11 ms·

Salary-porn seems to be a category that generally gets a lot of attention on HN. Personally, I feel a bit ambivalent about it. Obviously it's useful to be abl

Salary-porn seems to be a category that generally gets a lot of attention on HN. Personally, I feel a bit ambivalent about it. Obviously it's useful to be able to compare & benchmark, because one should go into any decision-making process being well armed with information. But on the other hand: The information exchanged is never enough to truly contextualize the numbers appropriately, and it's a potential source of huge amounts of cognitive dissonance. You have to be pretty good at being a stoic to try to break the information down to something objective and not let it get to you. For example: The $175/hour number you just mentioned, and the fact that you seemed to imply that you're taking it for granted that it represents a successful outcome would be clearly a source of cognitive dissonance for most people. -- If he manages to do 2000 hours at $175 every year, that would be $350k which would be impressive. But then it may be nothing: if it is a highly specialized thing where you don't manage to get a fulltime workload out of a year, where you might spend the majority of your time with non-billable hours for project acquision, where you maybe have to cover costs of travel or time & money for certifications, where you have to carry high risk, etc. etc. ...it is usually impossible to properly resolve such questions to the point where it's useful for benchmarking and for extracting conclusions that are actionable to yourself. But the cognitive dissonance remains.

stakhanov 8y ago
...downvoting for disagreeing with you, without presenting a counter-argument. That's HN for you. Great way to build an echo-chamber.
- cromulent 8y ago
  Please don't complain about downvoting. You're not disagreeing with him, you are disagreeing with a post by someone else from 8 years ago, that he bookmarked in order to prevent himself from making the same mistake.
- osrec 8y ago
  I wasn't a down voter, but I understand their sentiment with respect to your comment. You being ambivalent suggests that you're okay with less informed people being screwed. I think that's grossly unfair on a bunch of people, especially the highly technical folk that can't bullshit their way to a good pay packet, despite being technically capable. Keeping salaries open is a good thing in my opinion. The fact that companies at times will discipline employees for discussing salaries should make you see that it's a bit of smoke and mirrors used by managers to screw people, while paying themselves handsomely. It's total rubbish, and quite frankly does more harm than good.
  - Not_anchovie 8y ago
    This is how HN and all other social commentary systems work. People downvote or ban without even a polite dissection of how you could be right or wrong. If someone doesn't want you to exist - you won't.
HenryBemis 8y ago
I won't downvote, I want your opinion to be visible so other people can read this. I am one of those 'suckers' that left a job/career (call it what you will) in the Big4 to go solo. Apart from boosting my annual income x4, I am no longer involved in backstabing, politics, shitstorms, and other permanent employment 'pleasantries'. The C-levels who sign my invoices keep me out and away from all that. I have gained their trust and they keep me around to get-the-job-done. I do get some surprises every now and then, but nothing I can't dance around those. The gig economy (up to a level) works for me. >where you don't manage to get a fulltime workload out of a year I only NEED to work 3 months in a year, and spend the other 9 sitting on my behind doing my hobbies. Of course I work as much as possible (8h/day - 5d/week) and I do take some time off (by European 'standard'). I found it that once I start monitoring the contracting market, getting weekly alerts, see the trends, etc. it is possible to build on your existing skillset to make sure you remain relevant. E.g. anyone in Europe with a good GRC knowledge had plenty of time to get in shape for GDPR.
- stakhanov 8y ago
  I wasn't arguing against being a consultant, merely pointing out that an hourly rate of a consultant is something where a bit of context is needed in order to be able to interpret the number, and that a consulting rate can easily seem high compared to an implied hourly rate received by a fulltime employee in a low-risk environment if the context is unknown or misunderstood. -- But the same is also true for comparing fulltime salaries, especially with onsite jobs, where cost of living, cost of real estate, tax regime, social security implications etc all have a huge role to play and make an apples-to-apples comparison difficult.
