[roguecoder]

Is all you care about in a job the money? And are you looking at your total comp, or your hourly rate?

In my experiences, the places that pay the most _have_ to pay that much because the job sucks. By the time you divide their salary by hours actually worked, people at FAANG end up making significantly less than I do. I value all my time, not just my bank account.

What does my reputation buy me? In the worst job market in the last 20 years, I had two offers in hands within three weeks. I can bring top performers willing to work for regular salaries into wherever I land. All of that is because a lot of people who worked with me in the past would like to work with me again, and the companies we build software for benefit.

I've built my career on jobs with _actual_ advancement, not just a bigger number. And it has been plenty lucrative.

Startups don't succeed because the code is good, but they sure can fail because it is bad. When a company needs to save itself after the underqualified mercantile engineers have left a spaghetti mess of lambdas scattered all over the org or a spaghetti mess of a monolith with every model in one folder, they are very happy to pay for actual expertise.

[whoknowsidont]

I care about my well-being and being able to float for extended periods of time if necessary. I can go many, many years without a job at this point and suffer absolutely zero quality of life issues.

>the places that pay the most _have_ to pay that much because the job sucks.

I mean don't overwork for an employer who doesn't care about you (none of them do)? Just go switch jobs.

>I've built my career on jobs with _actual_ advancement

This just reads like a no true scotsman fallacy. What does "actual" advancement mean here? Again, I have plenty of security (not job security) right now.

>I can bring top performers willing to work for regular salaries into wherever I land.

So you're fine with exploiting people? What? Just because someone is willing to be a fool doesn't mean you should stand by and let them be one.

And also, I question the "top performers" part of this, given your other qualifiers throughout the post. Especially the comment about big tech. The numbers don't add up in your favor.

[scarface_74]

> In my experiences, the places that pay the most _have_ to pay that much because the job sucks. By the time you divide their salary by hours actually worked, people at FAANG end up making significantly less than I do. I value all my time, not just my bank account.

This is the type of copium that you usually hear from people who have never worked in BigTech…

BigTech could afford to pay me 50% more as a mid level employee than working a lot harder at a 60 person startup and that company was paying about average for a local enterprise dev in a major metropolitan area.

I’m no longer there. But I had to get a job as a “staff” level employee to even get in the range when I left of my job as a mid level employee at BigTech. Comparing the leveling guidelines, it’s about the same as a “senior” at the equivalent job at BigTech.