Ask HN: Am I underpaid?

[MstrMZR]

I'm currently living in SF and working at a fairly prolific late stage startup. I've got a Bachelor's of CS and am a Front End Engineer with roughly 5 years of engineering experience. The first half of those years was spent working full stack, and the last half working very closely with Backbone, jQuery, Require, and other modern JS frameworks. I've launched numerous very successful products, and consistently get nothing but positive remarks in annual reviews.

I make roughly 115k a year, which at first seemed like a ton after moving here from a relatively low COL area. Lately though, the combination of looking at my account balances after paying rent + seeing people talk about salaries on HN make me think that I am on the very low end of the pay scale. Combine that with the paltry amount of equity I have and the fact that my company gives absolutely zero bonuses, and it all leaves me thinking that there might be greener pastures in other companies in the Valley.

So what's your opinion HN: Are the people paid above the median the vocal minority, or should I reevaluate my situation for more fair compensation?

[popschedule]

I don't think 110 is low for a front-end engineer. Whether or not you are underpaid is more of a question on how much money you need to be happy. Will increasing your pay by 30k per year significantly change your current lifestyle? You should examine if you are happy at your job first, understand how different your life might be if you added 1200 more per month, and determine whether or not that increase will make you happy?

I've always been a believer that if you are truly happy in your work then the pay will not matter much. If you are unhappy in what you do a little more will only make you happy for a short while.

[ardit33]

Yes and no.

For 5 years of experience that seems like in the low end, but if you have only front end skills, then jobs available to you will always be lower paid than somebody that has full-stack/back-end skills. Being good in the back-end means that you have to brush your Computer Science skills. Nobody wants to trust their back-end to people that don't have their CS down, and they are willing to pay more for the people that do, Front end is seen a less mission-critical area for most tech companies. Also the entry bar is lower, which increases competition (lots of new grads, or people that don't have CS skills can apply to those jobs), which decreases salaries. That's how it works.

.

Start developing your back-end skills. Python, Ruby, Java, whatever suits you. Also makes sure your Computer Science knowlede is up-to date. Buy Skieana's Algorithms book (it is a great read), and internalize the most common algos. (Not memorize, but internalize). Being full stack will dramatically increase your job opportunities and income over time.

Also, it makes you much more prepared/ready to get a startup/product going, end to end.

[MstrMZR]

Good advice. I was actually a back-end engg for the first few years of my career. I ended up transitioning into front-end because I really enjoyed it, though I kind of miss helping out in all aspects of the stack.

[volandovengo]

The other problem with california is the state tax. You can make 10% less in Washington + take the same amount home.

[avelis]

If this is a serious post and not a joke then allow me to humor your situation. You are trying to gauge external fairness by getting a layout of responses in the regional industry. The fact of the matter is some will make more than you and a good amount make less than you. Some will have more experience than you and make less and some will have less experience than you and make more. Ultimately there is enough evidence on both sides of the spectrum to sway you either way. The choice is yours on what you choose to read and go by.

If you are happy with what your compensation, great. If you are not then do something about it. Offer value and I guarantee opportunity for compensation will come knocking.

[RandallBrown]

I'd say you're in the ballpark.

I live in Seattle, where cost of living is lower (although still pretty expensive).

People I know with similar experience make less than you (3-5k less) and work for major software companies. Given the difference in the cost of living, I would say your numbers are about right. It's possible that since your company is less established (late stage startup) they might not pay quite as well as someplace like Google or Microsoft.

[up_and_up]

In my exp, Frontend Development is not the highest paying area of software engineering. I jumped from doing mostly frontend to doing mostly backend and system admin and was able to demand more money. Now I am at the Sr. Level and can demand more.

Albiet, deeply knowing the full stack is a big plus on my resume.

Complex Backend dev, big data, iOS/Android dev all seem to offer higher salaries.

Checkout the Angelist job section, they list tons of salaries.

[Matt_Mickiewicz]

Based on the thousands of offers from hundreds of start-ups that I've seen DeveloperAuction, that is definitely a little bit on the low end for a "late stage" startup (Series B+?) company, but you're not horribly far off.

You could probably get $125K-$130K elsewhere, maybe even more, and potentially with a signing bonus as well.

$100-$115K is a typical salary at a seed stage company which would offer a significant equity stake

[jmathai]

Find happiness. It may or may not involve your job. If you're unhappy with your work because of your salary, you're going down a rabbit hole. Optimize for happiness.

Otherwise, the best advice I can give is forgo the equity and take the extra $15k in salary. It acts as a baseline for your next job and it's cash you can use today for savings or material goods.

Unless you're a founder or a VERY early employee in a quite successful startup the financial upside just isn't there. The upside has to be a good job that compliments whatever it is that makes you happy.

[sherm8n]

You're not underpaid, but you could be making A LOT more money. A lot of the suggestions seem to be learning how to do backend development or other skills. You could become a badass full stack developer, hone your skills and then apply for other positions. But why wait?

Talented developers are known for being able to pick up any skill they can on the fly. So you're not really at an advantage spending months or years becoming really good.

