[alkonaut]

> Why would anyone with the intelligence and drive needed to become a software engineer pursue that field?

Instead of... what? It's not like you can make 2x the salary easily by instead becoming something else. Salaries are pretty flat, if you want to make money you should invest in somethig or have your own company.

Also: I'm not sure it's' a good idea to pick jobs based on salaries. It's good to not worry about money at all (which almost no SWEs' need to). After that I'd recommend pursuing sommething one finds interesting.

Edit: I think there is a cultural difference in the US where one is expected to aggregate net worth/savings throughout one's career, for many reasons (ability to send kids to better schools, saving for rainy day e.g. sickness, ...). In a welfare state I don't have that priority. I wouldn't switch to a job paying 2x the money unless it's really a interesting job! Because there is almost nothing that 2x the money would do to my lifestyle, the future prospects or security of my family etc.

[zeku]

This is a great point. I'm American and my girlfriend and I make close to the same amount of money. We have recently decided to live(buy a home etc.) off of just one salary and completely invest the other salary because the penalty for getting sick and losing your job in the USA is so high that we don't feel comfortable spending most of both salaries.

ALSO, this is only possible because we each make 150% of the median household income in our city. Our country is awful for the average person, it really really is.

Oh yeah forgot to mention the combined $90,000 in debt we have in student loans(so we can get these jobs) and car payments(so we can drive and exist in society).

It's just such a stupid way to organize a society...

To drive this point back to the conversation at hand--these American pressures are what drive the mindset that dominates most of any English speaking dev forum.

[dcolkitt]

> In a welfare state I don't have that priority

I just don't believe that's true. Many, many more Germans immigrate to Switzerland, the UK or even America than vice versa. That's primarily because professional salaries in the latter are higher. That strongly suggests that at least some non-negligible proportion of German professionals care about compensation.

[alkonaut]

Obviously there are tons of people who want to do this. But the difference I think is that fewer people feel the need or expectation to aggregate wealth over their career.

Another angle I didn’t think of is the work-hard-retire-early mindset which of course means that a) you work hard and expect high comp for it b) if you do long hours and have little holiday, you have a higher interest in retiring early, which requires lots of capital.

My SWE salary is with 6w holidays, haven’t done many workweeks over 40h yet in a 20 year career. I don’t just expect to work to 70, I want to work to 70. My work life balance means I have more than enough time for gardening and travel without retiring. Retiring at 70 requires a lot less capital than doing so at 55.

[dcolkitt]

> But the difference I think is that fewer people feel the need or expectation to aggregate wealth over their career.

German savings rates are 50% higher than America.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_gross_nat...

[alkonaut]

Germans are probably more successful at saving! I do think though that if you asked “is it important to have a well paying job” or “important to retire rich” I think more would agree in the US (although few would succeed). I don’t have any numbers for this hypothetical interview question though.

[imtringued]

Weak euro -> trade surplus -> Germany earns more than it spends -> savings -> lends money to importing nations

and the cycle repeats