The Evolution of Developer Salaries: Looking Back 20 Years

https://codesubmit.io/blog/the-evolution-of-developer-salaries/#tracing-developer-salaries-in-america-from-2001-to-2019

by fagnerbrack • 5 years ago

102 173 5 years ago

So from $62890 to $92610 in 18 years.

That is only a 4% increase per year.

I am surprised it is so little. I recently looked up some old receipts I paid in restaurants and cafes from 11 years ago. And then looked up the same items in the same cafes and restaurants now. The prices roughly doubled. So these increased by about 6% per year.

If developer salaries increased slower than inflation, why is it still so hard to find good freelance developers? Could the explanation be that the market has been flooded with people who call themselfes developers but hardly grasp what is going on under the hood? And just glue external code together until it kinda works?

enriquto• 5 years ago

hardly grasp what is going on under the hood? And just glue external code together until it kinda works?

Wait, isn't this what all of us do? Do some folks really understand things?

ben_w3• 5 years ago

I try to, but I guess it depends what you mean by “really understand” — I’m happy so long as I know about the product logic, but @pjc50 has said of themselves something along the lines of “full stack at every level from the transistor to the UI” or similar (I can’t find a link to the actual comment, they post too much for that).

gambiting4• 5 years ago

I mean, I won't pretend I understand everything I do, but working in video games there's frequently no "external code" you can draw from, not even a Stack Overflow where you can ask questions. Over a year ago we got few prototype PS5 devkits dropped on our desks with some basic documentation available and were told to make it work - that's not something where you can ask for any help anywhere, because it's all NDA'ed and Sony engineers are extremely busy, so you just....have to figure stuff out by yourself.

sanxiyn2• 5 years ago

Yes, I do.

ido9• 5 years ago

Restaurant prices are not the only mark for inflation. Has inflation in the past 18 years been more than 4% per year on average?

thaumasiotes• 5 years ago

It doesn't look impressive against the CPI.

According to the BLS calculator, $62,890 in 2003 is worth $90,538.76 in 2021.

So after adjusting for inflation, salaries have risen by all of 2%?

ArtTimeInvestor3• 5 years ago

Depends on what you look at. Gold increased about 9% per year. The Nasdaq increased about 11% per year.

ben_w3• 5 years ago

This inflation calculator says the USA has had cumulative inflation of only 20%, not 100%, in the last 11 years; of 42% in the last 18 years; and of 48% in the last 20 years: https://www.usinflationcalculator.com/

I suspect your restaurant and café receipts are not representative of general price changes.

ArtTimeInvestor3• 5 years ago

I suspect that website is not representative of general price changes. Maybe it looks at things that got easier to produce so they got cheaper via efficiency. They just don't sell cheaper because of inflation.

Cthulhu_2• 5 years ago

They really aren't; I don't have concrete numbers, but most people agree that prices for restaurants and cafès have doubled since they introduced the Euro here. Even though officially it was illegal to do price hikes, many companies took the opportunity to do so, because while the new currency was worth 2x what the old one was, people still thought in the old currency's numbers. So 1.50 for a coffee or a beer stayed 1.50, after a little while people stopped trying to convert the value and just accepted the new normal.

frankfrankfrank• 5 years ago

This is unfortunately another one of those cases where the “government” + sycophantic institutions are essentially and deliberately fudging the numbers to make people believe something other than what is really happening, in essence, essentially also committing fraud. In the case of inflation, one way the trick works is that the basket of goods and services that are used to calculate the inflation are not at all reflective of the lived experience of regular people, let alone of most people.

It’s not really all that different than the fraudulent way in which the intentionally deceptive unemployment rate is calculated that is pushed by all the governments’ sycophants. In the USA that process drops people from the calculation by simply assuming disinterest in employment if one has been unemployed for a certain time (yes, it’s intentionally deceptive and manipulative, largely to defraud and cheat the markets and countries that are honest about their unemployment rates).

