dreaminvm

My advice would be to try both before you decide. Spend a day going through a RoR tutorial and another on a Py/Django tutorial. Pick the one that will accomplish your goals in the shortest time possible (your words).

This is just untrue. Plenty of high performance products are Python based, just look at Instagram, Dropbox etc.

Agreed. The level of productivity for most of us who need 8 hours drops substantially when we go above or below that threshold.

Even easier to misinterpret the $5.5B profit without the context of 6% decline in revenue, and net income decline by 27%.

That is lower than most non-technical positions for medium to large companies. For startups I can understand if it comes with a chunk of equity, but for $70k, you will have a hard time meeting living costs.

The Oracle comic made my day. I've despised their software since forever.

If you are interested in web projects using python, you should check out Django. There is a large, mature community and great documentation to get you started.

He set the tone at the beginning of the article with the following:

"There’s a particular sinking feeling that comes when the candidate starts on one of these problems and immediately writes a for loop"

I don't agree with the author that iterative code is bad (within a certain context). In fact, I tend to write iterative solutions first when I am just testing something out and develop more elegant, recursive solutions when I have a better understanding of the problem (which might not be possible when you are dealing with interview anxiety and an interviewer breathing down your neck).

A good practice for me is to begin with pseudo-code that outlines the logic of what I want to do. If the pseudo-code makes sense, its usually trivial to implement.

Its ironic that a lot of developers feel the opposite of what the OP is describing. Developers think wall street pays more and wall street (OP) thinks developers make "way more".

Like others have already pointed out, OP you seem to be underpaid in NYC in your position, but I wouldn't rush to switch fields. Stay with what you are doing and try to identify your value and skillset which you can then use to negotiate a higher salary.

There are incentives that come with working at startups like broader job ownership, stock options (long term investment), and agile development. Then there are incentives that are inherent in all Big Corps. like the large bonuses you mentioned, job security and generally acceptable work hours. Choosing between the two really boils down to your own ambitions and value of time off from work.

Personally, I am very happy at a Big Co. because my schedule is flexible and not insanely demanding (45hr/wk).