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Comment by clark_dent | Hacker News Reader

Why in the name of all that is unholy would you ever think that?

The people in charge of pay and hiring will never, ever, ever set things up such that they're considered less important or are paid less.

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Developer layoffs are always projected as huge savings in expenditure. It probably gives the impression that developers' pay is higher compared to other employees.

Compared to other employees in customer service, tech support, marketing, accounting, I'd imagine engineers are quite expensive.

There are more developers than managers, like you would hopefully expect.

That isn't true in at least two other industries: Finance and sports.

At investment banks, it's quite possible for a star trader or I-banker to be paid more than the CEO.

An NFL head coach is almost certainly paid less than the starting QB, and possibly other positions. The general manager is paid far less than many players.

> The people in charge of pay and hiring will never, ever, ever set things up such that they're considered less important or are paid less.

HR and accounting get paid less than engineers in every country on earth

HR and accounting don't hire and pay you, they're just the ones that fill out the paperwork. Isn't this obvious.

Those are the boots on the ground. The people in charge are those they listed, i.e, program managers, business analysts, administrators, consultants...

HR and accounting are not in charge of pay and hiring. They are involved, but management is in charge and sets the rules.

I have seen cases where I made more than my boss (the difference was a few hundred/year), but it wasn't long before they promoted my boss so that wasn't the case. (I'm convinced that it was only allowed to happen just long enough to say it was possible and then when nobody was looking they promoted him to ensure it doesn't become a pattern)

HR is definitely in charge of pay structure , at least where I have managed. You could argue with them, but it was a monumental effort to get them to do a market study, and they still wouldn't drop degree requirements for some of our best candidates.

I only had a tiny bit of freedom within a pay band.

Sure, but you can jump to a different pay band. If they want to keep you they will do it.

Management is in charge of this, if it is hard to jump bands it is because management wants it to be hard.

> accounting get paid less than engineers in every country on earth

Not in Argentina

Upper management yes but level for level engineers are paid more than biz roles at most other tech companies, FAANG. The only other people who possibly make more is sales (performance based)

> Why in the name of all that is unholy would you ever think that?

Seen it many times where engineers are making more than their managers. I had jobs where there was no real difference between my pay and my direct manager's.

There were fewer programmers for each programmer's role than managers for each manager's. Not sure if it still applies though.

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