- tmaly 8y ago
  > I found it that once I start monitoring the contracting market, getting weekly alerts, see the trends, etc. it is possible to build on your existing skillset to make sure you remain relevant What data sources and techniques do you use to monitor trends?
  - HenryBemis 8y ago
    I have registered to services like Reed, or JobServe. I have some wide-enough searches that send automated reports, and some very narrow (e.g. "GDPR", "SOx"). It looks like spam, but it gives me a good idea of how many contracts are available, for which areas/domains, and at what rates. This way I can see when the market increases or drops for the narrow searches. The wider terms searches help me identify new and upcoming trends. It looks tedious and time consuming, but after the first month, just scrolling through 3-4 emails gives me a pretty good idea of where the market is going.
ryanmarsh 8y ago
Calling it "salary-porn" gives away the rest of your comment. I could have written it myself based upon the many conversations I've had with people here, and elsewhere, about salary. For some reason many people are hostile to the idea that, at a minimum, you can make more money doing exactly the same thing for exactly the same company. Perhaps this shields them from the horror of the money they are most certainly leaving on the table, or the uncertainty of pursuing that money. The nice thing about being the lowest paid serf is the lord knows he's getting you for a song, or at least that's how the thinking goes. I'll just leave you with this: I make a minimum of $3k per day. I am not special. I have an IQ of 118 which is probably low for HN. The difference is I've never accepted that what they're paying me is the most the company (or market) can bear. My first programming job out of the Army (with no education) was 50k/yr. My current rate is the result of 15 years of continually challenging the offered rate and searching for higher rates. Today, I work part time and have tons of time for myself and my family. I'm so expensive that my clients honor my work and value my time. I know you'd prefer this lifestyle to the daily grind of 40+hrs, a middling salary, and little respect so why not test my model and see if it doesn't bear fruit for you.
- ohaideredevs 8y ago
  You can't say you make 3k a day without explaining your career path a bit so us lowly serfs can emulate.
  - balabaster 8y ago
    Nor can you say it without quantifying the structure of your earnings... Where are you based, city/country? What kind of clients do you entertain? Also what industry/niche does your consulting empire cover? I assume you're an incorporated consultant and the rate of $3K per day is gross revenue and not net income(?) Certainly this is achievable, but people need to understand exact comparables so they're not comparing apples to oranges.
    - ryanmarsh 8y ago
      Ok, replying to you and next up line. I do consulting, the kind I do is irrelevant because there are others with high bill rates too (I know of some iOS devs that make $2,500/day). I have friends who are Java devs making $250/hr. They're not dummies but they aren't exactly Linus Torvalds or Chris Lattner either. Since you asked, I advise companies on how to implement certain development practices, things like DevOps, TDD, etc.. Before you totally write this off, hold your horses. I'm not saying this is THE path for you. It's one of many. I just happen to care a lot about how we work together to make software and I always found myself drifting into those discussions on the team. I'm based in Houston, TX. I charge $3k - $5k per day. I usually pay my own travel expenses. I haven't been charging that for long and the first time I submitted a proposal at that rate I almost threw up I was so nervous. I work usually two weeks per month. I usually travel to my clients. I also sell support contracts where I offer them unlimited Slack and 1-2 calls per week. I offer them coaching, feedback, guidance. Sometimes it's pairing on building out a Jenkins pipeline, sometimes it's just explaining why "change fail percentage" is a good metric to track backed by industry studies. I have a friend who couldn't join us for BBQ this weekend because he's