Salary-Comparing Survey Identifies Top-Paid Developers, Discovers North America Pays Better (linux.com)

21,000 developers were surveyed for this year's annual survey by VisionMobile -- and for the first time, they were asked about their salaries. An anonymous reader quotes Linux.com: [S]killed cloud and backend developers, as well as those who work in emerging technologies including Internet of Things, machine learning and augmented/virtual reality can make more money than frontend web and mobile developers whose skills have become more commoditized... The top 10 percent of salary earners in AR who live in North America earn a median salary of $219,000, compared with $169,000 for the top earning 10 percent of backend developers, according to the report... New, unskilled developers interested in emerging tech will have a harder time finding work, and earn less than their counterparts in more commoditized areas, due both to their lack of experience and fewer companies hiring in the early market.

Along with skill level and software sector, developer salaries also vary widely by where they live in the world. A web developer in North America earns a median income of $73,600 USD per year, compared with the same developer in Western Europe whose median income is $35,400 USD. Web developers in South Asia earn $11,700 in South Asia while those in Eastern Europe earn $20,800 per year.
For developers who want to move up in the world, VisionMobile suggests "Invest in your skills. Do difficult work. Improve your English. Look for opportunities internationally. Go for it. You deserve it!"

Comments

Pirates

[xxxJonBoyxxx]

>> salary earners in AR

Clearly, they're nothing but a bunch of thieving pirates.

Re: Pirates

[dyeazel]

"AR"...that's what a pirate says. Get it? It's a joke!! Have another cup of coffee (or you've already had a few too many).

Re: Pirates

[Anonymous Coward]

Get it? It's a joke!!

I get it. I ain't laughing, but I get it. Which was the entire fucking point of my post, that I did get it, and that it was not funny.

Re: Pirates

[Anonymous Coward]

Okay, never mind, I get it now. ARGH because he's a pirate. Hahah, okay now that's funny. Please excuse my posts, for I am the pink-skirted shitstain, I apologize and will now sail into the west.

Re: Pirates

[Anonymous Coward]

Wait, I take that back. I thought I got it, but I'm a fucking moron. This pirate joke stuff confuses and upsets me.

Re: Pirates

[Anonymous Coward]

Not troll! Pun!

Direct Link to Survey

[xxxJonBoyxxx]

Here are some direct links to avoid the form:

http://go.linuxfoundation.org/l/6342/e-of-developer-nation-2017-pdf/3qp35l
(also, the form is cool with mailinator addresses if that stops working)

https://ufile.io/26f4a

Also, here's the extracted text of the Key Insights:

• Developers who work in areas with a higher technical complexity or in very young sectors - and therefore with higher barriers to entry and ultimately fewer developers doing it - generally earn more. In Western Europe, for example, the median backend developer earns 12% more than the median web developer; a machine learning developer makes 28% more. Web and mobile development are the most commoditised.
• We’re still a long way off a global market for developers. The median earnings of web developers in Western Europe are half of those of their North American counterparts; web developers in other regions earn half again. This opens up arbitrage opportunities for developers willing to work remotely.
• C# is the most popular primary programming language amongst Augmented and Virtual Reality developers, preferred by 30% of them. This is followed by C/C++ (16%) and Java (15%). Interestingly, professionals are more likely to use C# or C++ in comparison to hobbyists.
• Almost 90% of AR/VR developers would be considered juniors by other industries’ standards, having less than 2 years experience. The industry consists of many newcomers who are inexperienced in the field - they will not be deeply invested in any tools, technologies or platforms, so any vendor has the potential to establish market leadership with the right product.
• 48% of web developers are currently using a third-party library or framework other than jQuery as their primary way of doing front-end web development. Angular and React account for 30%, leaving all the others fighting for the remaining 18%. Indeed front-end web development is such a fragmented space that no other single library or framework accounts for more than 2% of primary usage.
• Facebook’s React appears to dominate Google’s Angular in online discussion and open source activity. However, not only is Angular 2.x the primary framework for about as many developers as React (10% vs 9% globally), but Angular 1.x is still the most popular overall by a slim margin (11% use it as their primary framework). In total those using one or the other version of Angular number more than double those using React.
• Amazon Web Services (AWS) is the most popular primary cloud hosting at every company size. For the smallest companies (1-5 employees) where Amazon has just a 15% share, they face very credible competition from Microsoft (12%), Google (11%), and Digital Ocean (10%). However, when we look at larger companies, Amazon’s share grows to 26-27% at every size, Microsoft stays in the 11-13% range, while Google fades along with Digital Ocean. Google has just a 5% share of companies with more than 5,000 employees, and Digital Ocean just 4% at the same size.
• AWS is also the most popular primary cloud host with developers regardless of targeted audience, although strongest with backend developers who target large enterprises, of whom 29% are primarily using AWS. Microsoft shows greater strength equally with developers who target large enterprises, and those who target small to medium businesses (14% each). They are weaker with those targeting consumers (11%) or professionals (9%). Google shows the opposite patternbeing strongest with developers who target consumers(10%) but only half as popular with those who target large enterprises or internal employees.
• Despite the proliferation of IoT platforms and other tools, the IoT tool market is still underdeveloped and heavily fragmented. IoT developers use comparatively fewer tools than their colleagues in other software sectors. 11% of IoT developers don’t use any of the tools in our list.
&#

Re:Direct Link to Survey

[Anonymous Coward]

Is this another case where the Europeans are reporting their after tax income and the Americans are reporting their pretax income?

The different tax structures make comparisons between countries difficult. If you are paid more, but have to pay more taxes directly vs. being paid less directly, but taxes are paid on your behalf.

Re:Direct Link to Survey

[Z00L00K]

Add to it the additional costs that US workers have to take in the form of high property taxes, health care insurances and a lot of other stuff then the amount left isn't much different.

Re: Direct Link to Survey

[__aaclcg7560]

Oh, look, a karma whoring motherfucker! Get the fuck out of your parents' basement, you bottom dwelling, shit-encrusted, pink-skirted fuckstick. Absolutely nobody here likes you, and we're not afraid to admit our disdain for your sorry ass. Please forget your password and never disgrace this site with your pathetic presence again.

This AC from 1999 woke up and discovered that we still don't have flying cars. I'm disappointed too, but I don't take it out on other people.

Re: Direct Link to Survey

[Anonymous Coward]

Would someone show us with math?

Re:Direct Link to Survey

[matbury6017]

Agreed. Whenever I've seen comparisons of income across different countries, e.g. in the Economist, they've almost always included one or more calculations of costs of living, standard of living, quality of life, and/or expendable income, and the calculations are usually done on a city to city rather than country to country basis. The USA prides itself on low to zero income taxes which inevitably means that Americans usually have to pay more for services because they pay for them as individuals: Governments benefit economies of scale when they provide services through taxation. It's a bit like Groupon but on a massive scale ;)

Re: Direct Link to Survey

[Aighearach]

We don't even have flying skateboards yet! HellOOoooooo, McFly!!!!

Re:Direct Link to Survey

[jedidiah]

> Add to it the additional costs that US workers have to take in the form of high property taxes, health care insurances

You mean the property taxes on a 5000 sqft McMansion? Yeah, those suck but they're are entirely optional.

This has to be the world's best kept secret. American liberals really want you to believe it's hell here and Eurotrash are quite wiling to jump on the dogpile.

The simple truth is that we make more, we keep more, we get taxed less, and our money goes farther. Even with the ugliness of Obamacare premium hikes I am still WAY ahead of my European counterparts.

I make enough that I can go and see how the other half lives for myself. The other half is pretty much stuck camping.

Full stack

[Anonymous Coward]

There is no difference between "front end" and "back end" anymore. The same person does both of them, and, alas, the salary doesn't change.

Re:Full stack

[ShanghaiBill]

There is no difference between "front end" and "back end" anymore. The same person does both of them, and, alas, the salary doesn't change.

Indeed. Every place I have worked, the same people do both. You need to have a fast edit-test-debug cycle without waiting for someone else to fix the server side.

Also, whenever I have filled out a salary survey, I bump my salary up by 30%. If everyone does that, I can show the high result to boss when I ask for a raise to a "competitive" salary.

Re:Full stack

[TFlan91]

"You need to have a fast edit-test-debug cycle without waiting for someone else to fix the server side."

Fast? Try yesterday fast. And that someone else? Nope, that's you too.

Re:Full stack

[tommeke100]

In web development you would indeed be pretty useless if you knew one without the other, especially in smaller projects, unless you're a top notch designer.
In larger applications serving more users or more data, or where your client interface is not a webpage, it makes sense having people more specialized in certain areas. You may want to mitigate access by different types of users ( warehousing, analytics, real-time, transactions) to a huge relational database. You may need to design and maintain noSQL Cassandra clusters. Your customer uses your services through RPC procedures where you need to have a high-availability pipeline to consume their data and present the end-result back to them. All these use cases require zero lines of HTML, but a rather specialized skill-set. And that's where the money is.
Not a bad idea on the salary bump though :-) Let's all do that this year so next evaluation we can go "Well Mr Boss Man, seems industry standards for my job are +30%, but I'll take +20%" ;-)

Re:Full stack

[Anonymous Coward]

What kind of products do you work with exactly?

What you say certainly rings true of "back end" web development - i.e. ASP.NET MVC developers for example that are also expected to know JavaScript, CSS, and HTML.

But web development isn't everything - there are still entire swathes of systems doing everything from data mining to batch processing, and systems monitoring to decision making whereby you'd never expect the developers to have any front end knowledge - they create black boxes with well defined interfaces that web developers may use somewhere down the chain, but would rarely be expected to do it all themselves. I would never for one second even consider putting any kind of front end knowledge as a requirement for a role for an expert in data mining for example, as it would be suicidal, you'd effectively be writing off the best people in the industry for the sake of a skill that they just don't need.

This survey matches my experience in the industry - that stuff like web development is pretty low paid, and low skilled, this is why you find plenty of developers that don't see a problem with things like JavaScript and PHP - they're certainly not experienced or skilled enough to understand why such languages are shit and they have salaries to match that relatively low skill level, doing very commoditised work. These are the people that typically complain about H1Bs, and suggest developer salaries are bad and all that kind of thing.

At the high end you have specialists in advanced topics - those in the summary such as cloud infrastructure developers, but also experts in fields such as data mining, compiler design, and so on and so forth. These people are well paid and deservedly so because they'll have put in consistent and repeated effort through their lives to skill up sufficiently in much more difficult topics. Such people will rarely complain about things like H1B because they've bothered to keep growing their skillset to be hireable regardless because there is such a shortage of those skills.

The reality is this also plays into the ageism debate here - no one wants to pay a web developer $150k just because they've been a programmer for 40 years - if you've been in the game that long you need to be in the second category above and have little excuse not to be. Those people will complain the industry is ageist, hate companies like Google for hiring younger people, oblivious to the fact that those younger people have done hard degrees, in hard topics, that allow them to engage in the second category of skills above, rather than the first category.

The division of skills talked about in this article is actually of profound relevance to the industry - it basically explains the division of views amongst developers here on Slashdot and across the internet, it highlights the difference between the haves and have nots. Any developer with any sense should make sure they're in the second category, because otherwise you'll end up dedicating your life to whining on Slashdot about poor pay, H1B, ageism and whatever else - complaints that are alien to any developer that's bothered to ensure they sit comfortably in the second category, that of highly skilled developers.

Re:Full stack

[Anonymous Coward]

Our company provides 'ananymous' listing of positions and salaries to a central company. In return, they get industry averages back direct from employers. They do not rely on 'surveys' to obtain salary data.

Re:Full stack

[vtcodger]

"a fast edit-test-debug cycle"

There is testing and debugging in the cycle? who knew? I thought the industry standard was "worked once-ship it -- we'll fix it in production"

Re:Full stack

[Anonymous Coward]

Usually backend is expected to be familiar with both while "frontend" can have a wider range of expectations (and salaries). On the easier end, the frontend developer may essentially be a web designer minus design and knowing more about very frontend specific things. On the other hand, I've seen "frontend" position job requirements that read like fullstack, needing to know both frontend and backend.

Re:Full stack

[Gr8Apes]

You write well, too bad you're an AC. I agree with much of what you say, however, your stance on ageism is slightly incorrect. I know several older devs that would be happy to land any job, web dev or otherwise, at $80K / year, or even $60K in some cases, just to have a job and health insurance....

Ah, now we're at the crux of why ageism happens. It isn't what they're paid, it's what they cost. Hire a couple of 40+ folks, and watch a company's health insurance double or triple. So for any job that you can get a college grad (under 30) person for, they'll always win over anyone over 35. Always.

As long as the under 30 doesn't totally flub the interview.

