[Jenk]

I (London residing) find that quite hard to believe.

Unless you mean TC which includes share-options "valued at" £200K+ (but likely will barely get £50k when vested after 5 years of active tenure.)

A good salary for principal engineers in London is upto £120k, but can be from half that. There are exceptional cases of higher. Highest I have personal confirmation of is £150k (a friend.)

Across all of engineering, the mean average salary at Google is £66k according to glassdoor, and that's known to be embellished.

[throwaway81348]

>share-options "valued at" £200K+ (but likely will barely get £50k when vested after 5 years of active tenure.)

This is a dangerous misconception to have. You may not want to work at FAANG which is fine. Otherwise don't shoot yourself in the foot by misunderstanding pay structure.

Public companies such as FB pay in liquid stock, that vests over some period of time. These are not options. You get 200K every year, immediately sellable. Or keep them and grow. Which given the performance over last two years would actually give you close to 400, not 50.

[Jenk]

I appreciate the clarification. It's not an indication of my desire to work at a FAANG or not. My own experience is from publically trading companies, whom offered options with (typically) 3-5 year vesting periods.

However..

> Public companies such as FB pay in liquid stock, that *vests over some period of time*.

And

> immediately sellable

Are a contradiction, no?

[throwaway81348]

the difference is that this is public stock and so you can sell as soon as it vests. Different from private options/RSU that can only be sold on secondary market, which is not as easy.