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Comment by gringofyx | Hacker News Reader

Reading some of the amounts listed is a bit depressing, I thought that the increased cost of living in London would justify salaries and rates much higher than the average.

By contrast I know from personal experience you can earn the same or better than what's listed here outside of London and enjoy the lower cost of living.

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In my experience, contract rates in London have been dropping like a stone in the last 2 years. I'm still not sure why that is, but feel forced to start planning my escape...

(My current rate is an awful £300, and that was hard to find!)

Is that per hour? I think I'd kill for that.. or was that per day? I'm based in the states so that seems quite nice for me.

Daily

In UK, software contracting rates are almost always quoted and billed based on days.

Any recommended locations to look at?

Berlin.

Manchester, Leeds, Newcastle, Bristol, Liverpool... probably in that order. I've heard good things about Glasgow, Birmingham and Cardiff too. The North West has been good to me and I've never really had to leave the area because there's pretty good transportation links over a wide area with a large population.

And I've lived and worked in Berlin too, it's nice, but by no means the perfect solution. And y'know... it means I can live close to family by being in the UK.

"Close" is a relative term.

Is it closer to London a little Scottish town, far from any airport or major communications hub, than Paris or Barcelona?

http://jorgepratscher.com/commuting-from-barcelona-to-brackn...

http://www.totaljobs.com/insidejob/extreme-commutes-to-londo...

I think you're missing a word .. but yes, parts of the highlands and islands are definitely further away in time from London than Paris is. I think even Manchester may take longer, at least until HS2 is operational.

(The first link isn't very encouraging! "As a consequence I had to visit my dear friend the physiotherapist to check my displaced vertebrae and super swollen trapezius muscles that didn’t let me get off my bed after travelling nonstop for 6 months"!)

lol yeah! I would never commute from Barcelona like this guy, but just puts into perspective how fast can you be very far.

I once had to visit a customer a Friday and a Monday (so there was no big point on staying the whole weekend in a hotel), having to drive each day 5 hours each direction. That was without leaving the UK. Apparently this guy makes it quicker from Barcelona to Bracknell (not even London, which would take less time IMHO).

You should try Nottingham too. There is at least 1 major brand with deep pockets offering very interesting amounts of money for developers at the moment.

What is the company? Recently moved to Nottingham. Not looking for a job but curious to learn more about the tech scene.

Alliance / Boots maybe?

That's great until that major brand goes bust. At least in London you have hundreds of major brands.

I'm in nottingham. Would be interested in any opportunities or some ideas. Boots, capital1, reuters seem to be the major ones. I'm currently contracting in smart metering.

Edinburgh works for me, although it seems skewed towards multinationals and banks rather than small companies. I nearly went to work for "Clydespace" in Glasgow.

I too have heard good things about Liverpool these days.

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