

Game Developer Salaries From H1-B Data - JabavuAdams
http://realtimecollisiondetection.net/blog/?p=70

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jrockway
Wouldn't H1-B salaries be lower than non-H1-B salaries? I thought companies
liked H1-Bs since the employees don't ask for as much money. (Plus, they have
the "if you dont like this job, you go back to your home country" leverage,
which probably makes the H1-Bs not ask for more money.)

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mariorz
I would think companies like H1-Bs because it allows a bigger talent pool to
choose from, not because they can exploit foreign workers more easily.

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artaak
Talent and leverage goes side by side in H1-Bs. The same applies sometimes to
the foreign students pursuing PhD in US. If the advisor does not like
something he does not mind to use the leverage"if you do not like it - go back
to your country".

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jrbedard
It's quite surprising that they are making that salary table public. I can
name 2 people that I know on HB-1 from that table just by looking up the
company name and job title.

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zach
No doubt, I can as well; quite unexpected that this is public in such a
format.

Presumably there is also a country of origin in this data -- that would also
be interesting to tabulate averages from.

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JabavuAdams
These look high, from my perspective in Toronto, Canada. That said, I've only
worked at smaller studios. The two large studios near Toronto, Rockstar, and
Koei are famously secretive.

My experience in Toronto has been that at most companies you take a salary hit
versus non-game-programming, because of the sexiness of the field, and the
small industry here.

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jrbedard
From my experience, these salaries are also 15-25% higher than what you get in
most Montreal game studios for entry level engineer positions.

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anamax
All of the games would go away if the govt auctioned H1-B visas. Then the only
question is whether they'd be owned/rented by companies or by individuals.

As to choosing the number to be auctioned, we could either pick a number or
stop issuing visas as soon as "enough" money has been raised. (Yes, you'd set
things up so the first visa didn't cost a lot more than the last one.)

