5 ms·

But you're also not paying ~17000 kronor a month in rent, are you? If you have a company in an area where the rent levels (and cost of living in general) are h

But you're also not paying ~17000 kronor a month in rent, are you? If you have a company in an area where the rent levels (and cost of living in general) are high, you will have to pay high salaries if you want to have any employees at all. But presumably having a company in the area allows you to generate more wealth than you would in any other area, which offsets the salaries. The only way you can take advantage of it is by moving to such a place. But note that companies are taking advantage of the reverse by moving their offices to places where the cost of living is lower, which means they can lower their salaries.

Chrono 15y ago
I do believe you cap out the taxes in Sweden at ~50k SEK/m so you would end up paying 52-59.9% in income tax on that figure. And if you live in Stockholm you pretty much CANNOT get anything decent to rent so you are forced to buy. A one bedroom flat at 34 m^2 in a good Stockholm location you might be looking up to $300,000. But no healthcare costs so it probably averages out in the end :o
itmag 15y ago
Maybe companies could build semi-permanent barracks near their offices or something? :p Take a page from the US Army, they know how to rapidly set up living quarters for large numbers of people. http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/3c/Military_camp_at_Bagram,_Afghanistan.jpg http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/3c/Military_... Would it be nice to live in such a place? Maybe not, but it would eliminate rent and the commute time. Also, living in a code-tent seems pretty bad ass (at least after it's over). A more humane version might be to just rent a large villa and stuff all the programmers in there. Aren't there a lot of abandoned McMansions in the US? Point is: from an operations perspective, there should be a more optimal solution than pissing away $50k a year on single-bedroom apartments. If a company were to come up with a smarter solution, the programmers could make more net money while being paid a lower gross income.
- apaprocki 15y ago
  The latest Economist special report touches on this in Russia, where companies needed to support workers in the middle of nowhere: A visit to the headquarters of Russian Railways can feel a bit like a voyage back in time. The guards wear the peaked hats and gruff manners of the Soviet era. A display shows the children of railway workers triumphing in chess and athletics. Vladimir Yakunin, the company’s boss, started his career with the KGB. He concedes that his company is a giant of an organisation: it has 1.2m employees, 20,000 stations, 86,000km of track, a network of schools and health clinics and even an equestrian school. ... He also points out that some of the oddities of his company, such as its schools and clinics, have been around for a century and derive from the difficulties of running a railway in the middle of nowhere. There is no such thing as pure capitalism or pure socialism, he argues; only more or less sensible solutions to practical problems. http://www.economist.com/node/21542929 http://www.economist.com/node/21542929
ricardobeat 15y ago
Even if you pay U$3k a month in rent, that's U$64k to live on. It's not unusual for rent/mortgages to eat up 30-50% of someone's income in most of the world.
- jbester 15y ago
  That's a 100k gross salary. I don't live in CA, but I'd guess about 30-40% overall tax rate including state tax. That leaves the earner 60k-70k overall to live on. That rent is >= 50% of their income.
- robflynn 15y ago
  Don't forget about income taxes, that'll skew that more toward the 50% mark .

Chrono 15y ago

I do believe you cap out the taxes in Sweden at ~50k SEK/m so you would end up paying 52-59.9% in income tax on that figure. And if you live in Stockholm you pretty much CANNOT get anything decent to rent so you are forced to buy. A one bedroom flat at 34 m^2 in a good Stockholm location you might be looking up to $300,000. But no healthcare costs so it probably averages out in the end :o

itmag 15y ago

Maybe companies could build semi-permanent barracks near their offices or something? :p Take a page from the US Army, they know how to rapidly set up living quarters for large numbers of people. http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/3c/Military_camp_at_Bagram,_Afghanistan.jpg http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/3c/Military_... Would it be nice to live in such a place? Maybe not, but it would eliminate rent and the commute time. Also, living in a code-tent seems pretty bad ass (at least after it's over). A more humane version might be to just rent a large villa and stuff all the programmers in there. Aren't there a lot of abandoned McMansions in the US? Point is: from an operations perspective, there should be a more optimal solution than pissing away $50k a year on single-bedroom apartments. If a company were to come up with a smarter solution, the programmers could make more net money while being paid a lower gross income.

apaprocki 15y ago
The latest Economist special report touches on this in Russia, where companies needed to support workers in the middle of nowhere: A visit to the headquarters of Russian Railways can feel a bit like a voyage back in time. The guards wear the peaked hats and gruff manners of the Soviet era. A display shows the children of railway workers triumphing in chess and athletics. Vladimir Yakunin, the company’s boss, started his career with the KGB. He concedes that his company is a giant of an organisation: it has 1.2m employees, 20,000 stations, 86,000km of track, a network of schools and health clinics and even an equestrian school. ... He also points out that some of the oddities of his company, such as its schools and clinics, have been around for a century and derive from the difficulties of running a railway in the middle of nowhere. There is no such thing as pure capitalism or pure socialism, he argues; only more or less sensible solutions to practical problems. http://www.economist.com/node/21542929 http://www.economist.com/node/21542929

ricardobeat 15y ago

Even if you pay U$3k a month in rent, that's U$64k to live on. It's not unusual for rent/mortgages to eat up 30-50% of someone's income in most of the world.

jbester 15y ago
That's a 100k gross salary. I don't live in CA, but I'd guess about 30-40% overall tax rate including state tax. That leaves the earner 60k-70k overall to live on. That rent is >= 50% of their income.
robflynn 15y ago
Don't forget about income taxes, that'll skew that more toward the 50% mark .