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I appreciate the person's intention behind sharing this data but as someone with some meaningful context in compensation (heavily involved in recruiting, managi

I appreciate the person's intention behind sharing this data but as someone with some meaningful context in compensation (heavily involved in recruiting, managing, and several personal job searches in recent years) I just don't find this remotely meaningful. Companies, teams, locations, and people are all fairly non-fungible and it's very hard to compare across. Even the idea of "level" that companies use is super coarse. An L5 is not comparable to another L5 even at the same firm. What is the value of me knowing that someone makes more or less than me in "the same" role. Is it really the same role or does he work on high impact, all-eyes-on-you stuff while I am doing sleepy back-office work? Or maybe I barely squeaked by the interview while he was considered for the next level already. Maybe he's bringing some domain specific skills that I just don't have. Etc. What I am saying is there's almost never enough context that helps you understand why the person makes what they make and to compare that to your situation. If all this does is make you think you should be earning more but you keep getting rejected without understanding why, you are just more frustrated than where you started.

xeromal 4y ago
I'm in 100% agreeance with you. Salaries are very individual specific and depend on a ton of factors. I will say that openness when it comes to salaries is beneficial in an order-of-magnitude kind of way. If you're making half of what someone is making in the same role at a similar company, you're either not as good as you think you are or you're horrible at negotiating.
- LesZedCB 4y ago
  But they don't need to be. Thats why why there's a push for clear salary ranges and deterministic pay scale It's not your problem when you're being paid well, until you aren't.
  - xyzelement 4y ago
    I strongly believe that if you "aren't being paid well" just some raw data isn't going to make the difference for you. What you make is a function of how much I want you and how much it takes to get you to move over there. If you're making $100, it doesn't matter that you decide you're worth $150 because you saw that number somewhere - what matters is whether I can easily get another "you" for $100 or not. If you were $150 material, you'd already know it from all the recruiters banging on your door offering you $150 jobs.
    - LesZedCB 4y ago
      you're individualizing it. it's not about the individual, even though to you professionally it is. individuals can't by definition engage in collective bargaining. but building awareness of the disparity, especially in domains like tech, is where this process starts.
deleted 4y ago
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GauntletWizard 4y ago
Jobs aren't fungible, but compensation is. That's the point of denominating it in dollars and not cows or sheep. It may be hard to compare, but it is okay to compare things that are hard to compare, and that's what values are. Some people value different jobs differently. Some people would be happy with far less compensation for the same job, while some people wouldn't accept a fair offer for personal reasons. These are good things about monetary and professional fungibility; people can compare on the jobs merits. Monetary compensation is not the only one, but it is a large one.
- xyzelement 4y ago
  I think you mainly missed the point. I see you're an SRE, let's say I am also one. If I see that you make 200% of what I make, what does that tell me? It definitely doesn't necessarily mean I am underpaid. And I have no way to figure that out. So what does comparing your comp to mine enable me to do?

xeromal 4y ago

I'm in 100% agreeance with you. Salaries are very individual specific and depend on a ton of factors. I will say that openness when it comes to salaries is beneficial in an order-of-magnitude kind of way. If you're making half of what someone is making in the same role at a similar company, you're either not as good as you think you are or you're horrible at negotiating.

LesZedCB 4y ago
But they don't need to be. Thats why why there's a push for clear salary ranges and deterministic pay scale It's not your problem when you're being paid well, until you aren't.
- xyzelement 4y ago
  I strongly believe that if you "aren't being paid well" just some raw data isn't going to make the difference for you. What you make is a function of how much I want you and how much it takes to get you to move over there. If you're making $100, it doesn't matter that you decide you're worth $150 because you saw that number somewhere - what matters is whether I can easily get another "you" for $100 or not. If you were $150 material, you'd already know it from all the recruiters banging on your door offering you $150 jobs.
  - LesZedCB 4y ago
    you're individualizing it. it's not about the individual, even though to you professionally it is. individuals can't by definition engage in collective bargaining. but building awareness of the disparity, especially in domains like tech, is where this process starts.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

GauntletWizard 4y ago

Jobs aren't fungible, but compensation is. That's the point of denominating it in dollars and not cows or sheep. It may be hard to compare, but it is okay to compare things that are hard to compare, and that's what values are. Some people value different jobs differently. Some people would be happy with far less compensation for the same job, while some people wouldn't accept a fair offer for personal reasons. These are good things about monetary and professional fungibility; people can compare on the jobs merits. Monetary compensation is not the only one, but it is a large one.

xyzelement 4y ago
I think you mainly missed the point. I see you're an SRE, let's say I am also one. If I see that you make 200% of what I make, what does that tell me? It definitely doesn't necessarily mean I am underpaid. And I have no way to figure that out. So what does comparing your comp to mine enable me to do?