6 ms·

This makes me cringe a bit. What this document says seems to be that France is a great country to start a company in mostly because you can get cheap labor. It

by heyts 12y ago

This makes me cringe a bit. What this document says seems to be that France is a great country to start a company in mostly because you can get cheap labor. It is stated that a mid-level dev is $50-80K in France, however the cost of living in Paris is comparable to living in New York, so it means that you ultimately should come to Paris because you can cut your payroll by 20%.

fab13n 12y ago
> you ultimately should come to Paris because you can cut your payroll by 20%. Don't forget that your employees enjoy perks such as free healthcare or unemployment insurance from the government. Moreover, they had their MSc for free or almost, which means they don't have any student loan to pay back. If they have kids, their school is probably both decent and free. If it isn't, what's meant by "expensive private school" around there is a couple thousand euros a year. Also, 5-7 weeks of paid vacation are included. Most US workers would be better off getting all of this for a 20% pay cut.
- patrickaljord 12y ago
  > Most US workers would be better off getting all of this for a 20% pay cut. It's not a 20% pay cut, when you get paid €5k here, your employer already gives ~€4k to the government to pay for all those "free social services", and then you still have to pay 30% tax on your income. So the "free" education and healthcare actually costs you something like €6k per month, most people are not aware of this because half of these are paid upfront by your employer, if only French knew how much they were paying for their expensive "free" social services... And they have to pay it for the rest of their lives whereas Americans can pay back their education loans way before that. Last but not least, you should know that healthcare does reimburse less each year, so you are now forced to pay for a private insurance in addition to the high tax you already pay for many healthcare services such as dentists, blood analysis and more. Great free services indeed! > 5-7 weeks of paid vacation are included. Yes, tell me about that. Every time I try to get someone at a company, half the time he's either on vacation or on RTT, and I'm asked if I could wait a week until he comes back. This makes doing business here way slower to get things done, very frustrating and hard to compete.
  - weddpros 12y ago
    So true. Last month, they announced a new law: Pay slips will be "simplified" by hiding all the contributions paid for by the employer. When I asked french relatives, they'd tell me "but it's not a part of my salary, it's what my boss pays". You. Stupid.
  - fab13n 12y ago
    > healthcare does reimburse less each year The part that matters is the one about serious conditions: accidents, cancers, infarctus etc. Paying a few hundreds a months to get a few thousands back when you break a tooth or your glasses isn't a life-changing service, it merely regulates your cash-flow for a fee. What matters is knowing that if you need a 6- or 7-figures treatment, you'll get it. You won't be bankrupt because of it, your insurance won't weasel out of paying for it, and your employment status at the time you discovered your disease is irrelevant to the way you'll be treated. All of those life-threatening and/or chronic conditions are handled by public insurance, and 100% reimbursed (except for convenience services like individual hospital room with TV, which indeed you have to pay for, directly or through your private insurance). You're right that the 20% discount claimed by the presentation is probably meant "out of the company's pocket", net salary differences are way beyond 20%. I think a regular developer with a few years of experience but no super-sexy skill will get around €2000-€2500 net of taxes in Paris. That's not a lot if you want to rent a decent flat inside Paris. People know how much they actually cost to their employer, it's written right next to their net salary on their salary sheet every month, and it's regularly reminded to them in public debates. About education, there's another advantage to its public funding: prices don't get ridiculously inflated as they are in American universities. There's no education bubble in countries supporting public education. Also, it (somewhat) improves meritocratic social mobility, which means a higher rate of smart kids actually becoming skilled professionals. Finally, as a potential employer, schools which don't treat their students as customers tend to force-feed them more of the unpalatable curriculums such as maths, algorithms, etc. You tend to get a better trained workforce. To sum it up, European prefer lower risk lifestyles, on average. There's more redistribution of wealth, less opportunity to become very rich, and less violence (I count denying a life-saving chemotherapy as violence, although social safety nets also alter crime rates). This appeals more to the kind of people who happily stay salaried than to risk-loving entrepreneurs. But as an entrepreneur, there's value in settling somewhere that appeals to the kind of people who will happily remain your employees: you don't have to pay them the opportunity cost of renouncing to become Mark Zuckerberg. What this presentation unfairly brushed off war the amount of bureaucracy you have to face in order to get anything done, and how even harder to navigate it is when you aren't a native.
foobarge 12y ago
Salaries are very depressed. Experienced engineers outside of Paris make 45K top, when you live in Paris you get a 30% salary increase for the cost of living. Payroll wise: take what you pay someone, multiply by two, that's what you actually have to front: half goes to the worker (who will be heavily taxed) and the rest is tax. Taxation is pure confiscation here.
- heyts 12y ago
  I agree that taxation is definitely an issue, but I also feel that the field of computer engineering is under-valued in France as a general rule.