ShadowStats has been tracking the real inflation rate for a few decades now since a major change was made to fudge the number. It should be pretty eye opening for some people.

http://www.shadowstats.com/alternate_data/inflation-charts

On a side note; it strikes me as a rather perplexing challenge that people seem to have a hard time adjusting their thinking to control for deceptive and manipulative practices, e.g., everyone who pays attention knows very well that the U.S. governments inflation numbers are literal fraud, yet they are the very number that drives so many aspects of everything. It’s like that meme scene in Idiocracy … “but fraudulent inflation rates are what the market craves” … “yes, but they’re causing illusion and deception to spread throughout the system that will cause collapse and ruin“ … * blank stare * “but fraudulent inflation rates is what the market craves”

csomar• 5 years ago

The CPI that the government tracks is as good as their unemployment rate. It's indicative (it should raise if inflation raises) but has nothing to do with reality. These numbers were twisted so that they do not look very bad. If you read that unemployment is at 30%, you'll be protesting.

The reality is, life got a lot better in the last decade. If you are measuring by that, prices are actually down (or did not increase that much). Today's iPhone would have been prohibitively expensive (if possible) and many houses did not have the amenities they have today (washing machine, cable, tech gadgets, etc...).

Loic• 5 years ago

For another reference point, the "cost of life index"[0] in Germany went from 79,9 (in 2000) to 105,8 (in 2020), a 32% increase.

DESTATIS provide all the details of the calculations of this index and also how it changes over the years to adapt to the real cost of life (like everybody having a smartphone now but not in 1991).

[0] https://www-genesis.destatis.de/genesis/online?operation=pre...

durnygbur9• 5 years ago

As a dev based in EU, in any year I was at around 50% of the expected American level. The healthcare and social systems are so underfunded and overloaded in most of the EU countries that in case of any health or life problems I expect to receive "American-style" support (ie. ending up on the street, with bills and debt collection hounding me). Why even bother being employed?

ido9• 5 years ago

I don't know where in the EU you are but I live in Germany and had to have cancer treatment a few years ago & got outstanding care for no cost. Also having two children the amount of support we (and everyone who has kids) get from the state here is excellent.

durnygbur9• 5 years ago

This will last at most only 5-10 years more [1]. Poland, Romania, Bulgaria, Italy, Spain and Greece are brain-drained to the bone already. There is noone to come over.

[1] https://www.populationpyramid.net/germany/2020/

Cthulhu_2• 5 years ago

I live in the Netherlands and I pay nearly 150 / month in health insurance, my employer pays another heap, and on top of that I have a mandatory minimal deductible, medication that isn't on a list gets billed extra, and a lot of things are not covered by default (like glasses, physical therapy) or have a max coverage (like dental work).

aweb• 5 years ago

I'm sorry but you're exaggerating quite a lot. Were are you based? In France this is definitely not the case. Public care works and is efficient enough.

durnygbur9• 5 years ago

Poland.

finikytou• 5 years ago

I wouldn't say france works and is efficient enough. You can see the covid crisis as a revelatory of what doctors and hospital are going trough in france. underfunded, directed by people from business schools looking at profitability (less beds, merging services between hospitals, promoting their buddies/network, hiring people to recreate company-like hierarchy where you undermine anyone that is not in your team) the goal of the current government is to cut everything that they can and obviously they would love to have less public hospitals.

Not even talking about the building renovations that are near impossible, the medical devices that will never be next-gen and the idea of counting beds rather than patients.

Yes it works. it is not efficient. And it is putting immense pressure on doctors that are underpaid, underappreciated by management.

I can see where it is going and I think we will be very sad. They want all the bad sides of the american model + the bad sides of the french model. None of the good ones. And then on their business model and powerpoint the picture will look amazing. Just like any BS company tweaking their financials to look great.

gambiting4• 5 years ago

Where the hell do you live in the EU. I had to go to the hospital several times in the last 2 years and the level of care I received in public hospitals(for absolutely free) was great, wouldn't say a bad word for it. My father has been treated for cancer for over 8 years, medicines, operations, hospital stays - all provided without any delay.

I'm sorry if you have been wronged by public healthcare at some point, but you're just talking nonsense for the sake of it I feel.

durnygbur9• 5 years ago

The experience is nothing like this in Poland. One still pays the contributions.

ornornor• 5 years ago

I do t think you’ve ever experienced the brutal reality of living in the US: barely any employment insurance compared to the EU, two weeks notice before you lose your job only, just an ambulance ride and seeing an MD in the ER is a few thousand dollars before they even start treating you, getting cancer also means hundreds of thousands of dollars in medical bills (good luck without insurance), 0 days a year vacation prescribed by law, to only pick a few. Oh and free or nearly free education all the way to a masters degree at least. Not to mention other public services like mass transit. Or life expectancy. You’re better off in Europe.

np-5• 5 years ago

Pretty much none of this comment is true besides maybe the mass transit thing, which again depends where you live, if you're a dev in the US (as the OP you responded to said is their profession). This almost strikes me as a Reddit-comment-style parody, so maybe I was whooshed.

