
Ask HN: How much do developers earn in Europe? - ciaoben
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScTh14SV6qbMvGrGz5-XQz0aGp04j5M4P_4ciaSOXsTBfzvGA/viewform
======
thinbeige
Slightly OT but maybe helpful: Don't focus too much on the salary. It's just
one tiny part of the whole package.

Your dev job pays your rent, food and savings. I assume that most dev jobs do
this quite well.

Beyond this, the main goal of a job is _to increase your future market value,
your professional network and to have fun._ So. basically it's about how much
you are worth in your next job and that you enjoy your time.

A high salary doesn't help you if you do stuff which doesn't matter in a few
years.

A high salary doesn't help you if you work at an unknown company which goes
bankrupt in a few months and you cannot show a finished product or that you
can stay at one job longer than 12 months.

A high salary doesn't help you if your coworkers are toxic or not the smartest
guys or their English is on such a basic level that the communication and not
the coding is your daily challenge.

A high salary doesn't help you if your CTO is a passive-aggressive, clueless
guy who doesn't talk.

A high salary doesn't help you if you just work on some side projects nobody
cares about, in a programming language you weren't hired for.

A high salary doesn't help you if you are not happy.

~~~
scarmig
Happiness is paramount. And especially early on having opportunities for
growth matters.

But after a couple years in the industry? A high salary goes really far. Note
that "high" means different things to different people, but choosing a
300k/year job over a 200k/year job is often a good idea, even if it's to do
stupid shit and not change the world. That doesn't mean you should choose
misery over happiness for money, but it's rare that the choice is that stark.

Most tradeoffs are ill-defined and uncertain when you're choosing the job.
Salary, on the other hand, is directly comparable, and it translates to
something very real and concrete.

~~~
BrandoElFollito
Well, having had a few times the opportunity to do such a move, I stayed at my
previous job. Good atmosphere, cool company (a big one), located in such a way
that my 15 km bike commute is 70% in a forest, no travel, yell at my children
every night so that they do their homework/wash teeth etc.

What would these 100k give me? Not much - I will comfortably retire when time
comes. I would consider a 500k increase as it would change my life and
probably help me to retire earlier.

I belive that what revenue brings in a set of plateaux. When you start every
euro counts, then comes a plateau and you move up after a significant change
of salary. Which brings some acceptable/bereable drawbacks.

~~~
Mortiffer
What about working for 2 years then taking a break to work on side projects
and travel for a year. With a high income you can do this; essentially working
66%

~~~
BrandoElFollito
Beside the fact that I hate to travel (I accumulated 2+M miles in 8 years, I
had enough) I have children. I want stability for them, a routine in which
they will feel safe.

I like to work in an office because it gives me two separate worlds (office
and home) which is good for my sanity.

Finally, I live in France where the costs of life are quite high and I will
not be able to easily find a similar job (there are just a few) so when I
retire, this is for good.

I am considering a sabbatical, though.

------
Fradow
In case you are interested, Urban Linker (french recruitment agency) publish
somewhat detailed salary stats (in French), last one is form 2016 [0]. This
only covers Parisian region, but it's really interesting to see how technology
affect the salary.

[0] [https://www.urbanlinker.com/le-webzine/etude-des-salaires-
de...](https://www.urbanlinker.com/le-webzine/etude-des-salaires-des-metiers-
tech-2016-en-idf-52)

~~~
yardie
This actually lines up with what I, a mid level .Net dev was expecting. When I
first arrived in Paris I thought the compensation was low, but I was educated
that that was the standard. It's improved a bit but not a whole lot.

Paris is still a great city to live in. We even managed to live there with
child.

------
shanwang
Can't open the doc because it's blocked by my employer. But generally the
developer wage is very low in Europe compared with US(Bay area).

AFAIK London have the highest salary among european countries, usually handed
out by Investment banks and other financial service companies.

In London a tier 1 bank's VP developer will typically get £90k-110k base, plus
15-40% bonus. If you work for a hedge fund, the base is typically 10% higher
with 10-20% more bonus. To get a VP job in a bank you usually need 7 year+
experience after graduation.

In contrast the big tech companies in london pays about 10-20% less base
salary than banks, far less cash bonus. But depends on which one you are
working for, the RSU could be either similar to the states side or a bit less.
The signon bonus is usually quite low as well.

Startups in London have very low pay, typically 50-60% of your market value in
a bank.

So if you are a top developer with 15 years+ experience, works for a top hedge
fund in London, you'll most likely take home < £200k, which is like $260,
that's only about average wage for a google senior developer.

