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It doesn't. Outside of this HN bubble I have literally never ever met anyone that made such rates with ML.

ganstyles 6y ago
In my experience it very much does, depending on what you're doing I guess. Levels.fyi under the Data Scientist tab seems to verify that this isn't some bubble thing. Well, bubble maybe, but not HN bubble.
- Avalaxy 6y ago
  Sorry but I have never heard of "levels.fyi". TBH the domain already looks like a typical silicon valley HN-bubble website. Don't you think there is a massive selection bias to the people who fill in their salaries on a website like that? A more reputable site (that's known outside of the HN-bubble) would be the stackoverflow salary calculator. If I fill in "Data Scientists with a master's degree and 5 years of experience in the Amsterdam area" I get a median income of EUR 51K. In silicon valley it's higher of course, but the same profile in San Francisco still 'only' gets you a median income of USD 157K.
  - Der_Einzige 6y ago
    Levels.fyi is way outside of the HN-bubble... Ever heard of blind? Levels.fyi is their holy Grail.
    - Avalaxy 6y ago
      > Ever heard of blind No... but just checking it out, and every single post is about FAANG/uber from people who work in silicon valley. You didn't exactly disprove my point.
  - ganstyles 6y ago
    I cite my salary and salaries of my friends and colleagues in the industry, and levels.fyi. You cite your experience and stack overflow. I think we'll have to agree to disagree, as you're not going to convince me I make less than I make (or pay, apparently) and I'm not going to convince you anyone makes more than you. I think that's okay.
marcinzm 6y ago
Larger companies will pay that much salary for ML talent especially with experience and a PhD. I've seen $400+k salaries for people with a few years experience and no PhD. Contractors will generally charge twice the amount per hour as an employee so you're looking at $500-1000/hr. As for why. If a large company makes money from advertising and you improve their $10billion/year click model by 0.01% CTR then you've just made them a million dollars. Do that few times throughout a year and a million dollar payout seems low.
- Avalaxy 6y ago
  > Contractors will generally charge twice the amount per hour as an employee so you're looking at $500-1000/hr. Yea, no. Not outside of the HN bubble. I run a data science company myself (in Europe). Rates here are really not higher than 80~100 euros per hour. That's for someone with a master's degree in data science and years of experience. On top of that, we have to very actively look for clients and advertise a lot. It's not like people are en-masse knocking on our doors to throw their money at us. So I claim BS on 500/1000 per hour. That just absolutely does not happen except for maybe the 1% who is a celebrity in ML world.
  - cosmodisk 6y ago
    The first thing I see going on your website: it's in Dutch.So you are targeting local companies only,or at least that's the impression I'd get. Is there a lot of large/extra large companies in Netherlands that could use your expertise?I don't mean the offices of some multinationals that are only there with a tiny office for tax reasons but companies operating there.I'm not in the ML industry, so I can't comment much on the services you provide,but I I think you should look into getting advice on your sales process, marketing,etc.

In my experience it very much does, depending on what you're doing I guess. Levels.fyi under the Data Scientist tab seems to verify that this isn't some bubble thing. Well, bubble maybe, but not HN bubble.

Avalaxy 6y ago
Sorry but I have never heard of "levels.fyi". TBH the domain already looks like a typical silicon valley HN-bubble website. Don't you think there is a massive selection bias to the people who fill in their salaries on a website like that? A more reputable site (that's known outside of the HN-bubble) would be the stackoverflow salary calculator. If I fill in "Data Scientists with a master's degree and 5 years of experience in the Amsterdam area" I get a median income of EUR 51K. In silicon valley it's higher of course, but the same profile in San Francisco still 'only' gets you a median income of USD 157K.
- Der_Einzige 6y ago
  Levels.fyi is way outside of the HN-bubble... Ever heard of blind? Levels.fyi is their holy Grail.
  - Avalaxy 6y ago
    > Ever heard of blind No... but just checking it out, and every single post is about FAANG/uber from people who work in silicon valley. You didn't exactly disprove my point.
- ganstyles 6y ago
  I cite my salary and salaries of my friends and colleagues in the industry, and levels.fyi. You cite your experience and stack overflow. I think we'll have to agree to disagree, as you're not going to convince me I make less than I make (or pay, apparently) and I'm not going to convince you anyone makes more than you. I think that's okay.

marcinzm 6y ago

Larger companies will pay that much salary for ML talent especially with experience and a PhD. I've seen $400+k salaries for people with a few years experience and no PhD. Contractors will generally charge twice the amount per hour as an employee so you're looking at $500-1000/hr. As for why. If a large company makes money from advertising and you improve their $10billion/year click model by 0.01% CTR then you've just made them a million dollars. Do that few times throughout a year and a million dollar payout seems low.

Avalaxy 6y ago
> Contractors will generally charge twice the amount per hour as an employee so you're looking at $500-1000/hr. Yea, no. Not outside of the HN bubble. I run a data science company myself (in Europe). Rates here are really not higher than 80~100 euros per hour. That's for someone with a master's degree in data science and years of experience. On top of that, we have to very actively look for clients and advertise a lot. It's not like people are en-masse knocking on our doors to throw their money at us. So I claim BS on 500/1000 per hour. That just absolutely does not happen except for maybe the 1% who is a celebrity in ML world.
- cosmodisk 6y ago
  The first thing I see going on your website: it's in Dutch.So you are targeting local companies only,or at least that's the impression I'd get. Is there a lot of large/extra large companies in Netherlands that could use your expertise?I don't mean the offices of some multinationals that are only there with a tiny office for tax reasons but companies operating there.I'm not in the ML industry, so I can't comment much on the services you provide,but I I think you should look into getting advice on your sales process, marketing,etc.