9 ms·

Are Silicon Valley’s Engineers Underpaid?

75 points by mjfern 16y ago

angelbob 16y ago
If so, then more of us should go work for ourselves. Put our money where our mouth is. If we're truly creating so much more wealth for these companies than we take in salary, it should be easy (ish) to turn that into more money for ourselves, even if large companies don't want to do that. And if working for ourselves doesn't instantly turn into way more cash, perhaps we're not creating as many billions in actual value as we think we are?
- larrik 16y ago
  There's no reason to assume that a programmer on her/his own is worth the same as s/he is in the right position at the right company. A team can (and should) be worth far more than the sum of it's members. Reading HN a lot can make us forget that being a great programmer doesn't make you great at business.
  - angelbob 16y ago
    I would argue that in that case, the business guys are creating a lot more of those billions in value than we generally credit them with.
    - timr 16y ago
      Let me make reduce the cognitive dissonance for you: being a good hacker doesn't make you lucky, and that's the difference. Nobody admits it, but a lot of the secret of creating a sustainable business boils down to luck, not being a "great business guy". Our industry is set up to reward risk-takers disproportionately...when they succeed. It's a lottery, but we like to justify the disparity in compensation post hoc by assuming that there's corresponding disparity in skill that somehow created most of the value.
      - praptak 16y ago
        "Our industry is set up to reward risk-takers disproportionately..." But then we're back to square one: why don't you become a risk-taker yourself? It's easy to paint oneself as an underpaid creator of millions of dollars in value, but for this to be possible someone had first to take a risk and then succeed. And in case of failure - would you, an employee who gets such a dispropotionately small share of generated value, be so eager to increase your share in the generated loss? I wouldn't and that's why I don't see much value in the "created value" argument.
        timr 16y ago
        "But then we're back to square one: why don't you become a risk-taker yourself?" Who says I'm not? Most of the time that people take risks, they fail. That's why it's called "risk", and not "guarantee". " would you, an employee who gets such a dispropotionately small share of generated value, be so eager to increase your share in the generated loss?" That's a straw man. Created value isn't allocated in strict proportion to risk of loss, and you don't have to take more risks to get paid more. If that were true, the people who funded a startup would get 99% of the upside, because they had the most to lose. (Also, doctors and lawyers wouldn't get paid squat. Anybody who knows a doctor or lawyer will tell you that that they're just about the most risk-averse people on earth.) The real answer is that compensation is about market forces. The people with the money are only willing to pay as much as the people who create value demand to be paid.
  - staunch 16y ago
    Your mistake is conflating working for yourself with working alone. Every startup founder works for himself and very few do it alone.
- rudiger 16y ago
  Let's apply this to feudalism: If we (the serfs) are truly creating so much more wealth for these lords than we take in salary, it should be easy (ish) to turn that into more money for ourselves, even if the lords don't want us to do that. The problem with this logic, of course, is that it's tough for a salary-worker to build a company that makes "way more cash" than they can get working for a salary.
  - angelbob 16y ago
    In feudalism, the downside of that approach was that if you went off on your own, armies would generally come and (at best) repossess the land or (at worst) kill you. As a programmer, you don't have quite the same issues. Where do you see the monopolized resources and/or forced prevention of exit being for us? We're not exactly medieval serfs that way, and starting a software-based company is, as pg repeatedly mentions, way cheaper than it's ever been.
- orijing 16y ago
  I respectfully disagree with your analysis. Let me explain why through an example. Suppose you have two options, A and B (seen below): A: Work for large company Z which reaches 100 million people already through a $10 product. You make an incremental improvement that improves sales 1%. You have now made $10m contribution to the company. B: Work for yourself. You found a startup that is getting half a million unit sales a year (pretty good, right?), and you double sales somehow. You've only produced a $5m value despite doubling the output. The answer is that often big companies are much more levered and each unit of input can create much more output (primarily because of breadth of resources and reach) than if you were to work by yourself. Your value is how much you can contribute. Your highest value is your value at the company where you can contribute the most. By a reasonable application of some auction theory, you would expect that your market pay (including costs you can't see like payroll taxes) should be approximately what your second-highest value is. (Because if it were higher, the highest-value place can lower it and you'd still be working there, and if it were lower, the highest value place may not have you)