~~~
pmlnr
> But generally the developer wage is very low in Europe compared with US(Bay
> area).

Because it usually comes with built-in social security and nationwide health
insurance.

> AFAIK London have the highest salary among european countries,

Nope. Scandinavia.

~~~
kowdermeister
> Because it usually comes with built-in social security and nationwide health
> insurance.

That's not the case. Health insurance plays very little role in this. I can go
to a private doctor for peanuts. Salaries are low, because companies are
"broke" and don't have million dollar funding and you can have a great
lifestyle with fifth/tenth of a SV salary.

> Nope. Scandinavia.

Nope, Switzerland.

~~~
pmlnr
Switzerland is not EU.

~~~
kowdermeister
I know that, but you wrote "among european countries" an Switzerland is
definitely one of them. It doesn't really make a difference for EU citizens if
Switzerland is in or out.

------
s3nnyy
Switzerland, Zurich is the only place in Europe where you can earn Bay Area
salaries; I am a software engineer/tech recruiter hiring on behalf of a
handful of Swiss companies. If you look for a job
([https://coderfit.com/openedjobs/](https://coderfit.com/openedjobs/)), or
know some engineeres who are, please reach out to me. You find my email in my
HN-handle.

(From an employee's perspective, Switzerland can be counted "as an EU country"
since you can work here with an EU passport.)

~~~
ThePawnBreak
I would disagree. Zurich does indeed pay very well, but it's very hard to get
a job there, and salaries are only competitive with the Bay Area at lower
levels. That means it's possible to find a job that pays 100k, but 300k
compensation packages are far, far more rare than in the Bay Area. I don't
know any company apart from Google that pays that much for senior engineers.

I tried to get a job there about 8 months ago, and I could only convince 3
startups to interview me (after I failed to get a job at Google), and I didn't
get an offer at any of them. I failed one for "cultural fit", one because I
didn't do well enough in the technical phone screen, and with the third one I
decided to stop the process because I had another offer and was tired of
interviewing. It's fine to not accept people for cultural reasons, but if
there are 4 startups that are hiring in Zurich, that kinda sucks for
candidates.

Also, recently Google started paying new engineers in Zurich lower than in the
US (same salary, far fewer RSUs). I guess the lack of competition in the
European market is a good enough reason.

Do you know any companies in Zurich hiring developers that pay Bay Area
salaries (100k junior, 200k senior) and hire >100 engineers a year?

~~~
dola
There are a few consulting companies doing project work that hire a good
amount of people. (However none are even close to you >100 / year number) And
also, it will be pretty hard to get near the 200k mark in Zurich if you're not
at either a bank with a very specific expertise or at Google.

~~~
ThePawnBreak
I am talking total compensation (salary + bonus + stock), and at Google you
get past 200k at L4, so after the first promotion. New grads used to make
around $160k, not it's somewhat less.

------
jpmonette
Data is impossible to read - seems like some people are converting their
salary to USD, some others leave it in their home currency and a rare few
provide the accurate currency. Interesting initiative though - would love to
see this in a better format :)

~~~
ciaoben
Why do you say this? Can you give an example of someone who has converted
their salary to USD?

At the end I plan to polish the results and publish them

~~~
atmosx
I am European and live in Europe but I've always been paid in USD and my
salary is negotiated in USD, so I am not sure what parent means or why does
currency matter.

~~~
seszett
Well currency matters if you want to compare all answers.

Also, the question specifically says "in €, otherwise specify" ( _edit_ : ok,
I see it was added later).

It's weird that you are paid in USD in Europe, isn't it? How comes?

~~~
Bahamut
A lot of US companies tend to pay in USD regardless of locale when hiring
remote.

~~~
kuschku
That would suck so much, taking a 30% paycut just in the past 7 months due to
this.

~~~
atmosx
According the ECB[1] data on 24 Jan 2017 the exchange rate was 1 EUR = 1.0514
USD and today is 1 EUR = 1.1806 USD so we have:

    
    
        (1.1806-1.0748)/1.0748 = 0.0984 => 0.0984 * 100 = 9.84% 
    

How exactly did you manage to lose 30%?

[1]
[https://www.ecb.europa.eu/stats/policy_and_exchange_rates/eu...](https://www.ecb.europa.eu/stats/policy_and_exchange_rates/euro_reference_exchange_rates/html/eurofxref-
graph-usd.en.html)

~~~
kuschku
Then take another time span, but the currency fluctuations are so large that
it becomes the largest factor to how much you actually take home.

I definitely wouldn't want that.

(I misremembered which currency fell 30% against the Euro, it was the pound
instead)

------
kornakiewicz
It always bug me, when developers, people whose main task is passing different
data to and fro, are unable to provide information in format that is
unequivocal for recipient. Do you really, for example, in systems you create,
store or send money data without currency information?

