5 ms·

So many things here. Lets talk pay, US tech workers, lets just say Sr SWE and up, and lets look at SF as the author uses this as a focal point. Salary is rough

So many things here. Lets talk pay, US tech workers, lets just say Sr SWE and up, and lets look at SF as the author uses this as a focal point. Salary is roughly $300-400k a year(in SF FANGish company), in Europe or England its about half of that, and maybe even less. I know as I have family I married into that points out this fact, the best workers all go over to the US and make large salaries over there at US tech giants. Lets talk about taxes, especially in the northern European countries taxes are extremely high when you get into professional wage bands, ie. above 120-200K euros(50% tax rates in some countries compared to 37% top US tax rate) and capital gains which is a huge issue as some employees get a majority of their income through this - 30% cap gains tax rate and above for a decent amount of western/northern EU countries, compared to 20% top tax rates for US. Lastly lets talk about employees, you hire someone and they don't work. In Europe you cannot just term them and give them a severance package of a few weeks. In France you are not allowed to even layoff employees unless you are close to bankruptcy(I think this was changed a few years back). But in general it is very hard to fire employees who are underperforming in the EU. All of these facts really highlight why alot of top talent and founders from the EU come over to the US to make money and start companies. I am not saying one way is right or wrong but just want to pint out the points that both ICs/managers and founders have all told me(I am US based).

