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Comment by distances | Hacker News Reader

I know several programmers that are many times more productive than their peers, when compared to least-performing peers it's easily 10-20x. They make a little bit more, I'd guess 20-30%.

Not in the US, but I'm sure this is quite common and compensation anywhere near reflecting the performance is a rare exception.

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>I know several programmers that are many times more productive than their peers, when compared to least-performing peers it's easily 10-20x. They make a little bit more, I'd guess 20-30%.

I'm not saying the system is perfect at identifying who's the 10x engineer and who's the bum. But once identified there is definitely a gap in pay roughly equivalent to the difference in production.

Which system is identifying the 10x engineer? What generates that gap in pay? It sorts of sounds like you are trying to fit reality into a model and not vice versa.

>Which system is identifying the 10x engineer?

The compensation scheme at companies that employ them.

>What generates that gap in pay?

All companies are different but it's typical a difference in grade or rank.

Sorry for a late reply. In most companies outside the US nobody, not even the CEO, makes 10x the income of an average low-performing engineer. A high performer has a chance of getting a respectable salary only by rising to CTO or similar roles, which obviously require skills other than just project contribution.

There is literally zero chance a high performer would get even 3x salary compared to their peers. Those pay ranks simply do not exist.

Totally agree. There are a few exceptions but for most people their pay is not much correlated with productivity.

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