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Despite what you may think, there isn't some nefarious conspiracy keeping tech salaries low in Europe. It's that this is where the market is, an equilibrium bet

Despite what you may think, there isn't some nefarious conspiracy keeping tech salaries low in Europe. It's that this is where the market is, an equilibrium between supply and demand for engineers. It's precisely the same reason that salaries in certain US markets are so high: FAANG don't pay high salaries because they have fundamentally decided that engineers should be paid X amount, nor because someone has read Marx and wants to give engineers more of the value they create. It's because demand has exceeded supply for engineers in those markets, and that has driven up the equilibrium price. I should also point out that the median salary for engineers outside the NY and the Bay Area is something like $100k, not the stratospheric packages often discussed here as though they were normal rather than exceptional. (I've not noticed too much of a love of paperwork here in Germany, but I could certainly see how the stereotype was formed)

f6v 6y ago
> It's that this is where the market is However, that also means software engineers don't create that much value. I've been hiring developers myself, it takes half a year to get a senior engineer, even with extremely relaxed immigration laws like in Germany, just due to shortage. It's a weird paradox. If companies had enough money, I'd imagine SV engineers jumping on a plane to Berlin right away.
- jlangenauer 6y ago
  Maybe. I was the CTO of a startup in Berlin until about 18 months ago, and built a engineering team of 13 people. There was certainly competition for engineers, but it never took 6 months to get someone on board[1]. That said, there was definite wage inflation being driven by that competition (at least in Berlin), but it still topped out at around EUR 80k (2 years ago, it may be higher now). I accept that the Berlin expat market is also a little bit different, where 3 month notice periods aren't insisted upon, and companies know how to move fast. The situation in the Mittelstand software industry could be very different for all I know. [1] The exception to this, for me, was DevOps, which took so long to hire for that we ended up developing a strong enough in-house capacity that we no longer needed them. Engineering management was also difficult to find.
- jason0597 6y ago
  >If companies had enough money, I'd imagine SV engineers jumping on a plane to Berlin right away. How many SV developers speak German? Germany isn't quite as English-friendly as other places in the EU (Netherlands, etc.), and if you don't speak the language you aren't going to enjoy yourself in the town very much
  - twic 6y ago
    Anecdotal, but i know several developers who don't speak German but have moved from London to Berlin and love it.
benhurmarcel 6y ago
> the median salary for engineers outside the NY and the Bay Area is something like $100k, not the stratospheric packages often discussed here $100k is €88k. As an engineer in Europe I'd consider that very high. Not sure I'll earn that much even at end of career.

f6v 6y ago

> It's that this is where the market is However, that also means software engineers don't create that much value. I've been hiring developers myself, it takes half a year to get a senior engineer, even with extremely relaxed immigration laws like in Germany, just due to shortage. It's a weird paradox. If companies had enough money, I'd imagine SV engineers jumping on a plane to Berlin right away.

jlangenauer 6y ago
Maybe. I was the CTO of a startup in Berlin until about 18 months ago, and built a engineering team of 13 people. There was certainly competition for engineers, but it never took 6 months to get someone on board[1]. That said, there was definite wage inflation being driven by that competition (at least in Berlin), but it still topped out at around EUR 80k (2 years ago, it may be higher now). I accept that the Berlin expat market is also a little bit different, where 3 month notice periods aren't insisted upon, and companies know how to move fast. The situation in the Mittelstand software industry could be very different for all I know. [1] The exception to this, for me, was DevOps, which took so long to hire for that we ended up developing a strong enough in-house capacity that we no longer needed them. Engineering management was also difficult to find.
jason0597 6y ago
>If companies had enough money, I'd imagine SV engineers jumping on a plane to Berlin right away. How many SV developers speak German? Germany isn't quite as English-friendly as other places in the EU (Netherlands, etc.), and if you don't speak the language you aren't going to enjoy yourself in the town very much
- twic 6y ago
  Anecdotal, but i know several developers who don't speak German but have moved from London to Berlin and love it.

benhurmarcel 6y ago

> the median salary for engineers outside the NY and the Bay Area is something like $100k, not the stratospheric packages often discussed here $100k is €88k. As an engineer in Europe I'd consider that very high. Not sure I'll earn that much even at end of career.