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Comment by kellros | Hacker News Reader

This made me cry a little inside. I make slightly less than a third monetary wise of the lowest Average Salary by Speciality with 4 1/2 years commercial dev. Most of the 'high' paying jobs in South Africa is around the $66K a year mark.

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I wouldn't worry too much. I'm not sure what demographics these figures are included, but these numbers are higher than anything I've seen in the real world.

That's the whole point. Employers don't want you to know about the real numbers. They want to pay you as little as possible. Even your manager doesn't make that much money. So they don't want their direct reports to have a higher salary. If you've ever asked for a raise you clearly see signs that they're trying to manage a budget.

Agreed with above. Salaries vary greatly by area. A dev in a non silicon valley type area could make 60% or less of these values. These look like inflated high cost area salaries. NYC, San Fran, Silicon Valley type areas.

Is that decent living in South Africa though? The salaries referred to are in SF.

It really depends on the area. I would classify my current salary as low-end for middle class. For your (low-end) basics (travel, food, accommodation, health insurance) it's around $24K a year in the slightly more expensive areas. Gasoline costs typically offset accommodation costs - especially now that it's around $45 to fill a 35L/9.2 gallon car tank.

South Africa is pretty strange in the sense that certain areas have a huge effect on living costs - you might pay 10%+ less on groceries simply by driving to another suburb. Some cities (ex. Pretoria) are more prone to be targeted by the government for money making purposes - ex. increasing taxes in Pretoria to pay for new roads in Durban (600Km/~400 miles away).

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