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Just to be fair, for 90% of the world, the kinds of compensation many hacker news readers have (a Silicon Valley engineer who gets a high base plus bonus plus e

Just to be fair, for 90% of the world, the kinds of compensation many hacker news readers have (a Silicon Valley engineer who gets a high base plus bonus plus equity) would also be considered “holy guacamole, whatever is the angle I look at it … does not make any f_ing sense”

jayd16 3y ago
If you look at the cost of living in SF and what you get, it starts to make sense. What is the equivalent argument for hundreds of millions?
- oars 3y ago
  Janitors, baristas, waiters, waitresses, bus drivers are also living in the Bay Area on nowhere close to those salaries. SF engineer salaries are still insane to these people. And they need to deal with the cost of living in SF.
- cscurmudgeon 3y ago
  Why should there be a justification? The only argument should be between Google and Pichai. Strangely, why aren't we doing the same for actors and sports stars?
  - cudgy 3y ago
    Poor example. How many people bought or used a tech product solely based on the CEO of the company? Virtually none How many movies do people attend solely based on the actors in the movie? Or sporting events due to a player on a team? Many
    - ztrww 3y ago
      > How many people bought or used a tech product solely based on the CEO of the company? Virtually none A lot bought it because of some decisions made by the CEO. They likely wouldn’t have bought it if he hadn’t made them (of course it varies a lot between industries). By how much would you say a famous actor/athlete increases the revenue 10/20/50/100/1000%? A CEO can do that too.
      - cudgy 3y ago
        How do you measure what affect the CEO had? CEOs (like Jack Welch for example) get great acclaim for years according to short term benchmarks only to be proven to have made disastrous decisions for the business. Appraisal of CEOs is more witchcraft than science.
    - cscurmudgeon 3y ago
      Poor logic. Why should that matter? The initial argument was that no one should need that much money. The sporting events can't take place soley due to the star. Do you think the star built the stadium or did all the background work for a movie? By this logic, movies with novice actors should always do bad. > How many people bought or used a tech product solely based on the CEO of the company? Not explicitly. What about founder CEOs who built v1 on their own?
      - cudgy 3y ago
        A CEO cannot be a CEO (unless they are a founder which is a different matter altogether) without an existing enterprise with equipment and real estate to manage, so I don’t see the point there. Founder CEOs are founders of the company and of course they will receive large payouts. The gripe is with non-founder executive vp sliding into CEO jobs and going from making $1 million a year to tens or hundreds of millions of dollars a year practically guaranteed with all sorts of golden parachutes attached.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
abeppu 3y ago
Honestly, I get that. I work at a company with engineers mostly in the US and in an EU country, and my understanding is that, though our salaries in that EU country are top of the range, they are still meaningfully lower than for US engineers. The international talent pool is very good, and available at considerable savings. While I am glad I have my job, and that companies still seem willing to pay Bay Area salaries, I don't fully get why.
bmitc 3y ago
That is a fair critique and overall true. But it also highlights the pay of these CEOs to be so absurd as to be barely comprehensible. It makes me wonder what types of personalities these people are. If I even had that salary for a year, max three, I'd retire and spend time learning and doing non-profit and foundation work.
- ghaff 3y ago
  People for whom being an important executive is at least almost as important as having as much money as they can reasonably consume. Certainly there’s a vast range of FIRE styles and even what constitutes retirement but at some level it’s a combination of keeping score, feeling valued relative to peers (see also sports), and the industry recognition.
  - bmitc 3y ago
    In other words: ego. Executives exist to play a game of ego.
    - ghaff 3y ago
      Unlike all the software engineers at Google who would be happy to have their various titles replaced with some egalitarian "developer" title. Most people have egos. Some more than others. And public recognition via titles matters a lot for future opportunities. (Though maybe you don't care much about that so long as you make enough money.)
- welshwelsh 3y ago
  That's why you'll never make CEO pay. Most people, myself included, will happily retire with a couple million. A lot of these people have ambitions that require a lot more money than that. Maybe they want to cure aging or explore space or something. Another way of looking at it: if someone makes 100m a year and they are thinking about retiring, how much would you need to offer for them to choose to work another year instead? That's how much you need to pay them next year.

