7 ms·
Why are software engineer salaries so low in Germany?
by aantix 5y ago
Why are software engineer salaries so low in Germany?
- engineeringwoke 5y agoI've worked in US and northern EU and in the latter there is basically no funding (relatively) and no talent feeders like FAANG. Senior engineers are also enamored with unnecessary complexity and founders still want to treat technical folks (even very senior) like cogs in a machine.
- moneywoes 5y agoI believe the better question is why US salaries are so high
- aantix 5y agoScalability of work? The work of a few engineers can support a workflow of a million users. That spending $1 on engineering can bring in $10 of revenue.
- ahtihn 5y agoIs that work somehow less scalable when done in Germany?
- ushakov 5y agoFAANG targets global audience, German companies target primarily Germany/Switzerland/Austria
- aantix 5y agoThe U.S. has the consumer products that have reached global scale. And they probably want to deal only with engineers from the U.S. for legal reasons. And up until recently, they’ve only hired in the Valley. Finding qualified distributed system engineers with that funnel would definitely reduce the pool to several thousands.
- caskstrength 5y ago> I believe the better question is why US salaries are so high Why wouldn't they be? US companies that drive up the salaries are extremely profitable and they compete for limited pool of engineers.
- MagnumOpus 5y agoFAANG stock price increases and the California startup bubble have increased money availability to the US software industry and massively inflated what coders cam earn there over the last 15 years. Eventually this has translated in raises across the US as other companies lost their best coders to FAANG (and MS and unicorns that pay six digits). Europe remains fairly isolated from this effect because (a) not enough EU coders want to move to the US even at triple the salary to cause a shortage of coders there and (b) FAANG and US firms can get away with paying less in Europe because remote work is not yet quite equivalent to being on-prem in the US...
- vmception 5y agoalso not all EU coders can come to the US even to network while on a tourists visa because many can't get those either. these are correlated with extremely destitute areas of europe where earnings are much lower, but they can go to Germany.
- ahtihn 5y agoMost of the people who can go to Germany can easily go to Switzerland as well where salaries are much, much higher.
- michaelt 5y agoGermany doesn't have adtech companies like Facebook and Google that vacuum up cash from the entire globe and deposit it all into San Francisco, or finance companies that vacuum up sketchy money from global oligarchs and deposit it all into London. Why don't German developers move to SF or London? Some do, but then they're not software developers in Germany... Why don't SF and London companies hire Germans to work remotely? Some are willing to - but they're also willing to hire Polish and Bulgarian developers, so the market rate isn't that great.
- missedthecue 5y agoThey don't have strong unions like in America.
- monadgonad 5y agoTech workers are extremely ununionised, especially in the US. While this may be the case in other industries (though I doubt it - Germany famously has much better labour laws than the US and other European countries), I don’t think it has any effect on developer salaries.
- dzhiurgis 5y ago> ununionised ionised then?