I am a software engineer in Europe and I would guess the average software engineer makes ~40000 (around ~28000 net) euro a year (~47000 in $) if (s)he does "average" software dev (so between junior and senior).
Now obviously you can negotiate salary (which I recommend) and exceptional senior devs do make around ~80000 here in Europe I guess, but here on HN I always read that most devs make around 100K (even if not a team leader or just fresh from the university or even self-taught), but if I would propose that kind of compensation to some company I am sure that it won't work out. I know that Google & Co do pay decent salary here in Europe, but other (software) companies would roll their eyes if I would demand a salary in this category.
Of course it is not that easy to compare as you are automatically insured in Europe (I don't know how that works in the US, I often read about some 401-thingy) which I highly appreciate but I don't think that you guys pay 50000 for taxes and social benefits/year?
So is my view biased as I hang out on HN too much, or is salary in the US really that much higher?
Or is it implied that you just make your 50 - 60 hours a week (at least in my area most people that do full-time are <=45 hours a week)?
Thank you for your comments.
//edit: Obviously not everybody, but let's say the 50% percentile.
An average IT graduate can expect to earn around net RMB150k/year, which is about US$23k. This is about twice the median for junior workers. Shanghai is one of the most expensive cities in China to rent, with average rents at 140-150% of median income, topped only by Beijing. Of course, with the largest subway system in the world, with prices starting from $0.3 per journey, everybody lives on the outskirts where the rent is cheaper, and commute a very manageable (though quite tight) 40-60 minutes to the downtown or numerous IT parks within the city.
The average programmer stays around there with the salary for years, the experience is not that important. But good and exceptional programmers command salaries that are much higher. I'd say from interview experience, 1-3% percent are good or have potential.
IT hubs in the country are centered around Hangzhou (Alibaba), Shenzhen (Tencent, hardware), Shanghai (many Western companies, esp. gaming), and Beijing. In well-financed Chinese IT unicorns, a good engineer can easily get net RMB700k/year (US$105k), and this is the country where you pay $3 for doctor consultation, $20 for tomography, and $15 to rent a car for a day.
In hot industries, it can be even higher. Just a few days ago we interviewed a talented candidate for blockchain startup CTO-level position, and the ask was net RMB2m/year (US$300k), villa-level housing allowance, and a personal driver. We didn't take it, but surely some unicorn will.
There's too much diversity of cost of living for an absolute dollar figure to be useful. I would look at percentile, fraction of median home price, lifestyle, etc. instead.
Using older terms: IT doesn't pay, SWE does.
I have also done some math to compare US and Europe pay, and if you max out at $150K, which seems a lot by European standards, you actually are very similar to European compensation. Why? College for your average two kids, plus retirement. In Europe, it's included. In the US, you save for it from your high salary.
[1] https://www.bls.gov/ooh/computer-and-information-technology/...
Also worth noting when looking at the data is what the BLS considers to be a "software engineer", what the industry breakdowns are, and where they are located.
[0] https://www.bls.gov/ooh/computer-and-information-technology/... [1] https://www.bls.gov/ooh/computer-and-information-technology/... [2] https://www.bls.gov/ooh/computer-and-information-technology/...
However, they all are headquartered in the bay area or seattle so cost of living makes those numbers not quite as eye dropping as it seems but still very good. I have worked for these companies since I graduated and have saved about $90,000 in a little over 2 years including 401k (No debt from college which really helps).
While not everyone can work for these companies, the first 5 I listed have 10's of thousands of developers each so it isn't too hard to get into at least 1 of them if you are willing to make the jump and move (you can also always try and move back later to a satellite office which is my plan).
Also, the general pay level and cost of living tend to be highly correlated. Those people you've heard about who make truckloads of money in San Francisco? They also pay twice (or more) what people in other American locales do for housing!
In the US, that kind of salary it's common only in the Silicon Valley and NY.
I don't agree with that statement. The title relates to six figure incomes, which are certainly quite common in all the tech hubs: Seattle, Austin, Denver, San Diego, etc.
You certainly have to be in a major city, and ideally one with large software companies.
I also know directors in other companies in said big cities making only 10k more than that, on-site.
I'd say you can read a lot from the general trends, but there are plenty of cases in either position or negative direction.
