The salary of a skilled German software engineer in this field is about 1/4th of the US counterpart. So I wish the German government luck in their endeavor, because they’re gonna need it.
Lower than the USA, yes; but even junior software roles are well above “wage slavery”. Housing and medical insurance are both much cheaper here (also food, but food is so cheap generally that it being cheaper here doesn’t make much difference, unlike rent and insurance).
It also helps that labor protection laws are rather strong here and when you look at the US, it's horrible in comparison and not to mention the potential healthcare/other costs that could eat up your wage (I guess with total comp you mean including stock options or something like that, I've rarely seen that here, people prefer to be actually paid).
That and moving to another country, possibly permanently is quite difficult and taxing.
Sure, but that level is paid to maybe 1-in-25 staff/principal/distinguished engineers at the top handful companies which make up maybe 1-in-25 of total jobs in the industry (order of magnitude)?
So for the 1-in-500 talents in the German coding industry, maybe it might be a worthwhile consideration to move halfway across the world with their families, but for the 499 even doubling their salary isn't all that enticing...
You don't really have a good army without decent generals.
[0]: https://www.teamblind.com/article/google-engineer---total-co...
I have friends that don't want to visit the US solely because of Trump being elected. Very smart software engineers.
Politics and worldview doesn't correlate at all with ones abilities, although this is often portrayed that way.
Compared to the US, you will not find many rich people in Germany. At the same time you will also not find many poor people. Generally, people are quite equal in Germany.
No one is saying there isn't eng. talent in Germany. They're just mistreated by the system.
And the valley tech giants know this very well and take advantage of it.
I assume that the brother from your anecdote doesn't declare all his income (you are left with about 60% of your paycheck after taxes and mandatory insurances). I don't see how a programmer salary isn't enough for two people to make ends meet.
And statistically, my bet is that most folks will put their dislike of the US in the backseat when offered a 4x wage increase.
>30 day vacation, paternity leave, health insurance, 40 hour week, unions support
And thank you for providing yet another (or rather a whole 5) perfect explanation of why it's darn near impossible to innovate in Europe.
We're getting down to faith-based reasoning here.
> without capitalists abusing our worker rights
Dude, you sound like the little red book.