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Comment by rb2k_ | Hacker News Reader

For a lot of companies, "salary" is usually a mixture of base salary, bonus and stock options/RSUs.

I guess there are also various perks (public transport ticket, food, ...), but those mostly don't end up scoring that high on the 'money' scale.

Are there any plans to take these things into consideration?

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> public transport ticket, food

Don't care, don't care, don't care. Unless the IRS is taxing it, I don't care about it.

I care about these things specifically because the IRS doesn't tax it. I save about 6k per year because my startup feeds me 5 lunches/3 dinners per week and pays for my public transportation. That's probably ~8k pre-tax dollars.

You don't, but others do. There are more people in this world than just you.

I think he means that they might as well be included in the salary, unless there's a tax or bulk buying discount.

I find that relying on my employer for everyday stuff isn't conducive to building future proof systems: am I alone in finding it hard to budget for expenses when my employer is providing a large chunk of my expenses?

Whenever possible, I prefer taking a cash equivalent and buying my own. Insurance, food, living quarters, public transportation..whatever.

Well employers get discounts for getting a large amount of these expensive. Food might not be true, but if an employer would give you the exact amount of money he pays for insurance, you would get an insurance a lot crappier, simply because the employer gets discounts.

I am currently paying insurance out of the pocket, it sucks. When I'll reach 30 (no more catastrophic plans), I'll definitely will find another employer with health insurance.

That's a good question. We are currently considering salary only but in near future we will add job position too. For example, a candidate can say: "Contact me only if some company is willing to consider me for VP of Eng.".

You should consider total compensation and salary vs. just a salary. If you're looking at finance, people will have requirements for both a base salary and the total compensation. Looking at them in isolation doesn't work. Same thing if a large portion of your offer from say Google is in RSUs, that's not cash; but is essential for evaluating the economics of the offer.

You have a valid concern. We are starting with salary to simplify things because cash is what matters the most.

In my opinion, you should add total compensation right from the beginning. This is because (1) You would be capturing data from many people (hopefully) and it would be difficult to fix later, (2) The site will be less useful without for many people including me, and (3) Some people will invariably confuse and put total compensation anyways which will introduce unnecessary variability in your data.

On the other hand, adding total compensation from the beginning cannot be too complex.

Depends what goes into "total compensation".

Things like startup options are basically monopoly money. If the salary is $30,000 but they offer two ten-thousandths of a company which is currently worth nothing, but they plan for it to be worth five billion dollars in five years, is that a $230,000 salary?

Recruiters will post bullshit if there's no downside; to avoid this you need concrete measures that can't be manipulated and can be audited.

Total compensation need not be included as a single number, it may/should be separated into actual factual numbers like base salary, fair market value of stock options / RSUs at the time of grant, cash bonus, etc. probably with a statement that the candidate is willing to trade one component for another to find a suitable mix.

Startups and big companies follow different norms, I am unsure if the latter should be ignored.

Wouldn't that be "compensation"?

Yes, but variable comp is variable because it isn't guaranteed, so it shouldn't be lumped into salary discussions.

In finance, at least, it is common to get an offer with a salary of X and a first year guaranteed bonus of Y.

You can put a price on perks. Food? Provide something that matches what an urban centre provides for free? €10 per day by 240 days ~= €2,500 extra post-tax income per year (which you can round up to €5k pre-tax). Companies don't like when you point out how little the perk is actually worth.

Not to mention, I would work at SpaceX for 1/4 (or less) salary of what I would work at Google for.

That scenario is true for many. The core idea is somewhat like "what amount of salary will make you think of moving to a new job". Also the employer gets your details only when you approve them (one by one), so this might work in this scenario too.

That is one of the reasons Elon Musk is such a great businessman :)

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