Last I saw job offers for mistral (engineering, Paris) it advertised 90k euros base salary. Not sure how they’re intending to compete with the US when even a top AI lab can’t afford to be competitive :-/
Does the US position come with 5 weeks paid vacation? When the US position gets hit with layoffs, do you still have comprehensive healthcare and unemployment coverage?
Yes, EU software Eng salaries are a lot lower than their US equivalents, but quite a lot of folks are happy having a top 5% salary in their own county, without all the stresses and risks of working in the US.
As a concrete example, a few years back it leaked that Dan Abramov's (very decent) London salary was half what his US peers earned. Didn't seem to bother the man much at all...
Work a US job for 4 months, quit, take the next 8 months for holiday/vacation, and you still save more money than a European SWE.
Hey, the 2010s are calling, they want the trope “BuT eUrOpE hAs pAiD lEaVe” back.
Europe in 2026 (France, Germany, UK, Estonia, etc). What a joke. Nobody in the world respects them.
At least the US has jobs and a military. Not as good as before, but better than Europe.
Let's assume for the sake of argument that you have a decent software job in the Bay Area, so you earn somewhere in the region of $350k. That little 4 month stint earns you just $116k (since quitting after 4 months means you'll have to return any signing bonus).
Now in the Bay Area your median mortgage is around $3,500/month, so with modest living expenses we're talking a burn of about $5,500/month, meaning you need to spend about $66,000 to cover the year. Plus $17,000 in state and federal taxes, you're now down to a cushion of 33k/year.
That's assuming, of course, that you are happy sending your kids to public school in a dodgy district (private school fees alone would wipe you out, as would the mortgages in a good public school district).
The math doesn't math here chief
Yes, absolutely, the problem is these are not the people you want to hire.
And the people you do want to hire are either already in US or work for a US company remotely for 3x the salary.
What does this have to do if the advertised base salary? You would pay for your healthcare and social security with huge taxes from that already meager salary, it is not like those 90k is all-taxes-paid-and-batteries-included offer.
Housing near work is mostly old Haussmannian buildings that are rent capped and where demand far exceeds supply, so most of the stock is unmaintained. You either accept bad housing in the city or live in the suburbs and commute — not ideal.
To make matters worse, French companies (especially old-school ones) have a culture of presenteeism for white collar jobs, it's uncommon for people to leave before 6PM and staying late is rewarded as high engagement.
Lastly, you might consider buying and renovating a house so you can escape this dilemma, but it isn't cheap: 2-bedroom (T3) around 700k euros, that represents 20 years of frugal savings on 90k gross.
Vacation, cheap and good healthcare, and unemployment benefits are great in France, but the current government has been eroding these social benefits, and those are not unique to France for well-paid tech workers anyway.
And nowadays, with the erosion of the social safety net pushed by the French government, the gap is even more narrow. There definitely are huge inequalities there, US are far from being the heartless place EU politicians like to depict.
1. all good tech jobs in the US have unlimited pto
2. all good tech jobs in the US have good healthcare plans that will continue after being let go until you get a new job
3. you will be able to claim unemployment, but a good tech company in the US will also give you a severance
The others are valid though.
The flip side of this, is that you don't have a visible balance, so you have to calibrate what is an "acceptable" number of vacation days against what your coworkers take, and in competitive environments, that necessarily tends towards zero.
Plus, when you leave/are fired, the company doesn't have to payout a vacation balance, so they laugh all the way to the bank
I also worked in company where this guy was on PTO 6 months a year, but he kept working during his PTO, just on his own schedule. However, at the same company, I recall one coworker had to cancel his flight and company booked him another flight because "we need you to finish this pls". His manager basically beg him to stay one day.
However, in another company, I had issues taking a few days off because "your teammate been here for 2 years didn't a single day off" (I gave them my notice the same day)
So to answer your question from my experience: coin toss and you won't know it until you signed with them. I'd rather take 5 weeks for sure and no calls/emails/texts after the work day.
I'd say the Paris job provides noticeably greater day-to-day life vs Los Angeles with the same before tax salary.
Its usually 15 days paid time off, and unlimited unpaid.
To not talk about the toxic environment that European companies generate in general. Ie: "you should be grateful you have this job".
that buys you a lot of dentists visits and vacation funds
Look, the year is 2026, we all understand by now that unlimited PTO is a neat trick to incentivise your employees to take as little time off as possible.
> and yes you have options if laid off
Not great options. Taking California as a concrete example, you will qualify for a maximum of $450/week in unemployment payments, and if you need healthcare coverage, you will need to spend about $1,500/month on COBRA coverage for a family of 4. This is in a region where the median mortgage payment is $3,500/month.
Maybe this appeal to mediocrity in a competitive market explains Mistral's mediocre performance.
