4 ms·

Download and install the app "Blind" to be shamefully informed of how many there are. Seemingly there is either a very large amount, or there are lots of SWEs

Download and install the app "Blind" to be shamefully informed of how many there are. Seemingly there is either a very large amount, or there are lots of SWEs who like to lie. Lots of it seem like stock options from FAANG and Uber.

afarrell 7y ago
s/SWEs/Anonymous chat participants/
ken 7y ago
I've been on the internet. I know people lie. The OKCupid blog found that "There are consistently 4x the number of people making $100K a year than there should be" [1]. They also lie about their height, and what they look like. What reason should I have for trusting anonymous self-reported data in a category where people are known to exaggerate? [1]: https://theblog.okcupid.com/the-big-lies-people-tell-in-online-dating-a9e3990d6ae2 https://theblog.okcupid.com/the-big-lies-people-tell-in-onli...
- knicholes 7y ago
  For OkCupid there's a clear motivation for exaggerating things like height, looks, and income. What motivation does one have for anonymously posting an exaggerated income? Are there really that many trolls who want to depress those making less than $500k/yr?
  - 1123581321 7y ago
    People like in anonymous communities all the time. One motivation would be to impress other (perceived-to-be) successful members so to be asked for stories to tell, for advice, etc. I don’t know why people are like that, but anonymity thins out the middle group of semi-/socially-truthful people by providing an opportunity to be much more honest or much less honest than is normally possible. $500k is achievable total compensation at a few companies for some people, though.
- jrockway 7y ago
  Yeah, so... plenty of software engineers are making $500k a year. That is total compensation; you should expect half of that to come from non-salary things like stock options and bonuses. Maybe some people are lying, but that seems about right to me for actual senior people (leading projects, maybe managing people). My last year at Google, my W2 income was in the area of $300,000. I was a "level 5" with good performance reviews, and the scale goes up to 9. I sold all my stock the second it was issued ("autosale"), so the W2 income is pretty close to the amount of cash I got. Programmers focused on the right task are worth their weight in gold. There are very few fields where an hour of time put in can save society as a whole thousands of hours. Software engineering is one of those, and we get to skim off a little bit of that value we created in the form of cash.
  - madengr 7y ago
    There is also much software that is complete garbage. If the ones with $500k TC are writing decent software, then those making $100k may be writing the garbage.
    - sbov 7y ago
      Depends a lot on where they're working. I know more than one person that had 15+ years experience that was making around 100k/year, then moved to a FAANG and hit > 500k total compensation in just a 2-3 years.
  - discordance 7y ago
    Unfortunately, the 'right' tasks for high TC are too often things like Google+

afarrell 7y ago

s/SWEs/Anonymous chat participants/

ken 7y ago

I've been on the internet. I know people lie. The OKCupid blog found that "There are consistently 4x the number of people making $100K a year than there should be" [1]. They also lie about their height, and what they look like. What reason should I have for trusting anonymous self-reported data in a category where people are known to exaggerate? [1]: https://theblog.okcupid.com/the-big-lies-people-tell-in-online-dating-a9e3990d6ae2 https://theblog.okcupid.com/the-big-lies-people-tell-in-onli...

knicholes 7y ago
For OkCupid there's a clear motivation for exaggerating things like height, looks, and income. What motivation does one have for anonymously posting an exaggerated income? Are there really that many trolls who want to depress those making less than $500k/yr?
- 1123581321 7y ago
  People like in anonymous communities all the time. One motivation would be to impress other (perceived-to-be) successful members so to be asked for stories to tell, for advice, etc. I don’t know why people are like that, but anonymity thins out the middle group of semi-/socially-truthful people by providing an opportunity to be much more honest or much less honest than is normally possible. $500k is achievable total compensation at a few companies for some people, though.
jrockway 7y ago
Yeah, so... plenty of software engineers are making $500k a year. That is total compensation; you should expect half of that to come from non-salary things like stock options and bonuses. Maybe some people are lying, but that seems about right to me for actual senior people (leading projects, maybe managing people). My last year at Google, my W2 income was in the area of $300,000. I was a "level 5" with good performance reviews, and the scale goes up to 9. I sold all my stock the second it was issued ("autosale"), so the W2 income is pretty close to the amount of cash I got. Programmers focused on the right task are worth their weight in gold. There are very few fields where an hour of time put in can save society as a whole thousands of hours. Software engineering is one of those, and we get to skim off a little bit of that value we created in the form of cash.
- madengr 7y ago
  There is also much software that is complete garbage. If the ones with $500k TC are writing decent software, then those making $100k may be writing the garbage.
  - sbov 7y ago
    Depends a lot on where they're working. I know more than one person that had 15+ years experience that was making around 100k/year, then moved to a FAANG and hit > 500k total compensation in just a 2-3 years.
- discordance 7y ago
  Unfortunately, the 'right' tasks for high TC are too often things like Google+