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Comment by jarek | Hacker News Reader

London software salaries are low compared to the Bay Area or Seattle. Comparable or a little bit lower than Toronto software salaries.

A couple of years ago Amazon would make a standard offer of 90k USD (~55k GBP at today's rates) to new graduates hired as SDE in Seattle, plus a 10k bonus if they stayed a year.

Of course there's differences like Amazon giving everyone only 10 paid vacation/annual leave days, 15 days being considered pretty good, annual bonuses aren't common at the larger U.S. companies, etc.

I personally think London is worth it, but the money difference is there.

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My jaw always hits the floor when I see the salaries they offer in SF/NY. Then I remember that working in the UK I typically get twice as much paid annual leave as most people in the USA, usually with the option to purchase more leave. I think I'll always choose more time off over more money.

And there's the matter of what to do with the time off. Prague, Rome, Budapest, Barcelona being a two-hour, £20-40 flight away is difficult to value but a big difference.

I hear this a lot from my foreign friends. It's 2014 and even Ryanair don't sell £20 return flights any more (£30-40 is pushing it. E.g LGW-DUB in Feb is £40).

Also, the Eurozone isn't all that cheap any more. Prior to 2008, £1 bought you 1.4-1.5 EUR. Since then it's typically been between 1.1 and 1.3 EUR. And prices have risen all over Europe.

Even if you found a £20 flight, it'll be the cheapest part of the trip! If you do anything other than a backpacking budget, your flight cost will be eclipsed by: baggage fees, travel to/lunch at the airport, accommodation, transport, entertainment and food.

It starts with a cheap flight and before you know it you've spent £200-400/pp for a couple of days away.

I meant one way prices. To my Canadian ears £40 one way is still very cheap.

Berlin, £50 round trip in March, £40 in January. Copenhagen, £50 in March. BCN, £50. Porto, £58.

Stansted Express, round trip 30 days in advance, £16.

Baggage fees, why? For a week or less, even the aggressive easyJet carryon size is sufficient.

Lunch at the airport... it's like you're trying to make a trip expensive.

Food... yep, you'll have to eat anywhere, and nowhere is that cheap. Considering UK grocery prices it might well be cheaper to travel. Dinner for two incl beer, tax and tip for 449 CZK? That's cheaper than cheap places in Seattle.

Was it cheaper in 2007? Maybe, I wasn't here, can't comment. Is it still miles better than travel options out of SEA or SFO? Yep.

(Cheapest SEA-SFO return is £113. SFO-SAN £107 return. Anywhere more unusual is pricier. LON-KEF is half the price of SEA-ANC. London-Split, £142 round trip, occasional £81 deal. SFO-HNL £290 round trip, London-Gran Canaria is £156 return, occasional £75 Norwegian deal, and it's not like Hawaii or LA or even the resorts in Mexico are particularly cheap. Well, I suppose it's cheaper to go to Vegas from SF.)

From SEA, you have the whole west coast at your doorstep, but you'll need a car and time to enjoy it. It's also a good place to get to Beijing or Tokyo, though it won't usually be cheap.

After spending 4+ hours in an immigration line the last time I went to London via heathrow, I am probably never visiting there again.

> From SEA, you have the whole west coast at your doorstep, but you'll need a car and time to enjoy it

Well luckily you'll have lots of time off from your Amazosoft job... What's the most exciting weekend city break out of Seattle, Portland? SF if you fly, and the selection tapers off after that. Weekend breaks are a lot more fun when you choose from 20 places to fly to for under a hundred.

> After spending 4+ hours in an immigration line the last time I went to London via heathrow, I am probably never visiting there again.

<snarky comment about U.S. immigration> Heathrow is fast with EU passport, though as it happens I agree regarding London as a tourism destination

When I was living in Seattle, I would visit Rainer, North Cascade, or Olympic every weekend in the summer; how many cities are 2 hours away from some of the best national parks in the world on 3 sides? There is a reason seattle has the highest sales of sunglasses per capita in the states.

US immigration is fast with or without a usa passport, well, at least it never takes four freaking hours; in Seattle its max 20 minutes even for first time Chinese visitors. Even Bali is only an hour if you don't pay the bribe.

Well that is a fair point. From Seattle you can choose from mountains, mountains, or mountains, from London you have to settle for city, country, or mountains :)

Well, its mountains, mountains, mountains, or mountains, but I don't think the east cascades is organized into a national park (though people go skiing there). We also have country (including that yearly tulip festival thingy up toward Bellingham). In Europe, you'd have to go to the Alps to get anything like that (or Norway for lakes and floating bridges).

If you find cities very interesting, I'm sure London is very interesting. But if you are into the outdoors, the west coast of the USA is actually pretty nice.

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