by heyts 12y ago

fab13n 12y ago

> you ultimately should come to Paris because you can cut your payroll by 20%. Don't forget that your employees enjoy perks such as free healthcare or unemployment insurance from the government. Moreover, they had their MSc for free or almost, which means they don't have any student loan to pay back. If they have kids, their school is probably both decent and free. If it isn't, what's meant by "expensive private school" around there is a couple thousand euros a year. Also, 5-7 weeks of paid vacation are included. Most US workers would be better off getting all of this for a 20% pay cut.

patrickaljord 12y ago
> Most US workers would be better off getting all of this for a 20% pay cut. It's not a 20% pay cut, when you get paid €5k here, your employer already gives ~€4k to the government to pay for all those "free social services", and then you still have to pay 30% tax on your income. So the "free" education and healthcare actually costs you something like €6k per month, most people are not aware of this because half of these are paid upfront by your employer, if only French knew how much they were paying for their expensive "free" social services... And they have to pay it for the rest of their lives whereas Americans can pay back their education loans way before that. Last but not least, you should know that healthcare does reimburse less each year, so you are now forced to pay for a private insurance in addition to the high tax you already pay for many healthcare services such as dentists, blood analysis and more. Great free services indeed! > 5-7 weeks of paid vacation are included. Yes, tell me about that. Every time I try to get someone at a company, half the time he's either on vacation or on RTT, and I'm asked if I could wait a week until he comes back. This makes doing business here way slower to get things done, very frustrating and hard to compete.
- weddpros 12y ago
  So true. Last month, they announced a new law: Pay slips will be "simplified" by hiding all the contributions paid for by the employer. When I asked french relatives, they'd tell me "but it's not a part of my salary, it's what my boss pays". You. Stupid.
- fab13n 12y ago
  > healthcare does reimburse less each year The part that matters is the one about serious conditions: accidents, cancers, infarctus etc. Paying a few hundreds a months to get a few thousands back when you break a tooth or your glasses isn't a life-changing service, it merely regulates your cash-flow for a fee. What matters is knowing that if you need a 6- or 7-figures treatment, you'll get it. You won't be bankrupt because of it, your insurance won't weasel out of paying for it, and your employment status at the time you discovered your disease is irrelevant to the way you'll be treated. All of those life-threatening and/or chronic conditions are handled by public insurance, and 100% reimbursed (except for convenience services like individual hospital room with TV, which indeed you have to pay for, directly or through your private insurance). You're right that the 20% discount claimed by the presentation is probably meant "out of the company's pocket", net salary differences are way beyond 20%. I think a regular developer with a few years of experience but no super-sexy skill will get around €2000-€2500 net of taxes in Paris. That's not a lot if you want to rent a decent flat inside Paris. People know how much they actually cost to their employer, it's written right next to their net salary on their salary sheet every month, and it's regularly reminded to them in public debates. About education, there's another advantage to its public funding: prices don't get ridiculously inflated as they are in American universities. There's no education bubble in countries supporting public education. Also, it (somewhat) improves meritocratic social mobility, which means a higher rate of smart kids actually becoming skilled professionals. Finally, as a potential employer, schools which don't treat their students as customers tend to force-feed them more of the unpalatable curriculums such as maths, algorithms, etc. You tend to get a better trained workforce. To sum it up, European prefer lower risk lifestyles, on average. There's more redistribution of wealth, less opportunity to become very rich, and less violence (I count denying a life-saving chemotherapy as violence, although social safety nets also alter crime rates). This appeals more to the kind of people who happily stay salaried than to risk-loving entrepreneurs. But as an entrepreneur, there's value in settling somewhere that appeals to the kind of people who will happily remain your employees: you don't have to pay them the opportunity cost of renouncing to become Mark Zuckerberg. What this presentation unfairly brushed off war the amount of bureaucracy you have to face in order to get anything done, and how even harder to navigate it is when you aren't a native.

foobarge 12y ago

Salaries are very depressed. Experienced engineers outside of Paris make 45K top, when you live in Paris you get a 30% salary increase for the cost of living. Payroll wise: take what you pay someone, multiply by two, that's what you actually have to front: half goes to the worker (who will be heavily taxed) and the rest is tax. Taxation is pure confiscation here.

heyts 12y ago
I agree that taxation is definitely an issue, but I also feel that the field of computer engineering is under-valued in France as a general rule.