Note that this is true for many reasons, not all of which are related to technical ability. Not everyone should try to get a FAANG job, either.

Factors candidates may consider:

* how much time they want to spend interviewing/prepping

* what their previous experience has been

* where they went to school

* where they are willing to live

* what type of work they like to do

* what type of organizations they enjoy being part of (largeco, smallco)

* how much control they want over their work

* what kind of impact they want to have

* how much they want to learn (and what type of knowledge--general vs specific)

In addition to salary, all of these play a role in determining whether a startup, small biz, other software company or FAANG make sense for an individual.

I mean "how much time they want to spend interviewing/prepping"?? If a FAANG will average 2-3x payout, it would be insane not to be willing to prep for literally months if that made the difference between getting a job and not.

It's not for me (or you) to decide for others, however :) . I just think there are many more dimensions than raw salary to consider. You could work like a dog for 5 years at a FAANG, make a ton of money, and die just after you retire. It's all weighing the risks and rewards and there isn't a formula for that.

BTW yes, 2-3 months of free time to prep may not be worth it given:

* one will miss/sacrifice other aspects of life

* one may not get the job. Nothing's guaranteed, after all

* the job may not be right even if they get it

At that salary you're looking at probably a 15 minute commute. By bike even if your office isn't in SF itself or you don't mind the hills. It's the startup employees in the bay area that don't have the money to live closer or have their own places.

>You could work like a dog for 5 years at a FAANG

From what I've found, startups and non-tech companies work you a lot more than FAANG especially if you're not looking for fast promotion in FAANG.

(A $1.5M mortgage is around $6k per month today.)

And at the end of the year, even if what’s left over in terms of percentage of income is the same (and it’s usually not, because many COL expenses don’t scale linearly with the cost of housing), you end up with more in the bank to send your kid to college or to retire.

You are presenting a theoretical ideal that is probably close to unattainable.

- how many tech startups are in Birmingham?

- how many VCs would be OK funding a startup in Birmingham? I know we're in COVID era now, but how long before VCs again start telling you to move to SF/SV (or perhaps NY)

- how many 150k salaried tech startup jobs are in Birmingham? I'd estimate in the single digits, probably zero.

EDIT: looks like copy/paste deleted some of the post, adding back:

$450k is likely $200k base, $40k bonus and $210k RSU (source levels.FYI). Most lenders won’t touch RSUs unless you had 2+ years at the same income level and even then they don’t like it. So taking 45% DTI (debt to income) ratio of base + bonus nets $9000 payment (principle + interest + taxes + insurance) and translates into $2mil purchase price assuming the hypothetical person also has $400k downpayment and reserves. That price point gets something like this:

https://www.redfin.com/CA/Mountain-View/2507-Alvin-St-94043/...? (3/1.5 1500 sqft 5800 sqft lot)

Let’s say RSUs take care of savings/extras.

Schools don’t look great for this house. This is where commute comes into play - you can trade long commute for more house and better schools.

Unfortunately, the geographical reality of Bay Area mean that there isn’t a lot of middle ground between short commute/lots of cost/other trade-offs or very long commute, but better everything else.

If you want a house, median is above $2M: https://sanjoserealestatelosgatoshomes.com/mountain-view-ca-...

Another thing to consider is that housing stock in Mountain View is very old on average, so the $2M price point doesn’t get you a mansion, but rather a very modest house (especially when considering that we are talking about TWO MILLION DOLLARS after all)

I earn well, so granted I'm not turning down as much as some would, but to drag out a tired old saying, I work to live, I don't live to work. I have plenty of things I want to do - some of them I can do in the right job, many I can't.

Of course one of the luxuries of already earning well is that the multiple of my current salary it'd take to convince me to take a job I don't actively love the sound of is far higher that it otherwise would be.

I don't know many other professions where high salaries are pretty much a given, without cutthroat competition among your peers?

You can get high payouts building a company, becoming a top lawyer or medical professional, but the investment in time, effort, and money is much higher, and the chances of success are lower.

Could I speed this up by another 5-10 years by moving to California to help monopolists serve ads, suppress competition and lure users into walled gardens? Sure I could. And what's wrong with stoking the world's most overpriced und undersupplied real estate market with another willful participant in the process.

