I work at a startup with these couple brilliant 10X engineers, much more talented than me and with more experience than me. Yet, I know they make 30% less than me and 25X less equity (!) despite having joined in the same time span.
They say they don’t care about comp, they care about doing cool stuff and say that they get paid enough to afford the quality of life they want.
Why is that these people exist just in the software engineering field and not in other highly skilled professions, such as law, medicine or accounting?
They drive down the average compensation in the market for everybody, and give to employers the idea that software engineers are gullible individuals who can be tricked in the offer process in exchange for immaterial “perks” and bs.
Mind you, I am not talking about non-profit work, in which case I’m totally in support of. These are companies that are very very much for profit.
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comments
The fact is that poor people say money doesn’t buy happiness because they’ve never had it and rich people say it so they won’t look like assholes. It’s a comical world we live in
Happiness is a state of mind. I agree that one needs money to be comfortable and comfort brings happiness. But why do you think Elon sleeps on the shop floor? Why does Warren Buffet fly all over the world on business trips at 70+ years of age? Why did Trump become a president to be ridiculed by everyone? Why did Steve Jobs work till he almost died? Your theory on happiness does not explain these people. Money brings happiness but it is not be all and end all.
Source: Dad is a Radiation Oncologist and all of his rich colleagues mention how they are doing it for the money and how they are happy.
I’ve dated a couple physicians before and the baseline is 300-400k fresh of residency without a lucrative specialization.
A guy I personally know clears 2M as an anhestetiologist (pardon the spelling, I don’t make 2M so fuck it) in his early 40s working for a hospital.
And without talking about equity, the 30% discount on the cash comp is more real than ever.
Also, a couple other folks (the ones who didn’t know how to negotiate, not the ones who just work for the glory, which I’m disturbed by) left the company and in their parting 1-1 with me as peers they told me they left because they “found out” their equity package was ridiculously low compared to the others. The company then tried to give them a new equity grant to bring them closer to the good comp, but at that point they were burned out and left.
And these are great performers, and the same thing happened at the last startup I was at. It somehow happens a lot in startups, and it involves also very senior engineers! Go figure
Besides if they are as good as you say the money will come one way or another. Just because you made more this time doesn't mean you won't get stuck in leetcode hell some day when their passion lands them a VP job.
I’m 32, this guy I’m talking about is like 48 (did the math looking at his graduation date on resume), before joining the startup spent 15 (yes, 15) years in a small company doing swe work, without ever getting a promotion (his LinkedIn shows a single 15yr slot of “member of technical staff”). And this is all while this guy being absolutely brilliant, he always comes up with the most elegant solutions and architectures, he’s definitely a technical mentor for me, despite me making much more than him.
Seriously, VP?
Plus, I very much enjoy my craft, and spend considerable amount of my free time reading up on tech content and books (going through CLRS as we speak for the 5th time in my career, even if I’m not looking to actively interview, I just like the topics), so the fact that I value compensation doesn’t have anything to do with my (lack of) passion.
I'm sure this guy is still making more than 95% of the US population, let alone the world. If that's good enough for him, so be it.
Take responsibility for your own damn life is the moral of the story. It sounds like you're going out and working hard to earn more; good for you. But sitting here whining that this guy is dragging down the average is some childish, petty nonsense that you need to get over.