jayd16 3y ago

If you look at the cost of living in SF and what you get, it starts to make sense. What is the equivalent argument for hundreds of millions?

oars 3y ago
Janitors, baristas, waiters, waitresses, bus drivers are also living in the Bay Area on nowhere close to those salaries. SF engineer salaries are still insane to these people. And they need to deal with the cost of living in SF.
cscurmudgeon 3y ago
Why should there be a justification? The only argument should be between Google and Pichai. Strangely, why aren't we doing the same for actors and sports stars?
- cudgy 3y ago
  Poor example. How many people bought or used a tech product solely based on the CEO of the company? Virtually none How many movies do people attend solely based on the actors in the movie? Or sporting events due to a player on a team? Many
  - ztrww 3y ago
    > How many people bought or used a tech product solely based on the CEO of the company? Virtually none A lot bought it because of some decisions made by the CEO. They likely wouldn’t have bought it if he hadn’t made them (of course it varies a lot between industries). By how much would you say a famous actor/athlete increases the revenue 10/20/50/100/1000%? A CEO can do that too.
    - cudgy 3y ago
      How do you measure what affect the CEO had? CEOs (like Jack Welch for example) get great acclaim for years according to short term benchmarks only to be proven to have made disastrous decisions for the business. Appraisal of CEOs is more witchcraft than science.
  - cscurmudgeon 3y ago
    Poor logic. Why should that matter? The initial argument was that no one should need that much money. The sporting events can't take place soley due to the star. Do you think the star built the stadium or did all the background work for a movie? By this logic, movies with novice actors should always do bad. > How many people bought or used a tech product solely based on the CEO of the company? Not explicitly. What about founder CEOs who built v1 on their own?
    - cudgy 3y ago
      A CEO cannot be a CEO (unless they are a founder which is a different matter altogether) without an existing enterprise with equipment and real estate to manage, so I don’t see the point there. Founder CEOs are founders of the company and of course they will receive large payouts. The gripe is with non-founder executive vp sliding into CEO jobs and going from making $1 million a year to tens or hundreds of millions of dollars a year practically guaranteed with all sorts of golden parachutes attached.

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

abeppu 3y ago

Honestly, I get that. I work at a company with engineers mostly in the US and in an EU country, and my understanding is that, though our salaries in that EU country are top of the range, they are still meaningfully lower than for US engineers. The international talent pool is very good, and available at considerable savings. While I am glad I have my job, and that companies still seem willing to pay Bay Area salaries, I don't fully get why.

bmitc 3y ago

That is a fair critique and overall true. But it also highlights the pay of these CEOs to be so absurd as to be barely comprehensible. It makes me wonder what types of personalities these people are. If I even had that salary for a year, max three, I'd retire and spend time learning and doing non-profit and foundation work.

ghaff 3y ago
People for whom being an important executive is at least almost as important as having as much money as they can reasonably consume. Certainly there’s a vast range of FIRE styles and even what constitutes retirement but at some level it’s a combination of keeping score, feeling valued relative to peers (see also sports), and the industry recognition.
- bmitc 3y ago
  In other words: ego. Executives exist to play a game of ego.
  - ghaff 3y ago
    Unlike all the software engineers at Google who would be happy to have their various titles replaced with some egalitarian "developer" title. Most people have egos. Some more than others. And public recognition via titles matters a lot for future opportunities. (Though maybe you don't care much about that so long as you make enough money.)
welshwelsh 3y ago
That's why you'll never make CEO pay. Most people, myself included, will happily retire with a couple million. A lot of these people have ambitions that require a lot more money than that. Maybe they want to cure aging or explore space or something. Another way of looking at it: if someone makes 100m a year and they are thinking about retiring, how much would you need to offer for them to choose to work another year instead? That's how much you need to pay them next year.