That said, "insane" strikes me as an extreme choice of words for someone forgoing this golden opportunity.

My experience in the one of them has been the opposite of what some of the bullet points implies, or at least in a 'positive' direction.

I know for a while the rumors were basically that if you hadn't gone to a place like Stanford, you weren't getting a job, at least at Google (Maybe Facebook too?)

Is this still the case? (Was it ever the case, or were things a more flexible?)

If you have experience already, where you went to school gets dramatically less important the more experience you have. I went to a decent (but definitely not top tier) state school and have 15 years experience, had no trouble getting interviews at FAANG companies and passed interviews at a few.

This is at all relevant only for getting into the interview process, which is something that is largely handled by recruiting. Once a candidate makes it to a phone screen with someone like me, where they went to school has no bearing on whether they move forward in the process.

And most importantly, the company can afford to pay well. Not quite FAANG level, but plenty for you to reasonably plan to retire (in a FIRE way) at 50 instead of 65.

And heck if it does hit, you’re early enough for a nice cushy bonus.

edit: yes the difference in comp is easily 100k+, but making 180k+ cash to not be a small cog in a gigantic machine, to me, doesn’t sound that bad

The only realistic value to assign is zero.

It's not guaranteed like a FAANG salary (which actually isn't completely, the past few years have seen great stock appreciation), usually it takes a few rolls of the dice, but it's just not accurate to describe it as a definite 0. Startup selection ability pays a serious role here, I've seen people whose picks I shake my head at consistently, and some people who can home in on successful ones like heatseeking missiles. If you're the type to take the story of a business person about lofty valuations and prospects at face value, though, you're probably going to have a bad time and end up bitter and talking about how bad a deal startups are on the internet.

But basically, you really need to do your homework and treat it like you’re making an investment.

For everyone else, the last point is CRUCIAL

> treat it like you’re making an investment

Remember, if you are giving up a market total-comp package (e.g., 200 or 300k+) for a below-market startup package -- you are literally investing the difference. Treat the difference as an investment.

Also keep in mind, unlike public stock or real estate investments this major, you also often have no visibility into financials -- discount for that.

You also cant sell when you may need to -- discount for that also.

Unlike a property or stocks, you dont get interim dividends/yield -- discount for that also.

You may also be forced to invest heavily or forgo stock if you leave the company -- discount for that.

If the company sold for $10 million, I would have ended up with about one years worth of the lower end salary...which was about 1/2 of what I could make from an average offer in rural parts of the US.

Ten years later, the company finally sold.

And you're kinda simultaneously arguing it's a good outcome and a bad one, in both cases the reason is the founder owned most of it. The net is that it's a mediocre outcome, just that in this case one guy did ok. If you can get nine other people to contribute towards building up your side project to sell for an average market price of the technology and business, you can get more, sure. But it's not "successful startup" more.

Not really... he's been working on the startup for 7 years. Let's assume he had an average salary of 150K during those years. Plus he got $3.7M on the acquisition (it's not clear from his post if that's what he takes home or if it's pre-tax). That's 4.75M.

Now let's assume a senior engineer in FAANG with a an average salary of $350K for 7 years. That's 2.45M. That's a very rough comparison and not taking into account taxes (the FAANG engineer is likely to pay more money in taxes overall).

But the bigger difference is how he spent those 7 years. He spent it building and managing his own company with all the freedom in the world. Compare that to a senior engineer in FAANG...

Update: someone in the comments mentioned he'll likely not need to pay any federal tax on the acquisition money. That makes a huge difference and the take home gap is much larger than my initial estimate.

I'm not saying running a company is not stressful. Of course it is. Even is it's yours and no one can fire you. But it's very different when you're the one who is making the decisions and not depending on other people and politics.

I don't even like VCs and I feel like what was pulled here was pretty galling. How does someone rationalize calling up an early investor and telling them to eat their investment because...more money for me?

Of course plenty of people prefer to work at startups because the environment is more fun and you have direct influence on what ships and often direct contact with customers.

Remember when Google suddenly gave an across-the-board 10% raise to every employee to try to stave off defections to startups? Sure, there are certain jobs that are fun (depending on your interests) and of course it's easy to find "phone it in" positions at FB and Google, but most of my friends avoid FAANG or are glad they left.

Once your comp hits $X there's more to life than money.