[jiveturkey]

Thanks for the link. I guess I overestimated starting salaries nationwide by quite a bit! But in my defense, I really meant total comp, not just salary.

I know of 2 SF startups that pay $120k ish for entry level. At entry level, forget about equity, the amount you will get will be worthless. The base is your entire package.

Google will give you a total comp (salary, bonus, RSU) of about $150-$160k for entry level. No senior+ person I know there is making less than $250k total comp. Google designs salaries very well to keep everyone in the same level centered at the same total comp. If you take a high salary, your raises and RSU refreshers will be less, regardless of your performance. Personally I think that's very unfair but hey I don't work at Google so who am I to say.

I was making $125k base (maybe $150k total) as entry level at a mid-peninsula bigco back in 2000. I never dipped under $100k going to smallco and startups since then. As you can imagine, I make a fortune these days but I am very highly specialized.

If indeed startups are paying less than $100k here, I can't imagine how they hire anyone, certainly not anyone good.