
It Pays to Know Ruby: New York City’s Top Tech Jobs (and Their Average Salary) - FluidDjango
http://www.betabeat.com/2011/12/29/it-pays-to-know-ruby-new-york-citys-top-tech-jobs-and-their-average-salary/
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rada
I don't know if I would put too much trust in this list. From what I know
about NYC salaries - 10 years freelancing at all kinds of companies, from
startups to corporate behemoths - the numbers seem about $20k low, on average.
PHP, Ruby and mobile devs that I know personally make $120+ (both freelancing
and full time), more on Wall Street. Sales engineers make significantly more.

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dabent
I wonder what the sample size was here. I noticed most of the salaries end in
numbers that indicate a denominator of 3 or 4, such as 250 or 667. If that's
really how small the sample set is, I'm not surprised that so many have seen
the numbers as being low.

I'm also curious about the source of these numbers. I don't think I've seen a
salary survey like this that's ever seemed anything but lower than what I know
the market to be. That makes sense if employers are providing the numbers, as
they'd like to pay less than they are currently paying for talent.

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brianvan
It's a placement agency so, yeah, don't fully trust those numbers.

Then again, you'd have to think that those numbers represent the sort of
market that would use staffing agencies. So, if you want to come work for a
financial titan, you can get more $$$ via direct negotiations / interviews.
However, if you think you're coming here to work for an interactive media or
B2B startup, then forget these numbers altogether. Those jobs pay everything
from low market salaries to a cash/equity mix. We'll never get a clear picture
of that market because, IRT insiders, it's in no one's best interest to talk
about it.

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brador
Once again: Averages without variance have no meaning.

This is why, at school, you were taught how to calculate averages at the same
time as calculating variance. The variance provides an indication of data
spread and the two belong together, like fish and chips.

One without the other means incorrect inferences are more likely. Like here.

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sliverstorm
Oh, I'm sure they are counting on incorrect inferences. You know, using the
super-senior dev's $250k salary to mask the introductory salary of $30k and
stuff like that...

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droithomme
For those of you who live in New York City, what sort of standard of living do
these salaries represent? Would one be comfortably be able to lease a 3
bedroom apartment within walking distance of work, in a neighborhood with good
schools?

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droithomme
Thanks very much for all the replies. So 3 bedrooms basically doesn't even
exist, but 1 and 2 is available. No answers on the school issues.

Is it uncommon then for developers living in New York City to have children?
If you have kids, they all go in a single bedroom it seems and there's no room
for a home office since there's no third bedroom.

If one is single I can see how it all works, but for those of us with kids I
am not so clear. Some have mentioned elsewhere in the discussion that the
listed salaries were around $20,000 less than realistic. Even with that, it is
still substantially less than I make now, and we have a 4 bedroom with enough
land for my wife to grow some vegetables and have a couple fruit trees. I've
been contacted from recruiters a few times seeking to attract me to Manhattan.
They say it is the new tech mecca. I haven't followed up though or priced
property in the area. Looking here though, it sounds like talent would take a
significant, perhaps monumental salary and lifestyle hit moving to the area.
Just trying to understand how people make it work. Clearly it has a strong
draw for many people.

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thetrendycyborg
Most of the developers I know are twenty-somethings. Some of the older devs
have kids, but they usually don't live in Manhattan proper. Long Island City,
Astoria, Brooklyn, New Jersey, etc, are much preferred. I know only one dev
who lives in Manhattan.

Commuting is amazingly nice in this area.

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droithomme
Thank you for the specific details. It sounds like those with children just
all live in other cities and states. In places I have lived most of my life
states are usually a bit farther apart, so the idea of commuting daily from
another state sounds strange, but I did do that for a while when I worked in
DC. The commute was far from pleasant though!

So regarding commuting, what sort of commute is involved for say the people
living in New Jersey who work at a tech firm in New York City. Can it be done
in 30 minutes? Is there a train that goes straight from one to the other or
does one have to drive to a station first, park, etc. How far a walk is it on
average from the nearest subway station exist to a tech firm office. Trying to
get an idea how many minutes a day the commute would be. Thanks.

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jasonwocky
I'm a developer with children in NYC. If you don't want to live in another
state, Brooklyn and Queens are fairly common options for tech folks who work
in Manhattan.

Commuting from Brooklyn (which isn't technically another city) to where I work
in Manhattan takes about 45 minutes. That includes the walks to and from the
subway. It's a quite pleasant commute...I live far enough away that I
basically always get a seat on the subway and can comfortably read on my way
into work.