cobbaut 2y ago
> Lastly lets talk about employees, you hire someone and they don't work. In Europe you cannot just term them and give them a severance package of a few weeks. This is not true! If a newly hired employee does not work, then you can fire them immediately.
mbs159 2y ago
Those are some insane generalizations about a population that is 1.5x larger than that of the US. Hard-working people are everywhere, and there are plenty of top-talent people working in the EU and Asia. Also it's worth mentioning that not all top-talent workers want to move to the US, and there are plenty of reasons for that.
johny115 2y ago
salary doesn't mean much in the vacuum without considering costs of living ... my cost of living in Czechia is a fraction to life in US ... with $300 a month, I can cover my social insurance, health insurance and taxes, and then I am free ... and whatever I need from health care has no additional costs, from a full bag of meds every month, through psychotherapy to big a and serious operations, no other income taxes either, and I will get a small pension too when I retire as for firing employees, many tech workers are not employees but contractors, conditions about the job are set by the company in the begining ... also what I noticed that US workers can and will quit on the spot if they decided so ... the othe side of the coin with EU employees is that they won't and can't do this ... the employer can rely on this ... if they are given notice and fired, they will responsibly continue working for the law mandated X months, so that the employer has time to replace them, and they will train their replacement and do proper handover ... at least from what i've seen, americans in tech once they learn they are being let go, they drop everything and are gone the EU way isn't that one-sided towards the employee, it has implications both ways ... and if you don't like the protections and stability, just get the person on contract instead, which many smaller startups do, as they don't want to be locked into their decisions too much
alephnerd 2y ago
Then why does Czechia, Romania, Poland, and (before 2022) Russia punch above their weight in entrepreneurship? Or Switzerland and the UK?
- peoplefromibiza 2y ago
  > Then why does Czechia, Romania, Poland And yet nobody would move there to find a job, not even from Italy, Greece or Portugal. Their salaries are simply too low and the ROI in terms of quality of life it's not remotely comparable. There's over one million Romanians in Italy, making them the largest foreign community in Italy.
  - johny115 2y ago
    I know some people who permanently move from Spain or Italy to Czechia. In their own words, there was no work in their home country. They tried super hard to get a job at home, but came up with nothing. Here they have some sort of non-technical office jobs in tech companies and are quite happy with the pay.
  - alephnerd 2y ago
    And how many of them are working in Italy's tech industry versus working as blue collar workers.
    - peoplefromibiza 2y ago
      How many of them are working in Romanian tech industry? In EU the share of ICT workers is pretty much homogeneous among the different countries. It's their salary that varies a lot (but not as wildly as in the US) It's much easier to get a decent wage for a Romanian in Italy than for a Romanian tech worker in Romania It's the reason why a lot of Italians go to live abroad as well.
      - alephnerd 2y ago
        > In EU the share of ICT workers is pretty much homogeneous among the different countries. Italy has a population of ~58m but an ICT service population of ~500k [0]. Romania has a population of 19m but an ICT service population of ~200k [1] And this masks the large Romanian tech diaspora in Germany, the UK, and ofc a portion in Italy. So the question is, why are so few Italians work in tech in comparison to a much poorer country? > It's much easier to get a decent wage for a Romanian in Italy than for a Romanian tech worker in Romania Just using levels.fyi (which imo is skewed) Romanian dev salaries are higher [2] than Italian ones [3] and as a former hiring manager for one of those MNCs Europeans keep trying to apply to, I can attest that salaries for the 50th percentile and above are comparable across Europe, which ofc means CEE based tech employees end up having less of an incentive to move out West (excluding UK and Switzerland) when factoring CoL. There's a reason Big Tech employers like Amazon have a major developer presence in Tier 2 Romanian cities like Cluj or Iasi and not Tier 1 Italian cities like Milan or Rome. [0] - https://www.statista.com/statistics/419569/number-of-employees-ict-services-sector-italy/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/419569/number-of-employe... [1] - https://www.statista.com/statistics/419587/number-of-employees-ict-services-sector-romania/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/419587/number-of-employe... [2] - https://www.levels.fyi/t/software-engineer/locations/romania https://www.levels.fyi/t/software-engineer/locations/romania [3] - https://www.levels.fyi/t/software-engineer/locations/italy https://www.levels.fyi/t/software-engineer/locations/italy
62951413 2y ago
Let's talk about you growing older. The closer you're to 50 the more difficult it gets to find a new job. You get laid off in a major downsizing round. Your COBRA healthcare plan is $2K+/month which incidentally is comparable to your 1-bedroom apartment rent. It could take you a few months to find the next job. Or longer, people discuss it on this very site every other week. The FAANGs and the capital gains are real but for a minority of us. If you're single and under 30 the Bay Area is a top destination for sure. You won't be that person forever though.
- bradlys 2y ago
  If you’ve followed the money train, you should practically be fatFIRE by 50 assuming you’re in SF. I can imagine it being difficult if you’re single income but dual income tech workers in SF should be easy FIRE territory for a 50 something. It’s really hard to imagine a scenario where someone is reaching 50+, can’t find a job due to ageism, and has anyone but themselves to blame. I have friends who don’t own property in SF, rented their whole lives, and haven’t accumulated millions in NW. They only have themselves to blame because they kept trying to do their own startups. They had 7 figure comp when they were at established tech companies but would keep leaving to start their own thing. They could easily be close to retirement but they’re gonna be working past 65 at the pace they’re going now. The only thing they regret is that none of their startups they founded have made them rich.
JohnClark1337 2y ago
[dead]
steeve 2y ago
> In France you are not allowed to even layoff employees unless you are close to bankruptcy(I think this was changed a few years back). Of course, this is not true. What is true is when you hire somebody, they are on a trial period of 3-4 months that can be renewed once. After the trial period is done, you need a cause to fire them.
- steeve 2y ago
  Downvotes? I'm french and run a company but please.
- fjdjshsh 2y ago
  What kind of causes do you need? Is a documented underperformance a sufficient cause? (And I mean underperformance, but still doing the minimum like showing up to work for example)
creer 2y ago
> 37% top US tax rate That's not true either. In California, you will also pay state income tax, most likely at 9.3% marginal rate - but possibly not too different in actual rate because the California thresholds are low. To continue the comparison, you'll need to consider which part of health insurance is or is not included (none in the US.) Etc. In the end, the marginal tax rates are pretty close. Meaning, shockingly high in California. And if you do come here for work, consider also exit tax. If you are successful, you will fall under exit tax if you ever want to leave.
- fragmede 2y ago
  In California, you'll end up paying a total of 50.3% tax rate if you make over $1 million. Federal 37%, state 13.3% adds up to 50.3%
  - subsubzero 2y ago
    What user defrost said. Also $1M is quite hard to do, that would indicate a salary(single not married in my example) of a principle engineer at FANG* or Sr. Director and there are very few of those around. Or you could be a Staff engineer and join a company with a parabolic stock price like NVDA or something similar.
  - defrost 2y ago
    Both state and federal are progressive tax brackets and the 50.3% tax rate is only paid on dollars earnt over a threshold. https://youtu.be/4PJfDNfg5KI?t=77 https://youtu.be/4PJfDNfg5KI?t=77
    - fragmede 2y ago
      Yes, that's correct. If I did my math correctly, if you made $4 million, you'd end up with $2,052,391.57, which is an overall rate of 48.69%, for those that don't understand progressive tax rates.
      - fragmede 2y ago

