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Comment by seer | Hacker News Reader

People in HN might be interested to know that Bulgaria has one of the (second place I think) biggest difference between average salary in IT and average salary for everybody else.

Being part of the EU it’s easy to find an IT job, with all the work from home initiatives now more than ever. SO being the poorest country in EU you can get to some ridiculous standards of living if you are in IT.

And in the recent five years or so the bigger cities in the country have upped their game quite a bit. Before the covid crisis I liked to hang out with foreigners visiting the country and all of them mentioned it being a very positive experience. They often start researching rent prices and such.

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Yes, I would actually argue that developers earn more than they would in Germany, Belgium or France.

But not compared to FAANG in the West Coast part of the US. I looked at coming back, but it turned out that I am leaving 2/3 of my income on the table. Even with the cost of living differences this was not justifiable. France or Belgium were not better either. Europe has an underappreciation of engineers overall. The differences in the disposable income are staggering.

Yes, nothing compares to USA. I’ve lived in USA and I would gladly live there again but I have a large family here that I am very fond of and it’s not a option for me. Still for developers in central and Eastern Europe Western Europe doesn’t make sense financially. You make same amount of money and everything is cheaper.

I guess that is true for any Eastern European country, especially if there's an easy way to avoid taxation.

The cost of life is low for anyone working in IT, especially remotely. However, I wonder if the infrastructure makes it worthwhile. The roads in Sofia have probably not been repaired since 90s. And there's no public transportation routes available in Google Maps.

I agree that public transportation leaves a lot to be desired, however roads in Sofia are actually not that bad. The bigger problem is traffic congestion. It makes it impractical to commute to the other side of the city for work (e.g. ~1hr in each direction) and hence severely limits employment opportunities in case you live in your own house.

With respect to taxation, I wouldn't say it is easy to avoid. It surely is for those that are close to the governing class, but not for the average Joe/Company. Quite the contrary. If you consider doing business in Bulgaria, I would advice against keeping your capital and intellectual property in a Bulgarian corporation. Everything that makes > EUR ~1M revenue/year shows up on the radar and then you either have to play on their rules (e.g. sponsor a political party, give them a share of your company at their terms) or you will be chased down by the huge government repressive apparatus (tax authorities etc).

> And there's no public transportation routes available in Google Maps.

I don't think this signifies anything though. It's up to the cities to decide if they want to publish the routes and timetables, and many choose not to. Including western cities, such as Montpellier and others in France.

But also ordering a taxi didn't work for me, since you have to call a phone number, where they promise a taxi at the airport, and it doesn't arrive. I assume Amazon or anything like that isn't present as well.

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