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Comment by tothrowaway | Hacker News Reader

Do any UK people here know what the typical employer taxes are on payroll? US companies pay around 10% of the employee's salary in taxes (~8% for social security and some change for workers compensation, unemployment and whatever else the state demands). So if your salary is 100k, your actual value to the company is closer to 111k (plus whatever benefits they are paying like health insurance).

90k seems low compared to American salaries, but if the employer has to pay 50k in UK taxes to hire you, well, that (partially) explains it.

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Salary of £90k will cost the employer £103,496 a year, including NI and mandatory pension contributions. The employee will get net £58,524. All of this from https://www.stafftax.co.uk/gross-to-total-salary-calculator

> £90k seems low compared to American salaries

It is. But you do get unlimited health-care for you and your dependents. Also note until recently it was worth $115k-ish USD and now it's worth $99k-ish.

Finally note that his £90k is actually £110k with stock, which is a strong London developer salary outside of banking.

> But you do get unlimited health-care for you and your dependents

Healthcare in the UK is not a solved problem at all - long waiting times and lots of stuff that should be covered in theory but in practice can't be accessed by many people (mental health, dental treatments). I'm paying a lot in taxes and NI, I have private health insurance through my employer and in many cases I still need to pay out of pocket for treatments.

As an American living in the UK, I will point out that you're not wrong, but the NHS is still vastly better than what was available in the US. And that most of the problems with long waits, etc. are largely the result of deliberate defunding and meddling by conservatives.

American here, when we or our kids need to see a specialist we usually have to go to an urgent care clinic to get a referral because scheduling with our primary care can be 3-6 months out. Then it's about a 4-8 month wait to see the specialist and a whole bunch of unknowns on treatment and the cost.

Some of my conservative friends have voiced that we need to radically change our healthcare but some still insist on their "freedoms".

It took my mother 3 months to get into see a cardiologist for a moderately serious issue. My sister has MS and is currently seeing the only neurologist in the area who specializes in MS, but they are retiring soon. She also spent a year being jerked around by insurance when they rejected the medication her neurologist prescribed, her disease progressing the whole time (there's no "getting better with MS, just slowing progress).

People in the US often criticize the wait times in the UK or Canada like it's better here, but it's often really, really not.

> It is. But you do get unlimited health-care for you and your dependents.

It is a postcode lottery and if you have a more complex problem than a cold, then you still rather want to go private, effectively paying twice.

Many treatments also are only available private - like for chronic pain - forget about getting medical cannabis on NHS.

> It is. But you do get unlimited health-care for you and your dependents.

A salaried tech job in the US would also include private health insurance for you and your dependents

13% on £90k

https://listentotaxman.com/?year=2022&taxregion=uk&age=0&tim...

Edit: Also we brits /know/ our salaries are low compared to the US. Also the majority of us get very confused when someone claims that they’re on £200k plus bonuses as a devops in London and we’re left utterly confused as those salaries are like from another planet for us

You are talking as if your salary is related to the revenue/value you bring to the business? That may be the theoretical upper limit, but the more important factor is the minimum you would accept, ie the labor market. Or the cost of replacing you (again the labor market).

> US companies pay around 10% of the employee's salary in taxes

I'm in the US and glancing at my pay slip, it looks like these taxes come out of my gross salary. It really looks like I'm paying them and not my employer

Maybe 90k GBP is like 150k USD right? Otherwise I'd be concerned.. the heck is going on over there?

Currencies worldwide have lost ground against the dollar, and the pound was doing poorly to begin with. A pound is only 1.12 dollar atm.

What's going on is a combination of social services using taxes and the US being one of few places putting a huge value on software devs. The US is an outlier, not the other way around.

Makes sense, ya'll should work remote for US tech if you can.

UK salaries have always been low. US salaries have always been very high.

Though we do get unlimited free healthcare and a statutory minimum of 28 days paid leave, and up to 28 weeks paid sick leave. Not quite swings and roundabouts - I'd like a higher salary, but there are some benefits to not living in the US.

15.05%

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