6 ms·

Fresh CS graduate wages down 20 percent

18 points by jasonlbaptiste 18y ago

secorp 18y ago
I mis-read this as "French" CS graduate wages down 20 percent :)
- awad 18y ago
  same here
  - pietro 18y ago
    So did I, and it didn't make any sense. Wages don't adapt to changing market conditions that easily in France.
aneesh 18y ago
That's just one data point. I don't have any numbers, but this doesn't seem to be the case at the big software companies.
- deleted 18y ago
  [deleted]
poshj 18y ago
Hi guys, I want to know how much exactly do fresh CS graduate(B.Sc) gets in US nowadays? I'm based in Japan, and we will get 2147 USD(200k yen) for base salary only no matter how good you are. It seems very cheap :( since the high living cost here. The yearly bonus is about 4~5 months of base salary, but you don't usually get it unless you are really recognized by the management team. EDIT: I must say, this is also the same for big companies like IBM Japan, SAP, etc.
- smanek 18y ago
  It varies greatly on skill/pedigree (the two often, but not always, correlate). If you are poor to average you'll start at $50K-70k/year. If you're average to good you'll start at 70k-90k, and 90k+ if you're particularly good (about 150K is the maximum I've heard of, and that's more in modeling or quantitative development than straight programming). About a 10% bonus is normal in my experience, but that obviously varies based on skill/industry. There is also some give based on what sort of company/industry you want (e.g., I personally know someone who just this week turned down a six figure offer at a hedge fund for ~20k less doing AI research). Those numbers are for a programmer in/near big cities (Boston, Silicon Valley, NY, etc). Revise them down ~10% for more rural/suburban areas (but it's harder to find work beyond code-monkey level at all in many of those places). And all this is based on my anecdotal experience, so figure there is likely some selection bias. In my experience, between federal and state income taxes, FICA, and sales tax you'll lose ~50% of your of your income to the government. And we have to save for our own retirement (we expect nothing from social security) and our kids' college education (currently ~15k-30K/year tuition). How are your taxes/retirement/etc in Japan?
  - litewulf 18y ago
    +1 sounds about right. My offers were 80k to 120k. (I'd say I went to a pretty decent university, but I wasn't too amazing.) There is massive massive variance based on the kind of position you are talking about. I would say your numbers seem about right, though with the caveat that CS graduates can end up doing all sorts of things from IT-gruntwork-level tasks to rank and file software engineers, all the way to, yes, quants who are offered lots and lots of money.
    - teej 18y ago
      I'd take a gamble and say that the name of the unversity is much more likely to effect your offer than grades. And even then, it probably doesn't scale down. As a hiring manager, you either went to a school I recognize or you didn't.
      - 18y ago
PStamatiou 18y ago
I wouldn't put much weight on this.. it's a 3 sentence blog post without much backing.
- wheels 18y ago
  "Technology sales are down 20%! ... I know 'cause I talked to my buddy who works at a computer store and he said he normally sells 5 laptops a day, but yesterday when we met for a beer he said he only sold 4." That would be about as worthwhile of a generalization. That said, I'd be surprised if wages weren't down across the board, with more emphasis on fresh graduates. This is hardly a surprise with lots of layoffs and a depressed economy.
- volida 18y ago
  so you need 3 pages of a blog post to sound convincing? I suppose that's the reason I don't read the majority of blogs out there...
- bd 18y ago
  This is from Phillip Greenspun's blog, so it has more credibility than if it would be just some random blogger. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phillip_Greenspun http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phillip_Greenspun
  - wheels 18y ago
    No it doesn't. It's still just an anecdote.
    - bd 18y ago
      Credibility of the anecdote, title is a bunk.
kqr2 18y ago
Employers / recruiters can use the bad economic news (Adobe layoffs, etc) in conjunction with the "exploding offer" to drive down wages of new graduates. http://www.joelonsoftware.com/items/2008/11/26.html http://www.joelonsoftware.com/items/2008/11/26.html
ig1 18y ago
I've done some research in this area (my startup is dev recruitment related) and from what I've seen that large tech companies aren't cutting fresh graduate wages because it complicated internal politics. If you pay this years grads less than last years, then they will find out about it and it creates ill-will and bad politics within the company. However the number of grad roles at the top-end are being cut, so previously grads who could have got a high-paying job at a top-end company now have to take a lesser paying job at a slightly worse company.
decode 18y ago
Every year, the University of Michigan publishes a survey of salaries for its Engineering graduates: http://career.engin.umich.edu/salary/ http://career.engin.umich.edu/salary/ Average annual full-time salaries for computer science graduates finishing in the 2007-2008 school year, by degree: Bachelors - $73,761 Masters - $79,762 PhD - $103,740 All of these amounts are up from the previous year. Caveats: the sample size is small, it's a top Research I University in Engineering, and participation is on a volunteer basis, so the participants may self-select in certain unknown ways. Also, the most recent survey is from the class that graduated in April, which was before many of the scary economic things began happening.
Dilpil 18y ago
...for a sample size of one?
wd40 18y ago
Anyone know what yc startups like scribd pay their developers?
vlad 18y ago
Maybe if they stop cursing and start recursing. Sorry for the worst and most annoying joke ever.

