9 ms·

From my limited perspective (non-German software engineer working in Germany), Germany is still a great country for people like me: - prices are not that expen

by danwee 3y ago

From my limited perspective (non-German software engineer working in Germany), Germany is still a great country for people like me: - prices are not that expensive like in the nordic countries. If you cook at home most of the week, you can easily spend only around 350-450 EUR/month eating healthy food - renting is still hard (it's not so easy to find an apartment), but you can get a decent place for around 1.5K EUR/month (or less). I pay 1.2K/month for a 80 sqm (not city center, but not outside of it neither) - if you have > 10 years of working experience, you can definitely reach the 100K EUR/year (not FAANG). It's not easy, but not insanely difficult. Reaching 80K EUR/year is even more standard. This puts you on the top 10-5% of earners in Germany, so you get to save a lot of money per month - electricity/gas bills are getting more expensive, but still you won't notice with your kind of salary - health insurance is good enough - public transportation works just fine (not the best, but surely good enough). Tons of options (bus, tram, trains, bikes) - big cities in the west are welcoming to people who don't speak German Compare this with the situation of other european countries like France, Italy (a bit cheaper than Germany in general, but salaries are way lower in IT: around 30-40% lower) or even the Netherlands (not cheaper than Germany, and salaries are usually ~15% lower in general for IT). So, if Germany is doing bad, I cannot imagine how other EU countries are doing. The only thing Germany needs to fix is the winter time (you cannot expect to have healthy people when the sun sets at around 3-4pm in winter). P.S. And I love the work culture: "9-5 -> work. Outside of working hours -> don't even bother reaching me, I won't answer"

