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Find salaries paid at companies using foreign worker data

215 points| krishna_sh | 11 years ago |salar.ly

109 comments

order

kelukelugames|11 years ago

I love these things. Transparency in salary information gives the employees more power. I know the site is down at the moment but it's worth it to bookmark and come back later. Make sure you set the search fields to 2013 or 2012 to 2013 to remove stale salaries. You don't want to negotiate using data from 2009. ;)

Here is comparing google to microsoft to amazon in Seattle. The gaps are pretty wide even for college hire SDE salaries. Go demand a pay raise today!

http://www.salar.ly/salaries/?title=&company=amazon&location...

http://www.salar.ly/salaries/?title=&company=google&location...

http://www.salar.ly/salaries/?title=&company=microsoft&locat...

Site is down by they are looking at it: https://twitter.com/roguelynn/status/507231579752902656

JimboOmega|11 years ago

Let's say you're being underpaid; what is the right strategy to take?

I don't want to poison the working relationship with people above me.

unknown|11 years ago

[deleted]

hungrygs|11 years ago

You call tell how much the H-1B system is being gamed by the Indian in-source companies. They basically never hire software engineers but only "computer programmers" and the ubiquitous "analyst."

Look at this (Salaries in New Jersey? $45,000 for systems analysts?) http://www.h1bme.com/?employer=COGNIZANT+TECHNOLOGY+SOLUTION...

Systems Architects $73k and "programmers" $63k. Not a single software engineer or developer! http://www.h1bme.com/?employer=TATA+CONSULTANCY+SERVICES+LIM...

johnward|11 years ago

Can anyone post a link to the original data source? I'd like to verify this is in fact DOL data. It's much easier to go to an employer with data from an official government source than it is from some site, even if that site claims it got it's data from the source.

datamatt|11 years ago

Does this include bonuses? Many companies (mine included) pay 40%+ extra in bonuses to bring people to the market level.

(site is also down so I can't see)

vampirechicken|11 years ago

If it takes bonuses to get you to market rates, then you're still underpaid.

untog|11 years ago

If your company does that, I very much doubt they also do it for immigrant workers. I doubt the government would approve such an application.

ronnier|11 years ago

Salary is very misleading. Total compensation is ultimately what matters.

foobarqux|11 years ago

Note that this excludes bonuses so is not helpful for positions where performance pay is a large part of compensation.

safepants|11 years ago

is there a similar web service for Canadian results, or even the raw data from the Government?

arenaninja|11 years ago

Is there something similar for non-H1B data? I've previously used salary.com, glassdoor.com and search results on indeed.com to try and compare local salaries, and the variation can be as much as $15k on either end (low-|high-)

yuribit|11 years ago

Very interesting, I'm waiting that it comes up again.. in the meanwhile, don't you think that every input fields in the "Find salaries" page should be a dropdown menu?

sp_|11 years ago

When the DB is up, you'll see recommendations while typing.

zszugyi|11 years ago

They seem to be making 500 (server error).

jprince|11 years ago

Put in Pangea, Chicago, 2009-2013, got server error, running Google Chrome on Macbook Air 2013 Snow Leopard.

KSS42|11 years ago

Some info gleaned from these site:

At Apple, one VP of SW has a salary of approx $400K.

new_guy123|11 years ago

I was so hoping for auto completion!

Kiro|11 years ago

It has but not working at the moment.

momchenr|11 years ago

This site is getting CRUSHED...

SushiMon|11 years ago

Server Error 500. Sigh. Yawn.

buchols|11 years ago

Title is not accurate. This site is actually a great server-error generator, but no sign of any salary data.

MaxwellM|11 years ago

Lynn, FYI - these numbers reported to the DoL are not necessarily accurate and thus should only be used as a ballpark estimate. They are likely to be overestimates of actual numbers.

Having seen H1B document submitted to the DoL, I know that firms misrepresent these numbers. An H1B is granted to immigrants for positions that ostensibly couldn't be filled by US citizens, this is rarely the case. Firms have to show that a job application was life for a certain amount of time and they were unable to fill it.

Finally they need to claim that because the position is so hard to fill, they are willing to pay above prevailing wage. See H1B LCA. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H-1B_visa#Labor_Condition_Appli...

They however do not need to prove that the claimed wage is what is actually being paid. These numbers are thus overestimates and I would guess >10% off the mark.

That said, it is obviously illegal to misrepresent these numbers and some firms are more scrupulous than others.

pslam|11 years ago

Do you have a basis in fact for any of this?

I, like the other replies here, had the exact salary which my H1B Visa application represented to the DoL. It is illegal to misrepresent this, so in order for the prevailing wage to be misrepresented by 10%, the vast majority of H1B Visas would need to be illegally submitted.

Edit: The application also includes a representative sample (or exact numbers of the last few employees) of others who were hired into a similar position. This includes non-H1B employees.

untog|11 years ago

As an H1B employee, I can assure you that the amount on my LCA was the same as I was paid. That said, it is important that people understand what these figures are - they are not actual technically salaries.

dpritchett|11 years ago

Imperfect data is still useful in a negotiation. Present it with minimal comment as a negotiating point and let the counterparty poke holes in it if they so choose. Don't undermine yourself!

Sure the large tech employers are going to have better salary databases than an individual, but that doesn't mean there's no point in trying to arm yourself with relevant info.

kelukelugames|11 years ago

The numbers match everything I've gathered from talking to employees, my own paystubs, and job offers I got this year.

I also know foreign co-workers who always report their current pay when job hunting because they have looked themselves up on similar sites.

vskarine|11 years ago

Actually, in practice I've seen totally opposite of what you mentioned. Companies do not want to reveal real salaries so they apply and report LOWER salaries than what it actually is and then when person joins they adjust it to be higher. This way company still complies with law but does not disclose real salary.

cedsav|11 years ago

You have to meet or exceed prevailing wages for the area/position. The reason is to make sure you're not underpaying foreign workers at the expense of local US candidates.

We sponsored H1B applicants in the past, and the numbers were reviewed by the lawyer who took care of the application. We also had to post the opening notice internally, with the salary offered. And finally, as others have stated, the number is known by the sponsored employee, so there's really no incentive to inflate that number.

badusername|11 years ago

Overestimates seems to be a wrong label, having gone through several H1B visa and transfer applications myself. I would say that most lawyers simply fill in the actual amount.

curiousDog|11 years ago

Again, you're conflating body-shopping/consuling/outsourcing companies with Google/microsof et al. None of the latter pull shit like that.

jsnk|11 years ago

Not sure which firms you worked with, but from my experience, all the numbers I've seen are accurate down to the last dollar digit.

There's simply no incentive for any party involved to misrepresent the figure. Why would companies, foreign employees or lawyers ever change the number when they have nothing to gain but expose themselves to incredible risk by doing so?