Hacker News Reader

Comment by nickthemagicman | Hacker News Reader

Google people make 200k starting as Jr devs so I'm assuming 400k.

Esp with PhD.

Agreed not super clear what's going on.

Google juniors are more like £40k in london. Jobs over £100k are not the norm, even in finance in london. The awful london housing market (small market, people do NOT sell) starts around £320k for a terrible studio. Banks nowaways tend to loan around 4-4.5x gross salary. (And you need a good chunk already saved, which is also hard as tax and rent is high)

£100k salary doesn't buy an average 1 bed in london (and you're competing against at least 4 cash buyers)

As someone who recently left london, the story checks out.

Seconded. Most 100k+ jobs in London ( that I'm aware of ) are contracting ones.

Houses ( for anywhere so-so ) are 400k at minimum, or else your aiming for a rabbit hutch.

Taxes of every shape and size will eat a tonne of your income.

Right now your better off looking outside of London. WFH has changed the landscape and it will not be business as usual for the coming years.

Stocks also play a role. The creator of Redux was making 100k£ (+35k£ in stocks) at FB.

That said, there is a huge disparity in salaries in London.

I was making 100k£ per year as a random full time engineer with 15 years of experience in some unknown company and working (potentially) fully remote before covid.

I know VPs and CTOs making 120-200k£.

I could get a contract for 600£-700£ daily and the top contracts I've heard for senior engineers from my friends are 1k£/1.2k£ per day (generally Java or Angular jobs in banking where things are on fire).

There are plenty of engineers who never go past 50k£.

To add another data point, an FB junior would make around £65k base + ~£27k stock per year (+bonus). So getting over £100k at a FAANG in London seems pretty common to me, I would expect finance to pay even more.

Personally I sympathise a lot with OP. I have a similar "stuck" feeling, I often wonder whether it's all downhill from here (comp-wise) for me. I cannot see myself working for a FAANG forever, so what other choices are there?

Wow, I just learned so many shocking things. (Not being sarcastic)

Google pays Londoners wayyyy less.

It's impossible to afford a house in London on a six-figure salary.

We live in strange times.

Another thing to note is that the income distribution in London seems bimodal. And so if you are earning a good amount, you may still find it a bad idea to assume similar good income in the future and therefore not want to get into a huge mortgage.

So yes, you may technically be able to afford a decent house, but in practice find it a very bad idea to do so. E.g. imagine if the OP got herself into a massive mortgage - she would feel even more trapped than she is now.

>Google juniors are more like £40k in london.

Are you sure this is up to date? I thought they were 90k - 100k GBP for fresh grad

For a non-FAANG London salary data point; I did ~5yrs Java development contracting in London/Finance and my day rates fluctuated anywhere from £600 - £950.

Converted to perm in 2020 at £140k base + $40k RSU's working for a consultancy that ships me into London/Finance gigs, effectively doing the same type of work.

How can this be true?

https://www.statista.com/statistics/416139/full-time-annual-...

The average salary in London appears to be 40k? How can Google and quant finance roles be at or below average salary?

Reply on news.ycombinator.com