- chc 16y ago
  So if my services securing your leaky billion-dollar Java app are worth hundreds of thousands of dollars (versus the money you'd lose in case of a breach), that must mean that if I create FizzBuzz and secure it, it should be worth a billion dollars to people. Is that the math you're using? Because it sounds like it, and it doesn't work. You might not be able to create wealth in a vacuum, but that doesn't mean the wealth you create in the right context isn't real.
praptak 16y ago
I don't see any reason for the market not to sort it out in this case. Thresholds for starting an IT business are low nowadays and access to the information about the market is pretty easy.
knieveltech 16y ago
I'd say the overwhelming majority of programmers everywhere are underpaid. I'm basing this on the fact that I could roughly double my current salary if I quit tomorrow and spent a year working my way up as a welder and my salary is pretty much in the median range for the area I live in.
- pestaa 16y ago
  While I agree with you, the claim programmers are generally underpaid got me thinking. If every programmer earns less compared to the field, nobody really does. (Think of the famous quote in The Incredibles: If everybody's incredible, nobody is.) So either we're all underpaid compared to the value we generate, or we all overvalue everything we create. Strange that there are no reliable metrics in a field filled with zeros and ones.
- endtime 16y ago
  Then why don't you?
  - knieveltech 16y ago
    I'm not particularly passionate about welding, whereas I derive real pleasure from programming. For myself this enjoyment is sufficiently valuable to more than offset the economic loss. YMMV.
    - endtime 16y ago
      Sure - the fun of programming (or the relative comfort of a desk job) is a benefit of the job. That's why you're not necessarily underpaid just because a welder can earn more.
- narkee 16y ago
  How does that imply that programmers are underpaid? I think your implication that the value of trades are somehow worth less than the value programming brings to society is unwarranted.
redstripe 16y ago
Anyone who believes 100k is underpaid has serious entitlement issues they need to examine. You need to look around and see how the rest of the country/world lives. Sure google, apple, and others may generate enough revenue to pay people more than that but they would also do it without you because 100k will buy them good developers. American programmer salaries are so far above the country average that complaining is just ridiculous.
- tomjen3 16y ago
  If you can get 130k across the street, 100k _is_ underpaid. It has nothing to do with entitlement issues at all: it is simply market economics. How much the janitor makes doesn't figure into the salary for a programmer, except as an indirect consequence.
  - flyosity 16y ago
    Also: if you're being paid $100k and, in turn, generating hundreds of thousands of dollars of value for your company, you're undervalued and underpaid. The software industry is one of the few industries where a single person can create mountains of value all by themselves. Comparing software engineer salaries to janitor salaries makes no sense as janitors aren't creating multiples of their salary in value for their employer.
    - us 16y ago
      The only problem with this example is not every software engineer has the ability to be an entrepreneur. Sure, they can create monumental value for their employers, but there are some people that just can't be founders or cofounders or anything more simply because of how they are. I know quite a few people like this. At the end of the day, it takes a variety of personality traits, skills, brains, and a slew of other things to create a well rounded individual who can maximize value. Outside of this, no matter how much value you're adding to your employer, how can you honestly say you're worth more.
      - 16y ago
deleted 16y ago
[deleted]
meowzero 16y ago
Silicon Valley engineers probably feel underpaid because of the high standard of living of that area. If they made $125k in Atlanta, for instance, they would be living very comfortably. I'm still surprised at the number of Tech startups still locating themselves in Silicon Valley. I would figure if they started up in a cheaper city like Atlanta it would be more economical for them. But I guess they want to be near the talented people. Although I would think if you build it, the talent will follow.
