4 ms·

Living wage? haha, more like 100 peoples living wage.

sillysaurusx 5y ago
In America, most unskilled software developers make somewhere in the $80k to $140k range. A living wage is around $20k for absolute bare minimum essentials. Skilled devs still get around $200k. Point is, maybe 10 people. And that’s if you like ramen.
- aiisjustanif 5y ago
  > Skilled devs still get around $200k. Moderately skilled it engineers other of backgrounds and devs can make much more than $200k, just go check levels.fyi To the parent comments point > It's a bit wild that the sum total money spent on salaries for engineers handling potential problems stemming from this or defending against the possibility in the future could probably have covered paying the maintainer a living wage many times over. The collective effort across numerous companies is much more than just $200k and you can bet your butt on that.
- llamataboot 5y ago
  I don't know where people get these crazy numbers - Even in America outside of the coasts and outside of FAANG, making $140-$150+ as a senior developer is very good (and compared to almost all other industries is absurd) - salary.com which doesn't just rely on self-reported info as levels does reports the median salary + bonus for senior software engineers as $120k https://www.salary.com/tools/salary-calculator/senior-software-engineer?type=bonus https://www.salary.com/tools/salary-calculator/senior-softwa... Outside of the US, even in more expensive places in the EU, even the equivalent of $100k for a super senior lead architect would be Very Good - I don't know a single SWE in the midwest in the US - including senior embedded systems engineers working on medical devices, senior firmware devs working on networking equipment, or any web engineer that makes more than $175k and I know plenty of Very Good senior full-stack web devs that make $125-$150 $125k a year is still a top of the top salary in the US, so don't cry for them tho
  - Dylan16807 5y ago
    They were using extreme numbers to say that even then you barely hit 10x. That's why the number they used for a living wage is so low too.
    - sillysaurusx 5y ago
      I just don’t think HN is interested in this anymore. There was a time. It’s gone now. Dumb comments saying software engineers make 100x a living wage (as if this would be a bad thing) are the flavor du jour. It’s hard not to respond in kind. But thank you, for what it’s worth. I remember you from 2010. It was quite a time.
      - mmmmmbop 5y ago
        For what it's worth, I didn't read thefourthchime's comment in a way that would suggest that software engineers are making 100x a living wage. The way I understood it, they meant that the total cost of all engineer hours spent on rectifying the problems caused by the 'colors' and 'faker' issue would easily cover 100 living wages.

In America, most unskilled software developers make somewhere in the $80k to $140k range. A living wage is around $20k for absolute bare minimum essentials. Skilled devs still get around $200k. Point is, maybe 10 people. And that’s if you like ramen.

aiisjustanif 5y ago
> Skilled devs still get around $200k. Moderately skilled it engineers other of backgrounds and devs can make much more than $200k, just go check levels.fyi To the parent comments point > It's a bit wild that the sum total money spent on salaries for engineers handling potential problems stemming from this or defending against the possibility in the future could probably have covered paying the maintainer a living wage many times over. The collective effort across numerous companies is much more than just $200k and you can bet your butt on that.
llamataboot 5y ago
I don't know where people get these crazy numbers - Even in America outside of the coasts and outside of FAANG, making $140-$150+ as a senior developer is very good (and compared to almost all other industries is absurd) - salary.com which doesn't just rely on self-reported info as levels does reports the median salary + bonus for senior software engineers as $120k https://www.salary.com/tools/salary-calculator/senior-software-engineer?type=bonus https://www.salary.com/tools/salary-calculator/senior-softwa... Outside of the US, even in more expensive places in the EU, even the equivalent of $100k for a super senior lead architect would be Very Good - I don't know a single SWE in the midwest in the US - including senior embedded systems engineers working on medical devices, senior firmware devs working on networking equipment, or any web engineer that makes more than $175k and I know plenty of Very Good senior full-stack web devs that make $125-$150 $125k a year is still a top of the top salary in the US, so don't cry for them tho
- Dylan16807 5y ago
  They were using extreme numbers to say that even then you barely hit 10x. That's why the number they used for a living wage is so low too.
  - sillysaurusx 5y ago
    I just don’t think HN is interested in this anymore. There was a time. It’s gone now. Dumb comments saying software engineers make 100x a living wage (as if this would be a bad thing) are the flavor du jour. It’s hard not to respond in kind. But thank you, for what it’s worth. I remember you from 2010. It was quite a time.
    - mmmmmbop 5y ago
      For what it's worth, I didn't read thefourthchime's comment in a way that would suggest that software engineers are making 100x a living wage. The way I understood it, they meant that the total cost of all engineer hours spent on rectifying the problems caused by the 'colors' and 'faker' issue would easily cover 100 living wages.