• CanadaPlus@lemmy.sdf.org
            91·
            2 years ago

            Yep. Few people where I live envy the US, but if you’re a developer the money is no joke. You have to expect that eventually all those big American tech companies will start offshoring, given the crazy money they could save.

            • dan@upvote.au
              3·
              2 years ago

              I moved from Australia to the USA since salaries for developers are so much higher here. I live in Silicon Valley which helps too. If you’re a senior developer (say 5+ years of experience) then a lot of the large companies here pay $200-300k/year salary plus $100-200k/year in company stock plus a bonus that’s 10-20% of salary if you get a good performance review.

              • Doxatek@mander.xyz
                1·
                2 years ago

                Ugh. Holy shit I went into the wrong field 🥲 I was just a kid. I didn’t know better

                • dan@upvote.au
                  2·
                  2 years ago

                  I got lucky since I’ve been into computers and programming since I was 8 years old (late 90s). My first job when I was at school was a part-time developer at a tiny IT company that did consulting work. Since then, all my jobs have been software development jobs.

                  The fact that it pays well in places like Silicon Valley was a great bonus. I moved here 10 years ago (when I was 23) after I got a job offer, and the starting salary was literally double what I was getting paid in Australia at the time.

                  The job changes a bit as you get more senior - there’s more mentoring of junior devs, project planning, deciding what your team should focus on, etc. I still spend a lot of my time writing code though, and still enjoy it. :)

                  There’s some downsides to living in Silicon Valley. A lot of stuff is expensive (that applies for California in general, but especially here). Housing is extremely expensive too.

        • pomodoro_longbreak@sh.itjust.works
          2·
          2 years ago

          How many years experience? It took me a few years before I started making a decent wage.

          Definitely keep honing your skills and applying around for different jobs, and taking jobs that you can use to “leapfrog” to other, even better jobs.

            • pomodoro_longbreak@sh.itjust.works
              7·
              2 years ago

              Okay that is getting up in years. I was about there when I started to get more aggressive with the salary I was asking. You could probably start on the developer I -> developer II -> senior developer career path.

              Do you look at other jobs much? Do much networking? Talk to other devs about their salary? Even just grabbing a lunch with some workmates from time to time can help get you in the right mindset of recognising your worth.