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Most startup jobs in NYC pay over $100K if you're an engineer. If you have a family and need a bigger place you can always live in New Jersey. "Money" is not re

Most startup jobs in NYC pay over $100K if you're an engineer. If you have a family and need a bigger place you can always live in New Jersey. "Money" is not really a problem in New York City. If you're smart and hustle in NYC, you can always make more money. You will probably have to do something heinous to get it, but it's sitting there, waiting for you. That said, many hackers just aren't into the sort of startup projects that get funded and pay well in NYC. That's a bigger factor in the "talent shortage." The startups there just aren't that cool. If someone in Brooklyn started a company making life-sized Gundam robots you could control with your web browser, everyone would quit working at whatever foodie-blog-ad-network they're currently stuck at and work at the robot place for half their previous salary. It's hard to do outsourced work in an early stage startup because stuff changes so frequently. The last startup I worked for in NYC actually did have a half dozen outsourced employees in places like Oregon and Hawaii and all but one of them quit because they were so frustrated about changing priorities and miscommunication.

mgkimsal 16y ago
re: "Money" - a $100k job in NYC with living in NJ just isn't going to get you anywhere close the same living space (especially for a family) as that same money would in most of the rest of the US. Similarly, $150k+ would go a long way to help make up that difference. Ultimately, it's just not a lifestyle tradeoff most engineering talent seems to want to make at those price points. Upping base to $150k (with something closer to $200k for sr-level talent) for startup engineers (vs ~$100k) would attract more talent the companies are claiming they need. If that's too expensive, perhaps 'startups' should locate themselves closer to where the resources they need are actually located? Those issues of 'miscommunication' and 'changing priorities' are happening regardless of where the workers are, and I bet many people working at the main office were similarly frustrated. I've worked on site and remotely, and understand the challenges in each. Neither is perfect, and having a remote team (and being a remote developer) requires certain skills. I'm dismayed, but perhaps not surprised, that these skills aren't actively developed and nurtured at more companies. The long term rewards will be great.
- CPops 16y ago
  Quality of life depends on what you value. If you value living space, you'll be happiest out of NYC. But if you value meeting a lot of cool people, great things to see and do, great mass transit, etc then NYC is great even at a lesser overall level of purchasing power.
  - tibbon 16y ago
    Agreed, I recently moved to Columbus, Ohio from Boston. Kept my (decent) salary from Boston. I have 3x the space I had prior, super low expenses and I'm in the top 10% of income here by household. Am I as happy as I was in Boston? No. There's some perks (garage to park my motorcycle and a room for my office) but that's about it. Oh, and things are just easy here. No traffic, the DMV's 'bad' waits are 30 minutes, not 4 hours. That type of thing. Meeting cool people happens much less frequently here, and the culture (even around OSU) is simply as not as academically focuses as hanging around Cambridge. Purchasing power way up. Quality of life? A draw at best, probably a loss. If I had my way, I'd be back in Boston tomorrow.
    - petercooper 16y ago
      Purchasing power way up. Quality of life? A draw at best, probably a loss. If I had my way, I'd be back in Boston tomorrow. Just taking a rude guess here (sorry if I'm wrong) but it sounds like you might be making a sacrifice for your family or partner? If so, you need to factor in how much they mean to you into your quality of life score for Columbus vs living alone in Boston. (I'm not judging you - a lot of us are in a similar situation!)
      - tibbon 16y ago
        Yep. Girlfriend working on her PhD at OSU. It's a difficult debate. In the long term its probably shooting my career in the foot being here, and the big-fish, small-pond thing hasn't proven to be useful at all. The problem is that the pond here is filled with even fewer interesting consumer facing web 2.0 companies than Boston. Programming for insurance and medical companies might pay the bills, but it surely isn't sexy.
bugsy 16y ago
"If you have a family and need a bigger place you can always live in New Jersey." Right that makes sense, because top talent would like to live in a craphole just so they can have the privilege of taking a massive salary cut.

mgkimsal 16y ago

re: "Money" - a $100k job in NYC with living in NJ just isn't going to get you anywhere close the same living space (especially for a family) as that same money would in most of the rest of the US. Similarly, $150k+ would go a long way to help make up that difference. Ultimately, it's just not a lifestyle tradeoff most engineering talent seems to want to make at those price points. Upping base to $150k (with something closer to $200k for sr-level talent) for startup engineers (vs ~$100k) would attract more talent the companies are claiming they need. If that's too expensive, perhaps 'startups' should locate themselves closer to where the resources they need are actually located? Those issues of 'miscommunication' and 'changing priorities' are happening regardless of where the workers are, and I bet many people working at the main office were similarly frustrated. I've worked on site and remotely, and understand the challenges in each. Neither is perfect, and having a remote team (and being a remote developer) requires certain skills. I'm dismayed, but perhaps not surprised, that these skills aren't actively developed and nurtured at more companies. The long term rewards will be great.

CPops 16y ago
Quality of life depends on what you value. If you value living space, you'll be happiest out of NYC. But if you value meeting a lot of cool people, great things to see and do, great mass transit, etc then NYC is great even at a lesser overall level of purchasing power.
- tibbon 16y ago
  Agreed, I recently moved to Columbus, Ohio from Boston. Kept my (decent) salary from Boston. I have 3x the space I had prior, super low expenses and I'm in the top 10% of income here by household. Am I as happy as I was in Boston? No. There's some perks (garage to park my motorcycle and a room for my office) but that's about it. Oh, and things are just easy here. No traffic, the DMV's 'bad' waits are 30 minutes, not 4 hours. That type of thing. Meeting cool people happens much less frequently here, and the culture (even around OSU) is simply as not as academically focuses as hanging around Cambridge. Purchasing power way up. Quality of life? A draw at best, probably a loss. If I had my way, I'd be back in Boston tomorrow.
  - petercooper 16y ago
    Purchasing power way up. Quality of life? A draw at best, probably a loss. If I had my way, I'd be back in Boston tomorrow. Just taking a rude guess here (sorry if I'm wrong) but it sounds like you might be making a sacrifice for your family or partner? If so, you need to factor in how much they mean to you into your quality of life score for Columbus vs living alone in Boston. (I'm not judging you - a lot of us are in a similar situation!)
    - tibbon 16y ago
      Yep. Girlfriend working on her PhD at OSU. It's a difficult debate. In the long term its probably shooting my career in the foot being here, and the big-fish, small-pond thing hasn't proven to be useful at all. The problem is that the pond here is filled with even fewer interesting consumer facing web 2.0 companies than Boston. Programming for insurance and medical companies might pay the bills, but it surely isn't sexy.

bugsy 16y ago

"If you have a family and need a bigger place you can always live in New Jersey." Right that makes sense, because top talent would like to live in a craphole just so they can have the privilege of taking a massive salary cut.