4 ms·

He is absolutely correct. A senior Linux admin is going to charge $75 an hour, and the contracting company that finds them will charge $25 an hour for handling

He is absolutely correct. A senior Linux admin is going to charge $75 an hour, and the contracting company that finds them will charge $25 an hour for handling the paperwork. You could hire someone full time for about $120K a year but then with benefits and employer taxes it will end up being closer to $150K a year anyway.

tptacek 15y ago
$120k is nosebleed high for full-time sysadmin. Are you sure we're talking about "system administrator" and not a more specialized role like "devops"? I know to us nerds those are basically the same thing, but they really aren't. If you're doing sysadmin for the primary purpose of deploying and maintaining boxes designed to run one proprietary application, you might be a devops person, and not a sysadmin. Again, this might be a valley thing. I've got a bunch of friends who have complained how hard it is to get sysadmin in SFBA. Just know, if that's the case, the dropoff in salary outside the valley is waaaaaaaaaay sharper than it is for dev, which is pretty much just COLA adjusted from place to place. (We staff offices in Manhattan, Chicago, and Mountain View, for what it's worth).
- apinstein 15y ago
  For my part, I suppose I was talking devops, or at least a sysadmin that thinks devops is a good idea and can help make it happen. It's probably wrong from a larger perspective to lump the two together, but for me sysadmin as a role has been supplanted with devops. If you are a sysadmin that doesn't want to automate away their work via devops, you are not doing it right.
  - tptacek 15y ago
    I agree that as a career choice, "system administrator" seems less lucrative than "devops". Remember, though, that not every sysadmin job is for an agile software shop. There are plenty of places that care a lot more about patch cycles than they do about single-click deployments. More importantly though, bill rates and capability do not track each other. Bill rates track risk. There is a lot of amazing- but- unproven systems talent out there, and there are some very expensive pikers on the market too. Generally I would agree that the more you pay, the less likely you are to have to fire 3 months later. It helps a lot to be able to do the job yourself, soup-to-nuts, so that you'll have a better shot at screening candidates.
- illumin8 15y ago
  Not sure where you're getting your numbers at, but $100K is entry level for a sysadmin in NYC, and $120K is normal for a sysadmin with a few years of experience. I'm sure northern California is similar.
  - tptacek 15y ago
    $100k is not entry level for a sysadmin in NYC. I get my numbers from the fact that just about half my company, including its headquarters, is in NYC. I am absolutely confident that there's some role/vertical definition you can come up with where sysadmins are making $100k in the door. But I think you're discounting most of the market for sysadmins, just like the people on the other current HN sysadmin thread who all seem to believe that sysadmins also optimize SQL queries, fix C code, and teach systems programming to stupid developers.

tptacek 15y ago

$120k is nosebleed high for full-time sysadmin. Are you sure we're talking about "system administrator" and not a more specialized role like "devops"? I know to us nerds those are basically the same thing, but they really aren't. If you're doing sysadmin for the primary purpose of deploying and maintaining boxes designed to run one proprietary application, you might be a devops person, and not a sysadmin. Again, this might be a valley thing. I've got a bunch of friends who have complained how hard it is to get sysadmin in SFBA. Just know, if that's the case, the dropoff in salary outside the valley is waaaaaaaaaay sharper than it is for dev, which is pretty much just COLA adjusted from place to place. (We staff offices in Manhattan, Chicago, and Mountain View, for what it's worth).

apinstein 15y ago
For my part, I suppose I was talking devops, or at least a sysadmin that thinks devops is a good idea and can help make it happen. It's probably wrong from a larger perspective to lump the two together, but for me sysadmin as a role has been supplanted with devops. If you are a sysadmin that doesn't want to automate away their work via devops, you are not doing it right.
- tptacek 15y ago
  I agree that as a career choice, "system administrator" seems less lucrative than "devops". Remember, though, that not every sysadmin job is for an agile software shop. There are plenty of places that care a lot more about patch cycles than they do about single-click deployments. More importantly though, bill rates and capability do not track each other. Bill rates track risk. There is a lot of amazing- but- unproven systems talent out there, and there are some very expensive pikers on the market too. Generally I would agree that the more you pay, the less likely you are to have to fire 3 months later. It helps a lot to be able to do the job yourself, soup-to-nuts, so that you'll have a better shot at screening candidates.
illumin8 15y ago
Not sure where you're getting your numbers at, but $100K is entry level for a sysadmin in NYC, and $120K is normal for a sysadmin with a few years of experience. I'm sure northern California is similar.
- tptacek 15y ago
  $100k is not entry level for a sysadmin in NYC. I get my numbers from the fact that just about half my company, including its headquarters, is in NYC. I am absolutely confident that there's some role/vertical definition you can come up with where sysadmins are making $100k in the door. But I think you're discounting most of the market for sysadmins, just like the people on the other current HN sysadmin thread who all seem to believe that sysadmins also optimize SQL queries, fix C code, and teach systems programming to stupid developers.