shtopointo 3y ago
> Compare this with the situation of other european countries like France What's the problem in France?
- danwee 3y ago
  I didn't mean that there is a problem with such countries. I meant that prices are generally more or less the same (e.g., in the supermarkets, the price of an iphone, cinema tickets, etc.) but salaries are lower (at least in the IT industry, I see that one gets around 30% less in countries like France, Spain and Italy compared to what I could get in Germany, but definitely the cost of living in Germany is not 30% higher than in such countries).
  - hn_throwaway_99 3y ago
    This seems like such a common problem where I wonder if there is anything that can be done to break this cycle. For an equivalent comparison, on this side of the pond tech salaries in Canada are abysmal compared to US salaries (at least from what I hear). And it's not like Canada is a ton cheaper (their real estate affordability crisis makes even places like California look a bit tame). But then I often here how policymakers in Canada wish there were "more tech" north of the border how they put in place programs to attract tech talent to the country. Of course, those programs are usually completely useless when engineers can double their salary coming to the US. But a big part of the issue is that companies simply couldn't afford to double their salaries because they aren't as profitable as US tech giants (and not even FAANGs, but just other mid-tier tech companies as well). But it's going to be hard to build top tier tech companies if you can't attract top tier tech talent, so the cycle spirals. I'm curious what tech salaries are like in bonafide EU tech standouts like Spotify.
    - nradov 3y ago
      Why can't Canadian tech companies be just as profitable? The North American market is fairly unified; there are few obstacles to Canadian companies selling in the USA. What are they missing?
      - VK538FY 3y ago
        It's a bloody good question. From Nortel to BlackBerry, Canada has great potential that sort of goes pschitte in the end. Not to mention the continuing progress of the gaming or film sectors -- or even quantum computing. Universities are strong (at least in my home province) and I'd prefer them to anything that I've seen in the US, France or Germany. There may be a more economic than social explanation behind Canada's mediocre performance. Resource extraction is very profitable and maybe this extractive logic is transferred to other economic activities. Just throwing the idea out there.
    - piva00 3y ago
      > I'm curious what tech salaries are like in bonafide EU tech standouts like Spotify. Usual mid-high end of Swedish tech salaries in Sweden. Not sure about the USA. > But a big part of the issue is that companies simply couldn't afford to double their salaries because they aren't as profitable as US tech giants I don't understand why there's always a comparison to US's salaries, the US is the outlier in every discussion about labour and salaries, almost nowhere else in the world (maybe except for Switzerland and similar countries) pays such high salaries, the rest of the world won't pay as much as the USA, it's a fact, I'd prefer to stop comparing everywhere else to that outlier, it won't be the rule. It's the top benchmark and it has a huge cost in terms of quality of life for a chunk of the population, the USA is a business-first, citizenry-after kind of society, I don't feel it's a way of being that other countries should emulate. At least after living there for a while I never really felt that it was so rich, it has loads of rich people with shiny toys but society in general feels poor: infrastructure sucks (passing by any airport in the USA is a trip back to the 80s/90s), stuck with the car-centric mentality from the 50s, a very palpable huge divide between rich and poor, etc. The USA has amazing businesses, and makes a lot of money, but I don't think it trickles down into society; given how rich the country is in nominal terms I'm always surprised whenever I pass by and realise that wealth is not translated into a better general quality of life for most citizens, it's just that people can afford to buy more trinkets...
aeyes 3y ago
> you can definitely reach the 100K EUR/year Before taxes and contributions. If you are single without kids 100k is ~58k net.
- danwee 3y ago
  That's right. It won't make you rich. Just take into account that 100K eur/year is unheard of in other european countries.
- kleiba 3y ago
  And, of course, the difference is not just money that goes "to the government", but you get some of it back in form of various benefits, such as free education, a pretty nice high speed highway system (and other roads, of course), comprehensive health insurance (including dental), etc.
- Retric 3y ago
  It’s harder to compare these numbers than you might think. The US numbers get seriously fudged via the 12.4% cough 6.2% social security payments etc. Germany pays 7.3% for health insurance which looks bad except we pay 2.9% for Medicare without being able to use it so it’s more like 4.4% for health and dental insurance for 366/Month @100K which doesn’t look so bad. Of course when people are talking 100k salaries in the US this stuff is baked in so the underlying numbers aren’t necessarily important only achievable take home pay and cost of living.
- lm28469 3y ago
  Which is extremely comfortable, more than twice the average salary and puts you in the top 10%
  - snapplebobapple 3y ago
    That's not the right metric. The right metric is what you would have paid if there was no coercion but also if free loading wasn't an option (aka you would pay up to the marginal benefit to you of the marginal tax. The benefit includes network effects, which gives you the logical framework for why someone would want to pay tax to benefit someone else (they get a positive network effect from helping that person)) It's hard to calculate but it's almost certainly lower than 42 %
DoughnutHole 3y ago
> The only thing Germany needs to fix is the winter time (you cannot expect to have healthy people when the sun sets at around 3-4pm in winter). Short of taking Germany and pushing it further south I don’t think there’s much to do about that. Permanent daylight savings will give people in parts of the country daylight for ~30 minutes after 5, at the cost of people commuting in the dark at their groggiest in the morning. A further change would compound that even more. The reality is that if you live near the top of the world the winter daylight situation is gonna suck.
- rich_sasha 3y ago
  I was once in Iceland in mid-December (around equinox). They are heavily shifted in their time zone, so sun was up at 9 am and down at 9 pm. I loved it! For me personally sunlight in the morning is a waste, I barely notice it before 3rd coffee. But afternoon/evening... lovely!
  - tzs 3y ago
    Uhm...Iceland in mid-December only gets about 4 hours of sunlight a day. Also, December has a solstice not an equinox. They get 12 hours of sunlight in September and March (which have equinoxes), so maybe one of those is what you were thinking of?
    - rich_sasha 3y ago
      Ah, typo. Mid March.
lm28469 3y ago
> Germany is still a great country for people like me: Any country in the world is great for people like us, even the dumbest IT worker will make 2x the min wage of the locals. Don't forget we're the main cause of gentrification too, we're the reason why locals have to flee the city centers
ChumpGPT 3y ago
DO NOT LISTEN TO OP! Europe is awful and NA is a million times better. You do not want to even consider moving to Europe (especially Germany, Czechia, Poland and even Ukraine! Everything is worse, even downtown SF or India are better! Stay in the USA and Canada or you will regret it! OP please delete this comment and stop trying to convince people your life is great.
- yowzadave 3y ago
  Assuming ChumpGPT is a European who likes it there and doesn't want it to get crowded with expat Americans.
TheCoelacanth 3y ago
The definition of "worst-performing" that they're using is relative to the prior year in the same country, i.e. Germany had the worst annual growth rate for their economy. That says nothing about standards of living between countries. Even if Norway had -10% growth rate and Afghanistan had a +10% growth rate, I would still much rather be living in Norway.

