One great takeaway regarding local variances for the people who are fortunate enough to be able to benefit from it: If you're able to work remotely, you can do work for companies in the ~130% areas (e.g. San Francisco, New York, D.C.) and make those wages while living in an area where most people can get by on ~90% of the national average.
I fully agree with the principle, but note that these numbers indicate the market rate for salary, not necessarily cost of living. The two are correlated but not the same. Here is a table that lists cost of living as calculated by the US Bureau of Labor Statistics:
For example, note that Honolulu has a salary coefficient of 92, but it's actually one of the most expensive places in the country to live. It has a cost of living coefficent of 171.
Another thing is that in addition to cost of living, one must consider state taxes, which you can calculate here:
Not always. Most employers will likely realize the differences in cost of living and try to get you relative to your local market. One of the benefits of remote employees for an employer is around being more cost effective.
I've also been in the situation working for a remote employee who tried to pay comparable CA wages (wasn't in the Bay Area), but didn't understand the true cost of living differences. Also been on the flip side, in office in SF and looking for people in cheaper markets.
I have a limited perspective (I guess as all of us do) but I find that the coefficients listed for offsetting the wages by city are not very on-par with the average wages that I know of in the expensive cities (SF/NYC). They are not drastically off but I've found the wage swings to be more moderate when going to a place with a much higher cost of living. In all honesty, in some of the most expensive spots the average wages should be double the national average to be fair but Im still waiting for that day to come :)
Typical of the undermathed professions* : they provide high and low salary numbers, but no median! This makes this salary guide vastly less useful than it could be.
Judging by the ranges, it's my guess that these are not extremes, but possibly 25/75 quartile marks.
The methodology isn't clear, so we don't know how the data were aggregated/culled, but it seems that +/- 3 SD data, at least, were stripped in creating these tables.
You do realize the ideas you're pushing are here essentially indistinguishable from a conspiracy theory, right? Not only do multiple sources show similar results, but everyone here says, "Yep, that seems about right in my experience." But because your experience is different, you think everybody must be lying or totally hoodwinked, and you're the only one who knows the real truth. The more likely conclusion is that your experience is below average, not that everybody else is falsely reporting the same above-average working conditions.
Both sides cite multiple sources. If all it was one company, then it would be just "a bad company", except that I'm not just referencing one - I'm referencing several.
Let's suppose I've managed to find the absolute worst of companies - fine, I can accept that.
Then why are recruiters/HR/managers so apprehensive to disclose what the cost control measure are - what are the plans, policies, procedures, practices, and processes, what are the duties and scope, roles are responsibilities ........ ?
I honestly don't think that getting vending machine tokens from HR daily for can of free soda, or whatever "gourmet sandwich" is the vending machine is impressive.
Impressive would be 401K plan sponsored by the company that allows you to rollover the 401K's from previous employers, and allows you to roll it over into some other company when you leave. Or a 401K that stays with you as you move from project to project within the company.
Actually your "side" never cited a source. Again, looking at your comment history, I see you telling a lot of vague stories and criticizing other people's sources, but you never provide a single source of your own. In your entire history, you reference exactly two distinct urls neither of which has any salary or benefits information at all.
If your job is as bad as you seem to imply, then I certainly hope you heed people's advice and find another. But I'm beginning to suspect that you're being intentionally misleading for some other purpose.
Is it just me or are the highs in developer salaries kind of low? I know people who make $250k+/year at Google and other companies. If I took full salary as a mobile developer (rather than leaving it in our company's reserves) I would make about $300k/year.
Starting salaries for various tiers - i.e. 1-5 years, 5+ years, etc. Even still, I know a college grad that entered Kaiser as a developer at $150k. It does not seem to say how they define "high" and "low" though (right/left bell curve average, median, etc)
There is and you don't have to pay for it. The Creative Group is a division of Robert Half, a staffing/recruiting company which also does technical staff. I found the information (particularly the bit about local variances) very valuable. Any hiring manager can reach out to one of their recruiters/account managers and get a copy of this thing. The downside is you have to interact with a recruiting company. :-)
It would be great if someone posted the PDF version of the document like they did this one.
Those numbers are in line with what I've seen from other sources such as glassdoor, the BLS, indeed.com, and various postings on HN.
edit: interested parties can find the US Gov's Bureau of Labor Statistics giving salaries for a number of different positions. While they break down job titles in odd ways sometimes, these numbers appear entirely in line with it. Mid-70s is about the average number for starting salary as far as I can tell.
A glance at your comment history reveals a pattern: anecdotal examples of wildly low salaries ($40k-$50k), and unsubstantiated claims that every possible source of salary data (aside from your examples) is inaccurate.
>The developers we have onsite with the customer (Department of Defense with Top Secret clearances) are paid roughly $40-50K/yr USD.
>If there were companies that actually paid the salaries you're quoting there would be a line of people at the front door every morning wanting to get hired.
Yup - I hate the HR hype (you're HR right) that "OMG LOOK @ WUT WE PAYZ!!!!111".