KDJohnBrown• 5 years ago

Two weeks notice? Only if the company cares about reputation, there’s zero legal requirement for notice or severance.

It is also pitifully easy to be denied unemployment. 8 years ago I was laid off from a failing startup with the option of 1 week’s severance or 2 weeks if we signed non-disparage / non-entice.

Everyone who choose 1 week was “fired for cause” and had their unemployment contested. Mine was contested after 4 months and I was forced to pay it back with a 50% “fraud” fee.

In America money talks and bullshit walks.

The irony is that this is why we hop startups every year or two. The only reliable way to get a significant income increase is to level up on popular new technologies at employer A and get employernB ton pay more.

msh• 5 years ago

I think you are generalizing way too much. While there are underfunded healtcare systems in the EU I dont think its realistic to say in most.

z92• 5 years ago

His conclusion :

In the years to come, industry experts expect low-level coding and programming jobs to become obsolete with the development of new tools that remove the need to code completely.

Me wondering how much of it shall we see.

danjac• 5 years ago

Without context, I could guess that quote could have been written at any time in the past couple decades. It's the "nuclear fusion" of our industry: one day someone will make it happen, but not as soon as you think.

durnygbur9• 5 years ago

It's like instant on demand video and voice calls. Science ficiton had been dreaming of it since the end of 19th century. Then suddenly... Skype. It will happen in the most obscure place.

arcturus172• 5 years ago

It's been discussed ad nauseam here, but companies love "no-code" tools until they find their limitations (which is often sooner rather than later) and then they desperately get out their wads of cash to have the problems they caused sorted.

This creates an entire ecosystem of "low-code-real-developers" who have the skill, commercial foresight (and possibly patience) of working inside the guts of low-code tools, doing Java, JS or what-have-you, but inside an ugly, sparsely-documented propietary API instead of an open-source framework with literal gigabytes of documentation and knowledge accumulated in Stack Overflow over the course of fifteen years...

So now instead of two in-house analyst-developers building business applications, you have Mark from Marketing & Sales building apps in low-code, and four "low-code-high-code" contractors on expensive contracts cleaning up behind Mark.

And so it goes...

sanxiyn2• 5 years ago

Being able to do something by oneself is such a huge advantage over telling someone else to do something that it can compensate for lots and lots of disadvantages. HyperCard was a great success, and I have high hope we will have great low-code tools like HyperCard in the future.

nickthemagicman• 5 years ago

Haha this is the business model for every project I've ever worked on in Tech is.

Hire low paid developers to 'save money' at the start.

Low paid developers present working prototypes that aren't scalable or maintainable but the biz people don't know that ,they just see working demos.

Years later the app is a nightmare and the low paid devs have moved on and now they have to pay out the nose to get people to actually work on their stuff.

And so it goes.

rutthenut• 5 years ago

I think that sort of claim has been made for decades already, repeated by each generation of programming language, 4GL tools, AI and graphical tools.

tonyedgecombe3• 5 years ago

An example from forty years ago: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Last_One_(software)

RegBarclay• 5 years ago

As the developer tooling improves and parts of my job get easier, I sometimes think I may be out of a job someday. But then I talk to some users or other non-devs about technical issues and realize I will always have a job.

after_care• 5 years ago

The delta in technical expertise between the average dev and the average user is so large that there will always be economically viable ways for the dev to spend their time.

rory3• 5 years ago

The thing is, high-level languages like Python are already a really efficient way to communicate requirements to a computer, and we've already seen a massive shift from low-level languages to high-level languages in applications that don't need low-level control.

Developer tools and user interface components will likely continue to get easier to work with, but chunks of functionality that we compose with arbitrary code in between will always be a better model than a "no-code" monolith we configure.

Nasrudith2• 5 years ago

Personally I see lawyers as "proof" that taking the highest level won't be sufficient to do away with devs. That and many of the non-technical specifications emphasize that there must always be someone to specify the details and make sure they are consistent and handle the nasty corner cases.

TheCoelacanth2• 5 years ago

Yes, I think the doom-and-gloom predictions are dramatically over-hyped.

