Ask HN: How much are you worth? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: How much are you worth?

11 pointssaltcod10 comments

Chris Coyier (of CSS Tricks) suggested on his ShopTalk Show podcast (#82), that an intermediate-level developer could get a job in the $100,000 salary range in San Francisco. Is this true?

If it is true, how much am I worth? http://waterstreetgm.org/how-much-am-i-worth/

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Please add San Francisco to title. Irrelevant for a lot of people.

I think it's reasonable...

Starting salaries in Raligh-Durham, NC are around 60k for a college graduate in Computer Science. According to CNN, this is equal to 104k in SFO with cost of living adjustments. (Source: http://money.cnn.com/calculator/pf/cost-of-living/ )

Although, I think the numbers are a little suspect.

Interesting to hear $60K starting here in RTP now. That's not much of an increase in the last 10 years . . . Of course, in 2001 the undergrad CS starting numbers I was hearing ranged from $45K to $55K (a little lower at SAS). About $10K higher for MS in CS types back then.

Healthcare IT work (which I think we both know something about?) seems a little lower though, but jobs in RTP seem plentiful in that vertical.

That's possible, if you have experience and are good at what you do. Taxes and other social needs will subtract from that. California takes about 10%, Feeds take about 20%, social program payroll fees take about 8%, retirement savings /should/ take 15%, and health and dental insurance are probably paid paid for you but not your family if you have one. Rent starts at $2500 per month for a minimal space in a bad part of town. Also, almost all open offers I've seen offer three weeks of combined sick time and vacation ("paid time off".) Also note that this assumes actual programming capability -- not just configuring existing platforms!

It sounds like Chris was talking about non-CS grads in the podcast though. It seems reasonable that they would be able to command $100k in the SF area, but I believe he was talking about front-end developers.

$100k seems like quite a lot for these folks.

Yes, this is probably true. Many of the recent graduates I know make over $100K.

This is a good tool to find out how much you can possibly earn by job title/keywords + location: http://www.indeed.com/salary

Graduated from college (B.S in Comp Sci.) 3 months ago. Making a little north of 100K in Silicon Valley.

3 years web developing experience in Wash DC area. C#, TSQL, javascript, node.js. How much am I worth?

How much your employer is willing to pay you for the work you do.

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