~~~
ciaoben
You are right, horrible mistake. Fixed now, sorry.

------
Palmik
Does not include Switzerland. Also, what about bonuses and stock (options)
which often make sizable portion of income?

~~~
briandear
Options are not income and are worthless unless it’s a public company or there
is a liquidity event. Considering options as a part of income is the same as
if your company paid you in lottery tickets.

~~~
AstralStorm
Tax codes agree and defer the actual taxation to the time you execute the
options - then they become income.

~~~
schrodinger
Exercised options in a private company still aren't liquid, or usable income.

~~~
anindha
Early employees at Uber had an opportunity to sell stock at a funding round.
Not sure exactly how many people, but believe it was first 1000.

------
kowdermeister
Salary questions should require a currency suggestion.

~~~
LusoTycoon
Indeed, please edit the survey so the data becomes more readable.

~~~
ciaoben
I edited, any other suggestion?

I will publish polished results when will end data gathering

~~~
BrandoElFollito
It would be great to have a reference currency (EUR probably) so that the
comparison is easier.

------
pbosko
Why did you focus on EU only? What about Norway, Switzerland, Iceland, Serbia,
FYROM, Albania, Bosnia & Herzegovina?

~~~
pmlnr
Because you have the right to work in the EU without any extra paperwork.

~~~
bhaak
Iceland, Liechtenstein, and Norway, and Switzerland do, too.

The former three through the EEA and the latter through a series of bilateral
agreements.

------
lowry
In many EU countries, seasoned developers become fre lancers. Achieving higher
revenue is impossible otherwise.

~~~
ciaoben
This is sad. I mean, I think that numbers that we see in Silicon Valley are
ridiculous, but it seems to me that here in Europe this profession it is not
recognized for the value it delivers.

~~~
paublyrne
I think it's less to do with recognition as much there just not being as much
money in European businesses, particularly startups.

~~~
atmosx
Indeed. On the other hand EU scene doesn't look like a bubble with insane
valuations.

------
dmitriid
"Annual gross salary": Euro? Dollars? Swedish/Norwegian/Danish crowns? British
pounds? Swiss franks?

Was this survey created by an American? ;)

~~~
ciaoben
Sorry! you are right, fixed it now. BTW, not american :D, italian.

------
RCa_
How about this:
[https://insights.stackoverflow.com/survey/2017#salary](https://insights.stackoverflow.com/survey/2017#salary)
?

~~~
ciaoben
Interesting, thanks!

------
kevindqc
> Gender: Apache Attack Helicopter Comment: Fuck you implying anything about a
> wage gap stupid tranny

Nice..

------
RugnirViking
Might I suggest you correct 'years at experience' to 'years of experience'

otherwise, interesting survey. I hope i'm not too much of an outlier here to
mess with the result for uk.

------
_hao
Reading input from my own country it seems I'm grossly underpaid right now....
Makes me feel extremely bad. Perhaps it's time for negotiations with my boss.

~~~
RugnirViking
If its a couple percent it might be doable, but typically if you're underpaid
the best option is move companies - even though you might like where you are
right now, you can negotiate less hours for the same pay. Staying won't give
you many options, and often, you can even jump right back into your company
higher up the chain.

------
internity
After seeing this i'm like i want to start crying. i'm actually a software
engineer working on cryptocurrencies devops and system engineering back-end.
My tasks wait for that : 1 - coordinate withe clients 2 - write code 3 -
deployement 4 - testing (golang) 5 - writing specs 6 - putting down
architecture in tunisia what i get per month around 700€. a ford fiesta in
here cost about 13k€.

------
johnflan
Given this survey is targeted at engineers, the data formatting is terrible.

------
Mc_Big_G
Ask I suspected based on the salary of a VERY senior developer friend in
Barcelona, the pay in Spain is terrible. I make 3x+ what he does and 5x+ most
of the salaries in the spreadsheet. Too bad because my wife is Spanish and I'd
like to move there some day but I'll have to be retired for it to make sense.

------
eoin_murphy
I don't think you're going to get a great response as that's a lot of
identifying information you're asking for. Country, Area (optional), years of
experience, gross salary and extras is what you really want.

~~~
ciaoben
Lot of info are optional..Until now I am pretty happy with the number of
responses

------
Yaggo
In Finland, experienced developer with relevant skills can make 60-75 k€ year
brutto, translating to 40-50 k€ netto. (Though lower salaries are not
uncommon.)

