I can hardly imagine earning $350k a year. I've never earned a third of that anually. What I can imagine is a job that places such a demand on my time and attention that I don't have time for a life outside of it.
It’s easy and comforting to imagine that someone getting paid more than you must also suffer more than you – certainly well paid doctors and lawyers and investment bankers seem to suffer terrible working conditions – but it isn’t really true. A software developer earning an ordinary good salary (say $80k-$120k to pick some reference point) isn’t going to be working ‘harder’ than someone with a more manual job[1] earning much less pay or indeed your equivalent software developer in a poorer country, and unlike a skilled tradesman, the programmer is unlikely to reach 40 in a terrible physical condition with his muscles shot and some kind of chronic joint pain. And warren buffet is unlikely to be working much harder than the CEO of some smaller company.
Most of the reason those big companies can pay software developers so we’ll is that they are worth it, and they can be worth it because they have more leverage: if you do something that causes a small company to be 1% better, and if that same thing would make a small part of a massive company 0.5% better, the latter can be worth a lot more just because the denominator is so much bigger. It feels harder to explain why they must pay so much. The first order argument is that there is lots of demand for software developers and that pushes up the price, but these companies are active in markets where developers are paid less well (e.g. Europe) and they could adjust hiring to favour candidates who are good but less competitive (e.g. because they are bad at a particular kind of interview) so I don’t understand why market forces haven’t lead to things being more balanced.
Well all the examples I gave were from America. It’s true that at some jobs higher pay comes with worse conditions (eg hazard pay or working a night shift) but generally for programming (and many other professional jobs) higher pay comes with better conditions.
$350k is just the max base salary (cash). Comp packages have multiple components and then the actual total compensation including the value of shares awarded would typically be higher, veritably much much higher for anyone getting $350k base. For a lot of senior tech employees “cash salary” is a small minority of total comp.
You work there 3 years and you'll earn a million bucks. Plenty of life to live after that and a lot of money to do whatever it is you want. Many people are willing to make that tradeoff, perhaps not you though.
Ruining your health is an aspect that I think gets far too little attention. If you're honestly working 16hr days your quality of life is going to absolutely tank and you'll be paying serious interest on the damage you do to your heart, back, eyes and wrists for decades to come.
Doesn't that kind of depend on having kids or love? There's probably a fair number of people out there skilled enough to do the work that doesn't have those things to distract from having a demanding job.
Ultimately it's a decision that you'd have to make depending on what you care about. You could turn your question on it's head; what's the point of having children or a significant other if you are incapable or unwilling when you could be making money for the things you do care about in life?
You could turn your question on it's head; what's the point of having children or a significant other if you are incapable or unwilling when you could be making money for the things you do care about in life?
That's a good point, actually.
Which I will bookmark as the perfect description of the kind of personality profile that is most suited to working at Amazon-- and perhaps the only personality type that can thrive there, actually.
I'm there and have a great life outside of work and a young family. I've yet to see the crazy culture everyone rants about.
I prefer a bit tougher job that means I'll be financially free in 10 years. It also means my wife doesn't have to work and can really focus on raising our children.
I've worked some long days, but not 16hrs. Plus I really dig the projects I'm on.
and you get to say "ex-Amazon or ex-FAANG" on any of your future projects to a completely non-discerning audience that will drown out any nuanced discussion from cynics.
Just reiterating what some others said. The decision in your career life does not have to be a zero sum balance of low pay vs high stress/hours.
There are several companies where the revenue they create per employee is so astronomical that reasonable work-life balance and high pay are on the table.
Exactly. No amount of money can buy you time. You are committing to a significant quality of life deterioration during the period you are employed at Amazon.
Also, I'd be curious to know where you get your numbers from - simply because numbers for total comp (across all companies) seems hard to come by. One can't go by what's posted on levels.fyi of course, because that's skewed heavily towards people who have ... something to brag about.
>350k is ... not that much in high cost area like Bay/NYC/Seattle
Yeah it really still is. Living in the bay area as a single 20 something making that kind of money you are approaching 1% status. Rent is a little higher sure, but what really is the difference between $2k/month and $4k/month when you're bringing home $20k+/month? And everything else in California besides housing is the same as anywhere else really in terms of cost of living.
You don't bring 20k+ per months, more like 9k+ after tax/401k contribution. And stock grants are liquid assets, but they are not cash, and most people I know won't exercise them right away, so they are still numbers in certain DB table
401k contributions are still savings, deduct that (at a max contribution rate that’s like 1.5k) and you’re at 10.5k a month. The bit about stock grants is meaningless, if it’s a public company that is straight cash.
Eh for those liquidating them, most are turning most into equity in other companies/funds - ie a number in the same sort of DB table, albeit with a different ticker attached.
100%. I'm approaching the amounts that only a few years ago would have been in a fantasy land category, however there are issues with high stress levels, overtime and many others. I do understand many many people in my position would just pull through just because of money but eventually it wears out as a strong argument.
I can hardly imagine earning $350k a year. I've never earned a third of that anually. What I can imagine is a job that places such a demand on my time and attention that I don't have time for a life outside of it.