I'm pretty sure that software development has had by far the most effort put into automating it of any job that has ever existed, simply because every person capable of doing the job has the same skills necessary to automate it.

That has done nothing to decrease salaries for developers. If anything, it has raised them, simply because developers can now produce more useful things in less time and at lower overall cost.

np-5• 5 years ago

The way I see it, at the end of the day we still live in the real world with real, imperfect business/social/etc processes. Unless the entire world is 100% standardized and run by robots, any technological no-code solution would still need to be Turing Complete. At that point, basic computer science principles need to be learned to use it, so all you've done is create another programming language, which again...we already have plenty of those.

visarga2• 5 years ago

Me wondering how much of it shall we see.

Have you heard of RPA? It's a low-code/no-code way to automate mouse and keyboard actions on top of desktop and web applications.

vfc1• 5 years ago

At least the freelance rates of today are about the same value as in the early 2000's, for the typical enterprise job.

I used to work as a freelance around 5 years ago, and I still receive some recruiter emails with occasional mention of the going rates.

It's the same as 5 years ago or less, which is the same since I remember in the early 2000's.

The rates took a hit with the 2008 crisis and stagnated since then. I think the golden age was somewhere in the mid-90s, where developers got paid really well.

tonyedgecombe3• 5 years ago

I stopped contracting in 2001 (in the UK) and the rates I was charging then don't look much different to what is on offer today. It doesn't help that the UK tax authorities have been waging war against contractors, their latest wheeze is to force them into being employees.

burntoutfire• 5 years ago

The rates are heavily dependent on the skillset. I.e. for people well-versed in the latest and "greatest" tech, it's typically 500-600 pounds per day, for everyone else it's 300-500.

unnouinceput• 5 years ago

Quote: "In the years to come, industry experts expect low-level coding and programming jobs to become obsolete with the development of new tools that remove the need to code completely. Take for example the role of Web Developers when it comes to building websites. With popular CMS tools like WordPress and Squarespace, almost anyone can build a website for their business, reducing the need for people who know “just a little bit of front end web development”. "

Yeah, not gonna happen. Low level code, if anything, is going to become even more popular with the current explosion of IoT. You have this 4th generation becoming in full swing (1st was mainframes in 50's/60's, 2nd was PC in 70's/80', 3rd was web/mobile in 90's to 10's, and now Arduino/Raspberry/MicroBIT for IoT) and I swear is the same stuff under new hood. Plenty of people want fully integrated stuff and blings around them, which means in next decade IoT is going to be what smartphones started from 2008 to 2015.

Second - Sure mom and pop can do basic stuff in Wordpress, but once they want something unique guess what? PHP developer to the rescue to adjust their Wordpress site. So no, if anything, it's going the opposite direction, more code, more software. So the <need for people who know “just a little bit of front end web development”> is going to be shifted to mom and pop and that's all...at best.

mritchie712• 5 years ago

I think "low level" here means "low skill level", not the programming definition [0]

0 - low-level programming language is a programming language that provides little or no abstraction from a computer's instruction set architecture

osigurdson• 5 years ago

I would like to see some concrete examples of what is meant by low skill level "programmer" work. In my opinion, programmer, developer and engineer mean the same thing. Is there a market for "Hello, world" that I am not aware of?

sumtechguy2• 5 years ago

IoT is dead in the water right now because of the same reasons smartphones did not take off until iPhone. The dataplans suck. Steve Jobs insisted on unlimited data for a flat fee. If you go look at the M2M offerings for most data providers you will see they do not list prices. That is for a reason. I personally saw many of the actual prices. The ranged from 'not bad' to 'you got them to agree to that?!'

You can piggy back on customers networks to a point on 'home automation'. Everyone is trying to be the next modbus/zigbee on that one but charge a monthly fee for the privilege of using their protocol, or even better their service. The integration between services is kinda crap and the ecosystem is very shaky with no clear winners.

Bespoke systems are doing 'ok' but again no clear winners yet. Most seem to be setting themselves up to be bought out by some bigger player instead of shipping good product.

What we found with IoT was it was not the software or hardware. We had that 15+ years ago. The problem is integration and maintenance and connectivity. The integration phase you can see sales cycles of 2-3 years. Maintenance ongoing cost no one really wants to pay for. Connectivity is at the mercy of someone elses price plans.

mywittyname3• 5 years ago

I think the issue is that IoT is not really broadly useful for normal people.