sequoia 16y ago
Almost everyone ITC is focusing on the developers' attitudes and whether they are "entitled" etc., but it seems to me the article was just as much (more?) about the impact that such salaries have on the companies. The author isn't so much arguing that it's "not fair" so much as "it's short-sighted on behalf of the employers," at least how I read it. The developers' attitudes are relevant only insofar as they influence their actions in this case. If it's making it difficult for companies to hold on to talent, that's a big deal. If it's causing developers to grumble on IRC, not so much.
waterlesscloud 16y ago
Employers are constantly complaining about a shortage of good developers, so the only possible answer is "yes".
- electromagnetic 16y ago
  Think more and you'll only get an answer of "yes". Throughout history there has been areas that excel in certain trades. Steel Work and boat building moved from highly talented areas in the UK pre-WW2 where workers were underpaid compared to their skills. As wages rose, this era ended and the steel work and boat building jumped straight to post-WW2 Japan. Similar things transpired as wages rose and it shifted to South Korea that the government suppressed unionization and allowed its steel industry to flourish and still only appears to be in the declining phase of its ship-building. Whilst the elite of the worlds technology reside in the valley, good developers will be underpaid. When the workers get stupid and want to be overpaid for their work (IE unionise) then there work will move to the third world overnight. Then there's the other valuation of income. I always make less than I should, simply because if I worked for myself doing whatever job I do I will be making more. If you're an employee, you'll never make what you would as an employer or as a self-employed.
  - Dylanlacey 16y ago
    Unless you are no good at business tasks. It's an unpopular truth, but still truth: Some people could never run their own business. They don't have the skills, or the mental chemistry. Some kids could never be president, some people can never run at a competitive level, and some people can't work for themselves. It's not fair, or glamorous, or even particularly PC. But it's true.
tassl 16y ago
Being born in a foreign country, I have to smile when I see a blog entry like this one. I agree that the salary is relative to where people are living and I get the point of the writer. To specify an example, let's say that some Silicon Valley engineer wants to buy a $1M house. With $100K salary, it will make 10 years of salary. Now, let's move to another country: Spain in this case. A normal salary for a junior engineer is around 15K/year (euro) up to 30K for a senior developer. A big house (for europeans, 950sq ft) in a normal neighbor in Barcelona costs around 400K (euro), which would be like... 26 years of salary? And I have compared different houses, for what I have seen, in general the price $/sq.ft. is pretty similar between both cities. As I said, I understand that the engineers might not get back what they produce (and I agree) but I just wanted to give another point of view.
- klochner 16y ago
  There are a few factors to consider here. First, the Spanish housing bubble appears several times larger than in the US, and prices may still have a long way down to go: http://www.economist.com/blogs/freeexchange/2010/10/global_house_prices http://www.economist.com/blogs/freeexchange/2010/10/global_h... Next, how many hours per week and weeks per year are you working? The typical american engineer is probably working 50+ hours per week, with only 2 or 3 weeks of vacation per year. Finally, you should consider international consulting if you're being paid $30k/year while working 50 hour weeks. email me if you know ruby :)
  - tassl 16y ago
    Yes, I agree with you that the Spanish housing bubble was (and still is) insane. I don't have current numbers, but in this website you can check the number of houses started in Spain and compare them with other countries: http://www.casastristes.org/files/viviendaNuevaEuropa/viviendaConstruida.html http://www.casastristes.org/files/viviendaNuevaEuropa/vivien... (link in spanish, but numbers are universal). Since 1999 building more houses than France and Italy together; while in other countries there is a lot of investment in technology, in Spain they invest on houses. I was not talking about myself. I worked in Barcelona for a while and moved to the US on 2009. Usually engineers don't have a 8-6 working schedule; in the company where I worked it was more normal a 8AM-9PM. 1h for lunch. And during deadlines it was "normal" to stay until 1-2AM. And back at 8, of course. All that for 15K. Sounds great, doesn't it? I left the job after 6 months because I considered that it was not a "good deal". It is true that I could be close to 30K in 1-2 years but... I can't talk for all american engineers, but people that I know are close to the 100-120K without working 50+ hours. The difference on holidays is one of the biggest differences, that's true. And social benefits. As for your last comment, foreign engineers should definitely consider that!! Spain universities are pretty good (our engineering undergrads were 5 years until the current Bologna system) and engineering programs are considered really tough.