traveling to SF just to visit with a former client who paid him something like $100k for a handful of Java classes he taught. I'd have to look at the invoices to know the exact amount and I have a call coming up. He went through my company. The nice thing is once you set up a company properly it becomes a vehicle for all sorts of financial endeavors. People think creating a company is scary and complicated and can really fuck you up. That's wrong. It's trivial to create a functioning company and the upkeep just to keep it compliant is absolutely minimal if it's incorporated in a state like Texas. If you've read this far, here's the golden nugget. I wish someone had told me what I'm about to tell you. 1. Follow the things that really interest you, not in your head, the things that make your heart pound. Maybe that's picking up certain types of stories in the sprint, or helping a coworker with a certain kind of bug. While your energy will come and go, that thing that makes your heart pound will always be there. It's connected to your calling, which you might not understand until you're in your 40's (like me). 2. Always ask for more money. Ask nicely, and after you deliver something of value. The company ALWAYS can afford to give you more. If giving you $20k more will bankrupt the company then your company is dying and you're going to be out of a job anyway. People who aren't business owners (myself included at one time) do not comprehend the decision flow business owners take. Ask for the money until they don't have any more. It is more ethical than letting them waste it on another kegerator for the office. Programmers in particular have a very skewed sense of the value they provide. Even a mediocre programmer is worth 10x his salary. You have no idea how valuable you are to a smart business person. Instagram had 30 employees when it was sold for $1B. Think about that. 3. Be polite and talk about the things that interest you with others. Share what excites you. It will be genuine and people will like that. It will link you up with the kind of people you should be linked up with. 4. Only invest time in the people with the most potential. Don't waste your time having coffee with people who aren't passionate, smart, hard working, or creative. This means avoid shit-magnets/pin-cushions. Within 10 years these high potential people will pay off for you in multiples. For me they've become great friends and have fed me most of my business. Back then they were just "I like this person". 5. Show your work. Imposter syndrom is lies you tell yourself in the absence of valuable feedback. Make things, no matter how flimsy or unfinished, and show them to people. A Russian guy once told me "never show unfinished work to an idiot". So show your work, just don't show it to idiots. Every single time I've had the courage to show smart people things I was tinkering with it has led to an opportunity. 6. Be courageous. Learn to do things you know to be wise, even when they're scary. 7. Be patient. It's the journey not the destination. I know this all sounds like horse shit but how many times have you heard these exact things from "successful" people before? Did you ever stop to ask yourself why? Maybe they're good principles. Maybe they actually work. If I told you the "path" to where I'm at and you tried to follow it you'd most certainly fail because the world is so complex that the correct answer (in discrete steps) is only knowable after the fact. The only thing you can do is be guided by principles that bear good fruit. Follow your heart, ask for more money, be polite, invest in potential, show your work, be courageous, be patient. From the bottom of my heart I wish you the best. If you ever would like to chat I'll happily hop on a zoom and share as much as I can with you. I want you to find as much joy and financial reward in your endeavors as I have found in mine. God bless.
ido 8y ago
It's not 100% all the info you need, but as a rule of thumb $x/h as a consultant is similar to earning $xK/year (anecdotally it seemed to check out: I once asked HR to do the math with me to evaluate what kind of rates we can afford to pay freelancers compared to how much similar-role employees were making - I think the example used was that a freelancer paid €60/h would cost equivalent to the salary cost of an employee earning €65k/year). The guy may not be making the equivalent to a $175k/year salary but he was almost certainly making a lot more than he previously was at $60k.