IoT devices have been a big thing in the manufacturing/industrial sector for a while now, because collecting telemetry on equipment is extremely valuable. The growth in ML has been a huge value-add in the sector.

I can't really see the value in IoT devices for the consumer market. There are niche applications which may appeal to a small group, for example security systems or climate control. But, for the most part, there's really no obvious "killer app" for consumer IoT devices. The few ideas with potential are already getting integrated into the iOS ecosystem (health monitors).

Nasrudith2• 5 years ago

The data plan certainly doesn't help but the fact most IoT devices actively put time and money into providing anti-features like demanding an unnecessary connection for basic functionality, an unpredictable sunset period of 'whenever we go out of business, get bought up, or just feel like it', needless privacy issues, and needless vulnerability to hacking and viruses and expect people to pay more for it including recurring charges? Using ubiquitous computing to turn their devices into dumb terminals which must defer the home server?

It is downright stupid runaway greed run amok while viewing themselves as entitled to customers - they couldn't make their contempt for their customers clearer if they had put photos of themselves flipping the bird twice to the customers on every box and giving making every product name a combination of three to five randomly chosen swears and insults.

If they actually started with an appliance and asked "what features would a customer find useful" instead of "what can we charge them for and put behind a pay-gate" then we would have something worth considering. Washer/dryer unit which can text or email you when your load is done and can be programmed in sequence? Great. Smart locks for changing entry codes remotely and phone communication with an app? It is actually made for its niche.

Instead their strategy is like including a remote triggered bomb in every product and then wondering why people rarely buy their stuff.

burnthrow• 5 years ago

CMS replaced the guy who turned your .doc into HTML (this used to be a job). Many of these people became LAMP CMF specialists. That transition was at least a decade ago. Sysadmin roles have been under the most pressure since.

visarga2• 5 years ago

So no, if anything, it's going the opposite direction, more code, more software.

That's the paradox, the more we automate, the more work we have to do. All because of scope creep.

spartan8312• 5 years ago

This is good to hear, and I've felt that a lot of people are underestimating the IoT explosion that is to come. The automotive industry is just finally on the cusp of it. Buy a new high end appliance, and you can probably connect it to a network. Everyone loves "smart home" accessories. I think demand is going to sky rocket.

sokoloff3• 5 years ago

Why would I want to buy a fridge in 2021 with 2018-era tablet embedded and expect to use that fridge in 2035 with who knows what WiFi standard changes in between?

I’d pay extra to not have a tablet embedded in an appliance.

mfontani2• 5 years ago

Both charts purportedly show stats for 2001-2011.

Is it the case the first shows 2001-2011, and the second 2011-2021?

6gvONxR4sf7o• 5 years ago

Both charts...

There are four charts. Are you referring to the just the top pair labeled median 2001-2011 and mean 2001-2011 which are in the “From 2001-2011” section? Those are 2001-2011.

If you want later ones you’ll have to scroll down to the section titled “From 2013-2019.” There’s a pair labeled median 2013-2019 and mean 2013-2019. Those are the 2013-2019 ones.

mfontani2• 5 years ago

Ha! Missed the tiny "mean" vs "median" difference between the first two. Thanks!

swyx• 5 years ago

this is subject to the same issues all salary surveys have - they dont take into account stock based comp, which is responsible both for the huge amount of variance in comp by years of experience and for the increase in total comp over time. the conclusions you can draw from this are really not that meaningful in total.

fatnoah• 5 years ago

That is definitely a big miss. Looking only at cash, my rate of compensation increase was about 7.5% per year (in reality, it was typically a couple years at 1-2% with some big jumps). When stock is factored into the equation, the average jumps to about 12.5%!

adamc• 5 years ago

The article needs to compare against salaries in general to distinguish changes in developer salaries from other trends.

