tl;dr: at most banks, the traders directly drive pnl. developers are seen as secondary since they treat the process as developers supporting traders. At other

tl;dr: at most banks, the traders directly drive pnl. developers are seen as secondary since they treat the process as developers supporting traders. At other places, the developers are the true source of "alpha", and there the developers are treated like rock stars. "developers are treated as second-class citizens" <-- partially true There are two classes of developers: those who drive pnl and tose who don't. To give an example, I built an ultra low latency trading operation. My development [granted, it was only part of my work process] directly resulted in pnl and it could be proven. Some of my friends worked in the IT departments of some investment banks (GS, MS, JPM, etc). Many of them are doing things which do not directly generate pnl, nor could their work be attributed to the revenue of any division. "paid comparatively poorly(though not absolutely) to traders" <-- partially true Traders are paid more because it is easier to attribute pnl to them. Developers in a quantitative shop are paid better than the traders, because in those contexts the developers bring more value to the process than traders. "are expected to put in long hours" <-- partially true I've never had to work outside of 9-6. However, in some places, where they care about headcount, people work longer hours. "- Is it true that developers are treated like support staff to traders?" Depends on the place "- To be blunt: What are typical salaries for software engineers in finance?" For support, salaries are like 70K. At a quant shop, you are looking at like 100-150K. At a hft developer, 200-300K is pretty common (but those jobs are hard to land, mainly because those funds arent doing as well thanks to a low VIX) "- For those who have experience working in the Valley as well: how does it compare?" Cannot say