Making the move from an NZ employer to (essentially) an AU employer got me a ~40% pay rise.
I'm now afraid I've priced my self out of the NZ market and will have a rude landing if I'm forced back into the NZ market (you never know, things happen).
But it is frankly ridiculous how far NZ employers have their heads in the clouds. If remote work stays around and more US companies don't mind a few hours overlap with the West Coast timezone to get access to a native English speaking, Western culture, talent pool... well, I think those NZ employers will start banging the immigration drum a lot harder.
When the recruiter told me the offered salary, I thought it was a typo, scam, or someone was smoking crack.
And the NZ software employers who cry the most about "a skills shortage" are ones that locals won't work for because they're known shit employers.
Looking at you, Orion Health.
Just go contracting - I charge probably on the low end for my experience but take home almost 2.5x what I used to as a salaried worker for less time on the clock. As long as you keep a decent chunk of cash (which is easier since you're making more) then you can ride out short-term gaps between contracts. That being said, I haven't been without work for the six years I've been contracting so haven't had to dip into it yet.
It's really true. We see a lot of New Zealanders applying for jobs in Australia and they are often good candidates.
I still love NZ but to keep progressing in my career I felt it was really helpful to be able to access a bigger market.
do you know if there is big influx of IT immigrants in NZ?
It's exactly the same in Austria (the one with schnitzel, not kangaroos). Employers will tell you, "you don't need more than 60k/year because the quality of life is so good, you know we keep winning most livable city in the world", to the point where I think the whole winning most livable city in the world is some paid BS advertising from Austria to sucker in foreigners willing to lowball themselves and fill in the so called "skill shortage", up until they move here and realize a house costs 1 million Euros, stuff is more expensive than in Germany while salaries are lower and then they fuck off.
i.e suggesting because a place has nice weather that you should be paid less.
Basically the nice cities with nice weather attract a lot of candidates meaning employers don't need to pay so much, while employers in cloudy, windy, rainy and depressing cities need to pay good because otherwise there's no reason to move there. It's just supply and demand.
I could get a nice pay bump by moving to Netherlands or the UK, but I really can't stomach the weather in that part of Europe, as someone who like going outside for walks in the sun. Sometimes there's more to life than counting more money, and life is too short to spend it living somewhere where you don't like just to accumulate money.
Weather is one of those intensely personal things. I am very much outside of the norm, especially when it comes to sun.
I've lived in Seattle my whole life and right now it is in the mid-80s and not a cloud in the sky; the whole week is predicted to be like this. The people I know have filtered, as they do every year, into two groups. One group is posting on social media about how they're out to "enjoy the sun" and "such marvelous weather". The other, like me, is sitting inside waiting for the grey to return. (Anecdotally to my friend group, people who move here tend to be in the first group; people who were born around here in the second.)
Which is to say, I would happily take a pay cut to get away from the sun so I suppose I'm glad the "gloomier" places tend to pay more.
Of course it is, and if you grew up in a gloomy place your whole life you're used to it, but if you grew up in nice weather area it's tough to move somewhere depressing, and even people from depressing places want to live in nice weather places.
There's the scientific correlation between sun exposure, or at least seeing the sun with your eyes, not just bathing in it, and serotonin levels. Also people form northern gloomy places (at least in Europe) have higher suicide rates and consumption of antidepressants than the people living in the south despite the inverse correlation in wages.
So yeah, it seem like the sun and nice weather is better for your mental health than bigger wages.
It would be amusing to see a list of "most livable city in the world". Vienna, Sydney, Auckland... they probably all win from slightly different orgs awarding.
Then once they get an Australian passport, they can use it to work in the US on an E-3 visa :-)
I wouldn't be surprised if their (and others') ultimate goal is the US. That's the case with Canada, where my understanding is that FAANG offices are staffed mostly with those who cannot (and often will never get) a US visa, plus the odd local who doesn't want to move to the US for personal or family reasons.
(My last role paid 240-250K NZD depending on exchange rate; the local role prior to that: 120K NZD)
Didn’t know about E3 visa route. Very interesting, thank you