herf 16y ago
One big issue is that engineers haven't seen cost of living increases in the last 10 years nearly on par with lawyer/finance/professional jobs. This was justified by the "tech crash" for many years, but it went on too long (only in the last few years are salaries going up again). The only way to afford to live well in a California tech center as an engineer has been to have a big startup exit or a very senior job. I managed a team at Google, and had 4 direct reports ask to work from home 50% of the time, or even to work 100% remotely, mostly so they could live somewhere cheaper. This comes out in "work/life balance" - when your commute gets too long so you can afford a big enough house in your 30s, spouse gets mad, you get overtaxed, and it's not a good scene.
- nagnatron 16y ago
  How is working from home viewed at Google?
  - ChuckMcM 16y ago
    Poorly. But to make this post more than just noise, much of the Google culture for a long time revolved around personal relationships and being in peoples cubes to get their attention. Not something you could do from home anyway. The Anybot experiment would have been interesting to see.
dlevine 16y ago
I'm not sure that I agree with the tenets of this article. Silicon Valley Engineers don't seem underpaid to me. Sure we could potentially make more in finance, but that doesn't mean we are underpaid. I feel like there are a number of things that I value (in the following order): 1) Exciting work 2) Large potential impact 3) Financial compensation Notice that money is third, and that isn't an accident. I probably make less than many of my classmates who went into finance (although the difference is likely smaller that one might assume based on comparing "averages"). However, most of them don't really seem to like their jobs all that much. I get to work on interesting things that will hopefully have a large impact, and get paid pretty well for it (I've usually made significantly above the Silicon Valley "average"). In addition, I think that many people in finance are likely overpaid relative to the value they generate, and that there will be a correction at some point in the future.
joe-mccann 16y ago
Here's a tip: move to Austin. 1) No state income tax. Read that again. 2) Cost of living is at least HALF of SF/SV/NYC 3) Real estate is actually affordable, even close in. Now, I know there is the argument for needing to be in SF/SV for startups and tech, but Austin is a hotbed of tech activity and with more and more companies allowing remote work, it's worth a shot.
- hkarthik 16y ago
  As a Texan that would love to see more talented engineers and innovative companies here, I agree with you. But we have a weird mix here. Houston and Dallas have the rich people, but Austin has all the nerds. We need more cross pollination of both to ever be as attractive as Silicon Valley. That, and a lot less hardcore conservatives.
patio11 16y ago
Well, let's see: 1). Does the market clear? Can every company wanting to hire someone for $100k find someone? 2). Do different firms routinely value the sane person consistently, such that switching jobs results in no significant salary increase? 3). Do developers routinely capture gains made as a result of productivity increases? For example, has the adoption of frameworks which make web sites about 10x faster to build in ten years resulted in 10x increases in salary? ... Well, look on the bright side: you're not Japanese engineers.
ShardPhoenix 16y ago
I think the thing people aren't taking into account is risk. Sure, you don't get to capture all the value you create, but you also aren't (usually) liable for any value you might accidentally destroy, and you still get paid even if your project generates $0.
bootload 16y ago
"... But these tales of high-rolling nerds mask a greater truth, one that actually threatens to hurt the tech industry over the long term: Software engineers in the Bay Area are underpaid when you consider the billions in wealth their work creates. ..." This observation isn't new, cf: "Career Guide for Engineers and Computer Scientists" ~ http://philip.greenspun.com/careers/ http://philip.greenspun.com/careers/