There’s tons of money in engineering in the United States, but I would say it has come with a cost. The only reason so much money has been able to be plowed into software and hardware was because of financial products developed by Wall Street since the 1970’s. Obviously we’ve seen great results in software and hardware, but all the recent financial busts have shown there is no free lunch...
How come a city in a country of 300,000 people pay as much as $100k USD for a SWE?
Do you have any data to back it up? I did a quick look at Glassdoor and it's far from that.
I’ve seen jobs listed above that routinely in Indianapolis, Minneapolis & Columbus. Talked to a recruiter the other day for a job in Nashville that paid above 100k.
These are all front line Midwest towns. Get into the sunbelt and you’ll see even more cities where those wages are common.
I have family in Norway and attended part of a Master's program in Switzerland, but left because the job prospects in Zurich did not look good without German fluency. This was not in technology, though.
Now, connect the ocean in between the US and Europe and it makes it even harder to relate to your $100k/y as a reference. In europe alone you have different countries, rules, etc. I would say that the general rule is that your buying power within society remains fairly equivalent no matter what location you’re in.
in 2016 I was an over-worked web developer making $50k. Now I am an under-worked software engineer making double that. I have changed jobs 4 times since then (3 layoffs, 1 resignation from a dead end role, several other offers i turned down) and learned multiple new technologies. i also go to meetups and keep my network growing.
Here in US we pay about 30% in taxes and insurance. I try to keep some savings around in case of layoffs or to give me the flexibility to walk away from a role
A rough rule of thumb is that if you are making $50,000 per year gross salary in the USA, you'll be taking home roughly $3000 per month in net pay.
This number changes a bit if you are married, have kids, have an expensive house, and so on.
If you are making $100,000 gross per year, especially in NY or San Fran, you realistically might have a take home net monthly pay of $5700 or even a bit less as a non-married human.
Realistically, mandatory expenses like rent and commuting (unless you are sleeping under your desk in the office!!!) will be about $1,000 to $3,000 per month, most people around $2,000 in those cities.
And yeah, lifestyle creep is totally a thing in the USA. There are people making $5700 a month who are spending $5700 per month, certainly.
Also, minimum wage is $1600 per month full time post tax at places like burger king and mcdonalds.
The absolute number is really meaningless. I remember a Ph.D prep talk about salary expectation in grad school in France mentioning $105K in the US, and I remember thinking “wow!”. What they don’t tell you is that a third of this will go to taxes, half of the reminder will go to housing, and because of the outrageous deductible and out-of-pocket caps of most corporate medical insurances you can be hit anytime with a $2K or $3K medical bill, which can be quite common if you have kids.
If you are interested in a less technical role that makes more money, check out being an Enterprise software sales engineer. These are the people who help customers with real problems architecting systems, have a poor quality of life because there is always a new project starting, but make more than engineers or sales people these days. It can be interesting work if you like variety, but can't be done the first few years out of school because experience with various architectures needs to be cultivated.
The amount you mentioned is what someone straight out of (middle) school with 0 experience would make in the field, and they could expect to have that increase to the mentioned middling wage after ~3 years of real work. That would put them at that wage at around 20-21 years old.
The issue is that this type of compensation is highly dependent on the stock market. Both the bull market in general and companies getting rewarded by the market for growth rather than earnings. You should be thinking about other types of investments (e.g. real estate, etc) that are not as tech/stock market dependent to funnel some of this cash flow into. Nobody knows how long this level of compensation will last.
A lot of people seem to think you have it automatically made in the shade if you're a software engineer. But it doesn't guarantee a good income, not even in the US. Cue delusional managers seeking $15/hr full-stack web developers. Or the infamous "do everything with computers" one-man IT job that gives you no benefits or no strong future with the company.
There are a lot of people in this field that still struggle financially, even though they are not buying expensive luxuries.
What's funny is that being a contractor seems to be a disadvantage when applying to some US companies. I sometimes had the impression that interviewers were thinking "What's wrong with you, can't you get a real job?"
If I moved to Europe, and offered a 200k salary, would I be able to attract bay area level software devs? What about a 100k salary?
[1] https://www.bls.gov/ooh/computer-and-information-technology/...
