4 ms·

I'm not sure what it's like in Scandinavia, but $150/hr would be an exceptional rate in the US for someone with the skills you describe. Most contract programme

by rdouble 15y ago

I'm not sure what it's like in Scandinavia, but $150/hr would be an exceptional rate in the US for someone with the skills you describe. Most contract programmers with that resume are more like better paid temp workers who make $25-60/hr.

maybeindie 15y ago
I based the 100-150$ number on couple of datapoints from people I know who have worked on freelance gigs and who are roughly equivalent to me in experience/rep. Wages (and cost of living!) seems to be higher in Scandinavia than in the US.
- justincormack 15y ago
  Thats a high rate for London UK individual freelancers too. More like an agency rate. Bear in mind you will need to allow time to search for new work too.
babebridou 15y ago
I don't know about Scandinavia, but the typical beginner consulting gig in Paris, France is 40-50€/h. More experienced are at 60-80€/hr, vets are ~100€/h and super experts are at 125€/hr & more. Do the maths. That's before taxes of course. Then realize out that EUR->USD history: from 1:1 to 1:1.5 in ten years, and meanwhile wages in Euros have been kept relatively constant. You can't survive in Europe if you get paid in USD, these days.
- maybeindie 15y ago
  That seems consistent with what I've heard, too.
- jordinl 15y ago
  that sounds like a lot! What technology are we talking about? Also, do this roles require being able to speak french?
  - babebridou 15y ago
    Nah if you speak any European language you can land that kind of gig, just elsewhere in (Western)Europe. That won't pay the bills, though. In order to do these jobs you need to be near one of the bigger cities, where the cost of life is excruciatingly high, 2.5$ for an espresso, 10$ for a pint, 1250$ for a month in a 30m2 flat. Add to that between an hour and two of commute time every day... About the tech, for that kind of money it's mostly Java, PHP and C++, with a bit of perl, Oracle PL/SQL. We're old fashioned :) but for the past few years C#, .NET, and javascript are making a splendid coming out, and there's always demand for ObjectiveC (iOS mostly). Now don't take my words for truth about the tech on the market, I'm super biased by the company I've worked in and their customers. But in any case it's nothing compared to what you earn if you're good enough with Excel, Powerpoint and absolutely nothing else. The more tech you know, the less you bill is the rule of thumb at least in the French consulting business.

by rdouble 15y ago

maybeindie 15y ago

I based the 100-150$ number on couple of datapoints from people I know who have worked on freelance gigs and who are roughly equivalent to me in experience/rep. Wages (and cost of living!) seems to be higher in Scandinavia than in the US.

justincormack 15y ago
Thats a high rate for London UK individual freelancers too. More like an agency rate. Bear in mind you will need to allow time to search for new work too.

babebridou 15y ago

I don't know about Scandinavia, but the typical beginner consulting gig in Paris, France is 40-50€/h. More experienced are at 60-80€/hr, vets are ~100€/h and super experts are at 125€/hr & more. Do the maths. That's before taxes of course. Then realize out that EUR->USD history: from 1:1 to 1:1.5 in ten years, and meanwhile wages in Euros have been kept relatively constant. You can't survive in Europe if you get paid in USD, these days.

maybeindie 15y ago
That seems consistent with what I've heard, too.
jordinl 15y ago
that sounds like a lot! What technology are we talking about? Also, do this roles require being able to speak french?
- babebridou 15y ago
  Nah if you speak any European language you can land that kind of gig, just elsewhere in (Western)Europe. That won't pay the bills, though. In order to do these jobs you need to be near one of the bigger cities, where the cost of life is excruciatingly high, 2.5$ for an espresso, 10$ for a pint, 1250$ for a month in a 30m2 flat. Add to that between an hour and two of commute time every day... About the tech, for that kind of money it's mostly Java, PHP and C++, with a bit of perl, Oracle PL/SQL. We're old fashioned :) but for the past few years C#, .NET, and javascript are making a splendid coming out, and there's always demand for ObjectiveC (iOS mostly). Now don't take my words for truth about the tech on the market, I'm super biased by the company I've worked in and their customers. But in any case it's nothing compared to what you earn if you're good enough with Excel, Powerpoint and absolutely nothing else. The more tech you know, the less you bill is the rule of thumb at least in the French consulting business.