Does anyone have any insight as to why this is?
Permanent jobs have low salaries, there are rare exceptions or perm roles with 100-120k range but those are hard to find.
I believe there are probably several reasons for this.
1. Labour laws and regulations. Once you hire a perm employee in U.K. and they pass the probation period, it is very very difficult to fire anybody with current laws. So companies don't want to pay high salaries and then they won't be able to easily get rid of a poor employee.
2. Demand. There is probably less tech industry in U.K. compared to banking and financial services.
3. Probably also a perception problem. Software engineering is not seen as a good job comparable to lawyer, doctor or banker. So engineering profession is not respected and companies don't think engineering jobs are worth more than 30-40k.
Which laws? The probation period seems to be quite diversionary for the employee - I know quite a few people who think that when they pass probation they're "safe".
If you were employed after April 2012, the law prohibits you taking your employer to a tribunal for unfair dismissal unless you've been employed for 2 years (except for discrimination).
More importantly, and far less discussed in all the HR/labour blogs on the web: in my experience and circles companies now make you quit by, for example, forcing a change in working requirements you can't meet, tearing up your old contract (and presenting a new one with worse terms), making changes to your job and so on.
> 3. Probably also a perception problem. Software engineering is not seen as a good job comparable to lawyer, doctor or banker. So engineering profession is not respected and companies don't think engineering jobs are worth more than 30-40k.
That I agree with, especially if the company's main product/service isn't software.
Before that 2 year milestone you can basically be summarily dismissed. The probation period is meaningless.
After 2 years it's harder, the employee would be able to bring a claim for constructive dismissal for the examples you give.
IANAL, but I have personally witnessed people being fired from a small business. None of them had done anything especially terrible.
Could be that it's cheap EU labour combined with an English-speaking society.
Then again, you could work as an engineer without ever having to speak the local language in the Netherlands and Germany as well (to some extent, not all companies are amenable to non-native language speakers but I suppose most modern tech companies are).
What about Ireland? From cursory research engineering salaries there don't seem to be significantly different from continental Europe.
My guess is it's more about the dominance of the banking sector and its business culture, which doesn't really value engineering. After all, in banking IT often still is a mere cost centre, a necessary means to run the 'real' business.
Almost everyone in EU learns English right after kindergarten. And then movies, tv series, online mmorpg, internet stuff, English is everywhere. I would have preferred to go to Finland, Germany, Denmark, Sweden, where I would be able to advance my education for free. And although UK was easier to manage in several aspects, I was ok to go to a anywhere else, buy my girlfriend (with a job in other area) was not.
Ireland does a lot international recruitment, going to EU universities to get ppl.
I don't know how good this data is, but from experience I can tell you that an average salary is 15-20k after taxes: http://www.payscale.com/research/IT/Job=Sr._Software_Enginee...
Pretty sad.
> the UK, culturally, regards software engineers or those similar to be little more than educated manual labor. You're not in management, so you're labor.
I agree there is a pronounced two-tier culture in British business. In most companies, confidence and leadership are seen as more important qualities than technical excellence.
Ultimately software development is seen as a cost to be minimised wherever possible.
There are also a lot of terrible devs and £30-£40 is about the right mark and lots of companies will hire people who are rubbish because they don't know better and don't really care.
Most people who are any good go contracting and earning £150k is no problem, if you choose to work at least 43 weeks. There are typically people who contract because they are good and also people who do lots of <=3 month contracts who are not so good and will earn less but still decent money.
IT has really given many many people the opportunity to earn significant amounts of money that they wouldn't have been able to otherwise - 150k for a couple of years experience and no schooling, what profession is better than that??
In the US, there are more tech companies which are fighting for the talent than it's in UK.
Also, 100K entry level is norm only in NY and California, the rest of the US, its around $70K.
For contracting, 90% of contractors have a 300GBP daily rate ( 300 * 22 days/month * 11 months/year = 72600GBP/year if you are fully booked for the year)
Once all expenses are taken into account, I think that US salaries are higher but not _that_ higher.
US companies tend to build products so developer wages have high returns and wages might be higer.
European companies tend to sell software development services to third parties. Services are expenses without associated income and companies tend keep their operational expenditure (opex) under control...
True. Which is why rates in the UK comparatively are even worse. London is one of the most expensive places in the world. I can't imagine how one could even survive there with some of the salaries quoted here.