75 points by mjfern 16y ago

If so, then more of us should go work for ourselves. Put our money where our mouth is. If we're truly creating so much more wealth for these companies than we take in salary, it should be easy (ish) to turn that into more money for ourselves, even if large companies don't want to do that. And if working for ourselves doesn't instantly turn into way more cash, perhaps we're not creating as many billions in actual value as we think we are?

larrik 16y ago
There's no reason to assume that a programmer on her/his own is worth the same as s/he is in the right position at the right company. A team can (and should) be worth far more than the sum of it's members. Reading HN a lot can make us forget that being a great programmer doesn't make you great at business.
- angelbob 16y ago
  I would argue that in that case, the business guys are creating a lot more of those billions in value than we generally credit them with.
  - timr 16y ago
    Let me make reduce the cognitive dissonance for you: being a good hacker doesn't make you lucky, and that's the difference. Nobody admits it, but a lot of the secret of creating a sustainable business boils down to luck, not being a "great business guy". Our industry is set up to reward risk-takers disproportionately...when they succeed. It's a lottery, but we like to justify the disparity in compensation post hoc by assuming that there's corresponding disparity in skill that somehow created most of the value.
    - praptak 16y ago
      "Our industry is set up to reward risk-takers disproportionately..." But then we're back to square one: why don't you become a risk-taker yourself? It's easy to paint oneself as an underpaid creator of millions of dollars in value, but for this to be possible someone had first to take a risk and then succeed. And in case of failure - would you, an employee who gets such a dispropotionately small share of generated value, be so eager to increase your share in the generated loss? I wouldn't and that's why I don't see much value in the "created value" argument.
      - timr 16y ago
        "But then we're back to square one: why don't you become a risk-taker yourself?" Who says I'm not? Most of the time that people take risks, they fail. That's why it's called "risk", and not "guarantee". " would you, an employee who gets such a dispropotionately small share of generated value, be so eager to increase your share in the generated loss?" That's a straw man. Created value isn't allocated in strict proportion to risk of loss, and you don't have to take more risks to get paid more. If that were true, the people who funded a startup would get 99% of the upside, because they had the most to lose. (Also, doctors and lawyers wouldn't get paid squat. Anybody who knows a doctor or lawyer will tell you that that they're just about the most risk-averse people on earth.) The real answer is that compensation is about market forces. The people with the money are only willing to pay as much as the people who create value demand to be paid.
- staunch 16y ago
  Your mistake is conflating working for yourself with working alone. Every startup founder works for himself and very few do it alone.
rudiger 16y ago
Let's apply this to feudalism: If we (the serfs) are truly creating so much more wealth for these lords than we take in salary, it should be easy (ish) to turn that into more money for ourselves, even if the lords don't want us to do that. The problem with this logic, of course, is that it's tough for a salary-worker to build a company that makes "way more cash" than they can get working for a salary.
- angelbob 16y ago
  In feudalism, the downside of that approach was that if you went off on your own, armies would generally come and (at best) repossess the land or (at worst) kill you. As a programmer, you don't have quite the same issues. Where do you see the monopolized resources and/or forced prevention of exit being for us? We're not exactly medieval serfs that way, and starting a software-based company is, as pg repeatedly mentions, way cheaper than it's ever been.
orijing 16y ago
I respectfully disagree with your analysis. Let me explain why through an example. Suppose you have two options, A and B (seen below): A: Work for large company Z which reaches 100 million people already through a $10 product. You make an incremental improvement that improves sales 1%. You have now made $10m contribution to the company. B: Work for yourself. You found a startup that is getting half a million unit sales a year (pretty good, right?), and you double sales somehow. You've only produced a $5m value despite doubling the output. The answer is that often big companies are much more levered and each unit of input can create much more output (primarily because of breadth of resources and reach) than if you were to work by yourself. Your value is how much you can contribute. Your highest value is your value at the company where you can contribute the most. By a reasonable application of some auction theory, you would expect that your market pay (including costs you can't see like payroll taxes) should be approximately what your second-highest value is. (Because if it were higher, the highest-value place can lower it and you'd still be working there, and if it were lower, the highest value place may not have you)
chc 16y ago
So if my services securing your leaky billion-dollar Java app are worth hundreds of thousands of dollars (versus the money you'd lose in case of a breach), that must mean that if I create FizzBuzz and secure it, it should be worth a billion dollars to people. Is that the math you're using? Because it sounds like it, and it doesn't work. You might not be able to create wealth in a vacuum, but that doesn't mean the wealth you create in the right context isn't real.

