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Comment by formerly_proven | Hacker News Reader

> Programming pays so well that it seems a bit absurd.

As usual it's important to keep in mind that this is a bubble. This is the SV bubble, where programmers get paid out of wheelbarrows filled with money.

Elsewhere programmers get paid about as much as other kinds of engineers, maybe a little bit less on average.

Maybe that's because developers outside the SV are garbage, maybe that's because there's a set of fairly unique and hard to replicate conditions in the SV that resulted in companies having to pay these sums.

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> Elsewhere programmers get paid about as much as other kinds of engineers, maybe a little bit less on average.

That's not true. I'm in the UK, and while software dev salaries are considerably lower than in SV, they're still quite a bit higher than is typical is other engineering disciplines.

I don't know about elsewhere in the US but here in [edit: south-eastern] EU programmers basically formed their own social class, one considered even higher than executives, top tier managers etc.

I like in UK and have never come across this strange idea

UK isn't in EU, is it?

Makes sense though - as all of you and not just programmers are rather well paid compared to people in continental EU, the difference is not that huge. Where I am the average programmer has 5-10x more than any other person, and 2x more than directors - and the outlier programmers can make even 20x more than other people, and that's still ignoring the millionaires (and few $ billionaires) that sold their startup stakes.

In the past decade, only programmers became rich from 0 here - all other people inherited their wealth.

May I know what country we are talking about here?

Czechia, Slovakia, Poland, Croatia, Slovenia, Serbia, Romania, Hungary, Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, Bulgaria and Montenegro. Probably Greece too but I don't know how it's there personally. Plus the non-EU countries in the region - Albania, Serbia, Kosovo, Moldova, North Macedonia and Bosnia and Herzegovina.

I sort of thought so. I'm in Prague myself and I would say that 5x-10x may be a bit of a stretch. I'm personally only a bit over 2x country average, though I think I'm underpaid so I might be checking out the market soon.

Most people in CZ have around 24k CZK/month, and 240k/month is certainly doable for a programmer. Not an average one, that's true - though not necessarily the best one, there's still plenty room to the top.

Shoot me an email at emteycz@gmail.com, I might be able to help you.

And I have seen several Germen developers on here saying they are not seen as high status professionals.

I'm in the EU too and I don't know of a single place where programmers are considered to be a higher social class than executives and top tier managers.

The EU is a big place and everyone's experience is different, but I think you're overstating matters hugely.

It's most probably more of south/eastern thing, but it definitely exists here literally as I am describing it - even the government acknowledged it in their yearly statistics; even the EU did actually.

Fair enough. In my part of the world it's probably still the finance types who would have that public perception. Programmers are seen as well-paid, but not particularly influential in comparison to executives.

I do not know such a place in Germany as well. It is very disappointing after growing up reading BOFH

I'm an engineer in the US and this is my personal viewpoint as well. I tested this attitude the last time I was interviewing and picked a company that values engineers by choosing to stay small rather than fill the ranks with middle managers. My CEO wouldn't have a product without me or someone else filling this role, so while his value to the company is capped at fundraising, mine is only capped by my own abilities.

i want a whiff of whatever you've been smoking.

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