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Apparently the new team is in Munich, where I live. Now, in Germany, Munich is almost a synonym for "ridiculously expensive". It's really difficult to believe t
by Arnt 3y ago
Apparently the new team is in Munich, where I live. Now, in Germany, Munich is almost a synonym for "ridiculously expensive". It's really difficult to believe that anyone would move here motivated by low cost. SF has higher costs, no question, but moving here because of low cost? That's hard to believe.
I wonder whether this is mostly about some management power struggle.
- xhkkffbf 3y agoMunich may be expensive, but is it as expensive as the US Bay Area?
- Arnt 3y agoIf pricing where the issue, would you move from the most expensive area to another famously expensive area? Seems weird, which makes me suspect that it's really something else, such as orgchart politics.
- RicoElectrico 3y agoI'd expect Poland for example, purely for bang-for-buck. Buying power and CoL are still catching up.
- dekhn 3y agoI think there's a few things here; some leaders in TI have long hated python and wished it would Go away, and I think they finally "won" in convincing their bosses to start that process by reducing the throughput of the python team. I think it's also possible leadership wants to indicate to long-term googlers that their jobs are not safe as a way to motivate their replacements. You end up with a certain amount of complacency after a decade at google.
- searealist 3y agoAt least they don't wish it to C++ away...
- randomdata 3y agoThe implication is that the workers are willing to work for less pay. Any additional cost to exist in Munich is unlikely to be much more than a rounding error in comparison to the labour cost. Which, according to Google Search, seems to be the case – with typical software engineer salaries coming in at half of what US developers realize. But perhaps your first-hand experience sees something different?
- Arnt 3y agoI don't know about the US, but the fully loaded cost of a Munich software developer is well above €100k. Take-home pay is one thing, fully loaded cost is quite another. EDIT: I should be explicit about my conclusion. Munich is cheaper than some places, but that doesn't make it the kind of place you choose if you're looking to move to if your want avoid experience developers.
- randomdata 3y agoThe typical US developer will take home well above €100k (although Google developers generally take home considerably more than that). Rule of thumb is that the fully-loaded cost is, at minimum, 2x take home, so we're well into €200-300k territory.
- randomdata 3y ago> EDIT: [...] if your want avoid experience developers. They want to avoid expensive developers, not experienced developers. There is no reason to think the new German team is lacking in any way, but they are almost certainly willing to work for a fraction of the price of a comparable developer stateside. There isn't the same kind of demand for them as compared to the US in order to juice salaries. Like was said earlier, you can hire a German developer all in for somewhere around €100k. That's nothing compared to what Google is accostomed to paying. It is true that the there are even weaker markets out there, but they come with other costs, like cultural barriers, that start to negate the difference. Germany hits the sweet spot of developers coming cheap, and still being experienced and talented on the same level Google is accustomed to, all while sharing an American-like culture. Labour costs are almost the entirety of the cost of developing software. The cost of existing in the city is effectively irrelevant. Munich being expensive doesn't matter.
- msolujic 3y agoAgreed. Munich is crazy expensive Serbia or Romania get a much better bang for a buck. Maybe this is part of long-term term strategy to move "commodity" roles to cheaper markets amid recent FTC decision on forbiden non-compete ...
- Arnt 3y agoEh… never attribute to a Plan that which is adequately explained by org chart politics?