cobbaut 2y ago

> Lastly lets talk about employees, you hire someone and they don't work. In Europe you cannot just term them and give them a severance package of a few weeks. This is not true! If a newly hired employee does not work, then you can fire them immediately.

mbs159 2y ago

Those are some insane generalizations about a population that is 1.5x larger than that of the US. Hard-working people are everywhere, and there are plenty of top-talent people working in the EU and Asia. Also it's worth mentioning that not all top-talent workers want to move to the US, and there are plenty of reasons for that.

johny115 2y ago

salary doesn't mean much in the vacuum without considering costs of living ... my cost of living in Czechia is a fraction to life in US ... with $300 a month, I can cover my social insurance, health insurance and taxes, and then I am free ... and whatever I need from health care has no additional costs, from a full bag of meds every month, through psychotherapy to big a and serious operations, no other income taxes either, and I will get a small pension too when I retire as for firing employees, many tech workers are not employees but contractors, conditions about the job are set by the company in the begining ... also what I noticed that US workers can and will quit on the spot if they decided so ... the othe side of the coin with EU employees is that they won't and can't do this ... the employer can rely on this ... if they are given notice and fired, they will responsibly continue working for the law mandated X months, so that the employer has time to replace them, and they will train their replacement and do proper handover ... at least from what i've seen, americans in tech once they learn they are being let go, they drop everything and are gone the EU way isn't that one-sided towards the employee, it has implications both ways ... and if you don't like the protections and stability, just get the person on contract instead, which many smaller startups do, as they don't want to be locked into their decisions too much

alephnerd 2y ago

Then why does Czechia, Romania, Poland, and (before 2022) Russia punch above their weight in entrepreneurship? Or Switzerland and the UK?

peoplefromibiza 2y ago
> Then why does Czechia, Romania, Poland And yet nobody would move there to find a job, not even from Italy, Greece or Portugal. Their salaries are simply too low and the ROI in terms of quality of life it's not remotely comparable. There's over one million Romanians in Italy, making them the largest foreign community in Italy.
- johny115 2y ago
  I know some people who permanently move from Spain or Italy to Czechia. In their own words, there was no work in their home country. They tried super hard to get a job at home, but came up with nothing. Here they have some sort of non-technical office jobs in tech companies and are quite happy with the pay.
- alephnerd 2y ago
  And how many of them are working in Italy's tech industry versus working as blue collar workers.
  - peoplefromibiza 2y ago
    How many of them are working in Romanian tech industry? In EU the share of ICT workers is pretty much homogeneous among the different countries. It's their salary that varies a lot (but not as wildly as in the US) It's much easier to get a decent wage for a Romanian in Italy than for a Romanian tech worker in Romania It's the reason why a lot of Italians go to live abroad as well.
    - alephnerd 2y ago
      > In EU the share of ICT workers is pretty much homogeneous among the different countries. Italy has a population of ~58m but an ICT service population of ~500k [0]. Romania has a population of 19m but an ICT service population of ~200k [1] And this masks the large Romanian tech diaspora in Germany, the UK, and ofc a portion in Italy. So the question is, why are so few Italians work in tech in comparison to a much poorer country? > It's much easier to get a decent wage for a Romanian in Italy than for a Romanian tech worker in Romania Just using levels.fyi (which imo is skewed) Romanian dev salaries are higher [2] than Italian ones [3] and as a former hiring manager for one of those MNCs Europeans keep trying to apply to, I can attest that salaries for the 50th percentile and above are comparable across Europe, which ofc means CEE based tech employees end up having less of an incentive to move out West (excluding UK and Switzerland) when factoring CoL. There's a reason Big Tech employers like Amazon have a major developer presence in Tier 2 Romanian cities like Cluj or Iasi and not Tier 1 Italian cities like Milan or Rome. [0] - https://www.statista.com/statistics/419569/number-of-employees-ict-services-sector-italy/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/419569/number-of-employe... [1] - https://www.statista.com/statistics/419587/number-of-employees-ict-services-sector-romania/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/419587/number-of-employe... [2] - https://www.levels.fyi/t/software-engineer/locations/romania https://www.levels.fyi/t/software-engineer/locations/romania [3] - https://www.levels.fyi/t/software-engineer/locations/italy https://www.levels.fyi/t/software-engineer/locations/italy