Always. Scratch flubbing the interview, they just have to be breathing.

Kind of explains H1-Bs in a new light, doesn't it? They're almost all under 30. Now if H1-Bs were restricted to 40+ except for 200K plus positions.....

Seems like single payer sensible health care would solve a lot more problems than merely covering everyone with basic healthcare.

Re:Full stack

[lgw]

Indeed. Every place I have worked, the same people do both

I've never worked at a company where the same people do both, which makes me wonder if we mean the same thing by "front end". I'm on a team responsible for a web service. We keep the service up, we own its API. A different team is responsible for the GUI and anything JS (but many of our customers just use the web service API directly from code). New features go live on the API for at least a little while before they appear in the GUI, if only a few days.

Maybe it's a size-of-team thing?

I will say the supply of front-end devs who can actually code is quite low - no surprise they make more. But there's a vast glut of "web devs" who write storefronts using some sort of framework for that, and have no clue what real coding is, so I'd bet it's hard to get noticed among all that noise.

This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[Anonymous Coward]

North America pays better, twice to three to seven times better.

H1B, outsourcing to Europe or Asia is always undercutting and threatening. There is just so much pressure on the American software developer to always keep improving and running ahead of the endless hordes of lower cost options snipping at the heels. So much so that a lot of them look at Trump to close the doors and make the race easier.

The H1B lottery is a real lottery, especially for a developer in India. It is an immediate seven fold salary increase.

Re:This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[Anonymous Coward]

Except closing the doors won't make it easier. Sooner or later India will become the next Japan. Then nobody will buy our products because all the software is too expensive and poof. So take a lower salary now, or watch your jobs dissapear.

Re:This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[cheesybagel]

North America pays better than in Europe. But you should check the salaries for top notch software programmers in Beijing, China. Prepare to be amazed...

Not that I would want to live there though, considering all the air pollution not to say other factors.

Re:This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[Anonymous Coward]

They've got a long way to go before they are Japan. Because as far as I know every city in Japan has a flush toilet.

Re: This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[fubarrr]

Senior engineer in embedded dev - CNY 21000 net + minimal allowances. Not bad.

But before you jump to conclusions, consider this - Positions in the south are available to recent grads who can get close to CNY 10000, and 10000 after just few years. It means China does indeed have a talent crunch, and they don't make any much close to enough of good tech specialists.

This is the reason Shenzhen was already squirming with eastern Europeans and Indians 10 years ago.

Re: This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[fubarrr]

*15000 after few years

Re: This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[Anonymous Coward]

> CNY 21000 net

Oh wow. A whole $3000 a year -- and change! This is the salary US workers (non executive) need to become competitive with.

Re: This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[fubarrr]

this is the salary per month, man

Re:This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[someone1234]

I believe, in Japan, there are more than a flush toilet per city.

Re: This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[Anonymous Coward]

It's actually monthly, so more like $36000. If they're in say Alibaba/Tencent/Baidu, the bonus (cash + stock) is typically a significant part of the salary (base:bonus is almost like 1:1 from what I've heard), so they're looking at maybe $70000 when they reach senior. Still less than half the money for the same talent you can buy in San Francisco, where even the most inane Ruby kids can get 70k+ total comp at entry level.

Re:This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[Opportunist]

So I was told, but after being soaked from head to toe by Japanese toilets, I was too pissed to find out whether one of the other buttons would flush it. I was afraid it would probably suck me down and swallow me instead.

Re: This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[Opportunist]

And that's 36000 with housing that cost a tiny fraction of what it costs around here, plus your personal slave if you're so inclined for maybe a buck or two a day.

Remember, it's not what you earn, what matters is how much is left over after you're done living. It means jack to earn 10k a month if you pay 9k for rent.

Re: This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[110010001000]

As long as you don't travel so you aren't exposed to higher prices elsewhere, and don't mind being surrounded by slaves who grovel for one or two dollars a day. Sounds horrible to me.

Re:This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[Fire_Wraith]

Japanese toilets are awesomely hi-tech. I see you unfortunately happened upon the bidet button, but there's other really nice functions, like the seat warmer (so you don't have to sit on a freezing cold toilet in winter).

Re:This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[Anonymous Coward]

There is a BIG difference between India and Japan. In Japan, the government and the people work together. If it helps a part of their citizenry, Japan's government will do it.

India... different story. Their government does little or nothing for the citizen there. The best hopes for people there, to have a decent life for them and their families, are moving to other places. For example, Texas is known as "Little India" in some circles, because the Indian population there is the most of any US state, except perhaps for California.

Re:This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[Anonymous Coward]

Devil's advocate:

North America pays better than Europe, but you get more services in Europe, especially as a citizen:

1: Unemployment actually means something. Here in the US, expect $800 every two weeks tops.
2: You don't have to worry about crime in big cities in Europe, and at worst, it is a pickpocket.
3: If you get sick or injured, your life's earnings are not in jeopardy. The US healthcare system is the most expensive and shoddily run of any country on the planet, bar none. In fact, if you don't have health insurance, there is a good chance that medics will just let you code.
4: The US has no transportation system to speak of compared to Europe. So, you have to pay for a car and high rates.
5: There is no education system unless you pay for a private school. In Europe, there is a strong public school system. Yes, US public education is so crummy that there is no way someone from it can compete against foreign competition unless they are insanely smart. Which brings the next point.
6: If you stand out, you will wind up smacked down hard. Talk out loud in class, it can mean prison until age 21 (age 23 in California.) The US is so beholden to the private prison system that the schools to prisons path is so well greased, more students wind up incarcerated than graduating in most districts.
7: Roads are in disrepair, but there are no funds to fix them. Look at the dam in California, or the highways in Atlanta. There is no money to fix them, ever.

If you have EU citizenship, STAY THERE. If you are Indian, find a job in the US, then go to Europe. Europe is not collapsing from within. Brexit may be scary, but it isn't a war, and really won't affect long term trade.

Re: This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[i_ate_god]

all this information is irrelevant.

I don't care what the salary is, I care about what my disposable income is. When rent for shitholes in San Fransisco is $3000/month then $70000/year is just not great.

Re:This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[Anonymous Coward]

Insightful comment, but I'll have to disagree on 6, "If you stand out, you will wind up smacked down hard." America still does have a culture that somewhat admires individuality and speaking up. If you want to see "if you stand out you will wind up smacked down hard" in action, spend some time in Japan or China, where individuality is absolutely eliminated in the school system. The saying is "the nail that sticks up will be hammered down."

(in Japan, oddly, they tolerate and even admire individualism eccentricity... if you get to a high enough level. Don't stand out as a starting engineer, but once your'e a star, you can go weird as you like.)

You're right about the prison system, though. Get on that highway, and there are no exit ramps.

Re:This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[Opportunist]

That's another thing that made me uncomfortable, it's like crapping onto the car seat (which happens to have a seat heating).

Re: This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[Ritz_Just_Ritz]

That's actually a fairly good salary in most parts of China. You won't live like a king, but you could have quite a comfortable middle class-ish life and still be able to save some money each month.

Re:This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[Anonymous Coward]

Except closing the doors won't make it easier. Sooner or later India will become the next Japan. Then nobody will buy our products because all the software is too expensive and poof. So take a lower salary now, or watch your jobs dissapear.

Never happen.

In general, the Japanese are ethical and work hard.

India's population in general has neither of those properties.

The Chinese, on the other hand, work their asses off.

And yes, that matters. Which is why you're posting in English. For now.

Re: This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[NatasRevol]

Is that good due to the cost of living is 1/4 of the US?

Re: This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[fubarrr]

Yes, with usd 4k income, you live better than in a Californiastan with 8k gross.

Just to live in the valley, or anywhere near a commercial centre you have to dish out half of your income.

To live in a Shenzhen suburb, in the newest piece of real estate, 5 minutes from a metro station will cost you usd 1k at maximum, and housing expense can be claimed back in a tax return for foreigners.

Re: This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[Anonymous Coward]

There's also this point that everywhere in China is a shit hole because of worse healthcare facilities, worse neighbors, worse hygiene, and worse pollution, all compared to the $3000/month apartment in San Francisco.

Re: This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[Anonymous Coward]

To an American, a pickpocket is a far worse criminal than a mugger who you can shoot.

Re: This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[Anonymous Coward]

I live off grid in the middle of nowhere, basically retired, and my disposable income is $2-$3K a month. Currently doing a cross country road trip with some friends. I can do this a few times per year.

Re: This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[fubarrr]

That's it. You can't state that more clearly than that +1

I lived in Western Canuckistan (Vancouver) for 5.5 years. I was lucky to land a 6.5k a month job as my first real job at the peak of "web 2.0" and social network mass hysteria.

Before starting a career, I was living for under 1k a month as a student there with no tuition, doin "codin 4 food" and appartment renovations like stuff with Bosnian guys. To my big surprise, a 6.5 fold increase in disposable income did not make me even a twofold improvement of my quality of living. Moving to downtown for job made me to dish out a 2k a month rent for an appartment with living room smaller than a bathroom that I had in Burnaby. 1/3 of my income just went away in tax. Claiming all and every possible expense in tax return only made me to have a month long conversations with CRA who denied me half the sum because I don't have "legal papers A,B, and C" which I simply can't get without paying a lawyer. I had to pay 200 bucks a week for basic groceries if I was shopping in downtown. I was only able to afford a meal in a restaurant once a week. 20 dollars for a light meal in Gastown, and 50 for anything decent. A dinner for two will cost you 120+ at minimum if you order wine.

In such conditions, thinking about a future is out of question.

P.S. for a city with 30% of population being Chinese, Vancouver has shittiest Chinese food possible. The very few normal places were $100 per meal Qilin, Glouchester that went down under new owners, and few "hole in the wall" places in Richmond which all went out of business.

Re:This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[Anonymous Coward]

Did you read all that in the Pyonyang Times?

Re: This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[NatasRevol]

I live in the midwest. So, about the same. A little more pay, a little more living cost. I don't have to learn Mandarin.

Re: This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[Anonymous Coward]

Guys, that's 36k NET, i.e. what you get in your bank account. You're comparing to your Ruby 70k gross which will get taxed a fair bit.

Re:This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[__aaclcg7560]

That's another thing that made me uncomfortable, it's like crapping onto the car seat (which happens to have a seat heating).

Uncomfortable is when your ass hovers above the toilet seat because the malfunctioning heater element is searing hot and your balls touch the icy cold water in the toilet bowl.

Re:This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[Anonymous Coward]

#1 Here in the US, expect $800 every two weeks tops

Whaaaat?
    What city is this happening, and is there no 'proof of searching for work' requirement?

#6 If you stand out, you will wind up smacked down hard. Talk out loud in class, it can mean prison
    Dude... I am sorry if you've experienced any of this or seen it.. but that is VERY incidental not 'how it is in the US'. C'mon dude that's conspiracy website stories there...

Re: This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[Anonymous Coward]

so true

Re:This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[PPH]

because all the software is too expensive and poof.

Software is a strange business. Unlike manufacturing, where workers' salaries and benefits go to the finished products costs, writing software is a fixed cost. Once you go into production, that cost is spread over the units sold. In fact, pay more for better design talent up front and you can reduce your per unit support costs. And in the software business, with a near zero marginal production cost, support is really the only factor remaining to be considered. This is why the smart companies* will pay a premium for this sort of talent. In fact, a lot of engineering follows this pattern.

*Stupid companies, a few of which I've worked for, tend to load up engineering and management on the moron offspring of company execs. Because it's all just overhead anyway. See The Dilbert Principle.

Re:This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[jon3k]

The US healthcare system is the most expensive and shoddily run of any country on the planet, bar none

Incorrect. The US has the best healthcare on the planet. It's just also the most expensive. There's a reason people travel from all over the world to the US if they have cash.

Re:This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[Gr8Apes]

Japanese toilets are awesomely hi-tech. I see you unfortunately happened upon the bidet button, but there's other really nice functions, like the seat warmer (so you don't have to sit on a freezing cold toilet in winter).

Apparently I live in a first world country, where the bathroom isn't freezing cold in the winter, so no heater is needed.

Re:This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[EvilAlphonso]

North America pays better, twice to three to seven times better.

Yeah I could increase my income by moving to the San Francisco office from the European office (doubling it, tops). However, the mortgage on my house is currently ~12% of my pre-tax income (2% fixed rate on 20 years)... there's no way I could find a house for a similar fraction of my salary 1h from the office. Most of my colleagues from the SF office drop 50% of their paycheck on accommodation outside the 1h commute belt. Once I throw in health services, pension, the cost of quality food, the cost of good education if I get kids, PTO... moving to SF is at very best status-quo and most likely a losing proposition.

