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I see a lot of people saying that money isn't an issue they would leave a job for. To me, money is the #1 thing that could make me leave a job. Maybe not 5%, bu

by MadManE 12y ago

I see a lot of people saying that money isn't an issue they would leave a job for. To me, money is the #1 thing that could make me leave a job. Maybe not 5%, but it realistically wouldn't take more for me to bail. 10% is almost a guarantee that I'll work for you. I think this shows just how significant the gap is between software engineering and everything else. I went into mechanical engineering; my brother did software engineering. I don't know the specifics, but he makes way more than I do. Not 20% more, but 200% more. Some of that is location - I live in the middle of the country, he lives in California. But even without leaving, I could increase my salary by at least 50% by being able to write software. Assuming that this is for a generic employee/employer relations advice, then pay is absolutely a huge concern. It's simply one that has been mostly solved in Silicon Valley.

freshflowers 12y ago
I think this is a function of the relative immaturity of software development. The pay is lagging behind the importance and scarcity of software developers, and this is distributed unevenly. Company A may be in a place where the relative value of their developers may be 2% more than what they currently pay them, but for company B is in a place where they would gladly pay 25% more and still get a big fat return on that investment. By the time company A catches up (as in, software has now become way more important to their business), half of their developers have moved on. They review their recruitment and retention strategy, and one year on they are the ones paying more than company B.
Iftheshoefits 12y ago
It isn't even close to being solved in Silicon Valley, for a variety of reasons, mainly due to the culture within the industry. My opinion is that there are two strains of cultural thought in this industry that allow developer wages to be kept relatively low compared with the revenues and margins of the companies they work for: 1) the rather Galt-like (and empirically unjustfiable) thought that development work is a meritocracy; 2) the strong line of thinking that prioritizes "enjoying my work" over "selling my very life in the form of time" coupled with the frequent (mistaken, in my opinion[0]) belief that the work is important. [0] I believe it's mistaken because, frankly, the vast majority of development work is for the very base purpose of commerce. Rarely, in cases where development is related to some scientific or artistic pursuit to advance human knowledge, it's important in any meaningful sense outside of commercial activity. On this basis, the commerce-related importance of a role necessarily implies that compensation ought to be a major factor if considered from a rational perspective.
- MadManE 12y ago
  I think that here "solved" is relative. What I meant was that pay is mostly removed from the equation as a requirement, because it is high enough that there is no possibility that base needs aren't covered by it. The motivation behind whether higher pay is effective or not is mostly irrelevant.

by MadManE 12y ago

freshflowers 12y ago

I think this is a function of the relative immaturity of software development. The pay is lagging behind the importance and scarcity of software developers, and this is distributed unevenly. Company A may be in a place where the relative value of their developers may be 2% more than what they currently pay them, but for company B is in a place where they would gladly pay 25% more and still get a big fat return on that investment. By the time company A catches up (as in, software has now become way more important to their business), half of their developers have moved on. They review their recruitment and retention strategy, and one year on they are the ones paying more than company B.

Iftheshoefits 12y ago

It isn't even close to being solved in Silicon Valley, for a variety of reasons, mainly due to the culture within the industry. My opinion is that there are two strains of cultural thought in this industry that allow developer wages to be kept relatively low compared with the revenues and margins of the companies they work for: 1) the rather Galt-like (and empirically unjustfiable) thought that development work is a meritocracy; 2) the strong line of thinking that prioritizes "enjoying my work" over "selling my very life in the form of time" coupled with the frequent (mistaken, in my opinion[0]) belief that the work is important. [0] I believe it's mistaken because, frankly, the vast majority of development work is for the very base purpose of commerce. Rarely, in cases where development is related to some scientific or artistic pursuit to advance human knowledge, it's important in any meaningful sense outside of commercial activity. On this basis, the commerce-related importance of a role necessarily implies that compensation ought to be a major factor if considered from a rational perspective.

MadManE 12y ago
I think that here "solved" is relative. What I meant was that pay is mostly removed from the equation as a requirement, because it is high enough that there is no possibility that base needs aren't covered by it. The motivation behind whether higher pay is effective or not is mostly irrelevant.