tosswayaway2• 5 years ago

Question: Should I be struggling to afford a 1000 sq ft house and maintain it? I want to get a bigger house but it feels like I’m getting priced out of the market right now. Fortunately I already have this small home which I used a loan from my retirement to put the 5% down payment on, paid off the loan and refinanced a couple of times, so I’m not struggling to pay for that, but it’s nowhere near big enough for my partner and I to both work remotely. It’s not in a super trendy area or new, actually near a bunch of seedy motels and pawn shops. I’m taking off work and crawling under my house to fix the furnace so I don’t blow through my savings. I don’t go out to eat often or much more than the occasional fast food or take extravagant vacations, usually just road trips to visit family or national parks. I have spent some money on replacing appliances and remodeling, but nowhere near a down payment on another house. I only bought this place because I was living in someone’s attic and it was getting old. I’ve been dev for 8 years, have always gotten stellar performance reviews, manage people, and get bonuses. Just feels off to me. Everyone else I know doing well has some kind of side hustle like managing properties. I myself was freelancing the past year in my free time trying to make some extra cash. True I’m doing better than many people and I am saving for my retirement, but it seems like a dev salary in this day and age should at least buy you a decent house. Everyone I know got a down payment from their parents. Is this normal? Where’s the money at?

ChuckNorris89• 5 years ago

I want to get a bigger house but it feels like I’m getting priced out of the market right now.

LOL, come to Germany where you're by default priced out of buying any house period unless you get some sizable assistance from the bank of mom and dad.

Everyone I know got a down payment from their parents. Is this normal?

It's normal if you've won the lottery of birth. If not, then, as someone else here said it, "get richer parents".

tosswayaway2• 5 years ago

If there’s any Daddy Warbucks out there that wants to adopt a 30 year old son, please let me know.

hiram1122• 5 years ago

This is depressing. For the last 15 years or so, when housing prices started accelerating rapidly in most of Anglosphere and much of the developed world, Germany was always touted as a country with sane and stable prices (with the exception of Munich, I remember). Then after the housing crash, things began to recover, and I'd heard Germany was still affordable, with the exception now of Berlin and Frankfurt, which were rising quickly.

But now I imagine all areas, even cities without a lot of tech and finance to push up prices, are becoming unaffordable to 80% of the millennial generation looking to buy their first home. Even in once low cost areas in former East Germany

Same thing is happening to once affordable 2nd and even 3rd tier cities in the US. Homes in my very low cost origin city in the Midwest are up almost 50% in just 7 years or so, and half that increase in the last year. And unlike cities where land is tight, there are farm fields in every direction, so unlimited room to grow. But something (lack of supply, money printing, immigration, low interest rates, massive price collusion, who knows?) is putting insane pressure on prices.

zeku• 5 years ago

I feel the same way. I've been a dev for a few years now, make 150% of the median household income in my area by myself.

Even once I finish my student loan payments I will be in the same position as you. I live in a Medium cost of living area of a LCOL state.

All of my friends are doing okay even with way less personal income than myself, because of their parents money. I happened to come from a single parent home with no resources.

It's pretty damn clear to me that people of our generation can not expect "The American Dream" unless their parents give them a bunch of money or they become a very high income earner themselves.

medium_burrito• 5 years ago

In the US, in the states where we can make decent money, yes, it is normal. If middle class is defined as being able to afford a modest house/condo and retire at 65, yeah, this country is fucked.

My experience parallels yours for 20-40 house owning friends in the Pacific Northwest. People got help from parents, or got lucky with IPOs (a minority of us for sure), or have trust funds, or bought in when houses were less than $500k.

So much of the market is a combination of real estate investors, private equity and foreign investors. I know a bunch of boomers who basically own several properties, and just keep buying them up. One guy in LA owns several hundred now in his later years.

EDIT: Also obviously massive asset inflation due to QE Infinity, which has more or less fucked everybody who has cash or a low net worth.

ryandrake3• 5 years ago

Same observation here. Things are bifurcating into 1. a (mostly younger) underclass whose savings will never catch up with prices to the point where they can own real estate / stocks without help from parents, and 2. a (mostly older) capital class who own multiple, sometimes dozens of properties, robust 401(k)s and pensions, and use those assets as leverage to buy more and more assets. The middle class "family without help owning a single home they live comfortably in" is vanishing.

eulers_secret2• 5 years ago

Same place right here.

I've been living WAY WAY below my means. I drive a 15 year old car, I live in a 1br apt (wife and I, 650 sqft). I've also been pushing forward in my career with as much zeal as I can muster. I'm also putting my wife through grad school (though she'll never make much, English degree - I'm just glad I can enable her to chase her passions) I don't have high other bills, currently have an iPhone 7 and don't plan to upgrade, my PC is 8 years old, etc.

