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I would literally move to nearly anywhere in the midwest, in a heartbeat if they paid real salaries. I see it now, the hundreds of HN comments from years past t

I would literally move to nearly anywhere in the midwest, in a heartbeat if they paid real salaries. I see it now, the hundreds of HN comments from years past talking about COL differences.The salaries I've seen in the midwest are what would have been reasonable in 2006, even adjusting for CoL differences. These companies are just not keeping pace with the market. This "oh the CoL differences" line was valid in the past, and still is valid in the few tech cities that have kept pace properly like Austin, but for most places it is a excuse to trick people into accepting lower salaries than people are worth regardless of what local rent costs. Ever notice how everybody here knows Austin even though it is flyover small town? I feel like I repeat myself a hundred thousand times. Almost EVERY city in the midwest, every city, would be as viable a location as Austin is, if the companies there weren't cheapskates and paid people what they were worth.

logfromblammo 7y ago
As someone who moved out of the Midwest for higher-paying work, this comment is 100.01% accurate. I had to move to Chicago for my first real job--one which went away a little bit after after the early 2000s dot-com crash--and then eventually moved out of Madison, Wisconsin, when an east coast company bought my employer out and fired nearly everyone. That last time around, I was apparently making way more than the local median salary, and really needed to replace all of it and then some. Every time I think about going back, I say "minimum $120k," and they say "ope, that's a bit much for us, dere" and never call me again. It saves time, I'm sure, but very disappointing nonetheless. From Minneapolis-St.Paul to Pittsburgh is the Midwestern megacity, with zero serious geographical limits on densifying, or adding to suburban sprawl. And every company in it would happily offer $70k/year to someone with 20 years of experience, and still believe it to be "extremely generous". At first, I thought they were all lowballing for the purposes of negotiation, but it turns out that they're all uniformly miserly.
- formermidwest 7y ago
  Agreed. I also moved from Chicago to the West coast for similar reasons. Doubled my salary overnight and have since more than doubled that again when counting my total income. The other thing is that the tech jobs in Chicago were all pretty bland enterprise jobs which didn't interest me. I moved away from family and friends (although many of my friends were headed out here anyway), and while it was a difficult decision, it was by far the best one I could have made. I might move back after retirement when I'm more cost-conscious and less active.
  - opportune 7y ago
    Not disagreeing with you, but outside of enterprise there seems to be a pretty good amount of finance jobs in Chicago. Some of the quant firms pay competitively with the bay area for software engineers / "quant devs"
- rinchik 7y ago
  > one which went away a little bit after after the early 2000s dot-com crash You have at least 15 years of experience and can't get an offer of 120K in Chicago? I don't believe that it’s plausible. Well, unless it's not a "high-tech" job you are talking about, meaning that your comment is not relevant to the article or discussion at all? If you are a software developer (or data-scientist, or anything that qualifies as "high-tech"), it is very strange that after 15 years your skills did not appreciate or improved enough to qualify for a 120K offer.
  - logfromblammo 7y ago
    I haven't looked in Chicago since 2004, and I'm unlikely to try again until 2024. There's more to moving than just the job. Your post came across as vaguely insulting. A company that maxes out under my minimum isn't looking for someone with a higher level of skill--or even a median level of skill. A lot of these companies ask for the Moon, and want to pay for river rocks, then don't list salary range in their advertisements. If I can't weed them out quickly, they will waste more of my time than I care to give up. It's not about securing an offer, it's about finding a company that isn't both tight-fisted and greedy. Now that I have left already, why would I expend the extra effort to find a Midwestern-based job that pays well, when other regions are falling over themselves to make even new graduates rich? Midwestern companies can only attract local talent, and that talent is fleeing to cities that don't pay peanuts. I would move back, if companies there could raise the average pay of their tech employees, and maybe also get a bit more sun during the winter.