If you live closer to Manhattan, the rents go up and the commute gets shorter,
but you're less likely to get a seat every morning. Standing isn't that big of
a deal, but it makes it tougher to read sometimes.

I'd say 45 minutes each way is pretty easy. 30 minutes and under can be
tougher and more expensive to pull off.

Walks to/from the Subway in Manhattan are typically less than 10 minutes,
almost no matter where the office is. There's a lot of tech in the Union
Square area, which has a ton of subway access.

In Brooklyn, depending on where you live, it can be a bit more of a walk to
the subway, but I've never had more than a 12 minute walk and today I can do
it in 5.

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droithomme
Thanks very much for the details, that give a much clearer idea about
commutes.

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thetrendycyborg
These numbers seem low. But as for cost of living, don't live in New York
itself. The longer your commute, the more you save. Time is the trade-off, of
course. If you get some partial work-from-home, you're golden. I have a fairly
nice sized (1200 square foot) apartment within 30 minutes by bus and train
from work.

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jimbobimbo
I ran some numbers to compare my current perks (NJ, less than 10 minutes
drive, lunch at home) vs possible offer in NYC (about an hour of train and
subway combined) and figured I'd need to ask 10k more to just to have same
amount of money left after expenses for commute and lunching out. And I'm
already making more that Ruby people from the OP list.

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TYPE_FASTER
Yes, those numbers seem low to me, especially for NYC.

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elb0w
This obviously doesn't include the financial industry. I know for a fact the
average salary range is higher than this. In some of the medium sized firms,
not even the large ones. Not to mention Perl is still a highly valued language
in this industry which wasn't even included here.

I assume this sample is based on start ups only?

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draegtun
re: _sample_ \- Looking at CyberCoders job postings for New York right now it
only shows 252 job posts in total so the sample is very small.

And you can slice and dice this kind of data in so many ways you can end of
with many different types of results from it :)

Searching on CyberCoders for PHP, Python, Ruby & Perl at moment (in NY)
returns these numbers of job posts...

    
    
      PHP      48
      Python   33
      Ruby     27
      Perl     13
    

However if we then break this down into clearly defined posts for a PHP
developer, Python developer, etc we get...

    
    
      PHP      9
      Python   8
      Ruby     9   (3 Ruby, 6 RoR)
      Perl     1
    

And the average salary range given for these developer posts are...

    
    
      PHP      $80k - $121k
      Python   $93k - $128k
      Ruby     $83k - $128k
      Perl     $80k - $110k
    

As with quoted figures everywhere please take these with a large pinch of salt
:)

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zyb09
I hope with "Mobile/Web Engineers" they don't actually mean native iOS /
Android development, because it would be a shame to see them lower than
everybody else.

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moocow01
The link in the article to the most poachable players sure is an interesting
one... never seen names and numbers called out so bluntly - their employers
must thrilled. (Oh well I guess thats part of the game...)

[http://www.betabeat.com/2011/11/17/new-york-techs-20-most-
po...](http://www.betabeat.com/2011/11/17/new-york-techs-20-most-poachable-
players/)

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lemming
I suspect that a bunch of the numbers quoted there are dramatically on the low
side, though.

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moocow01
I wonder how they came up with any of the numbers frankly. They seem weirdly
detailed for being algorithmic. Pretty entertaining though.

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jwallaceparker
The average Ruby salary is about 3% higher than the average Python salary.

Not a big difference.

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joejohnson
A lot of these jobs are not entry-level, but I believe that jobs in CA (in the
Bay Area) have equal or higher entry-level salaries. Can anyone confirm that
people in tech jobs are paid more in Silicon Valley than in NYC?

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itmag
Holy fuck you Americans are well paid...

80k is a very respectable salary here in Sweden. Hell, I know plenty of
programmer working for 40k a year. In the US it seems like the norm for
recompense is 100k+. What gives?

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mattdeboard
I'm an American, in America. 80k is a very respectable salary here in America
too, and I know programmers working for 40k a year.

The United States is a very large, very socioeconomically diverse country. It
is after all, iirc, at least as large as all of Europe. So no, not all
American devs are paid that way.

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olegd
where is .net?

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xseparator
Who cares?

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eropple
Quite a lot of people, actually. Thanks for the insightful post.

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dsolomon
Those salaries seem inflated, like most of the ads for developers.

The data source is CyberCoders. A ouiji board is more accurate.

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gyardley
Inflated?

I was thinking they were at least $20K on the low side.

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randomdata
Note that it is an average. If all your friends are making $120,000 per year,
and all dsolomon's friends are making $50,000 per year, the average income is
going to somewhere between both of your expectations.

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frou_dh
_Hammer Carpenter_

