Well that is not what I said.
So what do you pay your freelancer designers? I highly doubt they earn 100$ per hour?
What I meant is that if you can earn 100$ as a developer, you can afford to pay a designer for 50$. If I thought that design was worthless, I would have recommended do-it-yourself design.
$100 is very reasonable for a quality designer--personally I find $75/hr to be a good rate for the type of work I'm looking for.
My whole post wasn't geared towards your comment--so I apologize if it came off that way.
Did not mean to imply this was your view.
My point was, many people assume design is the least important part of a web site.
This mind-set is flawed, because design is very important. Not the most important part--but still very important.
There is a reason some designers charge $25/hr and some charge $100/hr, and the $75 you save today may (or may not) cost you $1,000 tomorrow.
I was lucky to find some affordable designers, but I am all for giving them their money's worth. I can't design at all, so I respect good designers for their work.
While an average designer probably does make less than an average developer, often people are quick to assume design isn't important--and therefore not worth paying for.
Sure it's easy to throw a design together and make something look decent.
But to have a designer that understands color theory, spacing, typography, usability/accessability, being able to "lead your eye" along with many other important skills--you have to be willing to pay.
Just like you can get a programmer that can technically program--but has no experience, no understanding of design patterns and has barely heard of this SQL thing--but they can still program your site, and that's good enough for you.
I think it's a mistake to penny pinch when choosing a designer. It will come back to bite you in ways you don't expect.
Like causing confusion among customers, increasing your bounce rate and ultimately affecting sales.
I recently went through the process of finding a designer and had enormous success using freelance sites such as getafreelancer.com (not affiliated).
I received about 30/40 replies. While I only need 1 designer, I now have 4-7 quality designers that I can go to for quality work in the future.
The short answer: You get what you pay for. Just like in every other profession.