- boring_twenties 7y ago
  This doesn't seem to make sense. I worked at a company with a Minneapolis office once and everyone there made $150-200k+
  - raydev 7y ago
    I know an intermediate-senior level guy who's entertaining a few $120k+ offers in Minneapolis as well. Blows my mind, I never thought of Minneapolis offering that much.
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
firstplacelast 7y ago
Then explain San Diego. Salaries here are notoriously low, even in the tech industry. I know nurses in the Bay Area that pull down 2x what an experienced tech worker makes here. And while housing is cheaper, you still can't get anything reasonable for under 600k. I'm baffled that SD made it on the list.
- vonmoltke 7y ago
  You can thank the military-industrial complex for that. Ditto for LA.
- tapatio 7y ago
  Big tech has arrived to SD with close to Bay Area salaries. DoD contractors is not where the money’s at.
harimau777 7y ago
I think the difference is that, despite its size, Austin has a culture that leads to people wanting to live there. In particular if one is a fan of live music.
- chiph 7y ago
  The live music is in danger. There's lots of tall condos downtown now, filled with people who moved there for the vibe, yet file complaints about the noise from the bars & clubs on Sixth & Rainey Streets. So there's a sound level ordinance now. https://library.municode.com/tx/austin/codes/code_of_ordinances?nodeId=TIT9PRAC_CH9-2NOAMSO#TOPTITLE https://library.municode.com/tx/austin/codes/code_of_ordinan...
  - wiseleo 7y ago
    I find it sad that people move to a location because of nightlife and then proceed to drive that nightlife out of business.
- cryptonector 7y ago
  The "weird" is almost gone. All the downtown bars and clubs are gone or almost gone. All the new construction got rid of those spaces and provided no replacements. Austin's on the verge of being boring.
kickopotomus 7y ago
It's pretty disingenuous to call Austin a "flyover small town". > Austin is the capital of Texas and the 11th largest city in the United States, and the 3rd largest state capital. The population of Austin is estimated at 964,254, which is an increase of more than 3% over the last census in 2010. [1] Midwest cities are not viable Austin replacements. One of the many reasons for it's success is the University of Texas. It's a research university and one of the largest in the world. Add to that the fact that Austin has a pretty rich culture, temperate climate, and plenty to do; and now you have a place that people want to relocate to. [1]: http://worldpopulationreview.com/us-cities/austin-population/ http://worldpopulationreview.com/us-cities/austin-population...
- ghaff 7y ago
  Temperate climate is a bit of a stretch. Maybe “not as bad as Houston.” But, yeah, Austin has a lot going for it relative to a lot of other cities in that general area of the country.
  - cryptonector 7y ago
    Austin's weather is just fantastic. Not as bad as Houston, or NYC, or DC, or anywhere on the eastern seabord in the summer -- it's hot, yes, but dry-ish (not dry like Phoenix), and unlike the eastern cities, there's A/C aplenty. In the winter it doesn't get very cold, there's no snow, occasionally some ice, and some times it gets very warm in the winter. The summer heat you get used to, unlike Houston or NYC.
    - ghaff 7y ago
      To each their own I guess. I've been in Austin for a fairly typical weekend during the summer and found it pretty awful. But, then, I don't deal with heat very well generally. and I don't like being confined to A/C. That's one of the things I like about living in the North. Outside of the cities you don't even really need to have A/C. Of course, there's snow in the winter.
- ImprovedSilence 7y ago
boring_twenties 7y ago
Couldn't agree more. I moved to a small city from NYC and what they're paying here for a senior developer is about what I made when I was 19. Why even bother? I rather just live cheap, not work at all and enjoy my life to the fullest. Then they have the nerve to complain that they can't hire anyone, lol.