H1B, outsourcing to Europe or Asia is always undercutting and threatening. There is just so much pressure on the American software developer to always keep improving and running ahead of the endless hordes of lower cost options snipping at the heels.

While I agree that there's top notch talent in the US, my experience over the last 20 years with US companies (automotive, banking, big iron, start-ups) is that there's tons of dead wood as well. People that are stuck in the way of doing things they learnt in college and never updated their skill set. People that will piss crap undocumented code that isn't maintainable by anyone else or do the worst possible architecture choices, in order to protect their god-given-right to a decent salary.

I'm currently working for a 10+ years old "start-up" that keeps stumbling on the most basic things, there's close to no documentation, there's close to no process and the entire thing relies of heroics to stay up and running. I'm currently fixing issues in our core business application because the dev teams in the US can't even be arsed to look at P1 issues that have been reported 22 months ago. As the program management team is made up of non-technical people, they don't even spot bullshit when the dev team announces 2 weeks of solid work for a whole team to add an item in a drop-down list (Spring/MVC app). So far in a week, while handling my regular work and auditors, I have fixed 3 of those P1 bugs, refactored the code to get rid of anti-patterns and make it easier to maintain in the future.

Re: This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[Anonymous Coward]

Odds are slim you'll encounter one unless you're hanging out at major tourist attractions all the time. They did get pretty bad in Barcelona and Paris, but I believe both cities have been putting more effort into trying to reduce that sort of crime over the past couple of years. Keep valuables in front or inner pockets, avoid sardine crowd situations, and you can buy pickpocket resistant backpacks and other items if you really want to be safe. Same applies if you live in NY. It's not as known for pickpockets, but is known more for more aggressive and dangerous crime than large European cities though it's not that dangerous overall, but it still happens.

Re:This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[Anonymous Coward]

near zero marginal production cost

hahahah-, oh wow you're serious, let me laugh some more.

Re: This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[Aighearach]

If you can't even normalize your units to the context, why would I assume that there is some sort of analysis or quality control? Maybe you just grabbed them out of the air? Why would I bother checking?

Re: This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[Anonymous Coward]

And that's 36000 with housing that cost a tiny fraction of what it costs around here, plus your personal slave if you're so inclined for maybe a buck or two a day.

Remember, it's not what you earn, what matters is how much is left over after you're done living. It means jack to earn 10k a month if you pay 9k for rent.

How about 10K/month and less than 2K mortgage with less than 20 minutes of commute time?

Re: This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[fubarrr]

In all normal countries, people count income as net per month. If you earn more that a burger flipper wage, you must know math.

Few reasons for Americans to calculate income on per month net basis:

1. In most normal countries, interest is compounded monthly.
2. In most normal countries, you can (and should) file tax returns monthly
3. Rent is monthly
4. Utility bills are monthly
5. All Americans with $5.3k and higher per month net income give away about 6% of their income as a negative interest loan without realising that.
6. USA will be a 34th province of Chicomia in 10 years time if things continue as they are

Re:This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[jedidiah]

Most of this is bullshit. The one about US public education is just plain funny.

Even with all things considered, the US still comes out ahead. What Europe has is a basic nanny state. You aren't left with any choices. All of your money is taken from you and spent on your behalf. You have no option to do things differently.

In the US you can squander every cent you have, be prepared for a rainy day, build wealth, or retire early. This is especially true for the whole "dual professional income" setup that's a must just to scrap by in some places in Europe.

As far as roads go... there's money it just gets squandered on other things. Plus American liberals aren't committed enough to social welfare to tax themselves appropriately.

Re:This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[EvilAlphonso]

The US healthcare system is #11 out of 11 on outcomes (https://www.forbes.com/sites/danmunro/2014/06/16/u-s-healthcare-ranked-dead-last-compared-to-10-other-countries/) and #37 out of 191 on efficiency (http://www.who.int/healthinfo/paper30.pdf)... hardly the best, hardly the worst. It is however definitely #1 in costs.

People with money travel from all over the world if they have cash, because expensive untested treatments are available in the US but not in other places.

Re:This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[PPH]

hahahah-, oh wow you're serious, let me laugh some more.

marginal production cost: the cost to produce one additional item. In the software world, you build an app, test it and load it on the server. The marginal production cost is the cost of one more person clicking on your 'Download' link.

I'm guessing that you don't work anywhere in or around the software business.

Re:This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[locopuyo]

Have you ever left the confines of your parents basement? You perception of the entire world is way off.

Re:This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[jon3k]

The reason the US scores so low is because they factor in cost. No question, it's unbelievably expensive, but if you remove cost from the equation it is one of, if not the, best medical care in the world.

Re:This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[Anonymous Coward]

Uh... almost none of this is accurate? The US is a big place. In SOME big cities in EU crime is high, and in SOME big cities in the US crime is high. Thankfully for most in the US, they DON'T live in big cities. Any proof for that "medics will just let you die" thing? Because it's against the law in every state for that. Not every place in the US "has no transportation system". Even in places around the world that do have public transportation it's still crappy to me versus car travel. Public schools in the US are often very good. Sure, you can cherry pick for your "surveys" by going to the worst inner-city schools and comparing against middle class and upper middle class EU schools which is what every one of those surveys I've seen does. I do agree that the prison system in the US is ridiculous, but you're definitely letting out your hyperbole here. Like most other things you've listed, roads are also different around the country. In most areas of the US I've been to, the roads are quite good, better than most in EU. Some areas have bad roads, just like there are bad roads in EU. This is a lot of supposition and exaggeration on your part which leads me to disbelieve the entire thing.

Re:This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[Outta_the_way_peck!]

but there's other really nice functions, like the seat warmer

I always associate a warm toilet seat with another person's ass having just been there.

Re:This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[godrik]

Well, I am not sure that outsourcing to Europe is actually cheaper because this compares gross salary which means little in practice. I'll take France as an example because I grew up there (moved to the US when I was 25).

In France, your gross salary includes part of the taxes and fees that the employee pays (charges salariales), but it does not contain the taxes and fees that are paid by the employer on the behalf of the employee (charges patronales). These charges patronales can be between 25% and 50% of the gross salary of the employee. And that is before things like company matching contribution to retirement accounts which are also not accounted for in the gross salary.

Re:This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[Anonymous Coward]

I would say that in the past, the US had a tolerance for individualism, but these days, it is limited to what color iPhone you have. Step too far out of line, if one is in K-12, the school resource officer will be pulling out the handcuffs. Step out of line in college, you will get pummeled by the troll-lol-lols. Once in the "real world" if you are in the job market, good luck if you don't fit the mold.

I can personally attest to the last part. I've actually told I wasn't hired because I didn't fit in, due to not having a full mane of facial hair.

Re:This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[Anonymous Coward]

Have you had a kid going through the education system?

You are far better off in Europe for one reason. Say someone gets sick. Europe, they take care of it. In the US, insurance gives you a nice "CLAIM DENIED" letter, and you then have to fight them in and out of court. Oh, you signed that arbitration agreement as part of the policy, now it gets decided in their kangaroo court. Well, you now have six digits of medical bills for a few days in the ER. Time to visit that bankruptcy attorney.

Oh, and if you lose your job... Europe, you don't have to cash your 401k in once your unemployment benefits run out... you just coast on what they give for a bit, find a job. Oh, and you can't be fired for any reason here in the US.

I personally as "MURICA" as it gets, and even I acknowledge that Europe's qualify of life is FAR beyond what the US can offer for the average person. The exception is if you make seven digits or more a year in USD. Then, the US is nice, because you are on the "right" side of the divide.

Re:This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[Anonymous Coward]

more students wind up incarcerated than graduating in most districts

I've never heard a more easily disproved piece of bullshit in my life. Your trolling skills suck. Do you truly believe over 50% of the adolescents who attend school end up in jail?

Re:This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[Anonymous Coward]

North America pays better, twice to three to seven times better.

H1B, outsourcing to Europe or Asia is always undercutting and threatening. There is just so much pressure on the American software developer to always keep improving and running ahead of the endless hordes of lower cost options snipping at the heels. So much so that a lot of them look at Trump to close the doors and make the race easier.

The H1B lottery is a real lottery, especially for a developer in India. It is an immediate seven fold salary increase.

H1b's represent a race to the bottom. The fact is that you get what you pay for and in this case you are cutting costs by putting someone in a position of responsibility and mission critical system managing and expect the same quality you would get from a native speaker, someone with gobs more experience and who has a more easier time with the culture of the workplace. I am not surprised that this industry has tanked as far as being viable for long term employment. It seems when most of this started back in the early 00's the expectation was that people would work for 1/3 the going rate, but that has caused a lot of very qualified people (myself included) to go into other more profitable industries, simply because of the fact that it is not worth my time to get paid $50k per year or even $100k per year when I am managing my own business and making that much money in a week. The joke is on these employers and Trump is doing a good thing by shutting down the H1b program, simply because it is a race to the bottom, Low cost, low quality and nonexistent security. Sounds like a prescription for disaster doesn't it? How is it that no one has seen this? This is because we have beancounters thinking that because they make more money that they somehow gain the expertise to make technical decisions without the experience or education to back that up. Disasters happen when people start making technical decisions from the accounting department. Look at the organizational problems that lead to the Challenger space shuttle accident. They seriously expected reasonable safety on the shuttles if they were launching every other month? Ridiculous!

Re: This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[Anonymous Coward]

all this information is irrelevant.

I don't care what the salary is, I care about what my disposable income is. When rent for shitholes in San Fransisco is $3000/month then $70000/year is just not great.

I don't understand why some people don't take advantage of this situation by getting a remote working agreement doing the same job in a high cost of living area and then leverage that by living in a lower cost of living area.. I you live in the midwest try landing a job in California or Amsterdam or the UK.. You will instantly be 2X or so richer than the people around you and doing less work probably.

Re: This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[Anonymous Coward]

That's it. You can't state that more clearly than that +1

I lived in Western Canuckistan (Vancouver) for 5.5 years. I was lucky to land a 6.5k a month job as my first real job at the peak of "web 2.0" and social network mass hysteria.

Before starting a career, I was living for under 1k a month as a student there with no tuition, doin "codin 4 food" and appartment renovations like stuff with Bosnian guys. To my big surprise, a 6.5 fold increase in disposable income did not make me even a twofold improvement of my quality of living. Moving to downtown for job made me to dish out a 2k a month rent for an appartment with living room smaller than a bathroom that I had in Burnaby. 1/3 of my income just went away in tax. Claiming all and every possible expense in tax return only made me to have a month long conversations with CRA who denied me half the sum because I don't have "legal papers A,B, and C" which I simply can't get without paying a lawyer. I had to pay 200 bucks a week for basic groceries if I was shopping in downtown. I was only able to afford a meal in a restaurant once a week. 20 dollars for a light meal in Gastown, and 50 for anything decent. A dinner for two will cost you 120+ at minimum if you order wine.

In such conditions, thinking about a future is out of question.

P.S. for a city with 30% of population being Chinese, Vancouver has shittiest Chinese food possible. The very few normal places were $100 per meal Qilin, Glouchester that went down under new owners, and few "hole in the wall" places in Richmond which all went out of business.

the joke is on Americans, what they serve as "Chinese food" in the US is not what they eat in China. People in the US get all obese eating Chinese food and then turn around and think that they eat like all those skinny Chinese people so what is wrong?????? truth is American Chinese food is worse for you than eating McDonalds every day.. Joke is on the stupid Americans.

Re:This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[EvilAlphonso]

Look at the first link... I'll concede that the US overall ranks 11th with cost factored in. However:

It ranks 5th on "quality care", 3rd on "effective care", 7th on "safe care", 6th on "coordinated care", 4th on "patient centered care", 11th on "healthy lives"... none of those factor in cost.

Re:This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh my god I laughed so hard at your post, thanks for the pick-me-up.

Reality advocate:

1. We don't need as much unemployment because we take home more money, a _lot_ more. Those who need more money have access to other social services, generally speaking it's not a problem because we have a better job market with almost half the unemployment rate.

2. Murder rates are 0.9% different between Europe and the US - only pick pockets in Paris?!? lol.

3. Only rare illnesses/hospitalizations can jeopardize your life's earnings *if* you don't have insurance, and if everyone who could afford it bought insurance we wouldn't have the highest rates in the world.

4. I did not realize transportation in Europe was free! We have a transportation system, and it covers 2.5x the amount of roads in Europe. Live in a big city? public options exist. Live in a small city? ride a bike like a lot of people choose to do. The average cost of vehicle ownership is 22k vs 24k between France and US - Britain comes in at 19k (normalized to pounds) - and we're not forced to take public transportation because we have the extra money to spend on a car.

