Hacker News Reader

Comment by debarshri | Hacker News Reader

I'm amazed that some of the salaries that are offered are way more that what you would earn in Europe (countries like NL, DE) for the same experience. I wonder what is the average attrition rate given there is so much options to move around and how do companies try to retain employee.

View on HN

I discovered it the hard way when I immigrated to the Netherlands in late 2018. For a senior role it doesn’t make a financial sense to move to EU. Especially so if you have kids as international school will punch a huge hole in the pocket.

We couldn’t save absolutely anything from what we earned. If not for RSU it would have been a financial disaster for me. Due to lack of growth opportunities I moved back last year and the quality of life (financially) has jumped up again.

Also, I found the tech scene to be not as vibrant in EU. Most of them are government run digital transformations or outsourcing work. I also discovered that IT is way down the pecking order which is reflected in salaries. And being a hiring manager when I interviewed candidates I saw that they didn’t have as much exposure to large scale software development. I later realized that the best of the lot just immigrated across the Atlantic to earn multiple times than what they would in Europe.

To answer your last question, attrition in FAANG companies are around 8%. In startups it varies wildly. I would discount the last 8-10 months of data because the job market has absolutely exploded with offers thanks to insane funding of startups as well as more US companies moving jobs to India due to WFH.

Software professionals across all experience levels have never had it so good in India.

I am in a similar situation. I have recently decided to move back. Would love to be in touch with you and learn about your experience moving back and rebooting your career.

Sure! I can be reached at hn@arunj.net

Ironically that's true in many places in Asia. They pay way better than Europe with a cheaper cost of living and less taxes too.

It reminds me of a friend of mine that had his ex boss establishing a company in Ukraine. Initially the developers' cost was cheaper if compared to the other parts in Europe, then many companies started to move one of their office there till they reach the point that they had one of the best salaries in Europe (compared to purchase parity and cost of living) due to the high job offer.

That's not ironic at all. There are less inequalities in Europe than Asia, at least in this century.

I don't know what century and which country are you referring to but is well known that inequalities have been growing lately in Europe in many countries (especially the south European countries)

Definitely is not as high as some countries in Asia. But while in Asia they're working to reduce inequalities in Europe it's mainly increasing (from 2000 onwards, with the spike after 2009)

Not so much in FAANG as they pay well and life is good.

So much in startups - usually pay is good, life is shit. So it’s a revolving door there. You were the sucker who prepped hard and came for salary bump, when you leave there’s another sucker waiting. There are too many suckers to be always available (late nights, weekends - this is what kills the culture in Indian companies) to get a big salary.

That’s true about EU <-> IN though. I wanted to work in EU but didn’t want to settle there. It didn’t make much sense monetarily as I’d retire in India. So not only I’d save more in India, hell I was absolutely earning more in India.

However if my plan was, or changes to, settling in Europe I’d have done it.

(Among few I had an offer from Booking)

If I calculated correctly, the 75th percentile is about 43k in euro's. That's quite a bit below market for the Netherlands, but does not take cost of living into account.

That's a very good salary in India. Not to mention that taxes are lower to many other European countries.

I'd say they definitely earn more money than their folks in south Europe (Spain, Portugal, Italy and Greece)

I wouldn't say it is quite below the average. One of the things about Netherlands is that it really depends upon the city you live in. If you are not in Amsterdam, it is a different story.

The average salary for a software developer in Denmark is probably around $80k, and at my company the "ceiling" is about $130k. On $80k you live very comfortably.

Data will be a little biased, still i'm surprised at the packages being offered out there. Salaries reported at glassdoor, linkedin, etc feel outdated. I can see very similar numbers at https://www.levels.fyi/Salaries/Software-Engineer/India/ as well.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com