Taxes are high and progressive, but you'll things like 4 weeks vacation, 3
weeks fully paid parental leave for dads (and partially paid for much longer),
free education (incl. universities), free daycare, free healthcare, social
security, etc. This is not without problems, of course, but has huge impact on
stable, equal society and general safety.

(Free = some nominal fees may apply, great majority of costs paid by society.)

------
fmsf
This survey should have a field for "total package" or "equity offered" given
that has larger implications than just Salary. Free food and other perks also
play a large role here.

------
drinchev
Super cool initiative.

For those complaining about formatting issues ( me as well ). I think someone
should fork and re-format the sheet later today and release it back to this
thread.

------
praeconium
I've tried to visualize Your data with this dashboard

[https://affliction123.github.io/euDevDash/](https://affliction123.github.io/euDevDash/)

please let me know how to improve and what info is interesting for You to
present/focus.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15109316](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15109316)

------
staticelf
Is this going to be published somewhere? I wrote in the salary in the currency
of my country which was probably not the intended thing to do.

~~~
ciaoben
I will polish results for having an overview, probably will publish it here. I
made the mistake to not specify currency from the beginning, would you mind
send me the correction to make? fvbenigni@gmail.com

~~~
staticelf
Yes, I do mind. Sorry.

------
gfiorav
There's an app for that:
[https://www.glassdoor.com](https://www.glassdoor.com)

~~~
staticelf
Glassdoor isn't big at all in Europe I'm afraid.

~~~
secult
Big enough to get the rough estimates.

------
predskolsko
Salaries in Serbia can go up to 40-45000 on an annual basis ( taxes can be
pretty insignificant). Even though that is not a lot of money, you can live
lavish lifestyle of that money, since everything is super cheap ( monthy rent
in the city center, 2 room apartment can be found for 300€)

------
thriftwy
Interesting definition of Europe that includes UK but doesn't include Serbia
not to mention Russia.

~~~
simonkamronn
Serbia, sure, UK definitely, but Russia?

~~~
rublev
Russia is European culturally not geographically.

~~~
arethuza
So what continent is Moscow in?

~~~
rublev
Russia.

~~~
thriftwy
So now, basically, there's an alarming incidence of separatist states in
western peninsula of Russia continent?

~~~
rublev
Was joke.

------
zyzyis
The salary in EU for developers (medium and above) is already lower than
developers in big cities (e.g. Beijing, Shenzhen) in China. I guess in the
coming years people will try to find job in China for top pay if US is not an
option.

------
lucb1e
Oh dang, missed the "annual" part of that question. I have no idea, would have
to calculate holiday wages and stuff... And OP has no contact info in his
profile to let him know which entry to update.

------
MrBuddyCasino
Is there a way to save / export the table for sorting etc.?

------
pmlnr
On the currency debate: I'd always assume local currency. I doubt any of these
are in USD, unless stated; the default, in this case, is EUR - or indicate.

~~~
ciaoben
This is what naively I thought when creating it. Anyway, now it's clear. My
bad!

------
sashavingardt
I'm a US citizen working and living in Iceland.

~~~
sgt
That must be quite rare. Tell us a bit about how you ended up living in
Iceland and how the IT industry is up there?

------
dhxt
Can someone filter this data and throw it into BigQuery? Grouping salaries by
years of experience and location would be interesting.

------
eggie5
there goes booking.com ruining the std deviation in Amsterdam again! :)

~~~
chesterc
Shame on them for paying better than most other companies in Amsterdam.

~~~
eggie5
I'm just super jealous every time I see they pay 10k over market on average.

------
kilotaras
Title should be "in EEA" instead of "in Europe."

------
misiti3780
Can someone explain to my why the salaries in Italy are so low? 28K?

------
gokhan
Please add Turkey.

~~~
gressquel
Turkey is not in europe.

~~~
dragandj
How so? Their CAPITAL, and decent chunk of territory are on the continent
called Europe. a couple tens of millions citizens live there. Just counting
those would put them in the first ten-ish most populous countries in Europe.

~~~
muro
Did they move their capital? I thought Ankara was in Asia.

~~~
dragandj
Good catch :) I'm so accustomed to Istanbul being the center of the Turkey's
economy and former Ottoman power. However, that does not change the point.
Istanbul and the European chunk of Turkey (+ Izmir and Aegean coast which was
in "Byzantine" zone of influence) is a huge chunk of Turkey.

------
iofiiiiiiiii
Currency, come on.