praptak 16y ago

I don't see any reason for the market not to sort it out in this case. Thresholds for starting an IT business are low nowadays and access to the information about the market is pretty easy.

knieveltech 16y ago

I'd say the overwhelming majority of programmers everywhere are underpaid. I'm basing this on the fact that I could roughly double my current salary if I quit tomorrow and spent a year working my way up as a welder and my salary is pretty much in the median range for the area I live in.

pestaa 16y ago
While I agree with you, the claim programmers are generally underpaid got me thinking. If every programmer earns less compared to the field, nobody really does. (Think of the famous quote in The Incredibles: If everybody's incredible, nobody is.) So either we're all underpaid compared to the value we generate, or we all overvalue everything we create. Strange that there are no reliable metrics in a field filled with zeros and ones.
endtime 16y ago
Then why don't you?
- knieveltech 16y ago
  I'm not particularly passionate about welding, whereas I derive real pleasure from programming. For myself this enjoyment is sufficiently valuable to more than offset the economic loss. YMMV.
  - endtime 16y ago
    Sure - the fun of programming (or the relative comfort of a desk job) is a benefit of the job. That's why you're not necessarily underpaid just because a welder can earn more.
narkee 16y ago
How does that imply that programmers are underpaid? I think your implication that the value of trades are somehow worth less than the value programming brings to society is unwarranted.

redstripe 16y ago

Anyone who believes 100k is underpaid has serious entitlement issues they need to examine. You need to look around and see how the rest of the country/world lives. Sure google, apple, and others may generate enough revenue to pay people more than that but they would also do it without you because 100k will buy them good developers. American programmer salaries are so far above the country average that complaining is just ridiculous.

tomjen3 16y ago
If you can get 130k across the street, 100k _is_ underpaid. It has nothing to do with entitlement issues at all: it is simply market economics. How much the janitor makes doesn't figure into the salary for a programmer, except as an indirect consequence.
- flyosity 16y ago
  Also: if you're being paid $100k and, in turn, generating hundreds of thousands of dollars of value for your company, you're undervalued and underpaid. The software industry is one of the few industries where a single person can create mountains of value all by themselves. Comparing software engineer salaries to janitor salaries makes no sense as janitors aren't creating multiples of their salary in value for their employer.
  - us 16y ago
    The only problem with this example is not every software engineer has the ability to be an entrepreneur. Sure, they can create monumental value for their employers, but there are some people that just can't be founders or cofounders or anything more simply because of how they are. I know quite a few people like this. At the end of the day, it takes a variety of personality traits, skills, brains, and a slew of other things to create a well rounded individual who can maximize value. Outside of this, no matter how much value you're adding to your employer, how can you honestly say you're worth more.
    - 16y ago

deleted 16y ago

[deleted]

meowzero 16y ago

Silicon Valley engineers probably feel underpaid because of the high standard of living of that area. If they made $125k in Atlanta, for instance, they would be living very comfortably. I'm still surprised at the number of Tech startups still locating themselves in Silicon Valley. I would figure if they started up in a cheaper city like Atlanta it would be more economical for them. But I guess they want to be near the talented people. Although I would think if you build it, the talent will follow.

