It's expected that money is negotiated. Companies that have bands usually have pretty wide bands and then the band you're in is also negotiable. Most companies will have a vacation policy of some sort which is hard to negotiate against.

Vacation is more visible which can make it a problem. This also creates a "negative vacation" problem- people working on weekends, holidays, long hours and during their "vacation".

What would you compare between Germany and the US? Perhaps a more adequate comparison is US salary level vs. vacation days across different companies. Also a very hard/noisy compare.

We should do an HN survey... (I'd be interested in how much vacation people are getting/taking).