Poll: How much do you make as a programmer?

[vaksel]

What are the salaries like out there? I've decided to have 2 tiers, one for those who live in high cost of living areas (California, New York etc, anywhere it costs $2K+/mo for a 1 bed room) and for those who live in less expensive areas (Idaho/Kentucky etc).

And what do you do for your salary?

[cletus]

This poll exemplifies the problem with all of these polls: it doesn't say what it's measuring. I would put in vastly different numbers for base salary vs base salary + bonuses + shares + other benefits.

I see the same on Glassdoor on elsewhere. The bigger problem is the people volunteering such information have differing views on what to put making such information mostly useless.

Also, if life has taught me nothing else, people lie about their incomes, even anonymously.

[kellishaver]

I agree. I put less than $50k, but I also only work part-time (by choice-the money I make is enough for my needs, so I'd rather have the free time than the extra cash), which doesn't really get factored in and just makes it seem like I work for really low pay.

[eliben]

Agree totally. For instance, I could never figure out if these American polls take pension deductions into account. Where I live, the employer pays additional ~20% on top of base salary into various pension/saving funds, but since everyone gets it, it isn't taken into consideration when comparing salaries. I always wondered if seeing a quoted $100K salary in the US - does it include these pension payments or not.

[endtime]

I think that dilemma is probably far less significant for non-Googlers. ;)

[jshort]

One key aspect of statistics is randomly sampling, this poll has bias for sure. It is still interesting to see what HNers make with respect to where the live. It would also be interesting to see salary data compared to hours worked per week and self-employed or not.

[johnl]

Plotted against years in business would give me a measure of where I am based upon my experience.

[veyron]

What is the point is this? Sorry for asking, but you are either curious about how much everyone else is making or trying to value yourself in the market.

If you are curious about how much everyone else is making, stop. Just stop. It won't make you feel good. You will feel shitty because I would imagine the HN crowd will show better numbers than america as a whole, or even just your city. To illustrate my point, if you asked me to write this poll, I would add 250K, 500K, 1M tiers here (as there are plenty of people who are making salaries in those ranges)

If you are asking because you want a sense of whether or not you are properly being valued in the market, you have to do two things: try to find another job, and try to ask for a raise. Simple as that. You don't know the skillsets of people who show higher or lower salary figures.

Lastly, salary doesnt help if you dont consider bonus potential and hours work. I'm thinking specifically of finance, where bonuses in most groups dwarf base salary (and in some fields, the per-hour rate looks pitiful, but that's because it demands >100 hrs per week)

[gst]

There are enormous differences in the productivity of programmers. Even in the area of "good programmers" really good people can be multiple times faster than others. (Also "better" than others, but that's not directly measurable).

So I think it's perfectly reasonable if the salaries of people are assigned directly according to their capabilities. Why should a programmer that is twice as fast as his peers only get 10% or 20% more?

Actually that's one of the reasons why I've moved to the Bay Area. In my home countries things as seniority are the main factors in regard to the salary. In the Bay Area it's exactly the opposite - and that's much more motivating for me.

[beedogs]

> I would add 250K, 500K, 1M tiers here (as there are plenty of people who are making salaries in those ranges)

I highly doubt you'll find "plenty" of people, here or elsewhere, making more than $250k a year as a programmer.

[fab13n]

The shortcomings of this poll have been outlined by others.

You might be interested by this:

* as a high score / pissing contest result. Then whatever the figure, you'll never be satisfied: either you don't mak enough, then you'll feel terrible; or you're making more than your reference group, but then you'll soon change the reference group you're comparing yourself to, and you'll go back to step one until you find yourself feeling terrible.

* as a genuine measure of your well-being, presumably to estimate the appropriateness of changing jobs. Then you probably underestimate non-monetary factors. First, you probably have fun working: that's worth a couple hundreds K$ IMO. Then, the ways money goes out matter at least as much as money coming in: I make a bit more than 50K€ in Europe, which is below the American average for my skills; but I don't have a student loan to repay, I won't have to pay for my kids' education either, I have world-class "socialist healthcare", I can get a nice house for about 250-300K, there's little criminality to be afraid of, I'd need to kill then rape my boss' kids to get fired, I work about 210 days a year...

What kind of conclusions do you expect to draw from this poll?

[pkapner]

There's too much whining on this thread. It's clearly limited to the US. Are there other places on the planet? Sure. Go get your own poll. As for total comp, assume it's what's listed as your gross pay on your tax return. There you go, easy. Is it restricted to HN folk? Yes. Do they make more than others? Probably. Does it matter? No.

[memset]

One gentleman created a poll several months back; he had a google doc where people punched in similar kinds of information. Analytics were promised. I cannot find the link - does anyone remember this, or know what happened?

Edit: here is the link. http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2763932

My best suggestion is glassdoor.com for this kind of information. And that resource is not limited to HN participants.

[JL2010]

I'm still hoping he'll release that geographical data...

[shaharsol]

A side note: It took me 6 years of entrepreneurship to be able to pay myself the same salary I was making as an employee programmer.

[kashif]

Not everyone works in the US - fairly narrow minded view of the world?

[scottio]

This poll was clearly designed to canvas United States cities, even if it wasn't explicitly stated. Is that narrow-minded? I don't think so. If I happened upon a poll on a Russian tech site that mentioned Omsk and Moscow and St. Petersburg, I'd assume it was a national poll. And then I'd move on.

