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by davidschof 5 days ago
Their senior solution architect vacancy has similar pay: https://www.english-heritage.org.uk/about/our-people/careers...

Somewhat less eminent job title though.

4 comments

I would love to have "Stonehenge architect" as a job title.
Monolithic codebase though
I'm counting the liths and I'm getting a lot more than mono
That's because I think it's more accurate to call it a megalithic codebase. :)
Don't threaten me with good times.
It's still modular.
And probably a prototype deployed to production!!!
They really miss out on opportunities here.
> We offer flexible working arrangements where the role allows. This role can be based at our offices in Swindon, or worked on a hybrid pattern. You will be required to attend our Swindon offices 1 day per week.

Pretty decent flexibility though.

Yes but you can have a pint down at the pub on a warm summer evening with your colleagues after work. Almost makes up for it.
that is abysmal!
As a Finnish dev with 12 years of experience, I can only aspire for such salary.
Are you serious? Sarcasm Don't translate well on internet.
He's serious. American programming salaries are an extreme outlier. You guys are in for a massive shock if they ever normalise.
American eng comp is commensurate with the money American tech brings in, you could even argue underpaid
Most of the “money American tech brings in” comes from the magnificent seven. US software engineering salaries are high even outside of those. In fact, it's high even in companies that are merely burning investor's money.
Comparing US and European salaries is the closest thing to comparing apples to oranges.
What fruit are UK salaries here?
Or in the next few years as AI devours the profession.
Why would they "normalize"? Do you think Microsoft, Amazon, Apple, Amazon, etc. are going to relocate to the EU or something? Are all the venture capitalists going to flock to Spain?

The mechanics driving compensation arent "normal." American pay is driven by the underlying mechanics. The USA didn't just randomly win at tech.

There are real factors that could reduce US compensation, but calling that "normalization" assumes the current gap exists for no reason. It exists because the US software industry is structurally different from most of Europe.

> Why would they "normalize"?

Globalization? Look at manufacturing, it moved to a country where things are a lot more affordable. In a world where remote collaboration gets easier and easier and you're able to pay software engineers half the world away a lot less there's no way it wouldn't have an effect on the domestic market.

If demand for software developers decreases due to AI, salaries are likely to decrease as well. Take the academic world for comparison, where supply of very smart people vastly exceeds the demand.
This is what it looks like right now. Unless there's some huge economic boom coming, which I doubt.
That's a fairly standard wage outside London for senior developers.

UK wages are not great.

i wouldn't call that standard wage, rather the lowest end of the spectrum where you could theoretically shop a "senior" outside of london.
Median senior dev salary is £70k according to recent job postings: https://www.itjobswatch.co.uk/jobs/uk/senior%20developer.do
And that includes London, it lists "excluding London" as £65k.

People overestimate how much senior devs in the UK earn, even after knowing they're not well paid, my usual response to hearing we should be earning £90k+ is, "well give us a job then"!

A friend is making about £180k / yr in London, and they bought a house recently in London. I think that's a lot, and his wife also makes a similar amount, slightly more. That seems to be the minimum, otherwise you're a renter for life. Pretty nuts.
The balancing force to this though, is that cost of living outside of London is massively lower
36 hour work week, flexible hours, 25 paid holidays and a 10% pension though...
Maybe you missed the “25% discount in our shops and cafes” perk for the day you need to be in the office. Score.
american salaries must be ridiculous if £70k (~$93.5k) is considered "abysmal(ly)" low!

as others have said, some may be in for a very rude awakening...

$93.5K isn't abysmally low in the USA. Average is about 66k

$93.5k is abysmally low for a Senior Solutions Architect in the USA. I would expect at least $175k if not $200k+ on average. Plus stock and bonuses.

This is a job for a charity - you're never getting stock + bonuses + competitive pay in a third sector job. UK pay is not near US but this is probably still median SWE pay outside tech roles and London + FAANG + others will pay closer with what you're suggesting with the mentioned bonuses/stock.
You are explaining why the pay is what it is.

I am comparing average pay in UK/US for a senior solutions architect position.

I dont understand what your comment has to do with my comparison of pay. Mind you, the comment I replied to speculated about this comparison. Hence why I provided more specifics.

Stock... in Stonehenge?

I think comparing a job like this purely on salary terms misses a lot. It's a prestige job that will be the highlight of someone's CV for the rest of their career. Not to mention 25-28 days vacation.

As someone that's lived both in the US and outside of it there's no denying US salaries are top of the game. But there are a lot of other factors that go into a person's life than salary alone. Long hours in US jobs are not rare at all. I expect folks at Stonehenge are out the door at 5pm sharp.

> I think comparing a job like this purely on salary terms misses a lot.

OK maybe. But that's how the salary compares.

Please re-read the comment I replied to. He speculated about salary differences and I gave solid numbers. You are arguing against some unspoken claim that I never made (something like "more money is always better").

> I expect folks at Stonehenge are out the door at 5pm sharp.

I don't expect that's true for the Head of Stonehenge. You're right about the prestige of that position though.

Yes, American salaries are ridiculous in a global context. The rest of the world should demand better.
For that level of experience you can prob get 200k in a MCOL area in the US, or up to 500k+ in HCOL

The rest of the world has already been in a rude awakening, talented engineers should be compensated well no matter where they happen to live

Good luck only working 36 hours a week at that kind of job, though.
theres plenty of cruising 200k jobs in the us

not so much 0.5-1M jobs unless you got lucky with sbc or are really talented

And this is for a 36 hour work week.
Wait till you see UK wages, when it's the UK arm of a US firm....
wait till you hear about the stock grants and vesting schedule
Be warned though, the equity you are granted will be exceedingly illiquid.
And you'll have to pay taxes on it despite it being unsellable.

Screw those things up, and those taxes will bankrupt you because they can exceed all your other earnings.