
Ask HN: Does anyone else feel overpaid? - aphextron
I make $90k USD to sit in an office 8 hours a day taking leisurely lunches and fixing bug tickets. Why do developers in the US make so much money right now?
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krapp
If anyone here finds their conscience burdened by the weight of too much
money, feel free to send some of it to my paypal account[0]. I'll be happy to
help you liberate yourself from the shackles of capitalist excess.

[0] [https://www.paypal.me/kennethrapp](https://www.paypal.me/kennethrapp)

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psyc
After 20 years in this industry, only one thought comes to mind.

"I returned, and saw under the sun, that the race is not to the swift, nor the
battle to the strong, neither yet bread to the wise, nor yet riches to men of
understanding, nor yet favour to men of skill; but time and chance happeneth
to them all."

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kowdermeister
Because there's a shortage of good people and you provide this much value to
the company. Where that money comes from is another question :) You might feel
this because don't challenge yourself enough.

~~~
le-mark
The kicker is, an external observer (ie your boss or hr) has no way to judge
who the "good people" are. Are you the one fixing the bugs that stumped the
team for weeks, or are you the one poorly implementing features that then
require rework later on (and all that entails; prioritization, scheduling,
talking, tracking)? What we do is totally opaque to everyone, but us.

So yes, I agree, there is a shortage of developers of all kinds. And nowadays,
every company out there has some legacy system or another they need maintained
or enhanced. Thus we're paid a lot. Some positions are very demanding, some
aren't. A position that's demanding to one developer may not be to another
(depending on experience etc).

At the end of the day, the big corporations are sitting on hoards of cash. The
way a lot of companies are choosing to spend it are via "capex" captial
expenditures on software projects. For these they need developers.

I've addressed this for myself by hopping jobs 3 times in 2 years, now my
salary is 10% above the local market rate. I am intentionally extracting the
most wealth from this situation that I can (within the bounds I have set for
myself ie w2 fulltime, contracting I could be making quite a lot more).

~~~
kzisme
>I've addressed this for myself by hopping jobs 3 times in 2 years, now my
salary is 10% above the local market rate.

How did you manage this? Did you end up switching technologies or fields? Was
it just for a salary increase, or were you un-challenged?

~~~
le-mark
I did not switch fields, so far as technical skills, I rarely feel challenged
nowadays. A few things:

The way it came about was partly accidental. When I started this, the company
I was at was failing, I knew it was time to leave. Then I took a contract
position at a Big Dumb corp, when that was ending, instead of converting to
full time, I had 3 other offers on the table. One local company was desparate,
that's where the > 10% came from.

Always be interviewing. from constantly interviewing, I knew what the local
market was like for my expertise (java enterprise). And I knew a great offer
when I saw it.

Talk the talk and walk the walk. Train for the technical interview, be able to
talk about how you've rocked past positions, and how you're going to rock this
new position.

Put in the time, don't hide from the hard stuff. Every job I'd had I was
sticking my nose into everything; frontend, backend, deployments, appserver
and cluster adminning, production support, everything. That's how you get to
be expert level at everything. It gives confidence, there's no part of the
process I haven't experienced and have firm opinions on how to do right.

Sorry that turned in to general "dev career advice".

I agree with the other comment, we are probably in a buble so far as dev
salaries, on the other hand, this may be the new normal. I base this opinion
on the way central banks are continuing to print money.

~~~
kzisme
That makes sense and thanks for the insight! Any advice is always appreciated

Having not interviewed much I'm always weary of looking at job postings,
interview questions, and such (for no good reason really).

I've learned a lot in my current position, but I'm starting to feel un-
challenged and slightly bored with the main initiatives we are working on.

Soon enough I'll be the only developer left at this place aside from
contractors, so that will be strange too...

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crypticlizard
Anyone here be willing to help me get there? I'm stuck in another job until I
figure out how to be doing bug fixes for ninety too. I like coding, & I live
in the Bay area. Msg me maybe? u/racketship on Reddit. :Facepalm

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quickthrower2
I did. Then I solved that problem by procreating.

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oldsklgdfth
I feel the same way. I make 83k completing vaguely connected tasks, while
mostly reading things on the internet. Even out of college making 60k felt
like I was overpaid.

The other side of that token is that I know guys making upwards of 120k with
little work, mainly through office politics and delegating work.

~~~
kzisme
I'm curious - how long have you been doing this sort of stuff then?