5. Where do you get your information? Sure we don't rank in the top 10, but the difference in scores represents less than a 5% spread between the top 20 nations, not exactly "impossible to compete".

6. Talking loud doesn't get you arrested, continually disrupting a class will. Europe has similar issues, like the 8yo boy arrested for "glorifying terrorism" in France.

7. Again, we have a lot of roads, and an order of magnitude more dams than Europe, and we spend almost half a trillion on them annually, both the dam and the overpass will be repaired, work on both of them has already begun.

I'm generally pretty welcoming for anyone to come live in the US, but we have enough crazies as it is, so you should probably stay in the EU.

Re:This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[david_thornley]

US health care is good - provided you can afford it, which for most people means having a decent employer-provided insurance plan. Medical bills are a leading cause of bankruptcy in the US. Pre-ACA, if you had a serious medical condition and lost your job you were really screwed. With the ACA, there's at least a better chance of getting the care you need.

Re: This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[Anonymous Coward]

I feel sorry for any of the Europeans who read this, have never been to a North American country, and are lead to believe your Eurocentric bullshit that is untrue and has been taken entirely out of context. Your post isn't fair to the average who knows next to nothing about politics or the different preferences between North American and European lifestyles.

I used to think like this until I was out of college and traveled to Europe to find it was people like you that glorify utopian societies that don't exist and encourage anti-American sentiments.

Oh, and I don't think my wife is looking forward to returning to Iceland anytime soon.

Re:This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[michael_wojcik]

Yeah I could increase my income by moving to the San Francisco office from the European office (doubling it, tops). However, the mortgage on my house is currently ~12% of my pre-tax income (2% fixed rate on 20 years)... there's no way I could find a house for a similar fraction of my salary 1h from the office. Most of my colleagues from the SF office drop 50% of their paycheck on accommodation outside the 1h commute belt. Once I throw in health services, pension, the cost of quality food, the cost of good education if I get kids, PTO... moving to SF is at very best status-quo and most likely a losing proposition.

There are several places in the US which are not San Francisco. In fact San Francisco comprises a minority of places in the US!

My main house is a 2400 sq.ft. historic Queen Anne on 1/3 acre in a small city, surrounded by small family farms, forests,[1] and lakes. Mortgage plus property taxes come to less than $1500 a month. My vacation home is a 1000 sq.ft. cabin in the mountains on 1 1/3 acres, and that mortgage + taxes is less than $800 a month.

Neither are mansions, but we have more rooms than we know what to do with.

My salary ... compares well with those mentioned in the survey, shall we say.

[1] Possibly the occasional witch, but I'm not a big gingerbread fan anyway.

Re: This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[Aighearach]

Nobody is going to care that other units are per month. You have to normalize units before you can compare things. It is just a basic fact of life.

Re: This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[Anonymous Coward]

Your experience is EXACTLY why I left Vancouver and took a job overseas. I loved living in Vancouver - awesome city - but the cost of living is punishing. Now, I earn "less" overseas (Europe) but somehow have considerably more disposable income, 30 days paid vacation, unlimited sick leave, etc., etc., and can easily afford (without saving) to take my family on 1 or two overseas vacations each year.

Do I miss Canada and Vancouver? You bet, but would I move back? Probably not. I can't swing an employment deal there like I've got in Europe... it simply doesn't exist.

So yah... technically lower income in Europe, but way way way better quality of life for me and my family.

Re:This is the real reason H1B scares Americans

[Anonymous Coward]

> more students wind up incarcerated than graduating in most districts.

Present evidence or GTFO, troll

H-1B Workers

[Anonymous Coward]

This survey proves that American workers aren't being harmed by workers with H-1B visas. In fact, American workers are prospering compared to their counterparts overseas. The real reason there's so much objection to the H-1B program is rampant racism among tech workers in the United States. You don't need to read Slashdot comments very long to see evidence of this for yourself. There are a lot of offensive terms for Indians thrown around casually in comments, such as "indo-chimps," and these terms seem to show up even in articles that are mostly unrelated to H-1B visas. There is no evidence that American workers are harmed by H-1B workers, but American tech workers are far too racist to admit this.

Re:H-1B Workers

[ShanghaiBill]

This survey proves that American workers aren't being harmed by workers with H-1B visas.

Nonsense. You cannot "prove" anything with statistics. We don't know what the salary range would have been if H1B visas didn't exist. In that alternative universe American tech salaries may have been higher. Or they may have even been lower if entire teams were shifted abroad. We just don't know, and this survey "proves" nothing.

The real reason there's so much objection to the H-1B program is rampant racism

Self-interest is a more plausible explanation.

Re:H-1B Workers

[Anonymous Coward]

> "indo-chimps,"

Never heard that term, and I've been a programmer for over 33 years.

The reason we object to having go work with incompetent people that are poorly educated is because they create more work for us.

Re: H-1B Workers

[Anonymous Coward]

If at least one American tech worker is out of a job because of an H-1B worker, then it's a problem.

Re:H-1B Workers

[AmiMoJo]

Also, salary is just one factor. Cost of living, especially healthcare, amount of paid holiday, having a "sick day" quota, workers' rights, maternity/paternity rights, employer spying, progressive society...

I get the impression that salaries in the US are high to make up for the lack of other stuff.

Re: H-1B Workers

[Anonymous Coward]

Nice strawman Pajeet. There are job advertisements out there that specifically r request a H1-B to the detriment of native citizens. Don't believe me?

https://www.indeed.com/m/viewjob?jk=2d4f80abc9fbd4ed&from=serp

What a nice job opportunity that could have gone to a recent American graduate. Instead it's going to Ramesh. In summary, fuck off back to India and poo in the loo.

Re: H-1B Workers

[Anonymous Coward]

This is exactly right. I would say a UK web developer would be on around 60,000 to 100,000usd. But Healthcare is free and as long as he is outside London the cost of living in his community will be low. The problem with these kind of surveys is to need to look at the cost to the company as taxes etc are so different in each country. A better comparison would be the hourly rate for a consultant.

Re: H-1B Workers

[Anonymous Coward]

This. It's not racist to want to work with competent people.

Re:H-1B Workers

[Opportunist]

This, a billion times this.

At my level, I could probably make five or more times what I make over here in Europe in the US. Easily. Trouble is, I don't even need the money I make here, so why bother?

But here I get 25 days paid vacation plus sick days on top of that (no, they don't count as vacation days here), perfect healthcare, unemployment benefit should I for some reason get unemployed (not bloody likely unless I want to, but in that case it pays, too), retirement plan, worker's protection (law commands I MUST NOT work more than 50 hours a week and even that only for a very short time, with no more than 45 hours a week on average during the year. Oh, and no more than 10 hours a day).

Try to beat that, US.

Re:H-1B Workers

[dnaumov]

This, a billion times this.

At my level, I could probably make five or more times what I make over here in Europe in the US. Easily. Trouble is, I don't even need the money I make here, so why bother?

But here I get 25 days paid vacation plus sick days on top of that (no, they don't count as vacation days here), perfect healthcare, unemployment benefit should I for some reason get unemployed (not bloody likely unless I want to, but in that case it pays, too), retirement plan, worker's protection (law commands I MUST NOT work more than 50 hours a week and even that only for a very short time, with no more than 45 hours a week on average during the year. Oh, and no more than 10 hours a day).

Try to beat that, US.

You almost had me until the "perfect healthcare" part. Good one!

Re:H-1B Workers

[sg_oneill]

Nonsense. You cannot "prove" anything with statistics. We don't know what the salary range would have been if H1B visas didn't exist. In that alternative universe American tech salaries may have been higher. Or they may have even been lower if entire teams were shifted abroad. We just don't know, and this survey "proves" nothing.

Theres no proofs in science, nor the queen of the humanities, economics. However you can make pretty good inferences, and then look how they couple with the theory. And basically immigration actually creates employment, with iron-wall countries having some of the shittiest economies. Economies need to grow to create employment, and the easiest way to grow them is by generating more mouths to feed. And if those mouths can work in high paid jobs, then their job creation potential increases due to higher consumption.

The high wages compared to europe tell two things. 1) Europes tech industry is in the sink. 2) American tech workers appear to be in high demand. When theres high wages, the bargaining power of american workers improves, pushing the market forces in favor of suppliers (workers).

Its pretty damn obvious that H-1B is not hurting american workers at all.

Self-interest is a more plausible explanation.

Racism is all about percieved self interest (That percieved bit is the operate here). I dont see any reliable evidence that its anything other than xenophobia. The immigration debate seems fueled by nonsense and fear of foreigners more than anything rational.

Re:H-1B Workers

[dunkelfalke]

25 paid vacation days is actually the low end.

Re:H-1B Workers

[Anonymous Coward]

Are there problems with the healthcare the NHS provides? -yes. If we factor the cost of the healthcare is it bloody great? -yes.

I will never forget seeing a program on US healthcare where a person who lost 3 fingers in an induustrial accident was tol the insurance will only cover X amount and he had to choose two of the three to save.

Hospital bills that leave people paying for decades and the above example do not happen here.

"perfect" is an exaggeration...although in certain areas in the UK you can get very good healthcare because your area has better doctors or hospitals...overall it's still good nation wide.

You know how much it costs to have the most common shoulder injury (clavicle fracture) sorted via surgery or what not? -nothing. No monthly insurance fees, no surgery fees, no outpatient fees, no disposable medical items fees. Nothing. Zip. Zilch.

People wanna get double pay for being constantly nickle and dimed out of their money for everything? -sure go live the American dream. Of coruse most of us that lived there know the "dream" can turn into a bloody nightmare.

Re:H-1B Workers

[Anonymous Coward]

progressive society

Be careful there: the word "progressive" means different things to different people. For example, I would consider the US to be progressive in the sense that I would face workplace discrimination there for being white and male (under Affirmative Action), which is one reason I prefer to remain in Europe.

Re: H-1B Workers

[LDAPMAN]

What you saw was a fraud. There is nowhere in the U.S. where employers are not required to be fully insured for such accidents. Even if the person had to pay on their own, the normal process would be for the hospital to do everything possible to save the fingers. They would then write off any loss or apply to one of our many charities that help cover the costs in cases like this. One of the reasons healthcare is so expensive here for those that can pay is because we subsidize those who can't.

Re:H-1B Workers

[AmiMoJo]

At six year's in I'm up to 35 days paid holiday a year.

Re:H-1B Workers

[Anonymous Coward]

Any Healthcare program is perfect as long as you are healthy.

You get sick, things tend to complicate. You get REAL sick and things tend to go to hell.

Re:H-1B Workers

[Fire_Wraith]

If you've got something like the NHS, that doesn't stop you from seeking private care if you can pay. What it does stop you is from going bankrupt if you wind up with a condition that would cost far more than you've got.

Are you going to wait longer than you would if you can pay for it? Yes. Is that any worse than what happens if it's pay-only, and you can't pay?

Re:H-1B Workers

[Fire_Wraith]

Omitting the cost of living bit alone takes out so much of the context, even among parts the US. Compare the cost of living in Silicon Valley/San Francisco/etc to other places, and it's a huge change. You could take a 10% salary cut and still live far better, because you get things like a bigger house (or a house, period), a shorter commute, less traffic, etc.

That's one problem I have with articles like this - they act like salary is everything, and the only factor is the size of the digits.

Re:H-1B Workers

[houghi]

It depends a bit how things are calculated.and things differ per country.
I work 38 hours per week. Officially I work 37.That means I get 1 hours per week extra. That is 5 extra days per year. The company give soe extra days as well. 2 days if I was not sick in the previous year. 3 because I have worked a certain amount of time and then some extra because they want to. That brings me to 32 +2 offcial holidays that are on a weekend, so 35.

The official count would be 21. If that would be it (and some get only that) and I would work 50 hours per week, I would have at least 1 day per week or 50 days per year extra.

That said, I know people who work 4 days and are still full time. 9h30 or the like per day and they STILL have 45 days.

So it is much easier to find a balance between home and work. If people do overtime ALL the time that means one of these things (in reverse order of likelyness)
They are incompetent in their job
Their manager is incompetent at their job
There are issues at home, so he uses work to not go home

That last one is important, because if that takes to long, it will influence the quality of work delivered.

And as the GP explained, sick days do not count as holidays. You are still paid. How much depends on country as well on the period you are sick and if there is an extra insuarance that covers the money difference. Because after 1 month (where I work) you will get 80% and later it will go down further to 60% and then minimum wages.

Are there people that abuse the system? Yes, but not enough to punish the rest. People who get caught will lose everything and need to pay back everything, so the risk is pretty high compared to the gains. Obviously that would mean that they can fire you and you will not get any unemployment benefits. Also unwise to use them as a reference for a next job.