I've managed to just this year save up the down payment for houses in my area... but it's kinda dumb, because I really can't afford a house (mortgage/higher utilities/repairs/etc). So I'm in limbo: I have a LOT of cash saved, that should be invested (especially now), but I might buy a house in 5 years so I keep it liquid.

I also want to say that I tied home ownership (or at least living in a house) to having children - I don't want the stress of bothering my neighbors on top of child stress. So I haven't started a family, and I don't see a path to starting one. I think I have been priced out of having a family and it makes me so so sad.

At least I'm a dev, my non-dev friends may as well not even bother getting up in the morning. They will never, ever, ever gain enough capital to be a owner. If their parents are broke, they'll die having only lived in apartments. This also makes me very sad.

I don't see prices going down. I guess I could move, and I am kind of planning a remote/low cost play after COVID is over and I can get an understanding of how stable remote work is. I'd hate to be stuck in the boonies of South Dakota looking for a dev job because things "went back to normal". Holding pattern forever.

Kalium• 5 years ago

I also want to say that I tied home ownership (or at least living in a house) to having children - I don't want the stress of bothering my neighbors on top of child stress. So I haven't started a family, and I don't see a path to starting one. I think I have been priced out of having a family and it makes me so so sad.

I see this a lot. Generally I see it from people who were raised outside urban areas, with a very white-picket-fence lifestyle. It turns into a great deal of stress in people's lives and relationships, as they often literally cannot imagine having children without a detached single family house and a yard and so on. I've seen some of them take major financial risks to try and work up what feels like enough money, with depression resulting if doesn't work.

The people I know who grew up in urban apartments often have none of these hangups. They regard occasionally hearing your neighbor's children as a fact of life.

zaphod12• 5 years ago

Only comment is that keeping your money in cash instead of invested for a 5 year horizon isn't wise. Put them in something on the safer side - I'm not saying buy Bitcoin or something - but that's a long time to have your money not be working for you at all. Interest rates at way below inflation.

ficklepickle• 5 years ago

Please see a good financial professional (not a bank employee). You don't need to struggle through this alone.

Any FP worth their salt should be able to make you significantly more than you pay them. And they will help you set your financial goals and reach them.

My mom is an FP and she would sort you right out. That stress and uncertainty would be gone.

ecmascript• 5 years ago

Answer: Yes, but it depends.

I have basically double the size of your house as living house, a guest house that is about 800sq ft and a big ass barn. I could afford it pretty easily but it needs a bit of renovations.

Also, I live about 45 min drive from the nearest city with a population of about 12k. I basically live in the middle of nowhere but with a big house.

I work remotely so I can live here, which a lot of people today struggle with. The trick is to live where no one else lives. In my country there is a massive urbanization going on and living in our capital where I am from is very expensive. A 3 bedroom apartment would cost more than my farm.

I don't know if you should be struggling, but I guess everyone kinda is. Everywhere I look there is people that seemingly have huge amounts of cash but what you need to know is that basically everyone sucks at money. Most of the western lifestyle is provided thanks to loans.

This talk changed my life for the better when it comes to economics and I recommend it to everyone: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8-Li_sFNc4Q

I sold my new car, bought an old volvo from -97 and I save about 60% of my income. That is helping a lot so I can afford to renovate the house. What you need to do is simply to live for much less than you earn, that way you will for sure end up financially secured.

kingnothing• 5 years ago

Leave the Bay Area, you'll afford a large house and car just fine.

parentheses• 5 years ago

I feel that these numbers hide a lot:

(1) There is a small percentage that are being paid what I consider to be a fair income. They are being paid in very competitive markets. They are getting valued in a HCOL market where demand for engineering talent is higher.

(2) There is a large percentage that are being paid something like a "developer status quo". A salary that:

- doesn't acknowledge that software developers are _capable_ of generating inordinately large amounts of value (and considered in aggregate, mostly do)

- treats all work done by college-educated individual contributors as of roughly equivalent value

- cannot be too high because "we can't pay you 2x what $other_person_of_value makes"

- cannot be too high because "we can't pay you more than what $your_manager makes"

(3) Developer skill levels vary greatly. This means that the average developer is just that: average. Average developers simply do not generate the kind of value that top-end developers do.

EVa5I7bHFq9mnYK• 5 years ago

"low-level coding and programming jobs to become obsolete" What is low-level coding: Verilog or HTML?

The Evolution of Developer Salaries: Looking Back 20 Years

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