stakhanov 8y ago

...downvoting for disagreeing with you, without presenting a counter-argument. That's HN for you. Great way to build an echo-chamber.

cromulent 8y ago
Please don't complain about downvoting. You're not disagreeing with him, you are disagreeing with a post by someone else from 8 years ago, that he bookmarked in order to prevent himself from making the same mistake.
osrec 8y ago
I wasn't a down voter, but I understand their sentiment with respect to your comment. You being ambivalent suggests that you're okay with less informed people being screwed. I think that's grossly unfair on a bunch of people, especially the highly technical folk that can't bullshit their way to a good pay packet, despite being technically capable. Keeping salaries open is a good thing in my opinion. The fact that companies at times will discipline employees for discussing salaries should make you see that it's a bit of smoke and mirrors used by managers to screw people, while paying themselves handsomely. It's total rubbish, and quite frankly does more harm than good.
- Not_anchovie 8y ago
  This is how HN and all other social commentary systems work. People downvote or ban without even a polite dissection of how you could be right or wrong. If someone doesn't want you to exist - you won't.

HenryBemis 8y ago

I won't downvote, I want your opinion to be visible so other people can read this. I am one of those 'suckers' that left a job/career (call it what you will) in the Big4 to go solo. Apart from boosting my annual income x4, I am no longer involved in backstabing, politics, shitstorms, and other permanent employment 'pleasantries'. The C-levels who sign my invoices keep me out and away from all that. I have gained their trust and they keep me around to get-the-job-done. I do get some surprises every now and then, but nothing I can't dance around those. The gig economy (up to a level) works for me. >where you don't manage to get a fulltime workload out of a year I only NEED to work 3 months in a year, and spend the other 9 sitting on my behind doing my hobbies. Of course I work as much as possible (8h/day - 5d/week) and I do take some time off (by European 'standard'). I found it that once I start monitoring the contracting market, getting weekly alerts, see the trends, etc. it is possible to build on your existing skillset to make sure you remain relevant. E.g. anyone in Europe with a good GRC knowledge had plenty of time to get in shape for GDPR.

stakhanov 8y ago
I wasn't arguing against being a consultant, merely pointing out that an hourly rate of a consultant is something where a bit of context is needed in order to be able to interpret the number, and that a consulting rate can easily seem high compared to an implied hourly rate received by a fulltime employee in a low-risk environment if the context is unknown or misunderstood. -- But the same is also true for comparing fulltime salaries, especially with onsite jobs, where cost of living, cost of real estate, tax regime, social security implications etc all have a huge role to play and make an apples-to-apples comparison difficult.
tmaly 8y ago
> I found it that once I start monitoring the contracting market, getting weekly alerts, see the trends, etc. it is possible to build on your existing skillset to make sure you remain relevant What data sources and techniques do you use to monitor trends?
- HenryBemis 8y ago
  I have registered to services like Reed, or JobServe. I have some wide-enough searches that send automated reports, and some very narrow (e.g. "GDPR", "SOx"). It looks like spam, but it gives me a good idea of how many contracts are available, for which areas/domains, and at what rates. This way I can see when the market increases or drops for the narrow searches. The wider terms searches help me identify new and upcoming trends. It looks tedious and time consuming, but after the first month, just scrolling through 3-4 emails gives me a pretty good idea of where the market is going.

ryanmarsh 8y ago

Calling it "salary-porn" gives away the rest of your comment. I could have written it myself based upon the many conversations I've had with people here, and elsewhere, about salary. For some reason many people are hostile to the idea that, at a minimum, you can make more money doing exactly the same thing for exactly the same company. Perhaps this shields them from the horror of the money they are most certainly leaving on the table, or the uncertainty of pursuing that money. The nice thing about being the lowest paid serf is the lord knows he's getting you for a song, or at least that's how the thinking goes. I'll just leave you with this: I make a minimum of $3k per day. I am not special. I have an IQ of 118 which is probably low for HN. The difference is I've never accepted that what they're paying me is the most the company (or market) can bear. My first programming job out of the Army (with no education) was 50k/yr. My current rate is the result of 15 years of continually challenging the offered rate and searching for higher rates. Today, I work part time and have tons of time for myself and my family. I'm so expensive that my clients honor my work and value my time. I know you'd prefer this lifestyle to the daily grind of 40+hrs, a middling salary, and little respect so why not test my model and see if it doesn't bear fruit for you.