logfromblammo 7y ago

As someone who moved out of the Midwest for higher-paying work, this comment is 100.01% accurate. I had to move to Chicago for my first real job--one which went away a little bit after after the early 2000s dot-com crash--and then eventually moved out of Madison, Wisconsin, when an east coast company bought my employer out and fired nearly everyone. That last time around, I was apparently making way more than the local median salary, and really needed to replace all of it and then some. Every time I think about going back, I say "minimum $120k," and they say "ope, that's a bit much for us, dere" and never call me again. It saves time, I'm sure, but very disappointing nonetheless. From Minneapolis-St.Paul to Pittsburgh is the Midwestern megacity, with zero serious geographical limits on densifying, or adding to suburban sprawl. And every company in it would happily offer $70k/year to someone with 20 years of experience, and still believe it to be "extremely generous". At first, I thought they were all lowballing for the purposes of negotiation, but it turns out that they're all uniformly miserly.

formermidwest 7y ago
Agreed. I also moved from Chicago to the West coast for similar reasons. Doubled my salary overnight and have since more than doubled that again when counting my total income. The other thing is that the tech jobs in Chicago were all pretty bland enterprise jobs which didn't interest me. I moved away from family and friends (although many of my friends were headed out here anyway), and while it was a difficult decision, it was by far the best one I could have made. I might move back after retirement when I'm more cost-conscious and less active.
- opportune 7y ago
  Not disagreeing with you, but outside of enterprise there seems to be a pretty good amount of finance jobs in Chicago. Some of the quant firms pay competitively with the bay area for software engineers / "quant devs"
rinchik 7y ago
> one which went away a little bit after after the early 2000s dot-com crash You have at least 15 years of experience and can't get an offer of 120K in Chicago? I don't believe that it’s plausible. Well, unless it's not a "high-tech" job you are talking about, meaning that your comment is not relevant to the article or discussion at all? If you are a software developer (or data-scientist, or anything that qualifies as "high-tech"), it is very strange that after 15 years your skills did not appreciate or improved enough to qualify for a 120K offer.
- logfromblammo 7y ago
  I haven't looked in Chicago since 2004, and I'm unlikely to try again until 2024. There's more to moving than just the job. Your post came across as vaguely insulting. A company that maxes out under my minimum isn't looking for someone with a higher level of skill--or even a median level of skill. A lot of these companies ask for the Moon, and want to pay for river rocks, then don't list salary range in their advertisements. If I can't weed them out quickly, they will waste more of my time than I care to give up. It's not about securing an offer, it's about finding a company that isn't both tight-fisted and greedy. Now that I have left already, why would I expend the extra effort to find a Midwestern-based job that pays well, when other regions are falling over themselves to make even new graduates rich? Midwestern companies can only attract local talent, and that talent is fleeing to cities that don't pay peanuts. I would move back, if companies there could raise the average pay of their tech employees, and maybe also get a bit more sun during the winter.
boring_twenties 7y ago
This doesn't seem to make sense. I worked at a company with a Minneapolis office once and everyone there made $150-200k+
- raydev 7y ago
  I know an intermediate-senior level guy who's entertaining a few $120k+ offers in Minneapolis as well. Blows my mind, I never thought of Minneapolis offering that much.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]

firstplacelast 7y ago

Then explain San Diego. Salaries here are notoriously low, even in the tech industry. I know nurses in the Bay Area that pull down 2x what an experienced tech worker makes here. And while housing is cheaper, you still can't get anything reasonable for under 600k. I'm baffled that SD made it on the list.

vonmoltke 7y ago
You can thank the military-industrial complex for that. Ditto for LA.
tapatio 7y ago
Big tech has arrived to SD with close to Bay Area salaries. DoD contractors is not where the money’s at.

harimau777 7y ago

I think the difference is that, despite its size, Austin has a culture that leads to people wanting to live there. In particular if one is a fan of live music.

chiph 7y ago
The live music is in danger. There's lots of tall condos downtown now, filled with people who moved there for the vibe, yet file complaints about the noise from the bars & clubs on Sixth & Rainey Streets. So there's a sound level ordinance now. https://library.municode.com/tx/austin/codes/code_of_ordinances?nodeId=TIT9PRAC_CH9-2NOAMSO#TOPTITLE https://library.municode.com/tx/austin/codes/code_of_ordinan...
- wiseleo 7y ago
  I find it sad that people move to a location because of nightlife and then proceed to drive that nightlife out of business.
cryptonector 7y ago
The "weird" is almost gone. All the downtown bars and clubs are gone or almost gone. All the new construction got rid of those spaces and provided no replacements. Austin's on the verge of being boring.

kickopotomus 7y ago

It's pretty disingenuous to call Austin a "flyover small town". > Austin is the capital of Texas and the 11th largest city in the United States, and the 3rd largest state capital. The population of Austin is estimated at 964,254, which is an increase of more than 3% over the last census in 2010. [1] Midwest cities are not viable Austin replacements. One of the many reasons for it's success is the University of Texas. It's a research university and one of the largest in the world. Add to that the fact that Austin has a pretty rich culture, temperate climate, and plenty to do; and now you have a place that people want to relocate to. [1]: http://worldpopulationreview.com/us-cities/austin-population/ http://worldpopulationreview.com/us-cities/austin-population...

ghaff 7y ago
Temperate climate is a bit of a stretch. Maybe “not as bad as Houston.” But, yeah, Austin has a lot going for it relative to a lot of other cities in that general area of the country.
- cryptonector 7y ago
  Austin's weather is just fantastic. Not as bad as Houston, or NYC, or DC, or anywhere on the eastern seabord in the summer -- it's hot, yes, but dry-ish (not dry like Phoenix), and unlike the eastern cities, there's A/C aplenty. In the winter it doesn't get very cold, there's no snow, occasionally some ice, and some times it gets very warm in the winter. The summer heat you get used to, unlike Houston or NYC.
  - ghaff 7y ago
    To each their own I guess. I've been in Austin for a fairly typical weekend during the summer and found it pretty awful. But, then, I don't deal with heat very well generally. and I don't like being confined to A/C. That's one of the things I like about living in the North. Outside of the cities you don't even really need to have A/C. Of course, there's snow in the winter.
ImprovedSilence 7y ago

boring_twenties 7y ago

Couldn't agree more. I moved to a small city from NYC and what they're paying here for a senior developer is about what I made when I was 19. Why even bother? I rather just live cheap, not work at all and enjoy my life to the fullest. Then they have the nerve to complain that they can't hire anyone, lol.