sequoia 16y ago

Almost everyone ITC is focusing on the developers' attitudes and whether they are "entitled" etc., but it seems to me the article was just as much (more?) about the impact that such salaries have on the companies. The author isn't so much arguing that it's "not fair" so much as "it's short-sighted on behalf of the employers," at least how I read it. The developers' attitudes are relevant only insofar as they influence their actions in this case. If it's making it difficult for companies to hold on to talent, that's a big deal. If it's causing developers to grumble on IRC, not so much.

waterlesscloud 16y ago

Employers are constantly complaining about a shortage of good developers, so the only possible answer is "yes".

electromagnetic 16y ago
Think more and you'll only get an answer of "yes". Throughout history there has been areas that excel in certain trades. Steel Work and boat building moved from highly talented areas in the UK pre-WW2 where workers were underpaid compared to their skills. As wages rose, this era ended and the steel work and boat building jumped straight to post-WW2 Japan. Similar things transpired as wages rose and it shifted to South Korea that the government suppressed unionization and allowed its steel industry to flourish and still only appears to be in the declining phase of its ship-building. Whilst the elite of the worlds technology reside in the valley, good developers will be underpaid. When the workers get stupid and want to be overpaid for their work (IE unionise) then there work will move to the third world overnight. Then there's the other valuation of income. I always make less than I should, simply because if I worked for myself doing whatever job I do I will be making more. If you're an employee, you'll never make what you would as an employer or as a self-employed.
- Dylanlacey 16y ago
  Unless you are no good at business tasks. It's an unpopular truth, but still truth: Some people could never run their own business. They don't have the skills, or the mental chemistry. Some kids could never be president, some people can never run at a competitive level, and some people can't work for themselves. It's not fair, or glamorous, or even particularly PC. But it's true.

tassl 16y ago

Being born in a foreign country, I have to smile when I see a blog entry like this one. I agree that the salary is relative to where people are living and I get the point of the writer. To specify an example, let's say that some Silicon Valley engineer wants to buy a $1M house. With $100K salary, it will make 10 years of salary. Now, let's move to another country: Spain in this case. A normal salary for a junior engineer is around 15K/year (euro) up to 30K for a senior developer. A big house (for europeans, 950sq ft) in a normal neighbor in Barcelona costs around 400K (euro), which would be like... 26 years of salary? And I have compared different houses, for what I have seen, in general the price $/sq.ft. is pretty similar between both cities. As I said, I understand that the engineers might not get back what they produce (and I agree) but I just wanted to give another point of view.

klochner 16y ago
There are a few factors to consider here. First, the Spanish housing bubble appears several times larger than in the US, and prices may still have a long way down to go: http://www.economist.com/blogs/freeexchange/2010/10/global_house_prices http://www.economist.com/blogs/freeexchange/2010/10/global_h... Next, how many hours per week and weeks per year are you working? The typical american engineer is probably working 50+ hours per week, with only 2 or 3 weeks of vacation per year. Finally, you should consider international consulting if you're being paid $30k/year while working 50 hour weeks. email me if you know ruby :)
- tassl 16y ago
  Yes, I agree with you that the Spanish housing bubble was (and still is) insane. I don't have current numbers, but in this website you can check the number of houses started in Spain and compare them with other countries: http://www.casastristes.org/files/viviendaNuevaEuropa/viviendaConstruida.html http://www.casastristes.org/files/viviendaNuevaEuropa/vivien... (link in spanish, but numbers are universal). Since 1999 building more houses than France and Italy together; while in other countries there is a lot of investment in technology, in Spain they invest on houses. I was not talking about myself. I worked in Barcelona for a while and moved to the US on 2009. Usually engineers don't have a 8-6 working schedule; in the company where I worked it was more normal a 8AM-9PM. 1h for lunch. And during deadlines it was "normal" to stay until 1-2AM. And back at 8, of course. All that for 15K. Sounds great, doesn't it? I left the job after 6 months because I considered that it was not a "good deal". It is true that I could be close to 30K in 1-2 years but... I can't talk for all american engineers, but people that I know are close to the 100-120K without working 50+ hours. The difference on holidays is one of the biggest differences, that's true. And social benefits. As for your last comment, foreign engineers should definitely consider that!! Spain universities are pretty good (our engineering undergrads were 5 years until the current Bologna system) and engineering programs are considered really tough.

