[ThrustVectoring]

I suspect a partial cause from right-to-work laws. It's much harder to fire an employee in Europe, so companies are less willing to bid on employees, and so compensation is lower. Plus the employees themselves value the job security, which substitutes for wages when evaluating offers.

For specific predictions from this model:

1. Public-sector programmers in general should get paid less than private-sector programmers, due to employees valuing the job security

2. The public/private gap should be larger in the US than in Europe, since there's a smaller job security gap

3. Public-sector programmers in the US should have higher wages than public-sector programmers in Europe, due to having to compete with more vigorous private-sector activity in the US

[thehardsphere]

California, Massachusetts, New York, and Washington do not have right-to-work laws, yet software salaries in SF, Boston, New York, and Seattle are among the highest in the world. If that were the cause, Austin, TX should become the high-pay Mecca that every programmer would migrate to, because Texas is a right-to-work state.

[vonmoltke]

GP is confusing "at will" with "right to work". All states, except Montana I believe, are at will, meaning employees can be let go without cause. Right to workis much less common, and prohibits things like closed shops where an employee is required to join a specific union as a condition of employment.

[thehardsphere]

That would make more sense.

[ThrustVectoring]

Yeah, I meant the laws that say that your boss can just show up and fire you for any or no reason, which is at-will employment. Got the name wrong, embarrassingly.

[djrogers]

You're supporting the GP's thesis - he's saying that right-to-work laws depress wages...

[thehardsphere]

GP's thesis is that Europe has no right-to-work laws, but America does, so America has higher wages than Europe.