invariably "I have to live in the US". Exactly why this was a con changed from person to person, but it was always there, and couldn't be accounted to long distance since countries like Japan or Singapore were fine. I'm going to hazard a guess and say that there's something intangible (which could probably be best ascribed to 'quality of life', as vague as it sounds) that makes very competent people stay in or go back to Europe, and this limits the brain drain somewhat and maintains competition for lower wages on this side of the Atlantic.
- henrikschroder 8y ago
  I'll add a +1 to your list. I'm now in the fortunate position of being able to sit anywhere in the US or the EU and work, and I'm sitting in the US. Pro: The weather is fantastic. Running a sole proprietorship is easy. Con: Everything else. I'm absolutely not growing old in this place, and I will definitely move back to Europe before I retire.

kayoone 8y ago

When I asked a Swede why salaries in Stockholm are comparatively low even by german standards (mostly because cost of living is higher in scandinavia while salaries are similar) he told me that it might have to do with the fact that in Sweden people are not supposed to rack up huge savings because they will be taken care of by the state when they retire to be able to still live comfortably. Basically you just need to earn what you need to live comfortably unlike in the US where you have to do a lot not to be poor when you reach retirement. The guy was not in tech and also a generation older than me, so i am not sure if it's fully true, but i was surprised by the low salaries in relation to the cost of living.

expertentipp 8y ago
> in Sweden people are not supposed to rack up huge savings because they will be taken care of by the state when they retire to still live comfortably This applies only to native Swedes. As a foreigner, even EU national, it's trivial to end up overboard of the social security net. Beware of tollerating low compensation fed by the "we'll hold your back" cliche. The same situation in Germany.
- jlangenauer 8y ago
  In Germany, even if you are a German national, there's no guarantee that the state will be able to fund pensions as it does now, due to the shift in demographics. I love it here, but I operate under the assumption that I'll have to provide for myself in retirement.
  - cecja 8y ago
    Die Renten sind sicher! Jokes aside the thing is if you have to provide yourself for retirement there went something wrong with the core of the "Sozialstaat" and getting something on your plate to eat would be the last of your worries. As demographics shift and our society gets older and older the democratic power shifts as well so trust me when old people have the most voting count in the country your "Rente" will be save. They would rather bleed the young than lose power.
8y ago

fastbeef 8y ago

Things I don't need to worry about/additional perks: - No healthcare costs. Scraped elbow? Free. Brain surgery? Free. - No saving up for college for my kids. - 30 days of vacation + ~13 public holidays. - No student loans (kinda-sorta, most people borrow money to not have to work during college), tuition is free in all universities and colleges. - Goverment-paid pension savings - On top of my salary, my employer also pays for - all insurances - 31,42% payroll tax (which I never see and is paid on top of my negotiated salary) - 10-15% of my salary is put in another pension savings account. Again, this is ON TOP of my salary. - private health insurance to fast track me to a specialist.

phyller 8y ago
The healthcare issues in the US can be a little overblown. People in good careers get good healthcare insurance provided by the company. You often have to pay a copay to ensure you don't abuse the medical system, but seeing someone for a scraped elbow vs. brain surgery are basically the same nominal fee for the best health insurance. And you get to see the doctors you choose, when you want, often very quickly. If you can't afford healthcare at all, they will bill you but you don't have to pay and they can't turn you away from a hospital emergency room. So basically government mandated free healthcare provided by private companies. The problem is the lower and middle class, if you don't have insurance but do have something to lose, or if you have minimal insurance and a large medical issue, you can lose all your assets paying for healthcare. What you said that's really interesting to me is that the high tax rate is paid in full by your company and not counted in your salary. Is that true all over Europe, like France for instance? I am always amazed by the really low salaries but if every bit of it is what you actually keep, it's not so bad. I didn't know it worked that way.
- mancerayder 8y ago
  All well and good about healthcare being available and not-as-bad-as-people-say provided 'good healthcare by the company.' But there lies the problem, the dependence on those variables, "good", and "company." a) What if you're self-employed? You're stuck with mediocre, expensive healthcare for the individual market. b) What if the company is cheap or negotiates poorly the healthcare options? Sometimes they're mediocre. c) Costs have been going up, and companies are finding ways to reduce costs (since someone has to pay for those padded healthcare executive salaries and healthy stock prices thanks for solid profit). Thus the same plan(s) get worse year after year. d) there's a push towards 'high deductible, self-managed / pre-tax account' type healthcare, which is smiled upon as a fantastic way to give people choice. The reality is different, now not only is the healthcare company still the middleman that keeps a chunk that gets paid out to providers, but now it's up to you to 'negotiate' what healthcare service is important to you. Oh gosh, is it expensive? I'll skip this particular service. The U.S. has got it all wrong, of course. I'm jealous of Swedish or other healthcare systems when I read through threads like these. Bottom line: the mediocre healthcare system in the U.S. and the emphasis on giving middlemen lots of money for no reason is a barrier to innovation and self-employment. Why strike out on your own and take a risk on building something if you'll lose your precious company healthcare? This problem is only getting worse and clearly has an impact on the political discourse.

toxik 8y ago

One thing that should be emphasized when comparing salaries between Sweden and other countries is how there is a secret tax baked into the Swedish salary -- arbetsgivaravgiften. Basically, in all other nationalities (to my knowledge), you are quoted how much the company will pay for your salary. Then tax is applied, and whatever is left is what you take home. In Sweden, you are quoted an in-between number. If you are offered $100k before tax in Sweden, that means the employer is _actually_ paying something like $143k. You will still not be getting $100k, but rather that is the "taxable income", so you end up with about $70k, but your employer paid $143k, but you agreed on $100k. Makes no sens.e

asmosoinio 8y ago
This is the way salaries are quoted in Finland as well. I suspect it's the same for many countries - though with different percentages. And yes makes comparisons very hard. Update: looking at this comment - this is not unique - same in Croatia: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17941203 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17941203
NullPrefix 8y ago
Isn't most of the Europe like that? Salary on contract is halfway between before-all-taxes and take home pay. Some taxes are paid by the employer, some others deducted from the employees salary. Way too unintuitive, but it is what it is.
- toxik 8y ago
  I didn't know that! But it seems difficult to me to justify this system. Cost incurred for paying an employee is tax, anything else is make-believe -- the market forces are decided on cost to the employer, not quoted salary.
nopzor 8y ago
It's the same in the USA. The percentages are just different. In the USA, if you are quoted $100k salary, it costs the company about $120k+ (depending on how you account/include things). Yes, it complicates things, and makes comparisons a bit more difficult. But it makes sense. In the USA, depending on the company, you will have to add in healthcare as a "cost to company". That's basically included in the Swedish taxes. Plus you have to normalize culture and employee protection/rights. In the USA it's not abnormal to get 2 weeks of vacation per year, less than a week of "paid parental" leave, and be expected to be available to answer emails while you're on your paltry vacation. You can be fired at any time for any reason or no reason (in most cases and states you are an "at will employee") In Sweden, this work:life balance would be preposterous. Employees get 6+ weeks of vacation a year, over _1 year_ of _paid_ parental leave, working healthcare, subsidized childcare, etc. You cannot be fired without cause and notice. In the USA, other than social security (which is another topic), employees get very little back for their taxes. But we have a lot of wars to pay for. You need to look at the big picture when you compare these numbers.