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Comment by alinajaf | Hacker News Reader

You're getting screwed at £15k, I've never been paid that little for developing web.

For reference, my salary history over my 6+ year career is as follows:

£20k->£26k->£45k->£450-£600/day

Note that I am a totally average developer, nowhere near as smart or knowledgable as a lot of the guys here on HN. I have a CS degree, barely (I got a 3rd), so that helped at the beginning, but most of my luck has been thanks to an extremely welcoming market.

If you have three years experience, you should be clearing £42k, if not £45k. I don't know much about speech impediments and how easy/hard they are to fix, but in this market, trust me, you can achieve £42k+ for fizzbuzz and a pulse.

EDIT: Modified figures in last paragraph on account of OP having three years of experience.

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I started on £25k in Brighton and I'm almost 9 months into the job.

Got a 2.1 in CompSci and picked up the job through a recruiter who found my newly made LaTeX CV on Monster.

I can't believe I was so apprehensive about the job market when I was graduating. I'd read that CompSci grads have poor job prospects [1] which scared the shit out of me. But I found the opposite to be true. I was beating recruiters off with a shitty stick.

[1] - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/10477551

£42k after 3 years? Where are you working - London? That makes rather a large difference, as I'd be shocked if someone was getting that after 3 years for web dev here in Manchester.

For the record, I hired on behalf of a corporate in London and would routinely hire graduates for a starting salary between £30k and £40k. We only hired people who had shipped something (anything!), and we paid more if they'd shipped something that looked more full-stack.

But yes, in London... people start North of £30k if they're able to demonstrate that they've shipped something.

Posts like this makes me wish I was born in a first-world country. I'd be lucky to be earning half of what this guy's making.

I'm with you, except I was born in a first-world country (next door to you). At least in Singapore the wages are better than in Malaysia, but the Singapore wage of USD35k pre-tax for a fresh/newish web developer is still pretty crappy pay compared to SF and even London. And rent is ridiculous, so basically every local lives with their parents.

There are people who make it to SF from here but it's mostly to the big corps. The rest of us will hang around Asia earning relative peanuts while possibly hoping for a side project to take off. Given the poor wages here, it only makes sense to try to get a business going.

Come work in Singapore anyway, you deserve better.

It's odd hearing this perspective. I've lived in a country most people consider 'third-world' and yet my recent move to San Francisco is the only time I've been worried about being able to pay rent at the end of the month.

Keep in mind that cost of living in London can be higher than even New York City, so that 40K GBP ($60K USD) isn't exactly raking in the dough.

I know one guy who contracts with a US-based company while staying in Asia, exploiting the gap between salary and living cost seems like a pretty smart play.

Question for the Londoners around here: what is the salary range like? I gather that NYC and London living costs are similar (with London supposedly edging out NYC slightly), but around here $120K is common (80K GBP), and in finance frequently runs higher than that. 40K GBP sounds strangely low, but I may lack context.

I guess for a fair comparison you'd need to consider taxation and major costs. In UK £45,000pa would net you £2,750/month after tax. Most likely your employer would be paying or contributing to your pension. Health care is free. Assuming you want your own place, a typical apartment in semi-central London might be £350/week rent. Local taxes depend on your properties value, but could say £100/month typical. Then for simplicity estimate major household bills (gas & electricity) at £100/month.

Net Income: £2750/month Major Expense: ~£1750/month

Few additions:

Add £100/month more expenses for public transport to work (since in London it's not very common to live within walking distance of work).

Probably a fair comparison might want to factor in university education cost. In the UK undergraduate fees are capped at £9,000/year. So a simplified sum: a 3-year undergraduate costs £27,000; spread over 10 years that's £225/month.

my first job out of uni was in medium-size finance software consultancy @£35k, up to £37k in less than a year. Trying to live a family life on that wasn't fun (definitely possible, just not fun). Moved 80 miles south for a £34k salary, reduced hours & stress, no dry cleaner bills, much cheaper rent and 0 commuting costs (cycling). Don't miss London one bit :-) OTOH, I've not had a raise yet and can't see one coming any time soon.

p.s. all numbers are pre-bonus, but for junior devs they're near-negligible in both companies anyway.

p.p.s both jobs are enterprise java.

The higher cost of living factors into that majorly though. I know where I am (Dublin) it's very expensive to live in the city and I imagine London is the same. That's why employers in those areas have to pay quite a bit more.

Yes, London. I was at £45k after two years, and permie salaries are in general higher now than than they were three years ago.

I would suggest that outside of London the salaries are massively different. Though £15k is still almost-criminally low regardless of where you are.

I'd expect someone with 3 years web dev experience to be anywhere from mid-20's to mid-30's outside of London, and a cursory search for Suffolk that appears to be about right.

Hi, I saw some rates in Lodon for my experience(around £60k for >6 years for permanent positions). Are these rates before or after taxes ? I'm asking because it varies from country to country. Thanks Andrei

In the UK, salary figures are always gross (pun not intended).

just to clarify for others, gross means before taxes. net means after taxes.

Slightly off topic, (Sorry OP) but as an 18 y/o with quite a bit of freelance/past experience, does £20k starting sound good to you?

If you have a portfolio site and testimonials from past clients, £20k isn't that great. I worked with a guy at a small(ish, <100 employees) company who started at £34k with a similar background to that.

Sounds between acceptable (Central London) and good to me. With an 18yo there's the risk that you decide to ship out to uni, travel the world, or are bonkers but no-one's noticed yet.

Wait I'm confused here. I did the conversion and those wages seem extremely low. I'm starting at double that here in the US and I'm not even graduated yet. How do you even live off of 60k in a city?

My hope is that one day some of you guys over in SV realize what you just did and start contracting more work to us across the pond. Programming talent in the UK is cheap.

What US city? What are the tax and housing expenses?

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