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Agreed. We don’t even need to reach for the apples to oranges comparisons with manual labor jobs, just gotta look at anyone working another highly paid white co

Agreed. We don’t even need to reach for the apples to oranges comparisons with manual labor jobs, just gotta look at anyone working another highly paid white collar job. Compare working in big law to big tech, and it will be plain as day. And I am not even getting into the baseline requirements to get there (undergrad from a good school with great GPA, LSAT, a top law school that is gonna cost you a pretty penny, hustling for internships, BAR, etc.), which SWE as a career has pretty much none of. The overall work-life balance difference alone is crazy.

FirmwareBurner 2y ago
>Compare working in big law to big tech Not everyone works in big tech. A lot of devs worldwide work in mom and pop shops, legacy businesses, or various consultancy/body shops. Big-tech workers are the exception, not the rule, except maybe for the US workers.
- filoleg 2y ago
  That’s a fair point, but I am not sure how it is relevant, unless devs at mom&pop shops/legacy businesses/etc. and those outside of the US work more than the US lawyers (or any other highly-paid white collar job) or have barriers to entry similar to those. From those I know working at those places (and from working at a legacy business myself at one point, a big bank), that didn’t seem to be the case at all. At startups, sure, but that’s just a high risk/high reward type of a deal, and they still don’t have almost any barriers to entry either. Is it the case outside of the US? Genuine question, because I am not super familiar with close reality dev jobs outside of the US. But from what I saw, it didn’t strike me as an obvious thing that they get ground to the bone or have high barriers to entry (as opposed to other highly-paid white collar jobs).
  - lucyjojo 2y ago
    most devs are not highly paid outside the USA. they're good jobs for sure, pay-wise it would be around plumber range? no high barrier to entry whether you're worked to the bone or not depends on the place but yeah, in general devs have nothing to complain about.
    - filoleg 2y ago
      Looks like we are in agreement. Interesting sidenote, given you mentioned plumbers: being a plumber in the US has higher barriers to entry than being a dev (gotta have your apprenticeship program completed under a licensed master plumber and pass the journeyman plumber exam). On the flip side, they get paid pretty decently well.
    - deleted 2y ago
      [deleted]
    - no_wizard 2y ago
      >but yeah, in general devs have nothing to complain about. I respectfully disagree. I think there's alot of room for improvement in our industry, even in regards to pay we could do better. Think of the value delivered per engineer vs what they're paid, the ratio is typically very high, meaning engineers are paid a fraction of what value they provide.
    - hadlock 2y ago
      > they're good jobs for sure, pay-wise it would be around plumber range? This has been my observation, software developer pays about the same as a plumber or electrician in places like England, outside of select industries like high finance in London etc
- no_wizard 2y ago
  >except maybe for the US workers Nope, so called 'dark matter' developers are the majority in the US too. HN is such a small sliver of the developer community, those who work for big tech even more so

FirmwareBurner 2y ago

>Compare working in big law to big tech Not everyone works in big tech. A lot of devs worldwide work in mom and pop shops, legacy businesses, or various consultancy/body shops. Big-tech workers are the exception, not the rule, except maybe for the US workers.

filoleg 2y ago
That’s a fair point, but I am not sure how it is relevant, unless devs at mom&pop shops/legacy businesses/etc. and those outside of the US work more than the US lawyers (or any other highly-paid white collar job) or have barriers to entry similar to those. From those I know working at those places (and from working at a legacy business myself at one point, a big bank), that didn’t seem to be the case at all. At startups, sure, but that’s just a high risk/high reward type of a deal, and they still don’t have almost any barriers to entry either. Is it the case outside of the US? Genuine question, because I am not super familiar with close reality dev jobs outside of the US. But from what I saw, it didn’t strike me as an obvious thing that they get ground to the bone or have high barriers to entry (as opposed to other highly-paid white collar jobs).
- lucyjojo 2y ago
  most devs are not highly paid outside the USA. they're good jobs for sure, pay-wise it would be around plumber range? no high barrier to entry whether you're worked to the bone or not depends on the place but yeah, in general devs have nothing to complain about.
  - filoleg 2y ago
    Looks like we are in agreement. Interesting sidenote, given you mentioned plumbers: being a plumber in the US has higher barriers to entry than being a dev (gotta have your apprenticeship program completed under a licensed master plumber and pass the journeyman plumber exam). On the flip side, they get paid pretty decently well.
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
  - no_wizard 2y ago
    >but yeah, in general devs have nothing to complain about. I respectfully disagree. I think there's alot of room for improvement in our industry, even in regards to pay we could do better. Think of the value delivered per engineer vs what they're paid, the ratio is typically very high, meaning engineers are paid a fraction of what value they provide.
  - hadlock 2y ago
    > they're good jobs for sure, pay-wise it would be around plumber range? This has been my observation, software developer pays about the same as a plumber or electrician in places like England, outside of select industries like high finance in London etc
no_wizard 2y ago
>except maybe for the US workers Nope, so called 'dark matter' developers are the majority in the US too. HN is such a small sliver of the developer community, those who work for big tech even more so