by danwee 3y ago

shtopointo 3y ago

> Compare this with the situation of other european countries like France What's the problem in France?

danwee 3y ago
I didn't mean that there is a problem with such countries. I meant that prices are generally more or less the same (e.g., in the supermarkets, the price of an iphone, cinema tickets, etc.) but salaries are lower (at least in the IT industry, I see that one gets around 30% less in countries like France, Spain and Italy compared to what I could get in Germany, but definitely the cost of living in Germany is not 30% higher than in such countries).
- hn_throwaway_99 3y ago
  This seems like such a common problem where I wonder if there is anything that can be done to break this cycle. For an equivalent comparison, on this side of the pond tech salaries in Canada are abysmal compared to US salaries (at least from what I hear). And it's not like Canada is a ton cheaper (their real estate affordability crisis makes even places like California look a bit tame). But then I often here how policymakers in Canada wish there were "more tech" north of the border how they put in place programs to attract tech talent to the country. Of course, those programs are usually completely useless when engineers can double their salary coming to the US. But a big part of the issue is that companies simply couldn't afford to double their salaries because they aren't as profitable as US tech giants (and not even FAANGs, but just other mid-tier tech companies as well). But it's going to be hard to build top tier tech companies if you can't attract top tier tech talent, so the cycle spirals. I'm curious what tech salaries are like in bonafide EU tech standouts like Spotify.
  - nradov 3y ago
    Why can't Canadian tech companies be just as profitable? The North American market is fairly unified; there are few obstacles to Canadian companies selling in the USA. What are they missing?
    - VK538FY 3y ago
      It's a bloody good question. From Nortel to BlackBerry, Canada has great potential that sort of goes pschitte in the end. Not to mention the continuing progress of the gaming or film sectors -- or even quantum computing. Universities are strong (at least in my home province) and I'd prefer them to anything that I've seen in the US, France or Germany. There may be a more economic than social explanation behind Canada's mediocre performance. Resource extraction is very profitable and maybe this extractive logic is transferred to other economic activities. Just throwing the idea out there.
  - piva00 3y ago
    > I'm curious what tech salaries are like in bonafide EU tech standouts like Spotify. Usual mid-high end of Swedish tech salaries in Sweden. Not sure about the USA. > But a big part of the issue is that companies simply couldn't afford to double their salaries because they aren't as profitable as US tech giants I don't understand why there's always a comparison to US's salaries, the US is the outlier in every discussion about labour and salaries, almost nowhere else in the world (maybe except for Switzerland and similar countries) pays such high salaries, the rest of the world won't pay as much as the USA, it's a fact, I'd prefer to stop comparing everywhere else to that outlier, it won't be the rule. It's the top benchmark and it has a huge cost in terms of quality of life for a chunk of the population, the USA is a business-first, citizenry-after kind of society, I don't feel it's a way of being that other countries should emulate. At least after living there for a while I never really felt that it was so rich, it has loads of rich people with shiny toys but society in general feels poor: infrastructure sucks (passing by any airport in the USA is a trip back to the 80s/90s), stuck with the car-centric mentality from the 50s, a very palpable huge divide between rich and poor, etc. The USA has amazing businesses, and makes a lot of money, but I don't think it trickles down into society; given how rich the country is in nominal terms I'm always surprised whenever I pass by and realise that wealth is not translated into a better general quality of life for most citizens, it's just that people can afford to buy more trinkets...