Re: H-1B Workers

[Anonymous Coward]

If you have something like the NHS, it also prevents you from having straight teeth. Or so I am told.

Re:H-1B Workers

[houghi]

Once wanted to apply for a job in the US. There was an option to enter my race. (Optional, I know). That would not be allowed to be asked.
When you ask a woman if she is pregnant, she is allowed to lie and say no and you can't fire here when she comes working and anounces she was pregnant after all.
That said, I know of two women who where in that situation and are both still with the company several years later.
One even took on a new function where the company was well aware that she was pregnant with kid #3

As always, there will be people that abuse the system. This is very minimal and not enough to punish the rest. Luckily all the companies I have wored for where more or less correct. This because small companies tend to be more social as you know everybody and larger companies (50+) are obliged by law to have union representatives, so they are all unionzed.

Re:H-1B Workers

[dunkelfalke]

I am German and the lowest amount of paid vacation days I ever had was 28 (working for a Finnish company). In all other cases I got 30 paid vacation days. Official holidays that are on the weekend are considered tough luck in Germany, though.

Re: H-1B Workers

[dunkelfalke]

It is just considered vanity, that's all.

Re:H-1B Workers

[Bender Unit 22]

Same for me in Denmark. When the official holidays around christmas lands on weekend, we call it an "employer" christmas and the other way around when they land on work days. :)

Re:H-1B Workers

[TheRaven64]

Once wanted to apply for a job in the US. There was an option to enter my race. (Optional, I know). That would not be allowed to be asked.

I'm not sure where you are, but in the UK it's fairly common to ask for that information on a separate form. It isn't allowed to be used in the hiring process (and there are penalties if you collect it and don't have a process in place to prevent it from being accessed by people involved with the hiring process), but is allowed to be used for statistical checks on the backgrounds of your applicants, so that you can spot things like '90% of applicants are in group X, but all hires are in group Y' and so on. I can't imagine a system not permitting this and somehow avoiding implicit bias being a huge part of the hiring process.

Re:H-1B Workers

[Anonymous Coward]

Speaking of chemo and the UK. I was on a year of chemo, that almost killed me three times. I found out the rules for administering it in the UK were lax enough I would have been guaranteed killed by the chemo in the UK had I been on it the full year.
But it sounds like they wouldn't have approved me for the full year, so I guess that explains why they are lax on blood tests for it since people don't get it.

Yes, had I gotten cancer in the UK I would have been dead already, had they treated it or had they not treated it. In the US I was able to get "proper" treatment that worked.

Re:H-1B Workers

[swb]

I think racism might be slightly too strong, but I will say there is definitely cultural clashes.

1) Rude and sexist behavior towards women, especially women managers. The story I heard was that with one Indian, the female manager finally broke him with relentless pager duty backed by 8 AM meetings and 2-3 unplanned office moves where his stuff was dumped in boxes and moved to progressively smaller cubes.

2) Appalling personal hygiene habits -- not bathing, not changing clothes. A friend seated next to an Indian filed a formal complaint with HR (he worked for a hospital system!) and the Indian had to basically meet with some kind of social worker to explain how hygiene worked in the US.

3) Clannish behavior among groups of Indians where they won't interact with American colleagues and setup conflicts

Mostly its Indians who don't assimilate, which is pretty much everyone's complaint about immigrants.

Re: H-1B Workers

[mishehu]

Hospitals are required to provide services to the level of "stabilization" only in the ER. That means they are not required to cure you all the way through to the end. If they do, that is there prerogative. You seem to have a misperception about what is required by law to be done. Also, do you have any sources that support your assertion that every of the 50 states would have insurance requirements upon the employer as you so assert? And beyond the 50 states, don't forget the protectorates and territories too...

Re:H-1B Workers

[Anonymous Coward]

I think the high salaries in the US are primarily compensating for their ridiculously high price of higher education.

Re:H-1B Workers

[Opportunist]

What's not to like about Healthcare in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, the BeNeLux, Sweden...?

Re:H-1B Workers

[utahjazz]

Developer salaries in the US are high to make up for the fact that they don't provide health insurance or paid holidays? Been a developer in the US for 20 years and never heard of such a job. In fact, never heard of a job w/o paid maternity/paternity leave. At my last job a guy was out sick for almost a year and he was paid the whole time.

Re:H-1B Workers

[gumbi west]

Self-interest is a more plausible explanation.

when you are talking about racism, self interest is usually pretty strong in the mix. It's basically people in power holding down people out of power. This is often done, in part, to keep the power. In this case, that power is high salary.

Re:H-1B Workers

[gumbi west]

To give an example, Thomas Jefferson agreed that slavery was wrong and should be abolished. It was just that they couldn't maintain their life style without it, so it had to go on. Jefferson was also worried that he had a wolf by the ear, as in, if he let go he would likely die. He basically explained the whole thing as self interest / self preservation.

Re: H-1B Workers

[Joe_Dragon]

and people in lockup get more then someone who just walks into the ER.

https://www.theatlantic.com/he...

Re:H-1B Workers

[Anonymous Coward]

I'll take higher salary and retiring after five years. ymmv

Re: H-1B Workers

[reanjr]

Here in the US, I get paid a competitive salary, have unlimited vacation, work about 35 hours a week, have on demand telecommuting, and free health care.

Sorry, foreigner, you can tell yourself you've got a good deal, but it sounds like unsubstantiated nationalism.

Re: H-1B Workers

[Anonymous Coward]

Easy. I have every right not to work grueling workweeks. If my employer is demanding such a thing, then I can quit and find a better employer.

Re: H-1B Workers

[Opportunist]

Yeah, but not everyone is lucky enough to be the president of the US.

Re:H-1B Workers

[magarity]

Nonsense. You cannot "prove" anything with statistics

WTF; who taught you that nonsense? You can "prove" *anything* with statistics. It's just a matter of presentation.

Re:H-1B Workers

[Fire_Wraith]

You seem to think that insurance companies aren't going to make cost benefit analyses whenever they can get away with it. You think they like paying through the nose for something like cancer care? Now, a lot of the shenanigans that used to go on before such as kicking you off insurance for some claimed preexisting condition they suddenly discover, or sneaking in a lifetime cap on your coverage in the fine print, were banned under Obamacare, but don't go thinking they won't try to find other ways, or that they wouldn't go right back to it if the government wasn't stopping them.

I'm also not suggesting the NHS is perfect. What I will state is that Britons absolutely love the NHS, to a ridiculous degree, and even the conservatives there won't touch it. Even Margaret Thatcher, who never met a state-run anything she didn't want to privatize, explicitly left the NHS well alone. And as I said, if you want to pay for private insurance or private care, having the NHS in no way stops you if you think you can get something better. Yes, the US system offers better care, if you can pay for it.

Re:H-1B Workers

[Anonymous Coward]

"Its pretty damn obvious that H-1B is not hurting american workers at all."

Explain workers being laid off and having to train their H1B replacements then? Oh, you can't, because you are spouting propaganda.

Re:H-1B Workers

[Anonymous Coward]

I dont see any reliable evidence that its anything other than xenophobia. The immigration debate seems fueled by nonsense and fear of foreigners more than anything rational.

For me, I don't have a problem with open borders (with possibly a check for outstanding warrants from the US or other countries). I do have a problem with H1B because (1) it singles out some people as being more "worth" including in your country which actually hurts jobs in those fields because (2) the people are being hired fraudulently* to replace extant workers. What you say about immigrants is true precisely because 1%** of workers are in each specialized field and the other 99%** all use that service. If you only take in that 1% you're not growing the market nearly enough to actually expand the market place, unless the market is so massive that you need that 1% to fill the current demand. Instead, the whole use of the H1B program is geared toward increasing supply to suppress wages***.

Oh, and it's bullshit that models are part of the H1B program while everyone else has to have a Bachelor degree and be providing a service in a technical field.

PS - Seriously, give me some open borders. I'll admit a lot of America isn't for it, but I'm not one of them. Regardless, the H1B program is not an immigration program, so it's very much a non-sequitur to mention.

* Not true 100% of the time, of course. The outrage, though, stems from the many examples where it has been shown to occur.

** Numbers pulled out of my ass, but clearly it's not a 1:1 (or even close) ratio of people who provide IT services vs users of IT services or bringing more people into the country wouldn't be much hjelp.

*** Have IT rages skyrocketed in the US at any point in the past 20 years? Or dropped like a rock at any point? Do you think H1B rates magically filled the gaps to offset the fluctuations that occur when there's a sudden spike in demand/supply to not see obvious salary changes? No, H1B is used (1) to suppress currently employees from asking or receiving salary/benefit increases and (2) to shift work away to cheaper employees which might eventually lead to wholesale outsourcing.

Re:H-1B Workers

[ShanghaiBill]

Explain workers being laid off and having to train their H1B replacements then?

It is easy to see specific jobs that are filled by immigrants, but immigration can still bring a net gain of jobs across the entire economy. The displaced tech worker can find another job at a comparable salary. Meanwhile, the immigrant is setting up a household, buying furniture, groceries, etc., which generates jobs for construction workers, grocery store clerks, etc.

Historically, countries with liberal immigration policies have experienced lower unemployment rates than neighboring countries with more restrictive immigration policies. A recent example of this is when Poland joined the EU. Britain and Sweden allowed Polish workers to immigrate, while every other EU country restricted Polish immigrants over the objection of economists. Over the following years, Britain and Sweden had the EU's greatest improvement in unemployment rates.

Re:H-1B Workers

[gumbi west]

Yeah, because people usually don't count their employer's contribution to health insurance, US health insurance generally drags down compensation people report.

Re:H-1B Workers

[jedidiah]

> Are there problems with the healthcare the NHS provides? -yes. If we factor the cost of the healthcare is it bloody great? -yes

This is the big problem with the usual socialist approach to healthcare. When your life is on the line, it's not the CHEAP option you want. It's the BEST option you want. Medicine is no place for the "cheap junk for less" mentality.

It's one of the most important things in society being practiced by our most educated and well trained people. Yet everyone thinks it's a place for a bargain and that doctors and nurses should be given the shaft.

Surgery is no place for the Walmart mentality.

Re: H-1B Workers

[jbengt]

There is nowhere in the U.S. where employers are not required to be fully insured for such accidents.

No.
Employers are required to have worker's compensation insurance. Worker's compensation includes a list of injuries and what compensation will be paid for them. The employer's liability is limited to what worker' compensation insurance pays, unless you can prove criminal negligence or the like in court, which is unlikely.
On the other hand, your personal health insurance, whether bought by you or provided by your company, might cover hospital bills - or they might not, depending on what they are required by law to cover (nothing if the repeal & don't replace crowd get their way). Usually they start off denying coverage and force you to complain before reluctantly paying some of the bills.
IANAL, YMMV, etc.

Re:H-1B Workers

[jedidiah]

> You seem to think that insurance companies aren't going to make cost benefit analyses whenever they can get away with it.

Yet in practice American private insurers are more aggressive than public systems in both the US and Europe. For my particular condition the US public systems are at least 10 years behind the times in terms of standards of care.

I know two people killed by socialized medicine in the US and Canada because of substandard cancer treatment. Horror stories about cancer drugs and the NHS are bad enough that they show up in the popular media.

Re:H-1B Workers

[jedidiah]

> What's not to like about Healthcare in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, the BeNeLux, Sweden...?

Germany is a few decades behind the times in orthopedics and seem to be generally stingy. Sweden does poorly with rare conditions.

Any ferret face can set a bone. That's not the stuff you want to hang your hat on.

Re:H-1B Workers

[tendrousbeastie]

In Britain all public holidays fall on weekdays, as a matter of design. If you have, say, Christmas Day falling on a Sunday, then the Boxing Day Monday will be a public holiday, and the Tuesday will be a public holiday in compensation for the Sunday.

All Brits (on a full-time contract at least) are entitled to the full 25 days holiday plus the 9 annual public holidays.

Re:H-1B Workers

[jbengt]

I would consider the US to be progressive in the sense that I would face workplace discrimination there for being white and male (under Affirmative Action), which is one reason I prefer to remain in Europe.

As a white, male worker in the US, I call bullshit. I hate to admit it, but in many, possibly most, cases, being white and male provides an advantage in the workplace, even accounting for Affirmative Action initiatives.

Re: H-1B Workers

[erapert]

But Healthcare is free...

Sounds like someone doesn't know what taxes are.

Re:H-1B Workers

[luis_a_espinal]

This survey proves that American workers aren't being harmed by workers with H-1B visas.

