6 ms·

> That money would buy you a week of developer time in most of Europe That's only true if you live in Poland and also ignore the all-in cost of your employees.

> That money would buy you a week of developer time in most of Europe That's only true if you live in Poland and also ignore the all-in cost of your employees. A good rule of thumb is to assume 2-3x salary for the all-in cost of having a workforce.

yakshaving_jgt 5y ago
I run a business and employ several software developers. What you are saying has absolutely not been my experience.
- pjmlp 5y ago
  In Germany average consulting rates, run around 100 euros per hour. https://www.freelancermap.com/blog/freelance-market-study-germany/ https://www.freelancermap.com/blog/freelance-market-study-ge... Plus some management expenses, and it turns into around 1000 euros per delivery day for a FTE. Then we can go to the companies doing high level consulting and pull some notches still.
  - yakshaving_jgt 5y ago
    Sure, there's ample opportunity for everyone in the industry to throw money into the sea. The comment that I was replying to specifically referred to employee time per month. That's naturally going to be different from some high-rate consultant, so this is totally an apples-to-oranges comparison. Furthermore, it's a large market and there are plenty of consultancies in Europe charging significantly less than that.
    - Xylakant 5y ago
      I’ve had a quick look into some of the tools on the list. We even use at least one, but we still pay for the hosted solution. Why? * We’re a shop full of developers, but none of us have the required skill set to host and debug a python app. * We’re fairly well booked. Any time I’d assign one of the folks to maintaining tool X, I’d have to take from time assigned to client work. Which means the internal cost is not what’s interesting. What counts is “how much do I loose by not having them work in billable hours?” All of this means that the calculation is strongly tilted in favor of buy.
      - yakshaving_jgt 5y ago
        For you perhaps, in your circumstances. Surely you weren't thinking you could project your specific circumstance to software development companies more broadly?
wongarsu 5y ago
In Germany, the average Software Dev salary is about 50k€/year. That's a total payroll cost of about 60k€/year after taxes, social security etc., so around 300€/workday. Add some money for office space, equipment, overhead, etc, and adjust by factor of two in either direction depending on location and role. Of course if you hire a freelancer, prices are very different and 1500€/day is very reasonable.
- rglullis 5y ago
  Either I have been very, very lucky or you are basing yourself in outdated reports. In Berlin (one of lowest cost-of-living German cities) you will have trouble to find even junior developers working for 50k€/year.
pzduniak 5y ago
Most engineers in Poland prefer anything BUT full time employment, so all-in the tax for engineering work is like 8.5%/19% with a ~$120/mo mandatory health insurance. They'd rather get hired as freelancers and pay less taxes (and burn less money contributing to the broken social security system).

yakshaving_jgt 5y ago

I run a business and employ several software developers. What you are saying has absolutely not been my experience.

pjmlp 5y ago
In Germany average consulting rates, run around 100 euros per hour. https://www.freelancermap.com/blog/freelance-market-study-germany/ https://www.freelancermap.com/blog/freelance-market-study-ge... Plus some management expenses, and it turns into around 1000 euros per delivery day for a FTE. Then we can go to the companies doing high level consulting and pull some notches still.
- yakshaving_jgt 5y ago
  Sure, there's ample opportunity for everyone in the industry to throw money into the sea. The comment that I was replying to specifically referred to employee time per month. That's naturally going to be different from some high-rate consultant, so this is totally an apples-to-oranges comparison. Furthermore, it's a large market and there are plenty of consultancies in Europe charging significantly less than that.
  - Xylakant 5y ago
    I’ve had a quick look into some of the tools on the list. We even use at least one, but we still pay for the hosted solution. Why? * We’re a shop full of developers, but none of us have the required skill set to host and debug a python app. * We’re fairly well booked. Any time I’d assign one of the folks to maintaining tool X, I’d have to take from time assigned to client work. Which means the internal cost is not what’s interesting. What counts is “how much do I loose by not having them work in billable hours?” All of this means that the calculation is strongly tilted in favor of buy.
    - yakshaving_jgt 5y ago
      For you perhaps, in your circumstances. Surely you weren't thinking you could project your specific circumstance to software development companies more broadly?

wongarsu 5y ago

In Germany, the average Software Dev salary is about 50k€/year. That's a total payroll cost of about 60k€/year after taxes, social security etc., so around 300€/workday. Add some money for office space, equipment, overhead, etc, and adjust by factor of two in either direction depending on location and role. Of course if you hire a freelancer, prices are very different and 1500€/day is very reasonable.

rglullis 5y ago
Either I have been very, very lucky or you are basing yourself in outdated reports. In Berlin (one of lowest cost-of-living German cities) you will have trouble to find even junior developers working for 50k€/year.

pzduniak 5y ago

Most engineers in Poland prefer anything BUT full time employment, so all-in the tax for engineering work is like 8.5%/19% with a ~$120/mo mandatory health insurance. They'd rather get hired as freelancers and pay less taxes (and burn less money contributing to the broken social security system).