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0 pointsryandrake9y ago0 comments

You're very likely talking about the top 0.1% employees at the top 0.1% of companies.

Every time salary is discussed on HN, inevitably someone brings up this "fact" that engineers are "routinely" making $200K or $300K or $400K or whatever other ridiculous figure. Given average Bay Area software engineer compensation being between $100K and $140K depending on your source, even at $200K we're probably talking at least 1 or 2 standard deviations from the mean. But there's no fighting HN anecdotes. There's always someone here who knows That Guy At Google Who Makes $300K or That Buddy's Roommate That Gets $400K Straight Out Of School At Facebook, and suddenly this turns into "everyone must be earning that much." Come on.

Yes. It is surely possible to work at Google for a decade and end up a multi-millionaire. It's possible to bowl 300, too, and hit 3 hole-in-ones in a row. It's astronomically more likely most people who work at Google or any other software engineering role for a decade will not end up multi-millionaires. Pretending otherwise grossly overstates the (admittedly okay) lifestyles and salaries most tech folks enjoy.

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usaar3339y ago· 2 in thread

This is all in the greater thread's context of whether you are more likely to get rich working for someone else or yourself. Sure, only the top engineers get paid $300k+/year, but an even smaller number of founders are able to pull that sort of effective salary. I'd wager that these days a smart engineer is financially better off at a big co than even starting a startup.

For more specifics, large, prestigious companies such as Google have salary and equity bands based on levels. The majority of engineers at Google are going to be above $200k total comp (salary + bonus + equity). Here's a glassdoor link for context: https://www.glassdoor.com/Salary/Google-Senior-Software-Engi...

ryandrakeOP9y ago

> This is is all in the greater thread's context of whether you are more likely to get rich working for someone else or yourself.

The point I'm trying to make is that both likelihoods are very small. Maybe you have a 1 in 1000 shot at becoming a multi-millionaire by working at BigCo vs. a 1 in 2000 shot at a startup. Some people are claiming that Google, Facebook, etc. are simply pumping out millionaire after millionaire and this is obviously not true. And when you call them on this, they trot out the usual "Bbbbut I know That One Guy At Google Who..." anecdote to somehow prove that everyone in the valley is printing money.

I generally don't trust equity figures when looking at Glassdoor, because there are no details. My guess is most of what's self-reported as yearly equity is really just signing bonus equity that vests after 4 years and then you're back to making base salary.

usaar3339y ago

Fair point, though I do believe it is reasonably common for a new grad that starts at FB, Google, etc. to have saved a million within 13 years. (An individual making $200k/year can readily save $80k/year)

> My guess is most of what's self-reported as yearly equity is really just signing bonus equity that vests after 4 years and then you're back to making base salary.

Generally, I think people would be reporting what they are going to make this year. (e.g. #shares vesting this year * value).

Companies continually issue refresher equity as time goes on. At year 2, you'd be expected to be vesting significantly more equity than you did at your start date (especially if you have been promoted)

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