I mis-read this as "French" CS graduate wages down 20 percent :)

awad 18y ago
same here
- pietro 18y ago
  So did I, and it didn't make any sense. Wages don't adapt to changing market conditions that easily in France.

That's just one data point. I don't have any numbers, but this doesn't seem to be the case at the big software companies.

deleted 18y ago
[deleted]

poshj 18y ago

Hi guys, I want to know how much exactly do fresh CS graduate(B.Sc) gets in US nowadays? I'm based in Japan, and we will get 2147 USD(200k yen) for base salary only no matter how good you are. It seems very cheap :( since the high living cost here. The yearly bonus is about 4~5 months of base salary, but you don't usually get it unless you are really recognized by the management team. EDIT: I must say, this is also the same for big companies like IBM Japan, SAP, etc.

smanek 18y ago
It varies greatly on skill/pedigree (the two often, but not always, correlate). If you are poor to average you'll start at $50K-70k/year. If you're average to good you'll start at 70k-90k, and 90k+ if you're particularly good (about 150K is the maximum I've heard of, and that's more in modeling or quantitative development than straight programming). About a 10% bonus is normal in my experience, but that obviously varies based on skill/industry. There is also some give based on what sort of company/industry you want (e.g., I personally know someone who just this week turned down a six figure offer at a hedge fund for ~20k less doing AI research). Those numbers are for a programmer in/near big cities (Boston, Silicon Valley, NY, etc). Revise them down ~10% for more rural/suburban areas (but it's harder to find work beyond code-monkey level at all in many of those places). And all this is based on my anecdotal experience, so figure there is likely some selection bias. In my experience, between federal and state income taxes, FICA, and sales tax you'll lose ~50% of your of your income to the government. And we have to save for our own retirement (we expect nothing from social security) and our kids' college education (currently ~15k-30K/year tuition). How are your taxes/retirement/etc in Japan?
- litewulf 18y ago
  +1 sounds about right. My offers were 80k to 120k. (I'd say I went to a pretty decent university, but I wasn't too amazing.) There is massive massive variance based on the kind of position you are talking about. I would say your numbers seem about right, though with the caveat that CS graduates can end up doing all sorts of things from IT-gruntwork-level tasks to rank and file software engineers, all the way to, yes, quants who are offered lots and lots of money.
  - teej 18y ago
    I'd take a gamble and say that the name of the unversity is much more likely to effect your offer than grades. And even then, it probably doesn't scale down. As a hiring manager, you either went to a school I recognize or you didn't.
    - 18y ago

PStamatiou 18y ago

I wouldn't put much weight on this.. it's a 3 sentence blog post without much backing.

wheels 18y ago
"Technology sales are down 20%! ... I know 'cause I talked to my buddy who works at a computer store and he said he normally sells 5 laptops a day, but yesterday when we met for a beer he said he only sold 4." That would be about as worthwhile of a generalization. That said, I'd be surprised if wages weren't down across the board, with more emphasis on fresh graduates. This is hardly a surprise with lots of layoffs and a depressed economy.
volida 18y ago
so you need 3 pages of a blog post to sound convincing? I suppose that's the reason I don't read the majority of blogs out there...
bd 18y ago
This is from Phillip Greenspun's blog, so it has more credibility than if it would be just some random blogger. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phillip_Greenspun http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phillip_Greenspun
- wheels 18y ago
  No it doesn't. It's still just an anecdote.
  - bd 18y ago
    Credibility of the anecdote, title is a bunk.

kqr2 18y ago

Employers / recruiters can use the bad economic news (Adobe layoffs, etc) in conjunction with the "exploding offer" to drive down wages of new graduates. http://www.joelonsoftware.com/items/2008/11/26.html http://www.joelonsoftware.com/items/2008/11/26.html

ig1 18y ago

I've done some research in this area (my startup is dev recruitment related) and from what I've seen that large tech companies aren't cutting fresh graduate wages because it complicated internal politics. If you pay this years grads less than last years, then they will find out about it and it creates ill-will and bad politics within the company. However the number of grad roles at the top-end are being cut, so previously grads who could have got a high-paying job at a top-end company now have to take a lesser paying job at a slightly worse company.

decode 18y ago

Every year, the University of Michigan publishes a survey of salaries for its Engineering graduates: http://career.engin.umich.edu/salary/ http://career.engin.umich.edu/salary/ Average annual full-time salaries for computer science graduates finishing in the 2007-2008 school year, by degree: Bachelors - $73,761 Masters - $79,762 PhD - $103,740 All of these amounts are up from the previous year. Caveats: the sample size is small, it's a top Research I University in Engineering, and participation is on a volunteer basis, so the participants may self-select in certain unknown ways. Also, the most recent survey is from the class that graduated in April, which was before many of the scary economic things began happening.

Dilpil 18y ago

...for a sample size of one?

wd40 18y ago

Anyone know what yc startups like scribd pay their developers?

vlad 18y ago

Maybe if they stop cursing and start recursing. Sorry for the worst and most annoying joke ever.