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Comment by jasonkester | Hacker News Reader

Entrepreneurs in other industries may need family money. Software Entrepreneurs can use their own.

Working in an industry where $120k/year is considered a starting salary, and where you know for a certainty that you are roughly one Twitter post away from having your pick of three companies that will fight to get you, you can feel free to pursue any goofy idea you like without fearing much for your financial safety should things go wrong.

Yet another reason this is the best industry to be in right now.

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Outside of a few hot spots like SV, $120k/year is certainly not starting salary.

It's a shame we see so much denial about this. The rational response when shown that you are dramatically underpaid should be to take steps to get one's self back up to the level of the market. Sadly, the more common response is to call whoever filled you in a liar.

I've noticed this happening a lot in the last few years, as developer salaries have skyrocketed but guys who had secured jobs before that still quote 2005 numbers as though they were the case today.

You don't need to be in Silicon Valley to make six figures as a developer. Taking that on board rather than rejecting it offhand can only lead you to a better place.

You initially mentioned starting salary, now you are just mentioning 6 figure developer salaries in general. Again, $120k starting salary for your average junior developer fresh out of college isn't a reality outside of places like SV.

Apologies if I wasn't clear. By six figure developer salary, I meant more like $250k. That is in fact achievable as a mid to senior level developer working remotely.

A kid from a good school capable of working for a Facebook or Google would be we'll served by holding out for that unrealistic Bay Area starting salary. It's not as unrealistic as you believe.

People make six figures outside of SV. But people in the midwest are not going to make six figures right out of school.

> one Twitter post away from having your pick of three companies

Can't concur on that one. I've been looking for more than a year for a job after graduation and getting through those interviews was hard. But maybe it's different here in Europe.

Not sure about the twitter post thing... but any industry that has constant demand for good workers and high wages would be conducive to this by eliminating a lot of the monetary risk of failure.

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