Err, maybe, maybe not. I know of a couple of cases were very talented teams have been eliminated completely by offshoring. So, in a way, they were "harmed" for something that is borderline illegal (replacing existing American positions with offshored and H1B replacements.)

OTH, they weren't really "harmed". They got their severance packages, and because they had their shit together, they landed jobs somewhere else.

I'd say there is H1B abuse. But I also say there is a bigger problem: there is a lot of IT dead weight in America.

As an US citizen, I don't care if a person is a US worker or a H1B worker. I care if said person is worth a damn as a worker or dead weight.

In America, with all its wealth, opportunities and educational resources, there is no reason to be dead weight in such a versatile, well-remunerated industry such as IT/software.

Re: H-1B Workers

[luis_a_espinal]

What you saw was a fraud. There is nowhere in the U.S. where employers are not required to be fully insured for such accidents. Even if the person had to pay on their own, the normal process would be for the hospital to do everything possible to save the fingers. They would then write off any loss or apply to one of our many charities that help cover the costs in cases like this. One of the reasons healthcare is so expensive here for those that can pay is because we subsidize those who can't.

Hehehe, you are a funny guy.

Re: H-1B Workers

[luis_a_espinal]

What you saw was a fraud. There is nowhere in the U.S. where employers are not required to be fully insured for such accidents. Even if the person had to pay on their own, the normal process would be for the hospital to do everything possible to save the fingers. They would then write off any loss or apply to one of our many charities that help cover the costs in cases like this. One of the reasons healthcare is so expensive here for those that can pay is because we subsidize those who can't.

Like in Japan or Germany or all the other dozen 1st world examples that I can think of. That is not the reason why healthcare is so expensive. You are making a conscious choice to believe and propagate a lie.

Re:H-1B Workers

[luis_a_espinal]

> "indo-chimps,"

Never heard that term, and I've been a programmer for over 33 years.

The reason we object to having go work with incompetent people that are poorly educated is because they create more work for us.

I agree with this partially. I say partially because:

1. Not all H1B are incompetent, and in fact, many are actually good and pleasant to work with. I've been in this IT/software industry rodeo for 23 years (not as long as you, but still, long enough), and I know that this is true.

2. We have a lot of "native" incompetent dead weight among us.

I want to see less H1B abuse and make sure we do not get incompetent people in. But at the same time, I want to see the competent ones to come in and kick our native dead weight out.

I have no compassion for dead weight, native or foreign. I'm not one to prevent a foreign born person to seek new opportunity just to protect dead weight.

Re:H-1B Workers

[Grishnakh]

Luckily all the companies I have wored for where more or less correct.

You obviously made a spelling error here, but I can't figure out if you meant to type "worked" or "whored".

Re:H-1B Workers

[Anonymous Coward]

yes, jefferson also suggested no generation run up more debt that can be paid off during their lifetime..........so we have just expanded slavery, against his wishes too.

see "the hazard circular".

    yet everyone loves to quote lincoln "a house divided cannot stand".....

  but never (paraphrase) "i have two enemies, the south in front of me, and the banks in back. the latter is a more serious foe" (paraphrase again) "with the war ending, a period of corporate excesses is likely to follow"

Re:H-1B Workers

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm in favor of socialized medicine, not because of any cost issues but because it's a profession by and for the welfare of the people.

There was a time when the doctor-patient relationship was a sacred trust. Then the bean counters stepped in and made it into nothing more than a business transaction, fees collected for services rendered.

Education too used to be a noble profession, now it's burdened with political and economic baggage that corrupts its vital sacred mission: educating the children.

Re:H-1B Workers

[houghi]

There is a difference?

Re:H-1B Workers

[Anonymous Coward]

It is easy to see specific jobs that are filled by immigrants, but immigration can still bring a net gain of jobs across the entire economy.

Again, H1B != immigration. When all you do is let in a very small, select population designed to fill certain jobs, you tend to displace native workers of that job precisely because the ratio of that job to the serving population is nowhere near 1:1. More generally, I find it rather ironic that once of the fields, medicine, for which we constantly see a need for greater supply of doctors we see such high standards for immigration of yet more doctors to decrease costs. No, wait, that's not ironic. That's politics, the AMA, and lobbyists.

To reiterate, I'd love to see open immigration. In fact, I very demand it of anyone who speaks of supporting the free market, since the free movement of workers is one of the most critical aspects of it.

Re: H-1B Workers

[david_thornley]

He's in a mandatory group insurance plan with a really big group. The savings are massive, and premiums are collected more by ability to pay. What's really important here is that, if he's flat broke and has a medical problem, he gets treatment. In the US, if flat broke, he'd have to go to an emergency room for an emergency and otherwise do without, and the emergency room will not do any long-term necessary treatment and will likely leave him with massive bills to face if he ever gets a decent income again.

Security is valuable.

Re: H-1B Workers

[Anonymous Coward]

Almost all employers are required to pay for Workers Comp Insurance which is what covers employees for both medical and unemployment benefits if they are injured on the job (and weren't doing something stupid like forklift jousting.) Independent contractors are typically excluded because they are considered business entities and expected to pay for their own business expenses (ie healthcare and accidental insurance.) Many countries offer similarly named programs. In the case of industrial accidents I think the procedures are done without regard to payment because they cannot determine responsibility until afterward. But the case being discussed was someone who didn't have insurance and cut themselves outside of a workplace. The moral of that story is pay for insurance.

Re:H-1B Workers

[michael_wojcik]

Try to beat that, US.

Why? I'm happy. Happy pretty much every day. Some days just hovering in the neighborhood of "content", some suffused with a cheerful glow; but happy to some extent, anyway.

Here are some things that are unlikely to make me happier: More days of vacation; I never use mine up anyway. More sick days; I hardly ever use any of those. "Worker's protection", the very idea of which makes my skin crawl - I'll do what I want, when I want, thanks anyway.

"Perfect healthcare" sounds ominous. Perhaps you don't know what the word "perfect" means?

I have a retirement plan. Yes, unemployment coverage in the US is wildly insufficient, but I wouldn't claim the US is ideal. Hell, I won't claim it's better than anywhere else, for me and certainly not for other people. But it's just fine for me.

I don't understand this weird dick-waving "try to beat that" crap. Are you happy? Great! That doesn't mean other people can't be unless they have what you have.

Re: H-1B Workers

[Opportunist]

Really? You can just do that?

I guess that lamenting about H-1Bs isn't that close to reality then, is it?

Re:H-1B Workers

[Opportunist]

But that's the stuff that 9 out of 10 times happens.

11K in south asia

[Anonymous Coward]

With 11K in South Asia you can live with the same quality of life as someone making $120K in the US.

Re:11K in south asia

[ShanghaiBill]

With 11K in South Asia you can live with the same quality of life as someone making $120K in the US.

Yes and no. You can't afford a car, but you can easily afford a live-in housekeeper and nanny for your kids.

Re: 11K in south asia

[fubarrr]

Yo man, are you staying in Shanghai for Qingming?

Re:11K in south asia

[drinkypoo]

Yes and no. You can't afford a car, but you can easily afford a live-in housekeeper and nanny for your kids.

Is it just me, or would you be scared to leave someone making barely more than slavery wages alone in your house with your child?

Re:11K in south asia

[Anonymous Coward]

It's not slave wages there. I recommend getting out and seeing the world some time. I just got back from Mexico. Down in Quitana Roo, which is tourist land, so it's "expensive" and overpriced. Artisan baked goods for 4 pesos (US 25 cents). A beer was US 35 cents. A brand new motorcycle for a hair over US $1000. These are prices at the grocery store, not what you'd pay at the resort. What in the US would be slave wages, in other parts of the world is quite good money.

Re:11K in south asia

[Anonymous Coward]

Dear ShanghaiBill,

I am an Indian here who did his PhD in computer engineering from one of the UCs in USA. I later moved back to India and have been here in Bangalore for over a decade. I still remain a life long fan of Slashdot for its tech coverage and its reader discussions.

Now I have been reading your posts for many years. Many of them are indeed insightful and interesting.

Yet you exhibit a subtle but very distinct form of racism that is couched in a seemingly informed analysis and facts. But most of your analyses are fraudulent. You argue intelligently but I have observed that it is seldom based on real data. It is more based on selective picking of pieces of data that fits your bias or racism or xenophobia or ignorance or whatever we can call it. We know it when we see it.

In this particular case, for example, you are authoritatively proclaiming knowledge of life in 'South Asia' which basically refers to India as we know. You indirectly seem to hint that most well to do Indians with upper middle class salary keep a live-in housekeeper. There are subtle accusations of a slavery like culture here by choice of words like 'live-in' instead of simply saying 'domestic help'.
But as an Indian I have to inform you that this is simply not true. Do you indeed have that stats at hand?
Do you have the real numbers? What exact proportion of well to do Indians keep a live-in housekeeper? Well, the answer is in single digits, sir.
The fact that you dont bother to gather stats is to me a subtle but clear indication of racism.

Re:11K in south asia

[Anonymous Coward]

It definitely depends on the person but quite often the live-in domestic helper has more disposable income and more stability than the average blue collar worker in town. And that income is more than what the spouse of the domestic helper makes back in their home country.

But of course, there are people who are stupid enough to abuse the person who cooks their food, take care of their kids and has access to all the knives in the kitchen.

Re:11K in south asia

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe he's misinformed, but his comment isn't racist.

Re:11K in south asia

[Anonymous Coward]

...

In this particular case, for example, you are authoritatively proclaiming knowledge of life in 'South Asia' which basically refers to India as we know. You indirectly seem to hint that most well to do Indians with upper middle class salary keep a live-in housekeeper. There are subtle accusations of a slavery like culture here by choice of words like 'live-in' instead of simply saying 'domestic help'.
But as an Indian I have to inform you that this is simply not true.

Hm. Must have changed since I was there, but I suppose since I haven't been there for over twenty-five years it may well have. In the early 90s (in Madras, anyway-- don't know about other cities), hiring unskilled labor such as housekeepers or nannies was something upper-middle-class people routinely did. Possibly the standard of living (and the unemployment situation) in India has improved since then, and cost of labor has gone up and it's not so common any more?

For what it's worth, at the time I didn't see it as "slavery"--everybody was treated the same. It seemed to me to be simply employment, which is to say, spreading income downward. (But then, I don't speak Tamil, so perhaps if I heard the conversations it would have been clear.)

Do you indeed have that stats at hand?
Do you have the real numbers? What exact proportion of well to do Indians keep a live-in housekeeper? Well, the answer is in single digits, sir.
The fact that you dont bother to gather stats is to me a subtle but clear indication of racism.

By the way, he didn't say that most Indians employ a live-in housekeeper. He said that "you can easily afford a live-in housekeeper and nanny".

Re:11K in south asia

[luis_a_espinal]

Yes and no. You can't afford a car, but you can easily afford a live-in housekeeper and nanny for your kids.

Is it just me, or would you be scared to leave someone making barely more than slavery wages alone in your house with your child?

It's not slave wages for them, and you are going to find out people are, for the most part, decent and whom can be trusted to do this type of job.

Stop spouting that kind of crap. Get out of wherever you are and travel the world. Look around. Look abroad and learn. You are going to find a lot of your notions about other countries to be nothing but an assortment of unsubstantiated, superficial bundles of bullshit.

Re:11K in south asia

[ShanghaiBill]

Is it just me, or would you be scared to leave someone making barely more than slavery wages alone in your house with your child?

I never lived in India, but I did live in China for several years. We had a live-in housekeeper, and she was paid 2500 RMB or about $300 USD per month. She also ate with our family for free and had a free room to live in. That was worth at least another $100 per month. So she had an annual income equivalent to about $4800 USD. This was back when the median annual income in Shanghai was about $4200 USD.

I never gave a second thought to leaving my kids with her. She was like a member of our family. My kids are grown now, and in college, but they still stay in touch with her via WeChat.

US vs. Europe

[Anonymous Coward]

$35,400 USD in Western Europe means far more than $73,600 USD in USA

Re: US vs. Europe

[Aloriel]

If you count that our social insurances are awesome and included: yes.

Re:US vs. Europe

[cheesybagel]

It doesn't quite cover the difference, but yeah having one month paid vacation and universal healthcare helps to soften the blow quite a lot.

Re:US vs. Europe

[Opportunist]

Plus worker protection laws that can't be beat. Limitation of hours per week, limitations of what your boss can impose on you, certain practices that are common in the US being outlawed, easy and free/cheap access to work related lawyers in case it gets to court (including insurance to cover your cost in case that lawyer says you should sue and you lose)...

The list is pretty long. And it's universal, so companies don't even get the idea to sneak it in on the low level, where people can't afford to defend against it and fight it, and let it creep upwards.

