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Comment by Jiejeing | Hacker News Reader

To be fair, aside from perhaps very specific domains (e.g. finance) or corporations, the pay probably looks dismal if you compare it to SV levels. Making six figures is certainly something hard to reach.

Ditto on the immigrants thing though, Germany is certainly not the worst country in that regard.

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There's almost no place in IT which is comparable to SV pay. It's not very useful as a benchmark if it's a complete outlier. But there's also a lot of reasons people don't want to live/work in SV - even given the massive pay.

Comparing salaries in Germany to the ones in SV is a nonsense. In Germany you have free healtcare, free education and cost of living and renting is lower than SV. 120k in SV are like 60k in Germany.

No free healthcare. You have to buy insurance (legal requirement). Depending on your pay, you may buy private insurance at a fixed monthly premium, or public insurance at 15% of your income. Your employer covers half the cost for each one.

Currently, the max on public insurance is about 800€/month incl. „Pflegeversicherung“ for when you need permanent care after injuries or old age. You‘re paying half of that, your employer pays the other half.

There‘s also tuition at universities but it’s not comparable to US universities. I don’t know the current level. It was the equivalent of around 100€ per semester when I was a student.

The number of figures is pretty irrelevant when you factor in cost of living.

That is partially true. The absurd remunerations of SV engineers factor in the cost of living, for sure, but generally people can consolidate a decent amount of capital in a few years if they have a good position.

Even if you have to spend $2000 for a two-bedroom flat, if you earn $150k/yr you are likely able to save more money than someone earning €50000 with a €500 flat.

(I am not saying SWEs are underpaid in the EU, if anything it is still an absurd amount of money compared to people who add real value to society, but there is certainly a stark contrast)

It's not just accommodation. Larger European cities are also usually pretty good for walking / cycling / public transport, so you often don't need a car. Cost of schools starts at $0 (details depend on a country). Basic coverage means you may not need a hospital visit emergency fund. Etc.

That is true. I am not disparaging our (most of europe’s) social security model, which I would never give up for a US-like one; but at higher levels of compensation that is usually not a factor, unless you have a terminal illness that will gut your finances.

(I am european with a MSc and have never paid for education, do not have a car, and am very happy with most of the social security programs. I only tried to see things from another point of view)

Have to agree with oji0hub. Once you factor in cost of living, health system, governmental support etc. Life in Germany is actually ahead of its American counterpart.

It makes it even worse for Europe, then. Cost of living has been growing consistently faster than salaries.

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