aeyes 3y ago

> you can definitely reach the 100K EUR/year Before taxes and contributions. If you are single without kids 100k is ~58k net.

danwee 3y ago
That's right. It won't make you rich. Just take into account that 100K eur/year is unheard of in other european countries.
kleiba 3y ago
And, of course, the difference is not just money that goes "to the government", but you get some of it back in form of various benefits, such as free education, a pretty nice high speed highway system (and other roads, of course), comprehensive health insurance (including dental), etc.
Retric 3y ago
It’s harder to compare these numbers than you might think. The US numbers get seriously fudged via the 12.4% cough 6.2% social security payments etc. Germany pays 7.3% for health insurance which looks bad except we pay 2.9% for Medicare without being able to use it so it’s more like 4.4% for health and dental insurance for 366/Month @100K which doesn’t look so bad. Of course when people are talking 100k salaries in the US this stuff is baked in so the underlying numbers aren’t necessarily important only achievable take home pay and cost of living.
lm28469 3y ago
Which is extremely comfortable, more than twice the average salary and puts you in the top 10%
- snapplebobapple 3y ago
  That's not the right metric. The right metric is what you would have paid if there was no coercion but also if free loading wasn't an option (aka you would pay up to the marginal benefit to you of the marginal tax. The benefit includes network effects, which gives you the logical framework for why someone would want to pay tax to benefit someone else (they get a positive network effect from helping that person)) It's hard to calculate but it's almost certainly lower than 42 %

DoughnutHole 3y ago

> The only thing Germany needs to fix is the winter time (you cannot expect to have healthy people when the sun sets at around 3-4pm in winter). Short of taking Germany and pushing it further south I don’t think there’s much to do about that. Permanent daylight savings will give people in parts of the country daylight for ~30 minutes after 5, at the cost of people commuting in the dark at their groggiest in the morning. A further change would compound that even more. The reality is that if you live near the top of the world the winter daylight situation is gonna suck.

rich_sasha 3y ago
I was once in Iceland in mid-December (around equinox). They are heavily shifted in their time zone, so sun was up at 9 am and down at 9 pm. I loved it! For me personally sunlight in the morning is a waste, I barely notice it before 3rd coffee. But afternoon/evening... lovely!
- tzs 3y ago
  Uhm...Iceland in mid-December only gets about 4 hours of sunlight a day. Also, December has a solstice not an equinox. They get 12 hours of sunlight in September and March (which have equinoxes), so maybe one of those is what you were thinking of?
  - rich_sasha 3y ago
    Ah, typo. Mid March.

lm28469 3y ago

> Germany is still a great country for people like me: Any country in the world is great for people like us, even the dumbest IT worker will make 2x the min wage of the locals. Don't forget we're the main cause of gentrification too, we're the reason why locals have to flee the city centers

ChumpGPT 3y ago

DO NOT LISTEN TO OP! Europe is awful and NA is a million times better. You do not want to even consider moving to Europe (especially Germany, Czechia, Poland and even Ukraine! Everything is worse, even downtown SF or India are better! Stay in the USA and Canada or you will regret it! OP please delete this comment and stop trying to convince people your life is great.

yowzadave 3y ago
Assuming ChumpGPT is a European who likes it there and doesn't want it to get crowded with expat Americans.

TheCoelacanth 3y ago

The definition of "worst-performing" that they're using is relative to the prior year in the same country, i.e. Germany had the worst annual growth rate for their economy. That says nothing about standards of living between countries. Even if Norway had -10% growth rate and Afghanistan had a +10% growth rate, I would still much rather be living in Norway.