

Ask HN - what skillset pays the most in tech? - vijayr

For example all things being equal, a PHP dev gets paid less than dot net or Java.  Is there any specific skillset that pays more than the rest? Either because it is hard to learn, or there aren't enough people to do it etc
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petermikerson
Unique technical skills. For example when Google decided that they wanted to
built V8 (JS JIT) they couldn't just entire anyone who's read some JIT book
one time, they need someone with genuine expertise, publication history and
leadership in the field. There are only like 50 people max in the world who
could do that. They also needed a GC for that JIT, so they need another expert
in that field. Those people get the big bucks.

The guy who runs the self-driving car project at Google earns tons, and he's
not just someone who picked it up as he went along. He picked something,
became and expert when few others did, so when Google wanted to hire him, he
could argue that if you don't hire me there are only like five other people
you could even ask to do this, so he could negotiate for a very high salary.

So you need to become a genuine expert in something, with a publication
history to back it up.

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ConceitedCode
Probably Cobol and maintaining legacy banking mainframe systems because it
would cost more to bring them up to date.