Re:US vs. Europe

[110010001000]

Many developers in the US get 5 weeks of paid vacation plus full healthcare. Don't believe all the sob stories.

Re:US vs. Europe

[dyeazel]

Where? You might get that with a tech company in the San Francisco area where they're trying to soften the blow of housing costs. In the rest of the country, you're working a corporate job with two weeks to start and a max of 4-5 after 10 years.

Re:US vs. Europe

[Anonymous Coward]

I have 23 days in my first year, by year 3 it will be 28, full health care (at least as much as full is in the US these days), 2 extra days for volunteer work, 10 paid holidays, and flex time. Not anywhere near San Francisco, and it's a big corporation, not a startup spending VC cash freely.

Re:US vs. Europe

[david_thornley]

Having been where I am for over seven years, I get 5 weeks of PTO, and nearly free good-quality personal health insurance. Note that "PTO": in the last year I've had some medical issues that forced me to take off a significant amount of time, which means I effectively get less vacation time.

Location trumps skill

[Anonymous Coward]

No matter how much you suck, you'll get more money from moving to the US than becoming better at what you do. Do they mention how in western europe you can easily lose 40% of your income to taxes, then pay more than half of what is left for rent? With food, cars, gas, whathaveyou generally being more expensive the difference is much bigger than it looks at first. At least we don't have to put up with Trump.

Re:Location trumps skill

[Opportunist]

Yes, but you get something in return for those taxes. It's not like your IRS uses it to buy golden toilets for the tax men...

Re:Location trumps skill

[Anonymous Coward]

Correct, but you forgot we're all communists over here, so everybody gets the golden toilets, even hippy slobs. But almost no one can afford a second golden toilet. :)

Re:Location trumps skill

[Opportunist]

Yes, it's a pity our rich can't even afford a spare ivory back scratcher just 'cause some plebs want indoor plumbing.

What about hidden cost?

[muecksteiner]

Does this survey properly factor in things like healthcare and retirement costs?

Because sure, in Western Europe you earn half as much as in the US - but with that salary, you usually already have health insurance, retirement and free education for your kids covered (minus university, which is not free in a number of countries).

These little details could conceivably tilt the balance in favour of the lower salary.

Re:What about hidden cost?

[Anonymous Coward]

The caption on the graph at the linked article's site says "Annual gross salary..." Not sure about the rest of the world, but that in Europe usually means that income tax, social security and other direct taxes come out of that. It also (in Europe) does not reflect the the total cost of the employee, since part of those social costs are paid by the employer.

Re: What about hidden cost?

[Anonymous Coward]

A more useful figure would be net PPP. Probably employer cost PPP too, to take into account different styles of accounting for health insurance/costs and general cost of living.

Re:What about hidden cost?

[houghi]

Also very important is cost of living. e.g. in Europe there will be a difference if you live in London or in Prague.
I know of people who wanted to go to Geneva, for a serious increase till they learned about the cost of living compared to where they were.

From what you can live like a king in one place will not even give you housing in another.

Re:What about hidden cost?

[tommeke100]

No it doesn't. Because you still have to pay taxes in Europe as well, and they are much higher than in the US.
So, not only are you only making half, you're also often losing half of that to taxes. So in the end, it's not a x2 but more a x3 win for the US.
I'm in Western Europe (Belgium) and wages for web (full stack) and software development are definitely higher than 35k. They are probably more in the 50k range. Except if you just came out of school.

Re:What about hidden cost?

[Anonymous Coward]

>Does this survey properly factor in things like healthcare and retirement costs?

Man, do you really understand that nobody of the current "early working age" people will ever, EVER, see their pension contributions returning as their pensions? Pension systems are state ran financial pyramids with current demographic trends. That is an undeniable truth.

Just silly.

[CptLoRes]

Comparing AR to web/mobile/backend is just silly. The people currently working on AR have to be highly skilled in some very specialized areas, basically inventing both the software and hardware technology as they go along. It's like comparing an actual rocket scientist to an car mechanic and wondering why the scientist has a higher salary.

Re: Just silly.

[Anonymous Coward]

These days it's far from certain certain the scientist would earn more!

Re: Just silly.

[fubarrr]

"inventing software" - cp unity/ my-piece-of-software/

"inventing hardware" - buying odm solution from vuzix, or just getting white box stuff from china

Re: Just silly.

[Opportunist]

Hush! We're trying to invent here, don't let management in on our secret!

You don't do stats do you?

[Anonymous Coward]

The entire bottom 90% of Developers could be paid in breadcrumbs and these numbers wouldn't be affected.

Re: You don't do stats do you?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, agree 100% ðY

What are the discretionary savings?

[thegarbz]

Income means nothing if I have to blow it on basic stuff like accommodation, food, school, and a many thousand dollar rainy day fund in case I stub my toe and need to go to a doctor.

Re:What are the discretionary savings?

[thesupraman]

I'm afraid that if you go to a doctor when you stub your toe, then you get EXACTLY what you deserve.

Re:What are the discretionary savings?

[thegarbz]

I'm afraid that if you go to a doctor when you stub your toe, then you get EXACTLY what you deserve.

I'm afraid that you are too literal to communicate with people. I suggest you get that looked at but you may not be able to afford it in the USA.

Re:What are the discretionary savings?

[TheRaven64]

and a many thousand dollar rainy day fund in case I stub my toe and need to go to a doctor.

The rest of the stuff on your list is universal, but that one is pretty much a US-only thing.

Re:What are the discretionary savings?

[drinkypoo]

The rest of the stuff on your list is universal, but that one is pretty much a US-only thing.

No. There are several countries where education is free. In the USA, only the most basic education is free. People are expected to go into debt to the government in order to get more if they don't have parents who can afford to pay for it. The system is designed to protect privilege.

Re: What are the discretionary savings?

[Anonymous Coward]

Higher education == massive debt in the UK as well now (unless you live in Scotland). It sucks.

Re: What are the discretionary savings?

[TheRaven64]

It's similar for the Welsh if the go to university in Wales, it's only the English or the Welsh in English or Scottish universities that have to pay. That said, the loans don't work like normal loans. The interest is at the rate of inflation and the repayments are based on your income and they're written off after a certain age, so it's effectively a graduate tax with a cap. It's not a great situation, but if your degree makes you even vaguely employable it's basically an extra percent or two on income tax for a while until it's paid off.

Re:What are the discretionary savings?

[bluegutang]

Ouch! Call the burn ward. But only if his insurance covers it...

Re:What are the discretionary savings?

[Anonymous Coward]

Not going to the doctor can result in death. I'm not sure anyone deserves that. A tiny nicking of skin on his toe led to a colleague of mine dying. Check out cellulitis.

Re:What are the discretionary savings?

[Anonymous Coward]

In the USA, only the most basic education is free. People are expected to go into debt to the government in order to get more if they don't have parents who can afford to pay for it.

"Working your way through school" isn't dead; it's just unpopular.

Re:What are the discretionary savings?

[Anonymous Coward]

In the U.S. nothing is free. K-12 education is paid for by taxing everyone and using the tax money to fund education. K-12 funding is 100%, students do not contribute. For university, State operated schools are funded about 50% by taxes, with students funding the other 50%. Private university is similar, but instead of taxes funding the first 50%, grants and scholarships cover it. Also, there is a wide range of costs at the University level depending on the subject matter and quality ranking of the school.

Re:What are the discretionary savings?

[Anonymous Coward]

You go to the doctor for a stubbed toe?

Now we know why Americans pay so much for healthcare.

Re:What are the discretionary savings?

[Anonymous Coward]

The rest of the stuff on your list is universal, but that one is pretty much a US-only thing.

No. There are several countries where education is free. In the USA, only the most basic education is free. People are expected to go into debt to the government in order to get more if they don't have parents who can afford to pay for it. The system is designed to protect privilege.

It's not really designed to protect privlage, it's juts poorly coordinated.

Basically, time was government subsidized loans were more manageable and had low interest rates thus allowing people to manage on a part time job and a close to free loan, then the Boomers and X-ers defaulted on theirs and colleges started calculating their tuition with the assumption that you took some loans, so you get what's basically a mortgage in principle and interest and not dischargeable by bankruptcy.

Meanwhile guidance counselors have been saying "don't learn a trade, go to college even if you major un underwater basketweaving you'll be guaranteed a high paying job when you graduate" which might have been true in the 50's but is complete nonsense today.

Re:What are the discretionary savings?

[sysrammer]

The GP has diabetes, you insensitive clod! Now, when he stubs his toe he loses his foot because he tried to take care of it himself because...

...if you go to a doctor when you stub your toe, then you get EXACTLY what you deserve.

Re:What are the discretionary savings?

[Anonymous Coward]

> You go to the doctor for a stubbed toe?

I stubbed it on a land mine.

Very important detail

[Anonymous Coward]

quality of life in North America is lower than in Europe, and the cost of living is much higher -- don't think you're going to be filthy rich just because you do the same job in a different country. All you're doing is helping the American Brain-Drain programme to skew the global intellectual wealth in their favor, in your pursuit of the "American Dream".

Re:Very important detail

[Anonymous Coward]

A response from someone with a lack of awareness, sitting squarely in the "fuck you, I got mine" category of people.

Re:Very important detail

[K. S. Kyosuke]

You have some very weird numbers there. WHO claims that Spain is 7 or less, UK is 7 or less, France is 16 or less, whereas the US is 12 or more, depending on how you measure it. Source: WHO.

The EU-28 average is slightly below 12. Source: Eurostat.

Re:Very important detail

[dunkelfalke]

You are a liar. USA has twice the amount of suicides.
http://apps.who.int/gho/data/n...

Sweden: 13.2
France: 15.8
United Kingdom: 7.0
Spain: 7.0
South Korea: 36.8
Canada: 11.4
United States: 13.7
Mexico: 4.1

Oh, and suicide rates strongly correlate to the latitude (because of the amount of sunlight in winter). United States shares most of its the latitude with Southern Europe, but its suicide rate is higher:

Spain: 7.0
Italy: 6.4
Portugal: 12.5
Greece: 4.9
Malta: 6.8

Malta is basically as far south as Southern Europe goes and it is on about the same latitude as Los Alamos, New Mexico, so USA goes even further south. Seriously, suicide rates in USA suck in comparison to what they ought to be.

Re:Very important detail

[Opportunist]

How can poor Mexicans and rich Americans both be low relative to their European counterparts?

When most of your people suffer from a mental handicap that tells them offing yourself is a nono because an imaginary being is going to torture you for it eternally, they'll readily suffer a few more years instead of facing the eternal damnation they were told is waiting for them.

Re:Very important detail

[Anonymous Coward]

Agreed. Life here in the exurbs is blessed. The Euros have no concept of gassing up their pickup with 30 gallons and exploring the great open spaces.

Re:Very important detail

[TheRaven64]

Strongly Christian areas also under-report suicides, to avoid the stigma, so you'll get a lot of 'accidents'.

Re:Very important detail

[tehcyder]

access to toys like fire arms and off road vehicles makes my quality of life decidedly better than my European counterpart.

Always good to hear the views of our teenage readers!

Re:Very important detail

[Opportunist]

Ahhh, so the guys in the Bible Belt aren't just too stupid to clean their guns safely...

Re:Very important detail

[Anonymous Coward]

Did you notice that the WHO data is from 2012? Not saying that GP's data is correct, but so much has changed since then, socioeconomically, that we can't assume 2012's data has any relevance to 2016 data. When will they release those numbers?

Re:Very important detail

[Anonymous Coward]

Suicide is a progressive right.

Re:Very important detail

[avandesande]

Fortunately OD's don't count as suicides so I think our rate now should be better

Re:Very important detail

[Anonymous Coward]

It's dammed tough for the Europeans without any off road vehichles

Re:Very important detail

[micahraleigh]

The cost of living in North America is much higher than Europe.

As someone who has lived in both places let me assure you, sir, that you are profoundly mistaken.

Re:Very important detail

[micahraleigh]

Ah ... meant to have a question mark in there:

The cost of living in North America is much higher than Europe?

Re:Very important detail

[K. S. Kyosuke]

Ah, our Euroepan curse of having roads and railways everywhere...

Re:Very important detail

[david_thornley]

At one time (and this might be true now), life insurance didn't tend to pay out for suicide, so there was a real incentive to find some way to call a self-inflicted death an accident. I don't know what the incentives might be elsewhere.

Of course it does

[Anonymous Coward]

North-American employers have to compensate for the fact that quality of life is significantly lower. If they didn't pay more, they would not attract any foreign employees.

Re:Of course it does

[Anonymous Coward]

Add to the low quality of life living among idiots, blacks entitled to the rule of land, fatsos and the disease of the politically correct. Thanks, but not thanks.