I've spent the past 10+ years as a defense contractor working cleared programs. I've seen all sorts of sleazy work done by HR and management to push salaries down.
- Justify your position - done 2x yearly
- Switching you from one project to another that has less benefits associated with it (this means the company doesn't have to pay their portion, so it's a larger profit margin for them)
- Not reimbursing for directed travel
- Full Time Employee required to pay for hardware/software to do the job
- Assigned a primary health provider closest to work so as to minimize out of office time; or assigned one on the other side of the state; in this scenario it would have meant a 2+ hour drive one way
- Bait and switch with employee referrals (suddenly not qualified for the bonus because a recruiting subcontractor had contacted them 2 years ago - no documented contact, but let the employee prove otherwise)
But who do you think fills out those salary surveys - HR/management. Do you believe that they'd be honest. They have a vested interest in stacking something like Glassdoor - prospective clients use it. Clients want a workforce that's "happy". They'll pay more for it because the perception is better output and low turnover. So the company has ensured a good payday for themselves, low employee expenditure rate, and the work is still being done. Of course with one project I worked the turnover was a killer (140%+ at the 30 month mark, 6 program managers, 5 deputy program managers, least amount of time someone was here before they said f*ck it was 22 hrs) - but profit is profit.
So keep believing in your vision that companies, managers, and HR speak the truth.
Um, trying not to be rude, but that's a problem you have, not a problem software developers have. Inflating reported salaries and then keeping some of the money for yourself might be a problem with people who use contractors. For normal companies using salaried employees, reporting inflated numbers make no sense. (Though note that for recruiting companies inflating salaries does make sense - but this benefits the developers as well as the recruiters.)
Get yourself on a salary with a respectable tech-oriented company. I worked for an average digital agency where none of your points applied to me, I was paid more out of school than your contractors, and to top it off I actually liked our HR.
Finding a quality company is a pain. Recruiters lie to get their 10% to 15%. Companies bait/switch - continued employment constitutes implied consent when dealing with benefits, and the list goes on.
Switch the industry. You can get $50k/year swinging Drupal code with no questions asked or qualifications required. I am honestly confused as to why you'd stay in this horrible environment.
1 in the top 10, 1 in the top 20, 1 in the top 30, and 1 in the top 50.
They're all like that. If they can't (or won't) answer about cost control measures, then they're crap.
50K/yr for drupal. LOL. We've got developers working with VB/C# and TFS for $65K/yr. Another developer doing coldfusion for 60K. And all with top secret cleances and DoD 8570 certs. Just the industry standard.
I think everyone has seen the recruiter spam for companies that offer free drinks. How about a medical plan where I can chose which provided to see - not be assigned one 2 hours away. Keep the free candy bar, and give me a 401K instead.
They're not... you're being willfully obtuse. I can tell you they're not because I've never worked for a company like that. I'm sure they exist, but to say they're all like that is simply untrue.
I assume you meant “one you think works differently.“
Facebook, Google, and Microsoft are all known for treating their employees well and paying top dollar for them. I've worked at a couple of other internet companies (and not those), and have always been treated and paid well.
And honestly here's the thing. A number of people have told you that they've had much better experiences at our jobs than you've had at yours. Not only that, but there are several sources of data available to you, some in this thread and others you can find by searching for things like “what is it like to work for $company” or “best companies to work for”. There have also been a number of surveys here on HN about salary (you can find them by searching for salary), and discussions of people's experiences working at companies.
And yet, I don't think there is any amount of data anyone can provide to convince you that software developers are normally paid very well and treated exceedingly well. I don't know if you're just bitter from working in a shitty job for so long, if you're some kind of conspiracy theorist, if you have some kind of personality disorder or what, but you simply refuse to believe what we're all telling you.
Either that or you're trolling, in which case, well done. I don't know why, but this discussion has really gotten into my head.
Of the premier companies you listed I've only have brief exposure to one - their recruiter was apprehensive/defensive/rude when pushed about equipment. It seemed like the tip of the iceberg so I stopped returning emails/phonecalls.
As was written elsewhere, if it was just one company, then it would be just that - one company. But I've been through 4.
Have you even tried to get out of the defense contracting world and work at one of the non-shitty jobs that commenters here keep futilely trying to tell you exist?
That can be exteremly hard, if you're not writing code. Not all the roles and responsibilities directly translate to the world of private industry. For example a Systems Engineer in defense is loosely a product manager/ architect. However, it's impossible to get show all the responsibilities translate. Try explaining that to a recruiter... It tried for months.
I was in that boat for ~2 years (got out of it a little over a month ago). My problem was reduced in some respects, while amplified in others, because on my program systems engineers were developing signal processing algorithms[0] and implementing them in real-time signal processing software, in C. This caused all sorts of partial mismatches and misunderstandings, but ultimately the software piece got me out of there.
[edit] I would like to add that not being able to discuss what I did in meaningful detail was the most serious hindrance to my job search.
