6 ms·
Can you elaborate on "Europe dug it's own grave here"?
by intev 6y ago
Can you elaborate on "Europe dug it's own grave here"?
- ChuckNorris89 6y agoLook at what EU "tech" companies pay vs what FAANG/Huawei pays. A friend finished his PhD in ML and ended up taking a job at a FAANG in the EU as the tech companies from Germany and France were only willing to pay half of that. You can't be at the top if you treat your SW devs and researchers as an IT cost center.
- bogantech 6y agoThey pay worse than even non-FAANG tech companies in Australia too
- moonbug 6y agothere's more to a job than the salary.
- f6v 6y agoAn important mission or great workplace culture don’t pay for mortgage.
- acatton 6y agoBut even if you accept the paycut, it's not like the workplace culture is great: https://www.npr.org/2019/12/20/790101370/french-telecom-company-convicted-of-moral-harassment-after-employee-suicides https://www.npr.org/2019/12/20/790101370/french-telecom-comp...
- sofixa 6y agoOne case at a shitty former-public-becoming-private company. Not really applicable everywhere.
- andi999 6y agoBut this goes hand in hand. If the salary is very high, management will try not to waste your potential. If low they might not care.
- chrisseaton 6y agoRight - I also want my work to be interesting and impactful, my colleagues to be motivated and talented, to get generous time off, etc... and guess what even in Europe the North American companies do better at all these aspects as well!
- _hao 6y agoThere is, but it's the main consideration to be honest...
- ftoscano 6y agoYes, there is more than just the salary. Except that, in Europe, most (if not all) forms of "equity" are proportional: your title, your salary, your ability to decide, etc. It becomes an equivalence: * Since you decide nothing, therefore your salary is low. * Since your salary is low, you therefore decide nothing. This stems fundamentally from a (backward?) European strict view of companies, regardless of how hierarchical/flat their structure may be. And that view is that the corporate environment is split into two groups: * Managers: they decide; * Workers: they do work. This split may have made sense in the Industrial Revolution era but it has shown it's age in this day and age. And yet the model (and the perception, and the values) persist. If you, as a knowledge worker, ever make the mistake of "getting down and get things done" you will have chosen your side.
- sofixa 6y ago> Except that, in Europe, most (if not all) forms of "equity" are proportional: your title, your salary, your ability to decide, etc. It's funny that you completely missed the point ( i think the other person is making). What about time off? Pension? Parental leave? Medical costs? Way of life ( as in, work stops at 6pm or 7pm or whatever, and then it's your free time; weekends are usually off limits; you don't have to own a car and waste hours in traffic depending on where you live, etc.) Furthermore, the rest of what you said is painting hundreds of thousands of business across more than 30 countries with the same brush. I work in a European company, and it's nothing like that. You shouldn't generalise like that.
- 908B64B197 6y ago> What about time off? Pension? Parental leave? Medical costs? For top engineers, that's not really a concern in America.
- kazen44 6y agowhich is not the argument I think is important. I want healthcare for those around me aswell! why is this healthcare not an option for those in society who are less able to work or are good at jobs which are not engineering/high paying? art and education is a good example of this. without either, a society is reduced to nothing. why do these not deserve proper healthcare? because the free market has decided they are not worth it?
- blaser-waffle 6y agoAll of the downvotes are saying a lot about HN, lol.
- intev 6y agoOh wow, I didn't realize there's such a huge discrepancy in salary.
- csunbird 6y agoYup. The average salary for a junior (e.g. with 1 to 3 years experienced) developer is around 45-50k Euro gross. You can get very exceptional and very experienced engineers for 90-100k Euro gross annually.
- 908B64B197 6y agoWhy not simply come to SV?
- dukeyukey 6y agoIt's not that easy. Even if you already work for a US company, and that company is willing to sponsor you, and you win the visa lottery, it can take years to move to the US, and many years after that to get a green card. And at any point something could go wrong, your company screws up paperwork or something, and you get sent back to the start.
- 908B64B197 6y agoLots of talented EU Engineers do it. Maybe some EU countries should look into getting a better deals for their citizen trying to go abroad.
- dukeyukey 6y agoAt a macro level, sure. At a personal level, it's not easy. As far as I know, only Mexico, Canada and Australia have preferred access to US visas for their citizens (though I'm hoping the UK will join them during trade deal negotiations).
- kazen44 6y agobecause leaving behind the people and community around me is not worth the money and work/life balance? also, the US has a political and social problem which make it a place I would not want to live.
- rapsey 6y agoTo be fair funding options for US companies compared to EU ones is absurd. US tech is swimming in money compared to EU tech.
- bryanrasmussen 6y agowhich is what the thread is about - US tech is swimming in money partly because the US supported their tech industry to the point where it became a big monster swimming in money, at which point the brains in EU drain off to the money oceans of the US.
- passivate 6y agoI wonder how much of the easy access to credit in the US is simply the strength of the dollar - we keep printing more $$ but the dollar doesn't devalue as much. Add to the fact that our poor interest rates on savings accounts makes private equity investments the only means to increase wealth.
- rapsey 6y agoThe joys of being a reserve currency.
- 908B64B197 6y agoEU investors are way too conservative.
- Cthulhu_ 6y agoI did think of working for a FAANG, but they don't really do much in my corner of Europe (there's a group working on Docs and similar in Germany but I don't want to move to Germany), and they are scary in that they seem to aim for the university high-achievers. I don't want to have to learn leetcode for a job interview, knowing full well that leetcode is not the day job there either. Plus I like being (or ok, feeling) productive, instead of spending 99% of my time on politics, analysis and waiting for small code changes.
- smueller1234 6y agoYou seem to have looked at Google specifically (mention of Docs). Google has substantial engineering presence in several european countries. Just a few cities/countries off the top of my head in no specific order: Munich, Zürich, London, Dublin, Warsaw. There's others, IIRC a bit on Stockholm for example, but I think those I named after among the larger presences. Anyway. Not just Germany. There's also SRE, which has a slightly different twang on how we spend our time and then interview makeup. For what it's worth, I'm not a computer science grad at all and I'm doing just fine at Google. Got hired as a senior manager, though, so YMMV. Not trying to convince you of anything, just trying to be helpful. :)
- ChuckNorris89 6y agoOut of curiosity what education/career path did you follow to get to your current position?
- langitbiru 6y agoI think you can replace EU with "the rest of the world". In Asia, we are also jealous of Silicon Valley. Obligatory article: https://alexdanco.com/2021/01/11/why-the-canadian-tech-scene-doesnt-work/ https://alexdanco.com/2021/01/11/why-the-canadian-tech-scene...
- MichaelZuo 6y agoWell I’m sure it’s possible to attract really good folks at low salaries even in SEA/Japan/SK/Taiwan/India/etc. if folks are compensated with significant ownership stakes instead. It’s about what the business owners are willing to do.
- 908B64B197 6y agoWhy doesn't Canada simply... compete? Honestly, bragging your engineers are worth 50K less while pitching for HQ2 won't stop their brain drain.