6 ms·

What is that insane salary? Seems you have no idea about how much executives are paid at that level in general. Or for Mozilla everyone has to work for free?

by geodel 5y ago

0xJRS 5y ago
rzzzt 5y ago
Maybe somewhere between the two extremes?
cnasc 5y ago
Does Mozilla pay their software developers an industry-standard TC?
- pc86 5y ago
  It looks like Mozilla's average SDE salary is about $120k, so yes. The national median software developer salary is something like $110k. The middle 50% range is like $85-150k, so if you're making above 150k TC you're already in the top 1/4 of developers, who are already very high up in general. I say this because people on HN love to pretend that "industry-standard" means $250k+ for new grads and $400k for experienced ICs when that's just not true. FAANG-level salaries (which can absolutely be 300, 400, 500k TC) are the 1% of the 1%.
  - cnasc 5y ago
    I don’t think it’s unreasonable to compare the take-home-pay of a Google engineer working on Chrome to that of a Mozilla engineer working on Firefox. That’s a good peer comparison to make. It is definitely unreasonable to compare a Mozilla engineer’s pay to an average brought down by body-shop CRUD operations. They’re really not the same industry.
  - sendilkumarn 5y ago
    That definitely feels a bit low. Is this considering only US or worldwide?
    - flyingfences 5y ago
      Outside of SV/NYC, that's not low at all.
    - pc86 5y ago
      It's the US median salary. If you're outside of SV and NYC, as a new grad you're looking at $60-70k, with no bonus and no stock (because outside of tech 99% of companies don't give their employees stock until they're at the director/VP level).
  - justapassenger 5y ago
    > FAANG-level salaries (which can absolutely be 300, 400, 500k TC) are the 1% of the 1%. Mozilla is going against FAANG products like Chrome. Compared to the competition their salaries are tiny.
  - sciurus 5y ago
    > It looks like Mozilla's average SDE salary is about $120k, so yes. I'm not sure where you're getting that number, but it's much too low. The figures at https://www.levels.fyi/company/Mozilla/salaries/Software-Engineer/ https://www.levels.fyi/company/Mozilla/salaries/Software-Eng... better match what I saw when I worked at Mozilla. You can compare compensation at equivalent levels for Mozilla and peer companies at https://www.levels.fyi/?compare=Mozilla,Microsoft,Apple,Google&track=Software%20Engineer https://www.levels.fyi/?compare=Mozilla,Microsoft,Apple,Goog... . You'll see that Mozilla pays well, but significantly less than them.
  - comp_throw7 5y ago
    > FAANG-level salaries (which can absolutely be 300, 400, 500k TC) are the 1% of the 1%. FAANG & companies that pay similarly employ something like 8-10% of the engineers in the country, so this is an enormous overexaggeration. We can quibble about whether it's reasonable to represent that as "industry standard" or not, but it's not such a drastic outlier that it becomes unreasonable to use it as a point of reference when discussing things that might be reasonable to aim for (or expect, in certain contexts).
ralmidani 5y ago
Nobody said anyone has to work for free. In general (not picking on Mozilla), I think it’s hypocritical when non-execs are told they should accept lower pay than they would make at a for-profit because “our mission!”, while execs justify their out-of-proportion pay by citing how much they could make at a for-profit. Shouldn’t executives be __more__ committed to the mission?
gruturo 5y ago
OP was clearly specific: EXEC salaries, not engineers and developers. And I'm not sure I would want their current execs there even if they indeed worked for free, not to mention at their absurdly high, grossly underserved salaries while they butcher the company all the way down. So yeah, find me a way to finance Firefox only, and not the funny projects, and to ensure that not a single cent goes to their execs (neither directly nor through some creative accounting, where they reduce engineer salaries to offset the cashflow from this new stream, and pocket the savings), and you have my 10 bucks a month for the next 8 years (and possibly longer, but let's see what they do in 8 years). I won't move the goalposts and I'll make good on my promise.
- paxys 5y ago
  The person you replied to was specific as well. Execs are paid well industry wide. If you aren't willing to pay market rates then you aren't going to get competent leadership to manage organizations at that scale.
  - silisili 5y ago
    Currently seems paying market rates and not getting competent leadership, so something seems amiss.
    - geodel 5y ago
      Nothing is amiss. Paying competitive salary is necessary condition not sufficient one. Just like paying IT staff competitive salary is basic requirement but that does not guarantee projects' success at all.
  - lesuorac 5y ago
    Ah yes, FireFox's issue is they're paying Execs below market rate. If they want to get better market share they should start paying more! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_share_of_web_browsers#Older_reports_(2000%E2%80%932019) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_share_of_web_browsers#Ol... --- Afaik people's main issues with the exec salary is their poor performance. Why pay "market rate" for "below market performance"?
lnxg33k1 5y ago
No they need to pocket 8 million dollars and fire developers, absolutely

What is that insane salary? Seems you have no idea about how much executives are paid at that level in general. Or for Mozilla everyone has to work for free?

by geodel 5y ago

What is that insane salary? Seems you have no idea about how much executives are paid at that level in general. Or for Mozilla everyone has to work for free?