~~~
oldsklgdfth
What stuff are you referring to?

I graduated about 3 years ago. My first job was with a small company. All
hands were on deck with little room to mess around. After that I worked for
large companies on projects with little organization and poor communication.

~~~
kzisme
Sorry - by 'stuff' I meant just development work or work after graduating
university.

~~~
oldsklgdfth
No worries. I have worked with quite a few developers that share the opinion
of inflated wages.

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bananicorn
No, making around 14-15k as webdev (italy) - the developers are the lowest-
earning people in our company.

~~~
wreath
Where in Italy? I've always considered moving to Italy for the beautiful
landscapes, food and the people, but salary as SW was always what kept me from
it.

~~~
bananicorn
Alto Adige (South Tyrol), Which is one of the economically strongest regions
of Italy. Lots of mountains (well, the Region used to be part of Austria, and
people speak mostly German and Italian here. I don't even think self-employed
web developers have an easier time, there's just too many, it seems...

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atom_enger
I think it's most likely a bubble. Enjoy it while it lasts and build a sturdy
parachute for when(and likely if) it doesn't. Maybe one day there will be too
many of us and our price will be driven downwards.

~~~
theseamusjames
I liken it to the auto-industry in America during the 1950s. Back then, single
income families could take long summer vacations to cabins they might even
own. The jobs came with good benefits and company culture was important. It
feels very similar.

~~~
aphextron
I kind of had that realization recently as well. It's just blue collar work.

~~~
PaulHoule
Exactly.

People use terms like "get your hands dirty" to describe programming.
Programmers are usually not encourage to wear button-down shirts, suits, etc.

~~~
brahj123
> Programmers are usually not encourage to wear button-down shirts

You're basing this view on a very small subset of companies (startups). the
vast majority of places where people work still expect professional dress
above the level of t shirt + cargo shorts and flip flops.

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thiagooffm
You can't do shit with 90k usd if you live in SF or NY. If you live in the
midwest, good!

Think that as you are possibly an american, your parents might be at ur age
getting a house and perhaps even raising you.

We definitely make a lot of money, but everything nowadays if expensive and
the "end-game" objectives are more expensive for us than it was for our
parents.

In the end, it's just a number, and you are possibly worse off than the
previous generation.

~~~
miguelrochefort
That's bullshit.

Even after rent, you still end up with more money than most people earn in
other places.

Those who make such claims usually seem to be those who get coffees at
Starbucks, eat out every day, travel multiple times a year, get Uber rides
everywhere, drink at bars regularly, buy the latest gadgets, etc.

~~~
literallycancer
What's the point of conquering the whole world if your people then can't even
afford a coffee or a taxi? Where do you think all the wealth extracted from
developing countries ends up? And it's not like it's going to magically return
there if a few people refuse to get Starbucks or use taxis.

>Even after rent, you still end up with more money than most people earn in
other places.

It's virtually certain that people in management, sales or any other important
part (besides engineering) of any company aren't thinking like this. "How much
can I get" is much more constructive way to approach this, compared to "how
much do I need".

Remember, you don't have to spend a bunch of money on useless crap, but since
most people are doing just that, you can negotiate as if you did too.

------
johnpython
Occasionally I have this thought but then I remember how difficult it is to
recruit great engineers. Perhaps we should be paid even more money.

------
laex
The way I see it, you're getting paid not for what you do at work. You're
getting paid for your presence.

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MiddleEndian
You shouldn't feel guilty for being able to take leisurely lunches. That's
part of being a human being. If anything it's people who cannot who are in
need of a better situation. Even now, you likely spend at least half your
waking weekday hours in an office, plus you have to commute.

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UK-AL
Trust me, there are lot of people who make more for less.

Developers can provide extremely good value for a company.

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twobyfour
Are you creating $90K/yr in value for your company? Probably more, or they
wouldn't be willing to hire you for that much. You're not overpaid.

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bsvalley
More info on that here:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14753492](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14753492)

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nicholas73
You're not overpaid if that salary doesn't provide an avenue for financial
security while having a family. You know, old middle class.

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liudmila
enjoy until it's possible:)))

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brahj123
You actually might be overpaid since you don't even understand a concept as
simple as supply and demand.

If you really feel so bad about what you get paid, tell HR you want to take a
pay cut. Maybe they'll be happy to help.

~~~
rawTruthHurts
Don't be jealous. I don't understand the concept either, and I'm grossly
overpaid, way more than OP, and most probably than you.

