[marvin]

I think you've got an excellent point regarding salary suppression propaganda; this is in my opinion quite widespread in Europe. I have seen examples of wage suppression collusion that would result in lawsuits in the US, and the propaganda examples you provide sound very similar to things I hear locally. (Scandinavia).

However, 90k per year for a senior engineer is peanuts compared to the shareholder value a well-placed engineer can generate. I think this is reflected in the compensation of the major tech companies in the US; they can easily be double this amount or more. And you'd be hard-pressed to find those salaries for a non-director employed position in Europe. Some consultants can demand this rate, which interestingly provides a clear image on what a company is willing to pay for the right to fire someone at will.

What we're lacking in Europe, apart from seeing through the propaganda, is enough companies that can properly utilize technology and would benefit from attracting the best engineers. That would lead to better pay.

[magduf]

>What we're lacking in Europe, apart from seeing through the propaganda, is enough companies that can properly utilize technology and would benefit from attracting the best engineers. That would lead to better pay.

Don't forget, however, that cost of living is generally cheaper in much of Europe (maybe not in Switzerland or Scandinavia though), than in the big tech-hub cities in America. Rent is cheaper, food is cheaper (and better quality), healthcare is much cheaper. Also, you can pretty easily get along without a car, which is a huge expense for Americans.

[marvin]

Maybe true for Europe in general, but at least for Norway, this isn't really the case. It's not as crazy expensive here as in the major tech hubs, of course, but you'll still pay at least 300k USD for a completely average dwelling anywhere near what we would call a major city (population 200,000 or more).

I found food to be similar in price or cheaper when I was on holiday in San Francisco. Avoiding the car is doable if you live in one of these city centers, but then the dwelling will be 400k and up. And a car will run you ~7000k USD per year in TCO, unless you drive an old beater. Taxation is around 50% in aggregate, probably slightly higher if you take care and count all the smaller taxes.

Guaranteed healthcare, workers' rights, vacations, parental leave and social safety net in case of disaster are fantastic, though. Although you'd probably get better _treatment_ if you've good good insurance in the US. It's probably a better quality of life if you're in the bottom 60% of earning power.

[magduf]

>Maybe true for Europe in general, but at least for Norway

I specifically mentioned Scandinavia as an exception in my post.

And Norway is even more exceptional, because it's not even in the EU, unlike the other Scandinavian nations.

>It's not as crazy expensive here as in the major tech hubs, of course, but you'll still pay at least 300k USD for a completely average dwelling

That's not far from what you'd pay in one of America's larger tech-hub cities, and far less than you'd pay in Silicon Valley.

I'm not trying to claim that Europe is as cheap as Thailand, I'm just pointing out that America is really expensive to live in these days in the nicer cities. Even in smaller crappy places, the rent has gotten ridiculous in the past decade or two.

But again, for the rest of your stuff, as I said, I specifically called out Scandinavia and Switzerland as exceptional and expensive. From what I saw in Germany, it's really cheap to live there compared to a major tech hub in the US, and the quality of life is much better.