62951413 2y ago

Let's talk about you growing older. The closer you're to 50 the more difficult it gets to find a new job. You get laid off in a major downsizing round. Your COBRA healthcare plan is $2K+/month which incidentally is comparable to your 1-bedroom apartment rent. It could take you a few months to find the next job. Or longer, people discuss it on this very site every other week. The FAANGs and the capital gains are real but for a minority of us. If you're single and under 30 the Bay Area is a top destination for sure. You won't be that person forever though.

bradlys 2y ago
If you’ve followed the money train, you should practically be fatFIRE by 50 assuming you’re in SF. I can imagine it being difficult if you’re single income but dual income tech workers in SF should be easy FIRE territory for a 50 something. It’s really hard to imagine a scenario where someone is reaching 50+, can’t find a job due to ageism, and has anyone but themselves to blame. I have friends who don’t own property in SF, rented their whole lives, and haven’t accumulated millions in NW. They only have themselves to blame because they kept trying to do their own startups. They had 7 figure comp when they were at established tech companies but would keep leaving to start their own thing. They could easily be close to retirement but they’re gonna be working past 65 at the pace they’re going now. The only thing they regret is that none of their startups they founded have made them rich.

JohnClark1337 2y ago

[dead]

steeve 2y ago

> In France you are not allowed to even layoff employees unless you are close to bankruptcy(I think this was changed a few years back). Of course, this is not true. What is true is when you hire somebody, they are on a trial period of 3-4 months that can be renewed once. After the trial period is done, you need a cause to fire them.

steeve 2y ago
Downvotes? I'm french and run a company but please.
fjdjshsh 2y ago
What kind of causes do you need? Is a documented underperformance a sufficient cause? (And I mean underperformance, but still doing the minimum like showing up to work for example)

creer 2y ago

> 37% top US tax rate That's not true either. In California, you will also pay state income tax, most likely at 9.3% marginal rate - but possibly not too different in actual rate because the California thresholds are low. To continue the comparison, you'll need to consider which part of health insurance is or is not included (none in the US.) Etc. In the end, the marginal tax rates are pretty close. Meaning, shockingly high in California. And if you do come here for work, consider also exit tax. If you are successful, you will fall under exit tax if you ever want to leave.

fragmede 2y ago
In California, you'll end up paying a total of 50.3% tax rate if you make over $1 million. Federal 37%, state 13.3% adds up to 50.3%
- subsubzero 2y ago
  What user defrost said. Also $1M is quite hard to do, that would indicate a salary(single not married in my example) of a principle engineer at FANG* or Sr. Director and there are very few of those around. Or you could be a Staff engineer and join a company with a parabolic stock price like NVDA or something similar.
- defrost 2y ago
  Both state and federal are progressive tax brackets and the 50.3% tax rate is only paid on dollars earnt over a threshold. https://youtu.be/4PJfDNfg5KI?t=77 https://youtu.be/4PJfDNfg5KI?t=77
  - fragmede 2y ago
    Yes, that's correct. If I did my math correctly, if you made $4 million, you'd end up with $2,052,391.57, which is an overall rate of 48.69%, for those that don't understand progressive tax rates.
    - fragmede 2y ago