The problem is many developers aren't good at marketing themselves. You don't really need to be an expert at something like MongoDB, Backbone or any other technology to get paid more. You just need to clearly explain that it will be no problem picking them up because you've worked with dozens of other no-sql data stores or javascript frameworks.

You want to demonstrate the business value that you can provide to them -- like hiring you will finally allow them to work on that feature that will increase sales by 20%. If you can convince an employer of that, they'll pay you lots of money. An extra 15-30K salary is nothing for companies at that stage.

[joshfraser]

Check out the histogram at: https://angel.co/salaries

[megaframe]

It all depends but I've learned to look at http://www.glassdoor.com its not 100% accurate but gives you a rough idea of whats going on. It's how I figured out I'm underpaid (I'd care more if the job was stressful but it's not...)

[peterjaap]

Quit whining and get to work. You are grossly overpaid. I live in the Netherlands and that job and your skill set would get you around 45.000 USD a year. And we pay roughly 50% taxes over that, netting you at 22.500 USD a year. So, get to work.

[patd]

Don't forget that your cost of living (rent, food, ...) is probably lower in the Netherlands than in SF. And you get all the social benefit from a European country (cheaper healthcare, cheaper education, ...).

It's hard to compare US and European salaries.

[Zklozenblarg]

You should reexamine your payslip. The highest tax bracket may be roughly 50%, but none of your income is actually in that bracket. You probably get to keep about 65% of your income, which is still less than you would get to keep in California.

[mping]

I'm sorry, but you are being paid by Portuguese standards (you sure it's net 22.k USD, not €?). I have received some offers for jobs in Amsterdam, the highest was 450/500 € per day, and I believe there's similar offers.

[fecak]

You mention positive reviews, successful products and no bonuses. One key question would be whether or not you have received any increases since you've been there (are they making an effort to keep you, and do they value you more today than they did when you started?). You don't say how long you have been at the company. I have recruited on the east coast for 15 years so not as familiar with SF, but in Philadelphia you'd be on the high end for that level of experience. I would have assumed for SF your salary would be at the bottom end of market rate, but I'm no expert on SF.

[lumens]

We're building Mighty Spring (https://www.mightyspring.com) to solve the exact problem you're having: "How can I make sure that I'm not missing out on better opportunities?".

We call it 'Passive Opportunity Awareness' and it's the core of our value proposition.

We're currently in private beta, but you sound like someone who could benefit from our service in it's current form. Feel free to write me at the address in my profile if you have private questions.

ps. We're releasing a new home page within the next day or so. The current one looks a little... startuppy :)

[michaelochurch]

That seems interesting. I agree with the ideology. I don't like resume culture (do I have to list projects I didn't like or disagreed with?) and I don't use LinkedIn much because it's too wedded the old, broken way of doing things.

I feel like most career-related websites are obsessed with the past, because they're targeted toward risk-averse bean-counters because that was who one needed to impress back when people still commuted to work on the backs of pterodactyls. That's why a LinkedIn profile is a resume and the game (for those who choose to play) is about trolling for endorsements like it's Downton Abbey and one needs a formal Letter of Introduction to get a job.

What approach are you taking to this? I assume the problem is related to "hidden node discovery", i.e. taking queries like "I want to be a data scientist in 3 years" and turning them into action plans. Is this going to rely on human curation (from, e.g. employers) or will it be done with machine learning/"big data" approaches? Or do I misunderstand the problem completely?

Anyway, cool stuff. I look forward to the next version of the home page.

[lanstein]

I'd recommend putting your (throwaway) email in the about section of your profile - you may get responses you wouldn't otherwise from people who don't want to go to the trouble of making a throwaway HN account.

[MstrMZR]

Done. Thank you for the suggestion.

[theprodigy]

Start talking to recruiters to see what opportunities and salary you can get.

You can be amazing, but if you can't communicate your value and what you have done then people will undervalue you.

Honestly, I think your salary is average.

[kogir]

Simple: If you can land a better paying (don't forget stock grants and options) and/or more fun job elsewhere, then yes.

Interview at other places you'd actually consider working and get offer letters. Compare.

As an employer, I knew my employees were doing this - It's my job to keep them, not their job to forego better opportunities and pay in the name of loyalty.

That said, if you do get better offers, talk to your current employer before jumping ship. They're best positioned to know exactly how valuable you are and might work very hard to keep you.

[yen223]

I make $15,000 a year. Am I underpaid?

[heelhook]

Depends on your skills and how/where you apply them.

[meerita]

I do 30k a year. Spain. :(

[aosmith]

C'mon down to Chicago. Sure it's cold but you'll probably make the same money and live for much less. That's why I'm here instead of there ;)

[MstrMZR]

I've certainly considered it. Unfortunately I am currently locked into a lease, and the outdoor opportunities in the area are worth at least a bit of the premium.

[rodrigoavie]

Generally, front-end developers tend to earn less than back-end ones. Pick up some CS fields and explore and learn them until you get good at some of them.

The fact is, front-end developers are not that hard to replace, so you don't have much of a bargaining power there.

Try learning more about Algorithms, Security, Optimization, maybe even A.I (NLP, Data Mining, Machine Learning, etc.)