ohaideredevs 8y ago
You can't say you make 3k a day without explaining your career path a bit so us lowly serfs can emulate.
- balabaster 8y ago
  Nor can you say it without quantifying the structure of your earnings... Where are you based, city/country? What kind of clients do you entertain? Also what industry/niche does your consulting empire cover? I assume you're an incorporated consultant and the rate of $3K per day is gross revenue and not net income(?) Certainly this is achievable, but people need to understand exact comparables so they're not comparing apples to oranges.
  - ryanmarsh 8y ago
    Ok, replying to you and next up line. I do consulting, the kind I do is irrelevant because there are others with high bill rates too (I know of some iOS devs that make $2,500/day). I have friends who are Java devs making $250/hr. They're not dummies but they aren't exactly Linus Torvalds or Chris Lattner either. Since you asked, I advise companies on how to implement certain development practices, things like DevOps, TDD, etc.. Before you totally write this off, hold your horses. I'm not saying this is THE path for you. It's one of many. I just happen to care a lot about how we work together to make software and I always found myself drifting into those discussions on the team. I'm based in Houston, TX. I charge $3k - $5k per day. I usually pay my own travel expenses. I haven't been charging that for long and the first time I submitted a proposal at that rate I almost threw up I was so nervous. I work usually two weeks per month. I usually travel to my clients. I also sell support contracts where I offer them unlimited Slack and 1-2 calls per week. I offer them coaching, feedback, guidance. Sometimes it's pairing on building out a Jenkins pipeline, sometimes it's just explaining why "change fail percentage" is a good metric to track backed by industry studies. I have a friend who couldn't join us for BBQ this weekend because he's traveling to SF just to visit with a former client who paid him something like $100k for a handful of Java classes he taught. I'd have to look at the invoices to know the exact amount and I have a call coming up. He went through my company. The nice thing is once you set up a company properly it becomes a vehicle for all sorts of financial endeavors. People think creating a company is scary and complicated and can really fuck you up. That's wrong. It's trivial to create a functioning company and the upkeep just to keep it compliant is absolutely minimal if it's incorporated in a state like Texas. If you've read this far, here's the golden nugget. I wish someone had told me what I'm about to tell you. 1. Follow the things that really interest you, not in your head, the things that make your heart pound. Maybe that's picking up certain types of stories in the sprint, or helping a coworker with a certain kind of bug. While your energy will come and go, that thing that makes your heart pound will always be there. It's connected to your calling, which you might not understand until you're in your 40's (like me). 2. Always ask for more money. Ask nicely, and after you deliver something of value. The company ALWAYS can afford to give you more. If giving you $20k more will bankrupt the company then your company is dying and you're going to be out of a job anyway. People who aren't business owners (myself included at one time) do not comprehend the decision flow business owners take. Ask for the money until they don't have any more. It is more ethical than letting them waste it on another kegerator for the office. Programmers in particular have a very skewed sense of the value they provide. Even a mediocre programmer is worth 10x his salary. You have no idea how valuable you are to a smart business person. Instagram had 30 employees when it was sold for $1B. Think about that. 3. Be polite and talk about the things that interest you with others. Share what excites you. It will be genuine and people will like that. It will link you up with the kind of people you should be linked up with. 4. Only invest time in the people with the most potential. Don't waste your time having coffee with people who aren't passionate, smart, hard working, or creative. This means avoid shit-magnets/pin-cushions. Within 10 years these high potential people will pay off for you in multiples. For me they've become great friends and have fed me most of my business. Back then they were just "I like this person". 5. Show your work. Imposter syndrom is lies you tell yourself in the absence of valuable feedback. Make things, no matter how flimsy or unfinished, and show them to people. A Russian guy once told me "never show unfinished work to an idiot". So show your work, just don't show it to idiots. Every single time I've had the courage to show smart people things I was tinkering with it has led to an opportunity. 6. Be courageous. Learn to do things you know to be wise, even when they're scary. 7. Be patient. It's the journey not the destination. I know this all sounds like horse shit but how many times have you heard these exact things from "successful" people before? Did you ever stop to ask yourself why? Maybe they're good principles. Maybe they actually work. If I told you the "path" to where I'm at and you tried to follow it you'd most certainly fail because the world is so complex that the correct answer (in discrete steps) is only knowable after the fact. The only thing you can do is be guided by principles that bear good fruit. Follow your heart, ask for more money, be polite, invest in potential, show your work, be courageous, be patient. From the bottom of my heart I wish you the best. If you ever would like to chat I'll happily hop on a zoom and share as much as I can with you. I want you to find as much joy and financial reward in your endeavors as I have found in mine. God bless.

ido 8y ago

It's not 100% all the info you need, but as a rule of thumb $x/h as a consultant is similar to earning $xK/year (anecdotally it seemed to check out: I once asked HR to do the math with me to evaluate what kind of rates we can afford to pay freelancers compared to how much similar-role employees were making - I think the example used was that a freelancer paid €60/h would cost equivalent to the salary cost of an employee earning €65k/year). The guy may not be making the equivalent to a $175k/year salary but he was almost certainly making a lot more than he previously was at $60k.