0xJRS 5y ago

rzzzt 5y ago

Maybe somewhere between the two extremes?

cnasc 5y ago

Does Mozilla pay their software developers an industry-standard TC?

pc86 5y ago
It looks like Mozilla's average SDE salary is about $120k, so yes. The national median software developer salary is something like $110k. The middle 50% range is like $85-150k, so if you're making above 150k TC you're already in the top 1/4 of developers, who are already very high up in general. I say this because people on HN love to pretend that "industry-standard" means $250k+ for new grads and $400k for experienced ICs when that's just not true. FAANG-level salaries (which can absolutely be 300, 400, 500k TC) are the 1% of the 1%.
- cnasc 5y ago
  I don’t think it’s unreasonable to compare the take-home-pay of a Google engineer working on Chrome to that of a Mozilla engineer working on Firefox. That’s a good peer comparison to make. It is definitely unreasonable to compare a Mozilla engineer’s pay to an average brought down by body-shop CRUD operations. They’re really not the same industry.
- sendilkumarn 5y ago
  That definitely feels a bit low. Is this considering only US or worldwide?
  - flyingfences 5y ago
    Outside of SV/NYC, that's not low at all.
  - pc86 5y ago
    It's the US median salary. If you're outside of SV and NYC, as a new grad you're looking at $60-70k, with no bonus and no stock (because outside of tech 99% of companies don't give their employees stock until they're at the director/VP level).
- justapassenger 5y ago
  > FAANG-level salaries (which can absolutely be 300, 400, 500k TC) are the 1% of the 1%. Mozilla is going against FAANG products like Chrome. Compared to the competition their salaries are tiny.
- sciurus 5y ago
  > It looks like Mozilla's average SDE salary is about $120k, so yes. I'm not sure where you're getting that number, but it's much too low. The figures at https://www.levels.fyi/company/Mozilla/salaries/Software-Engineer/ https://www.levels.fyi/company/Mozilla/salaries/Software-Eng... better match what I saw when I worked at Mozilla. You can compare compensation at equivalent levels for Mozilla and peer companies at https://www.levels.fyi/?compare=Mozilla,Microsoft,Apple,Google&track=Software%20Engineer https://www.levels.fyi/?compare=Mozilla,Microsoft,Apple,Goog... . You'll see that Mozilla pays well, but significantly less than them.
- comp_throw7 5y ago
  > FAANG-level salaries (which can absolutely be 300, 400, 500k TC) are the 1% of the 1%. FAANG & companies that pay similarly employ something like 8-10% of the engineers in the country, so this is an enormous overexaggeration. We can quibble about whether it's reasonable to represent that as "industry standard" or not, but it's not such a drastic outlier that it becomes unreasonable to use it as a point of reference when discussing things that might be reasonable to aim for (or expect, in certain contexts).

ralmidani 5y ago

Nobody said anyone has to work for free. In general (not picking on Mozilla), I think it’s hypocritical when non-execs are told they should accept lower pay than they would make at a for-profit because “our mission!”, while execs justify their out-of-proportion pay by citing how much they could make at a for-profit. Shouldn’t executives be __more__ committed to the mission?

gruturo 5y ago

OP was clearly specific: EXEC salaries, not engineers and developers. And I'm not sure I would want their current execs there even if they indeed worked for free, not to mention at their absurdly high, grossly underserved salaries while they butcher the company all the way down. So yeah, find me a way to finance Firefox only, and not the funny projects, and to ensure that not a single cent goes to their execs (neither directly nor through some creative accounting, where they reduce engineer salaries to offset the cashflow from this new stream, and pocket the savings), and you have my 10 bucks a month for the next 8 years (and possibly longer, but let's see what they do in 8 years). I won't move the goalposts and I'll make good on my promise.

paxys 5y ago
The person you replied to was specific as well. Execs are paid well industry wide. If you aren't willing to pay market rates then you aren't going to get competent leadership to manage organizations at that scale.
- silisili 5y ago
  Currently seems paying market rates and not getting competent leadership, so something seems amiss.
  - geodel 5y ago
    Nothing is amiss. Paying competitive salary is necessary condition not sufficient one. Just like paying IT staff competitive salary is basic requirement but that does not guarantee projects' success at all.
- lesuorac 5y ago
  Ah yes, FireFox's issue is they're paying Execs below market rate. If they want to get better market share they should start paying more! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_share_of_web_browsers#Older_reports_(2000%E2%80%932019) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_share_of_web_browsers#Ol... --- Afaik people's main issues with the exec salary is their poor performance. Why pay "market rate" for "below market performance"?

lnxg33k1 5y ago

No they need to pocket 8 million dollars and fire developers, absolutely