7 ms·
If you are a student, I would still recommend moving to SV. It's probably the best place in the world right now to be a software developer. This wage-theft stu
by debt 13y ago
If you are a student, I would still recommend moving to SV. It's probably the best place in the world right now to be a software developer. This wage-theft stuff is for very experienced echelons of engineers.
- peterb 13y agoThe wage-theft stuff lowers the curve for everyone, not just the top tier. It lowers the entire wage curve.
- accountoftheday 13y agoThe article does not support this claim. My reading is that GOOG's HR department kept/keeps the salary curve artificially flat (over-rewarding low performers) to manage pay within a narrow band and thereby prevent having to negotiate with top performers.
- nerfhammer 13y agoThis is also an effect of the "flat" org structure. Few annoying managers! and also almost no chance of becoming one of those managers.
- judk 13y agoI don't understand how employee A's salary is a factor in whether Employee B gets negotiated with.
- nerfhammer 13y agoFrom the article: > Google, like the others, used a “salary algorithm” to ensure salaries remained within a tight band across like jobs. Although tech companies like to claim that talent and hard work are rewarded, in private, Google’s “People Ops” department kept overall compensation essentially equitable by making sure that lower-paid employees who performed well got higher salary increases than higher-paid employees who also performed well.
- AutoCorrect 13y agoI'm in Atlanta, and our company does this too. So it's not just SV that is keeping salaries low.
- walshemj 13y agoShifting the curve of distribution (changing its Skewness) alters the entire distribution this is basic statistics 101. A positive skew will effectively reduce all employees wages http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skewness http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skewness
- nerfhammer 13y ago> If you are a student, I would still recommend moving to SV. <snark ratio="0.5">My advice would be to make sure you could find a place to live there first</snark>
- argonaut 13y agoAre you from SV? There are plenty of affordable places to live in SV. Just because everyone is talking about how SF is sooo expensive, does not mean you can't live in Berkeley/Oakland/East Palo Alto/other areas.
- unohoo 13y agoeast palo alto ? are. you. serious ?
- robertkrahn01 13y agoEast Palo Alto Struggles to Remain Affordable for Low-Income Residents [http://www.kqed.org/a/forum/R201401171000 http://www.kqed.org/a/forum/R201401171000]
- krakensden 13y agoIt's not 1995 anymore.
- khuey 13y agoCommuting from Berkeley/Oakland to SV is not fun.
- snappy173 13y agoSV != SF. East Bay -> SF, especially near BART is easy enough. East Bay -> SV is ... may as well be Portland ... Maine.
- tsunamifury 13y agoI do it every day.
- robyates 13y agoAgreed, there many good positions for new college grads. I don't think there is any better location than SV when starting a software engineering career. While housing prices are quite high, working in technology you are certainly able to afford the higher rents. The problem is when you don't work in tech and live here.
- ryanSrich 13y agoI'd have to respectfully disagree. While I've never worked in the valley I have researched and interviewed with 10+ companies there. My findings were that startups there are extremely busy. They are slow to respond to emails, meetings and interviews are often missed/rescheduled, and salaries are relatively low (<100k). When talking to execs it became clear that they demand 45+ hours a week. Compare that to Austin, Seattle, DC, Chicago, and Portland, who all have thriving startup communities that often match SV wages, and SV starts to look less appealing. SV working conditions are not something a college grad should strive for. They should focus on locking down a nice salary with relatively cheap living costs, clearing themselves of debt, and growing their personal worth with side projects.
- caniszczyk 13y agoThis man knows what he's talking about, listen to him kids
- debt 13y agoI want to agree, but the scene here is really incomparable to anywhere else. There's simply too much damn VC money floating around which attracts top business people. Chicago does not have billions of dollars of VC floating around. Austin might. DC does not. Also, the wages here in SV can not be matched anywhere else. It's economically impossible to pay someone a SV wage anywhere else. Economically impossible because if you're a business that has intentionally based your company in say DC then why would you continue to pay your engineers SV-sized wages. You'd be amongst the wealthiest people in DC if you were paid what a typical engineer is offered here.
- 13y ago
- kriro 13y agoWell if you care for privacy and data protection I'd recommend not moving to SV. Most places are not a lot better but many places at least try harder/care at all.