[sushshshsh]

May I also additionally ask how on Earth a 50k salary for a software engineer is at all justified? After paying taxes and rent, it seems to me there is not much money left over for saving or lifestyle spending?

It seems like an unfair situation

[jlangenauer]

Why is it unfair? No-one is forcing anyone to accept development work for 50k per year, yet there are plenty of people happy to do it.

[sushshshsh]

Define plenty? It seems to me the other commenters have offered counter points to you.

In the US, before taxes, an income of $130,000 to $170,000 is the norm in bigger cities. I imagine based on my calculations that the difference between Berlin's discretionary income for SWE and NY/SF/SEA/BOS is probably an extra $50,000 post tax.

[Tomte]

And what do you think do houses cost in Germany, compared to "bigger cities" in America?

I know plenty of people in that income range myself who do own houses (or apartments in some cases) and wouldn't think of forgoing their summer vacation in Menorca or Ibiza.

"The other commenters" is just one, and he's factually wrong. No matter how much HNers love to pile on, 50k Euros is a respectable income in most parts of Germany.

The idea that all software engineering is in Stuttgart, Munich or Berlin is laughable. We have lots and lots of family companies of the so-called "Mittelstand" strewn across the province (but West Germany primarily). Some of those are hidden champions. In towns and regions few Americans will ever have heard of.

[sushshshsh]

I've heard of plenty of American and also German towns and cities and even if I was living for free in a caravan (which I've done for many months in my life, much like Germans who go to music festivals will do in the summer), I don't see how it is possible to make a substantial savings in life on a yearly post tax income of $25,000.

After an entire decade of working, this will only result in a best case scenario of $250,000 in savings, which, for my personal lifestyle is not going to work. I think collective action for higher wages is proper here.

[lazyjones]

> how on Earth a 50k salary for a software engineer is at all justified?

Too many mediocre developers available (local & EE), too few good ones (they're in the US, UK, Switzerland). Also, if you can't find software engineers at that price, you just close the office and move it to Poland or so. Hence fewer employers remain.

[Tomte]

And yet, people manage to buy houses and fly on vacations on that income.

[rob74]

Trust me, in Germany with that income you can either buy an apartment (not a house, at least not in a place where you will find a software developer job nearby) or fly on vacations, but not both...

[patall]

My parents earn together ~90k, just bought a house and travel about 4 weeks a year through all of europe and still support us three kids. So thats not true, at least not if you are living in a smaller city. And for places like Berlin or Munich, 50k a year would be ridicoulously low. CEO in a start-up in Berlin told me a few month ago that they are hiring poeple with literally 2 to 3 coursera courses in machine learning for around 60k, more experienced people rather in the range of 90k. Big corp like Bayer will hire you with a PhD starting around 120k (as analyst without further responsebilites, team managers obviously get more). Given the Copay on Retirement and Health Insurance, that equates to an US salary of around 150k USD. Quite a bit lower than SV, but not as bad as some people want to make it.

[pheug]

You get 401k match and health insurance at any good employer in the US too. As well as much lower taxes. German taxes are just batshit crazy, second only to Belgium. How people can afford to FI/RE with these taxes and pay is beyond me. Oh wait they don't! One of the lowest median wealth per adult in western Europe!

[realityking]

I‘m not saying you‘re wrong, but the media wealth statistic are heavily distorted by two facts

1. our retirement systems is based on a generational contract, not capital 2. home ownership is very low

If you control for both the results would look very different. Now #2 obviously causes a huge issue in terms of generational wealth.

[pheug]

> 1. our retirement systems is based on a generational contract, not capital

You mean that people pop kids so that those kids would feel obliged to take care of them when they're old? Yeah, that's one legitimate retirement strategy. It's very popular in poor countries e.g. ex-USSR where I'm from.

Personally I'm more of a fan of US-style self-made retirement. It's easily possibly working in tech in the US, a 10 year career basically guarantees you financial independence here barring any major set back (like divorce). But not so in Germany and much of Europe.

> 2. home ownership is very low

Isn't that roughly same as saying people aren't wealthy enough to afford one? So if you "control" for this factor, you're just selecting the richer subset of people.

[econcon]

I don't think it's true, a lot of my German friends have been traveling for 3 years in south East Asia without having any real job while I hear from German old men that new generation is not as passionate about working as they were at their time. So what gives? How do Germans maintain such high quality life without working, it's mystery to me.

[ChuckNorris89]

Easy, inherited wealth. Germany has one of the most unequal wealth distributions in Europe.

Their boomer parents worked hard and saved a lot and managed to buy lots of assets, especially real estate, back in the 60's - 80's when salaries were high and properties were cheap. Now they can just kick back and relax while all that sweet rent money, that skyrocketed in the last two decades, comes in.

If you move to Germany now you definitely won't enjoy this kind of standard of living as your rent costs will be financing their mortgages while you won't manage to save enough to buy one of your own since property prices now are way higher, wages are low and taxes are high.

[sushshshsh]

Thank you for providing your perspective :)