I'm Australian. We have 4 weeks paid leave a year, comprehensive healthcare and unemployment coverage.
Most of my career I avoided taking leave, and I'd usually just get it paid out when I left. Who wants to take leave when you are doing the most interesting, most important thing you can imagine doing?
That aside, if you want to make it rational, you can think of leaves in the context of explore-exploit dilema. Probably a wider exploration would allow you to find better things to exploit. Its like the 20% innovation time that some companies offer
It's relatively common to get 4+ weeks paid in GOOD tech jobs in the US - of which these would be considered.
I didn't have that much at either Amazon or Meta.
https://www.levels.fyi/benefits/PTO-Vacation-Personal-Days/#...
Most companies start at 3 weeks + 12 bank-ish holidays (or you get unlimited - which you typically have zero issues taking 5+ weeks if you're competent and your boss isn't a dickbag). Most places also give you more PTO with tenure - Amazon does, Meta doesn't.
Thats quite competitive for a base salary, as high as max ICT5 Staff base at Apple Munich.
Is that still a thing? Or have those would leave have left, after all, it's been ~6 years of Trump already.
Now, that is quite a lot of people. But not nearly enough to reverse decades of brain drain.
Ah ok, thanks for the clarification. I thought this would be more to do with politics.
So we’ll end up with ex-US folks starting up those European companies that decouple Europe from US tech! (Thats tongue in cheek.)
Also, if given a choice of 90k eur in Paris vs let's say 2m usd in US I'm pretty sure suddenly most of the issues people have with US would suddenly disappear ;)
Yes 90k is more than most French software companies pay, but the salary needs to be competitive with those US companies.
Germany is not so great either in that sense though at least in crypto sector, the pay was reasonable... Though as a job it was total BS.
UK was pretty good at some point (though all the really good jobs were gate-kept by IR35 regulations), The Netherlands was pretty good (especially contract roles thanks to big tax discounts for foreigners). But IMO, one of the best countries outside of the US for software work has been Australia. I actually came back to Australia because of it. Though it's not quite as lucrative today but it's certainly still much better paid than France and has potential.
That said, if you want to do your own startup and you do not have special business connections or pedigree, then the US is the only real option IMO.
I think it comes down to easy money. Easy come, easy go. To be rich enough to invest in startups in France, you need to be born into old money or be a complete freak of nature. These kinds of people don't part with their money easily. They need a guaranteed return and they can't rely on any media channel to bring traffic. If you live outside of the US, all media channels are essentially working against you; you can literally feel that and so everything is riskier. It's like playing the same game with a massive handicap.
Salaries are calculated differently in France, Germany, US etc. For example working in Germany you're likely to fork a huge amount monthly to your health insurance. It actually makes it difficult to negotiate comp across borders.
$55k USD brut in France is around 2.8k EUR / month after taxes in France, which counts as the upper bracket of Middle Class in most of the country outside of Paris. Paltry when you're used to tech comps but decent for the vast majority of people here.
On the whole I agree that it's not competitive regionally or globally, and as for myself I'd leave for Switzerland or Australia if I had the opportunity.
2200€ in my pocket each month with health care and taxes paid.
My yearly gross salary 39_000€. My yearly super-gross salary (what the company actually pay) 54_000€.
Actually the company paid less due to CIR (https://entreprendre.service-public.gouv.fr/vosdroits/F23533) I don't the number but at absolute minimum the company could have paid 31_320€.
I live in the south east of france not in a big city and I have 13 years of xp.
And to compare to the cost of life :
- 200g of bread is 1€.
- tomato 4€/kg
- beef 27-40€/kg
- 100m2 individual house 350_000€
- 60m2 flat 150_000€Actually, after living in Europe and coming back to Australia, the quality and price of meat is what surprised me most. A lot of times in Europe, I would order a burger and the patty would basically taste like sausage meat; tough and flavorless. In Australia, beef is really good and cheap.
Then we got a PM, who's father in law is the founder of Infosys, who changed the law to favour the likes of Infosys (by making it too risky for smaller players to hire contractors). Scandalous corruption
Contracting was going to be my plan for buying a better house and early retirement, but that's gone now. Thanks Rishi
Similar vibes in Germany though a more modern version.
The Netherlands seemed relatively egalitarian for Europe. It's what I like most about Australia. In Australia, there are no artificial social barriers, no class system.
After failing at startups after a decade, I had to live somewhere I would not be seen as a second-class citizen.
Britain is its own worst enemy. I'm convinced if there was a movement to destroy the intangible class-system the economy would grow big time. The lack of investment comes from old-farts getting away with lack of reinvestment due to a lack of competition - and nobody talks about it.
The 'intangible class-system' is what you felt.
this comment is insane...
It probably means they don't, they just do their own thing how they see fit.