Comment by thrway14102017 | Hacker News Reader

Comment by thrway14102017 | Hacker News Reader

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No, incorrect. I have more than enough money to not worry about paying good salaries for a year or so. We're not in the US though, so we're definitely not paying inflated US salaries. Other than that, we're generally slightly above the market rate.

Are US salaries inflated, versus are other markets not caught up yet?

Definitively inflated. Whenever I visit the US, I notice how everything except food is overpriced. The taxes are insane, you need lawyers and tax accountants for every cough you make and the quality of life is hardly the same as in Europe or Asia. If anyone's got any catching up to do, it's the US. No offense - I like the country (visiting), but it's just unreasonably expensive. How can anyone choose to live there is beyond me. Right now it's the opposite of freedom, unless you're insanely rich - then you can feel comfortable.

I assume you visited outside of major cities and compared like for like? The US is not expensive.

Even in rural areas, most services will cost you more than basically all European countries (except for Scandinavia). Taxes tend to be higher in Europe but cost of living quite a bit lower.

Doesn't that difference in taxes make up the offset?

Also, there are extremely expensive European cities, London and Paris come to mind. Even basic necessities, like food, was far more expensive than I was expecting in Paris.

"Catching up" by decreasing salaries because you like to underpay your workers, as you basically implied in the original post? That's a bold statement.

See also the Big Mac index:

http://www.economist.com/content/big-mac-index

But why are the good developers demanding more money? ("fuck you, pay me".. what else could this mean?)

It's definitely not because they don't want to work for anyone... they're out there searching for work, talking to employers. They definitely want work.

"Fuck you, pay me" is not about how much money they demand, but about the attitude. I definitely sense the attitude.

That attitude isn't an impediment to them being a good engineer with a high level of professionalism. If you dont't mind paying their rate, what's the actual problem?

IMHO the engineers that don't have this attitude have a tendency to burn out.

It could be they were burned by a previous employer and are a bit jaded now. If you're fair and open in your dealings with them and share in the success of the company (not that you're not doing these things already) their attitude may change. A lot of "good CEO training" involves learning how to get the most output with the least input when it comes to employees. I think they assume people don't know what they're doing, but it just leads to an adversarial environment.

have you considered following up with some of the good developers that didn't follow through to find out where they ended up? You can probably make a decent rough guess at how much they're making based on who their new employer is/location.

Also hiring is difficult... have you considered hiring a recruiter to help?

I think the key here is that you're hiring remote. The market rate is global salaries. You might look at around $25 (junior/South Asian) to $60 (senior). Even developed countries hiring someone in a poorer country stick to close to these rates for long term contracts.

> so we're definitely not paying inflated US salaries

If you are hiring a remote developer - what prevents them to earn an "inflated" salary from a US company?

Many factors. Most US companies want to have on site engineers. Many of those who work remotely with overseas devs already know they can pay a lot less, so the market is adjusted and those working remotely for US companies are rarely paid the same as if they were in the US.

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