herf 16y ago

One big issue is that engineers haven't seen cost of living increases in the last 10 years nearly on par with lawyer/finance/professional jobs. This was justified by the "tech crash" for many years, but it went on too long (only in the last few years are salaries going up again). The only way to afford to live well in a California tech center as an engineer has been to have a big startup exit or a very senior job. I managed a team at Google, and had 4 direct reports ask to work from home 50% of the time, or even to work 100% remotely, mostly so they could live somewhere cheaper. This comes out in "work/life balance" - when your commute gets too long so you can afford a big enough house in your 30s, spouse gets mad, you get overtaxed, and it's not a good scene.

nagnatron 16y ago
How is working from home viewed at Google?
- ChuckMcM 16y ago
  Poorly. But to make this post more than just noise, much of the Google culture for a long time revolved around personal relationships and being in peoples cubes to get their attention. Not something you could do from home anyway. The Anybot experiment would have been interesting to see.

dlevine 16y ago

I'm not sure that I agree with the tenets of this article. Silicon Valley Engineers don't seem underpaid to me. Sure we could potentially make more in finance, but that doesn't mean we are underpaid. I feel like there are a number of things that I value (in the following order): 1) Exciting work 2) Large potential impact 3) Financial compensation Notice that money is third, and that isn't an accident. I probably make less than many of my classmates who went into finance (although the difference is likely smaller that one might assume based on comparing "averages"). However, most of them don't really seem to like their jobs all that much. I get to work on interesting things that will hopefully have a large impact, and get paid pretty well for it (I've usually made significantly above the Silicon Valley "average"). In addition, I think that many people in finance are likely overpaid relative to the value they generate, and that there will be a correction at some point in the future.

joe-mccann 16y ago

Here's a tip: move to Austin. 1) No state income tax. Read that again. 2) Cost of living is at least HALF of SF/SV/NYC 3) Real estate is actually affordable, even close in. Now, I know there is the argument for needing to be in SF/SV for startups and tech, but Austin is a hotbed of tech activity and with more and more companies allowing remote work, it's worth a shot.

hkarthik 16y ago
As a Texan that would love to see more talented engineers and innovative companies here, I agree with you. But we have a weird mix here. Houston and Dallas have the rich people, but Austin has all the nerds. We need more cross pollination of both to ever be as attractive as Silicon Valley. That, and a lot less hardcore conservatives.

patio11 16y ago

Well, let's see: 1). Does the market clear? Can every company wanting to hire someone for $100k find someone? 2). Do different firms routinely value the sane person consistently, such that switching jobs results in no significant salary increase? 3). Do developers routinely capture gains made as a result of productivity increases? For example, has the adoption of frameworks which make web sites about 10x faster to build in ten years resulted in 10x increases in salary? ... Well, look on the bright side: you're not Japanese engineers.

ShardPhoenix 16y ago

I think the thing people aren't taking into account is risk. Sure, you don't get to capture all the value you create, but you also aren't (usually) liable for any value you might accidentally destroy, and you still get paid even if your project generates $0.

bootload 16y ago

"... But these tales of high-rolling nerds mask a greater truth, one that actually threatens to hurt the tech industry over the long term: Software engineers in the Bay Area are underpaid when you consider the billions in wealth their work creates. ..." This observation isn't new, cf: "Career Guide for Engineers and Computer Scientists" ~ http://philip.greenspun.com/careers/ http://philip.greenspun.com/careers/