[0] This bit caused its own problems with a few companies, who saw "algorithms" and thought something else.
Yea, I'm pretty much a pure systems engineer. I'm working on teaching my self some code but it's not going to get me out of there. It's rough... I'm close though. Hopefully in a few weeks life will change.
Seriously. Try explaining PfM, UML, DoDAF or FEAF, to a recruiter. Or Troux, Primavera, System Architect, or DOORS. Or why ISSEP/ISSAP can be critical.
All while the recruiter is trying to do their job asking "Do you know C hashtag?" ... LOLWUT.
Yup, got called by Google. The "senior talent management engineer" had no idea what 'cost control measures' were. If within the first 10 seconds you can't tell me if I've got to pay out of pocket for visual studio of whatever else, then get lost.
Why are you even talking about that kind of thing in the first 10 seconds of talking to a recruiter? Discuss the terms of the job after you get offered the job.
Plus, I mean, have you done any research into the degree of coddling Google employees receive? You really think they provide you 3 gourmet meals per day, but not with the basic tools to perform your job?
I'm not sitting through 4 or more rounds of interviews with recruiters, senior recruiters, recruiter managers, technical recruiters, senior technical recruiters, technical recruiter managers, to finally reach the person capable of making a decision.
And exactly how can a recruiter brag about the company "gourmet" cafeteria (I'll pass on getting food poisoning from another gourmet cafeteria again), but doesn't know if the company provides the equipment?
It's they don't know, or more accurately won't disclose, then I'm just hanging up. And I'm sure I'm not the only one.
> I'm not sitting through 4 or more rounds of interviews with recruiters, senior recruiters, recruiter managers, technical recruiters, senior technical recruiters, technical recruiter managers, to finally reach the person capable of making a decision.
Well that's a problem. What you think they're going to hire you because of your charm and winning personality?
And honestly, I seriously doubt there are many people who would doubt that google provides their employees with the basic tools to do their jobs. It's simply one of the most absurd things I've read.
A brief interview process is fine. You do the HR crap that justifies their existence and move to the technical rounds - I'll do 3. If after the third round of technical interviews the decision maker can't make up their mind, then I'll help them out.
As was written elsewhere, if google was so great, then why were their recruiters apprehensive/defensive when asked. If the answer was "Yes, sure we provide the equipment - I'll send you our plans, policies procedures, practices, processes, duties and scope, roles and responsibilities for that area!" - but it wasn't.
You've been in the strange government contract world for so long, simplest things outside it confuse you. Are you a full-time employee, with an indefinite job contract and paid vacations? Then the answer is yes, and the question is borderline absurd, particularly to someone at Google, where they give away two hot meals a day and assign $5k office chairs. Are you a contractor and get paid 2-3x times more per hour, at the expense of benefits and job 'security'? Then probably no.
Your job sounds terrible, and you seem bitter about it. It doesn't have to be like that. I would think long and hard if I were you about figuring out what you can do to find a job you find more satisfactory.
If these salaries are to be believed, it's good news and bad news. Bad news: I've been and am significantly underpaid. Good news: well, I guess I can only go up…
Glassdoor.com is a pretty good guide for tech salaries. The salaries are self-reported, but they are aggregated and anonymous, so there is little incentive for people to exaggerate.
How would fluffing the salaries benefit a company? The result would be new employees expecting matching wages and existing employees feeling they are underpaid relative to their peers.
It certainly would benefit recruiting agencies; 20% of a bigger $ goes right to their bottom line. Not that they do that, of course, but I'd be slightly skeptical of any #s that come out of recruiting agencies.
In this case, any fluffing recruiting agencies do actually works in favour of good software developers.
You could make a claim that if the salaries weren't pumped by the recruiters, the employers could hire more people, but by all accounts lack of jobs isn't currently a problem for good developers.
HR makes the sell that "after a few years the candidate -could- be making that kind of money". The few years never really come, so the employee moves on. Except that the next company makes the same commitment.
By that metric just about every millionaire, and most every founder or cofounder billionaire, is an idiot. (Or was when they invested the time and energy to be where they are today.)
To underscore ckluis' comment, take a look at the document. It's not a scribd even though the title says so. It's a pdf, but well designed. Even if you don't care about the salaries you might find it's an enjoyable read.
It appears to also be a subtle ad/recruiting effort by The Creative Group (TCG) but if so, it's well done.
I'm confused by the term "starting" - do they mean starting fresh out of college? or a newly hired employee starting in that company (might have 5 yrs experience)? or starting out of high school?
To get out of a crappy, dead-end situation. I took a pay cut to get to a better company without having to relocate. The reasons are somewhat complicated, but my reply to grumps above explains a good portion of why.
It would be interesting to show the salaries as a ratio of average cost of living and then compare it to Madison Ave salaries in the 80's... my bet is average has gone dowwwwwwwn.
Yep it's money. It's a pretty well known quote by Adam Smith. Money, fiat or otherwise, only works as long as people believe they can conduct their next transaction with it.