Perhaps it's narrow-minded to assume that a poll on a U.S.-based tech site should by default be global in scope?

[learc83]

Cost of living varies dramatically across the globe as does currency value.

To make it truly a global poll, I suppose he should have asked how units, x, of a mixed basket of local goods, b, could you buy per year worked. xb = only possible correct statement of income.

You come up with b and repost the poll if you so desire.

[Tsagadai]

Completely agree. Let's globalise in some data then.

I live in South Korea and work as a programmer. I am making about half what I was making in Australia but I pay 3% in tax, I'm living rent free and my costs are ridiculously low. My disposable income (that is the remaining funds after bills, food, accommodation and other necessities are taken out) is about 2k USD per month (twice what it was in Australia). My costs are low. I know other people here who can live on less than $500/month for rent, food, alcohol, entertainment, the lot. Money isn't really important to me right now because I have no debt, and living and working abroad makes up for lower pay. I'm still quite young so the way I view it is that this is more of a learning experience and I am gaining far more marketable, diverse and useful skills. Learning how other cultures run businesses and do capitalism is a very valuable skill.

I'm sure others have similar anecdotes.

[HeyLaughingBoy]

So create your own poll for the region you're interested in.

[DavidSJ]

He didn't say everyone does.

[rabidsnail]

You don't need to ask. The government has already done the polling. http://www.bls.gov/ncs/ocs/compub.htm#CA Look for "Software Engineer - Applications"

[biotech]

I just graphed the data: http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/839/unledwte.png/

[rcfox]

Thanks for the effort, but I don't think this kind of plot is appropriate to the type of data. A bar chart would be more useful.

[biotech]

I can't edit the post, so here's an update (bar by popular demand):

http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/854/unledlauv.png/

[Inufu]

Thank you very much - I don't understand why HN doesn't have at least a bar graph by default.

[veyron]

Why wouldnt you use a barchart?

[voidfiles]

Even in SF it doesn't always cost 2k+ for a 1 bedroom.

[russell]

I commute to SF on a weekly basis and stay in a hotel because it's cheaper than an apartment. And my bed gets made every day.

Edit: $65/day including tax * 13 days/month ~= $850. Allowing for holidays, vacation and occasional work from home. It's decent, better than Motel 6, more like Best Western. I got a good rate because I negotiated it years ago. It's outside SF itself, but I use Bart.

[gst]

Seems a lot of people get fooled by the average prices on Padmapper.

But the reality is that expensive apartments stay on the site longer than cheap apartments. So the "average" prices are likely to be higher than the real average.

It takes some time to find a reasonable apartment however.

I've was apartment-hunting for one month each weekend and finally found a huge $1350 a month studio in Nob Hill (that's nearly the size of a one-bedroom). If you don't have that much time to look for apartments the rent will be much higher of course.

[samstave]

The unit next door to me has been on the market for some time - it was upgraded to include a washer/dryer - new paint, refinished hardwood floors and replaced kitchen appliances.

It is really nice, a one bedroom, parking and pets allowed: $2,600

I have a 2-bedroom and have been looking for a 3-bedroom...

The rents are crazy.

There was a beautiful 3-bedroom little house near me; they wanted $7200 per month with a $10,000 deposit! WTF.

[SeoxyS]

I'm in a 1 bedroom in SF and it's a base price of $2500 for rent. It just depends on how nice the apartment is and which neighborhood you're in.

[tsunamifury]

In the east bay even i pay 1900/m for 550 sqft Studio+

[DharmaSoldat]

Agreed - location is a good indicator. I make good money for my area, but cost of living is highest in the country and salaries are higher in other areas.

[RandallBrown]

Location is huge. I live in Michigan and make considerably less than friends that live elsewhere. My rent is also almost 1000 dollars cheaper per month.

[mahyarm]

So if you get something more than a $24'0000 (($1000*12 months)/.55 after tax income) raise to account for the $1k rent difference, would you go for it?

[mvolz]

Depends on where you live. I paid $1200 for a studio apt. in A2, and it can go even higher the closer to downtown you live.

[bretthoerner]

"Considerable" is unclear, it'd be easy to cover a 1k/mo spread under my definition of "considerable".

[pixeloution]

This sort of poll teeters on the edge of meaninglessness: you're only considering income and location.

Experience and type of work matter, as does actual ability - and good luck polling on that. Company size is also a factor (actual ability seems to affect pay less as the company gets larger, in my experience).

[goodweeds]

It would be fun to maps this data against geographic regions and index that against cost of living.. Except those of us in the bay area would discover that while we make $120k-$150k, our houses cost 4-6x what it costs for those who make $80-$120k in the midwest. Then we would all cry.

[plasticbuddha]

Or, you could use PayScale's data to find this out.

http://www.payscale.com/research/US/Job=Sr._Software_Enginee...

[adnam]

These salary polls are getting very tiresome.

[mrchess]

OP should look at this thread. Relevant and very interesting about CS/EE salaries. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3141716

[DavidSJ]

Please clarify whether this is base pay or total compensation.

[vaksel]

base pay + bonuses + current value of stock options

pretty much anything minus benefits

[olragon]

~$5k/year Vietnamese programmer with 3 years experience, living and working in Ho Chi Minh City, Viet Nam. Not bad, huh?

[brown9-2]

There should really be a choice between areas with "high" 1br-costs-2000-a-month cost of living and Idaho/Kentucky.

[sage_joch]

Seattle kind of falls between the two, for example.

[MKT]

Chicago