Why do Salaries in SV Suck So Much?

[skris4]

Originally Posted by aramax666

I suppose, its not that different in India.

The most dynamic / ambitious folks in my undergrad went onto do finance/Managment to the best Business schools in india. I was atypical as well.

However, I lucked out to some degree, in that, the last 5 years were a good time to be an CS/EE engineer.

I feel fortunate. But is it really true? that law pays more than CS?

Big Law salaries are standard. Here is an article with numbers...
NY To $190K!? Which Firm May Be Raising First-Year Salaries? | Above the Law

[BicoastalAnn]

It depends and you have to consider projected career longevity, industry stability, cost to entry, etc.

Just observing among my friends in NYC and SF, comparing the ones who went to top schools:

- Lawyers made more at starting, engineers made more long term due to high salaries at companies like Google, Facebook, etc. plus RSUs
- For excellent, top tier people in both fields, within 10 years after graduation lawyer made partner and engineer became high level tech executive. Latter made more money comparing those 2... talking about VP-level
- Lawyers need 3 year J.D., engineers don't necessarily need M.S or Ph.D but I don't know what the expectation is

If you don't go to a pedigree school, I think it may be significantly more difficult for lawyers to find a job much less one that makes >$100k. But I do know several engineers who went to state schools and are now at relatively well known schools although not Google and the likes. IDK about salaries there, but I imagine the RSUs would be worth it.

[silverkris]

Originally Posted by BicoastalAnn

It depends and you have to consider projected career longevity, industry stability, cost to entry, etc.

Just observing among my friends in NYC and SF, comparing the ones who went to top schools:

- Lawyers made more at starting, engineers made more long term due to high salaries at companies like Google, Facebook, etc. plus RSUs
- For excellent, top tier people in both fields, within 10 years after graduation lawyer made partner and engineer became high level tech executive. Latter made more money comparing those 2... talking about VP-level
- Lawyers need 3 year J.D., engineers don't necessarily need M.S or Ph.D but I don't know what the expectation is

If you don't go to a pedigree school, I think it may be significantly more difficult for lawyers to find a job much less one that makes >$100k. But I do know several engineers who went to state schools and are now at relatively well known schools although not Google and the likes. IDK about salaries there, but I imagine the RSUs would be worth it.

It's like this:

Engineering/tech is far, far more egalitarian in terms of where you went to school.

Law, unfortunately, seems to care a bit more about your pedigree with regards to hiring.

[BicoastalAnn]

Originally Posted by silverkris

It's like this:

Engineering/tech is far, far more egalitarian in terms of where you went to school.

Law, unfortunately, seems to care a bit more about your pedigree with regards to hiring.

Just a bit? Haha these days I think most would say if you want to be a corporate lawyer, you better go T14 or bust. Personal injury lawyers can make an ungodly amount of money without the pedigree, but this is so variable it's like saying a successful tech entrepreneur can make a lot of money. Most don't.

[duffdog]

Originally Posted by DamienThed

"Non-immigrant engineers are absolutely worth more to tech companies and command higher wages, which tends to breed jealousy in immigrant engineers who are not worth as much. "

With all due respect I do not agree. You need to open the eyes and look at the reality now. Bay area attracts top smart guys from all over the world. How could you be so confident that non-immigrant engineers are absolutely worth more and should command more salary? Unfortunately I heard many H1B engineers are actually paid more than non-immigrant engineers. I'd say both top and under performers would exist in any group whichever it's Asian, White, non-immigrant or immigrant. So don't be too generalize.

I have not logged onto this site for a long time and I figured I should respond to your post. It seems to me that you are frustrated that immigrant engineers do not command higher salaries when it appears that the qualifications of immigrant engineers either matches or exceeds that of non-immigrant engineers. I can assure you that this is absolutely not the case. A PhD from non-US university is equivalent to an average BS degree from the US. I'm sure that this sounds mean at first glance, but coming directly from a computer science PhD from Berkeley who used to teach PhD students in Beijing, I can tell you that the students in China were capable of literally memorizing all of the material she talked about during lecture and repeating it back to her word-for-word, but were absolutely inept and incompetent at creating new processes that previously did not exist. And these were the finest students in the University... I will stop there. In my field (videoconferencing engineering), I was sent to India to do hardware integration because a firm with offices there could not find an integrator who was confident or qualified enough to commission the system in the ENTIRE COUNTRY OF INDIA. Do you think that when I arrived in India and had to train these guys on what I was doing differently and how their system design was a failure that they did not resent everything about me and secretly hope that the population of the USA get blown off the face of the earth? Of course they did. It is simply not possible for someone who is less talented to consider how someone else could do something better than they can without even trying.

Fortunately, most high net-worth families in China are aware of the disparity in education and make it a point to get their kids educated at US institutions like Stanford. I will bet you a box of doughnuts that a PhD from Stanford commands 2x the starting salary of a PhD from any non-US university. (I actually know that this is true from personal experience, but betting someone doughnuts is fun to type).

But that is not the whole story. As you are no doubt aware, experience trumps everything. And by experience, I don't mean engineers who have "done stuff", what I mean is Engineers who worked on projects or for companies who destroyed their competition at every turn are more prized. Lets take automotive engineering for instance; if you worked on the hybrid engine management system algorithms at Toyota or Honda, and another engineer worked on the engine management system for Skoda, (see where I am going here?) The experience of the designers who made ground breaking products trumps a lifetime of engineering at a company who struggled to make inroads as even a mid-line, bargain basement product. So, lets say you have a video engineer who worked at Barco, and another who worked at Shenzhen Xinpengbo Electronics Co., Ltd. making huge numbers of bad copies of older Barco products. Which engineer would YOU hire for your new groundbreaking US made product? Keep in mind that your task is not simply to make a product, but to make the BEST product in the world. To make the best product, you can't look at who wants the job, you have to look at who is currently doing the best job and steal them from that company.

[buenos]

Originally Posted by duffdog

I have not logged onto this site for a long time and I figured I should respond to your post. It seems to me that you are frustrated that immigrant engineers do not command higher salaries when it appears that the qualifications of immigrant engineers either matches or exceeds that of non-immigrant engineers. I can assure you that this is absolutely not the case. A PhD from non-US university is equivalent to an average BS degree from the US. I'm sure that this sounds mean at first glance, but coming directly from a computer science PhD from Berkeley who used to teach PhD students in Beijing, I can tell you that the students in China were capable of literally memorizing all of the material she talked about during lecture and repeating it back to her word-for-word, but were absolutely inept and incompetent at creating new processes that previously did not exist. And these were the finest students in the University... I will stop there. In my field (videoconferencing engineering), I was sent to India to do hardware integration because a firm with offices there could not find an integrator who was confident or qualified enough to commission the system in the ENTIRE COUNTRY OF INDIA....

You are implying that the education in Europe is as bad as it is in Asia and Africa. Like if the USA was the only one civilized country on the planet.
For example the school I went to in Hungary, the alumni won 4 Nobel Prizes. The entire country of India all schools alumni combined won only one Nobel Prize. The top 3 schools of each country in Europe (including eastern, southern, northern, western Europe) are very strong schools. Although the schools outside of these top3 in each country are not that good. Like one engineering school, one economic school, one med school, or something like that.


Most SV engineers are from Asia, so maybe that is all you can see? Companies dont go to eastern Europe (where average income is 1/5...1/8 of SV incomes) to hire H1Bs. They only do it from Asia. Most hiring managers who request H1B hires are from the same Asian country as the candidate is from, and often even related. European managers dont do this kind of nepotism, so we dont multiply ourself this shameful way. Possibly a reason why you didnt see European engineers in the SV.