Re:Of course it does

[Anonymous Coward]

Add to that misandrists and manginas using she instead of he when building phrases, bother.

Re:Of course it does

[Opportunist]

And let's not forget the loonies who let their life be dictated by their imaginary buddy and his OCD.

Re:Of course it does

[Anonymous Coward]

And let's not forget the loonies who let their life be dictated by their imaginary buddy and his OCD.

That's a nice theory, but if there was any "God" then all the bankers would be burned at the stake.

Please do not confuse pretend "religious" types with actual. The actual run absolutely NOTHING. The entire WORLD is entirely top to bottom based on usury...the same "crime against nature" as "homosexuality" (no productive fruits, all the "Value" is siphoned off...just like shooting blanks).

I am all for bashing "Religion" but "religious types" run absolutely NOTHING the world over. The world has always been Satan's. He is "god of this world" for a reason. He is also "the serpent" and the "law of the sea" (commerce, international) is what everyone is press-ganged into from birth. So, again, the "law of the land" (common law, and the bible too) literally runs NOTHING.

Again, "God" and "religion" has absolutely NOTHING to do with the modern world. The world chose satanism long ago, materialism and usury, "enlightenment" as it were.

Weird stats?

[K. S. Kyosuke]

The top 10 percent of salary earners in AR who live in North America earn a median salary of $219,000,

Is it just me or is that a very convoluted way of saying "95th percentile"?

These are menial jobs

[Anonymous Coward]

I seriously wouldn't get out of bed for triple that amount.

If you look beyond the internet and lower level than the popular dynamic languages you will find that engineers are highly valued beyond basic code monkey work that most people seem to aspire to these days. Not to mention the technical challenges which keep you interested.

Rofl

[Anonymous Coward]

Go to usa lol thx for the info...

Stupid metrics

[argStyopa]

What sort of a pointless biased metric is "the median incline of the top ten percent"?

Half of all developers are below average.

It's time to invest in outsourcing

[Skorpion]

So the proper course of action is to start development company in Europe to price undercut the US developers. Seems like a great business opportunity.

Re: It's time to invest in outsourcing

[Anonymous Coward]

Though, for H1B you have a person who will work their fingers to the bone just to make sure they retain their job. I mean, H1B salaried employees in the US will work crazy hours...going back to their home country could prove costly.

Re: It's time to invest in outsourcing

[Skorpion]

The best european developers are not that keen to move to States, no matter type of visa.

"Look for opportunities internationally"

[zifn4b]

Can you do this 100% remotely? If so, how?

Regional salary comparisons are always the tip of

[Anonymous Coward]

[quote]A web developer in North America earns a median income of $73,600 USD per year, compared with the same developer in Western Europe whose median income is $35,400 USD[/quote]

Yes, but in parts of North America you have to choose between paying $3500/mo for a 2 bedroom apartment and living in high crime and bad school areas. You have to pay your own insurance, you get a fraction of the time off for holiday and family events, and mostly have to role your own retirement.

My salary is double what it was 15 years ago, yet I save almost the same and live no better than I did before.

A friend of mine moved to U.K. years ago (now a citizen) and he is often on holiday, has health coverage and access to so much more than I do... but I guess it's OK because in the dick/dollar measuring contest it initially looks like I am doing better.

It's frustrating to say the least.

H1-Bs tuk muh jerb

[mattwarden]

I should be making at least $225,000 per year for my tech skills, but due to the abuses of H1-B visa systems by employers, I am scraping by on a pittance of $219,000. Why is this major issue of public policy not bubbling up to be a top priority?!

But it costs a shitload more to live in the USA.

[Anonymous Coward]

A lot of the things are paid for and available in other countries that you have to pay out of pocket in the USA. Medical stuff, for example, costs about half in Europe what it does in the USA.

kindergarten

[fche]

"You deserve it!"

What a dumb punchline. No, you don't "deserve" it (success). Go pursue it, but no one owes it to you.

It's racist to think that indians are incompetent.

[Anonymous Coward]

Some will be competent, some incompetent. Just like merkins. A lot of incompetent merkins. But calling them "redneck trash" just because they came from America would be racist.

Ever have a problem getting a job because the business didn't want "dumbass redneck hillbillies" and concluded if they can from the continent of the USA that they must be redneck hillbillies? What? Never? Then the whine that you've been discriminated against because you're white is bollocks. You got discriminated because you're incompetent.

AR ?

[Anonymous Coward]

All who live in Arkansas live in North America.

Mod parent up

[TheRaven64]

If ever a post deserved a +5 Troll, it's this one.

You usually get what you pay for

[Anonymous Coward]

Sometimes you really do get what you pay for. For every competent Indian developer I've come across, you have to suffer through a dozen or more that can't hold a candle to even an average peer from Europe (east or west) or North America.

The real value proposition seems to be in Eastern Europe these days if you want people who can actually code and don't cost a fortune.

The question is why. Do Indian universities and technical schools suck that bad?

Re:You usually get what you pay for

[EvilAlphonso]

From my experience, a lot of the resumes you see have been doctored by the recruitment agency/company in India. One team member went to such and such university for a summer class, the whole team suddenly graduated "magna cum laude" from such and such university. One team member went to a RedHat event, the entire team is RHCE/RHCA.

To be honest, that problem exists to some extent with all recruitment/sourcing companies in the world. I once accidentally received my own resume doctored by a recruitment company as it had landed on a colleague's desk. I had met the recruiter for a specific position and didn't give them the authorization to send my resume to other clients. They were trying to sell me for a pure dev role for less money than I was actually making at the time. It took me a few minutes to even acknowledge it was my resume as they had inserted a ton of bullshit in my previous jobs.

Choose a finger [Re: H-1B Workers]

[Geoffrey.landis]

I will never forget seeing a program on US healthcare where a person who lost 3 fingers in an induustrial accident was tol the insurance will only cover X amount and he had to choose two of the three to save.

What you saw was a fraud. There is nowhere in the U.S. where employers are not required to be fully insured for such accidents. Even if the person had to pay on their own, the normal process would be for the hospital to do everything possible to save the fingers. They would then write off any loss or apply to one of our many charities that help cover the costs in cases like this. One of the reasons healthcare is so expensive here for those that can pay is because we subsidize those who can't.

A little google shows that the event discussed, a person losing several fingers and being told by the hospital to choose which ones to reattach, seems to have come from the Michael Moore film "Sicko." The details listed by AC, however, are inaccurate (unless there was another incident I couldn't find on google.) It was a table saw, not an industrial accident, and the man wasn't insured"

https://www.theguardian.com/fi...
http://www.npr.org/templates/s... :

Let's talk about some of the medical cases Michael Moore describes in this film. At the very beginning, there is one about an American man who loses the ends of two of his fingers in an accident with an electric saw. He did not have insurance. The man must choose between having his middle finger reattached for $60,000, or his ring finger for $12,000. The man chooses his ring finger. How can a man be put into the position of making that choice?

JOANNE SILBERNER: [In the U.S.,] the hospital doesn't have to give him care unless it's lifesaving care, and his life wasn't threatened by the loss of two digits. So the hospital was within its rights to say, "We can reattach your two digits, but it's going to cost you." The irony is that if he had insurance, the insurance company would have paid far less than $12,000 or $60,000. The insurers can negotiate rates with hospitals that individuals can't.

Re:Choose a finger [Re: H-1B Workers]

[Anonymous Coward]

"The insurers can negotiate rates with hospitals that individuals can't "

I LOVE the state and its glorious healthcare scheme.

NHS orthodontic care in the UK

[Anonymous Coward]

If you have something like the NHS, it also prevents you from having straight teeth. Or so I am told.

Actually, orthodontic braces are part of the NHS care at no cost up to age 18. After that you have to pay. http://www.nhs.uk/Livewell/den...

If it's "purely cosmetic", adult braces have to be paid for privately. But that doesn't "prevent" you from having straight teeth, any more than the U.S. healthcare "prevents" you from having straight teeth. If you want your teeth straightened, you have to pay for it, just exactly the same as you do in the U.S.

And, even there, turns out the cost of braces from a private dentist is slightly less in the UK than in the US,

Re:Well that's a lie

[tsqr]

the claim you made that every employer required people to be fully covered is BS>

His example was an industrial accident. The employee's health care coverage, if they have any, wouldn't be involved, as this is covered by Workers' Compensation.

Cancer survival [Re:H-1B Workers]

[Geoffrey.landis]

Speaking of chemo and the UK. I was on a year of chemo, that almost killed me three times. I found out the rules for administering it in the UK were lax enough I would have been guaranteed killed by the chemo in the UK had I been on it the full year.
But it sounds like they wouldn't have approved me for the full year, so I guess that explains why they are lax on blood tests for it since people don't get it. Yes, had I gotten cancer in the UK I would have been dead already, had they treated it or had they not treated it. In the US I was able to get "proper" treatment that worked.

Cancer survival rates in the UK are lower than those in the rest of Europe. But the rest of Europe also has socialized health care. Sweden's survival rate is the highest in the world. Should you attribute that to their socialized health care?

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/health/news/11891554/UK-cancer-survival-worst-in-western-Europe.html

And it's not clear whether the UK has lower cancer survival rates than the U.S. or not, because the UK has a national database, while the US doesn't. So it turns out there aren't actually good statistics for the US cancer deaths, because there's isn't any central agency they get reported to. On the other hand, every cancer death in the UK gets recorded.

Re:Cancer survival [Re:H-1B Workers]

[Anonymous Coward]

My post was on my SPECIFIC type and my SPECIFIC chemo drug. I do not claim it is the case for everyone, and I only claimed for the UK. I just found it odd the UK only did blood tests every 6 months instead of every month in the US (which prevented me from "overdosing" on the chemo)

Not allowed [Re:H-1B Workers]

[Anonymous Coward]

Once wanted to apply for a job in the US. There was an option to enter my race. (Optional, I know). That would not be allowed to be asked.

In the U.S., answering that question is voluntary, and they are only allowed to ask in order to collect information to be used for statistical tracking. It's not allowed to be used in the hiring decision.

However, I am not sure that all companies have a firewall to keep the information away from the hiring decision.

Re: It's racist to think that indians are incompet

[Anonymous Coward]

Indo-chimp comes from "Indian national incentives, economics, et al which lead to an epidemic of code monkeys working in India."

There is absolutely nothing racist about that.

Is this some kind of satire?!

[SCVonSteroids]

From TFS: [ For developers who want to move up in the world, VisionMobile suggests "Invest in your skills. Do difficult work. Improve your English. Look for opportunities internationally. Go for it. You deserve it!" ]

No, just... No.
This whole "you deserve it" bullshit is the root cause of the self-entitled asshole epidemic we see today. Stop it.

Re:It's racist to think that indians are incompete

[Anonymous Coward]

would be racist.

Is American a race now?

I'm not amazed

[nospam007]

"Discovers North America Pays Better "

Small wonder, other countries offer decent/very good healthcare, up to 80% of last job's pay in case of unemployment for 1 or 2 years, >35 vacation days, paid sick leave up to 6 months or years, maternity leave, paid new parent vacation for 6 months or more, up to 5/6th state-guaranteed pension rights, free daycare, insurance for disability nursing/shopping at home, ...

Your Data SUCKS!

[Anonymous Coward]

These median salaries are a ridiculous misrepresentation of reality and averages.

Don;t get your hopes up kids, these salaries are only in the dreams of liars that participated in the survey.

Meaningless

[farble1670]

Along with skill level and software sector, developer salaries also vary widely by where they live in the world. A web developer in North America earns a median income of $73,600 USD per year, compared with the same developer in Western Europe whose median income is $35,400 USD. Web developers in South Asia earn $11,700 in South Asia while those in Eastern Europe earn $20,800 per year.

Yes, and that's meaningless if you aren't going to factor in cost of living.

astonishing considering EU is far more expensive

[micahraleigh]

Considering the costs of products are often 30% higher in the UK and EU than the US, the fact that North America pays better is a big deal.

It sounds like living anywhere else is costing you more and you're getting paid less.

Flu vaccine injections

[Anonymous Coward]

Are flu vaccine injections still mandatory for people moving to the USA?

Re:Well that's a lie

[jbengt]

And worker's compensation generally pays less than you would get in court, but prevents you from suing. (note that there may be big variations by state.)

AR?!?

[tlambert]

AR?!?

Clearly, Accounts Receivable is a harder problem than I thought it was...

High Salaries in high tech areas leave the same ne

[avivasatenstein]

Choose the cities with the highest software engineering salaries and you will find the highest cost of living. Include education, healthcare, insurance and housing. And don't forget commuting costs.