That example salary for CS is not an outlier. It’s a typical offer from FAANG and such for CS new grads from top schools. Math majors from same schools can receive an offer north of 300k on Wall Street.
Some tech workers who do well in math/computer sciences also excel in the humanities-English et al fields. They could do well in any field. Their verbal skills may also help them in the cs fields- creative thinking… I like that someone mentioned that sciences are part of the liberal arts.
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Yes, computer game design seems like an attractive area to get into from the viewpoint of a high school or college student, but the reality is that getting the product out by deadline is extremely important, without relaxing standards of quality. Hence the extreme time pressure and workload at certain times of year.
No way is $150-170k “typical” for new graduates in CS. ~$110k is more “typical” from three of the “big four” in CS (CMU, MIT, UCB). A specific company’s “typical” pay may be significantly higher, but such a company is likely to be more selective in hiring, or have other reason to need to pay more to attract people to work there.
https://www.cmu.edu/career/documents/2018_one_pagers/scs/1-Pager_SCS%20BS%202018%20rev%202.1.19.kc.pdf
https://capd.mit.edu/sites/default/files/about/files/GSS2017.pdf
https://career.berkeley.edu/sites/default/files/pdf/Survey/2018EECS.pdf
https://career.berkeley.edu/sites/default/files/pdf/Survey/2018ComputerScience.pdf
This information is from Blind. I can confirm some of these numbers based on offers my DD and her friends got. In addition to that they get relocation funds.
Google
116k base, 10% or more annual bonus
130k stock
50k sign-on
FB:
115k base, 10% or more annual bonus
150k stock
80k sign-on
Apple:
130k base, unsure of bonus structure
90k stock
30k sign-on
Uber:
110k base, 10% or more annual bonus
110k stock
20k sign-on
The bulk of investment bankers and tech employees differ in all of the metrics you listed.
I previously linked to a survey showing an average of 42 hours per week for developers in the US, with managers/VP pulling up the average and software/CS type positions pulling down the average. If you search for specific well known SV companies, the vast majority are in the not much above 40 hours range. For example, I searched for Google employee hours, and the first link the came up was quora (removed link) /How-many-hours-a-day-do-Google-employees-work-on-average , in which the Google employees replying to the question mention ~8 hours is typical, and go in to more detail about various exceptions or special situations. As mentioned in my previous post, there are also many exceptions. I could list a minority of companies where working well above 40 hours is typical, as well as a minority of companies in which many software/CS work well below 40, sometimes remotely. I don’t have personal experience with banking, but most surveys I have seen of WS IB suggest 70+ hours per week is typical.
Career length also tends to be different. Most HYPSM… types whose first job in in tech hope for a career in tech and related fields. However most HYPSM… types whose first job is in investment banking do not hope for a career in IB and related fields. Instead most plan to leave after a few years and do something else. For example, the most recent Harvard senior survey mentions 35% of students plan to work in finance + consulting , but only 7% plan to still be working in finance + consulting after 10 years, while most who plan to work in tech plan to still be working in tech in 10 years. This partially relates to some banks offering a “two and out” program where the plan is stay for only 2 years, as described at https://www.vox.com/2014/5/15/5720596/how-wall-street-recruits-so-many-insecure-ivy-league-grads . Among those who stay longer, it’s my understanding there is a lot of culling and only a small portion of analysts continue to associate, a small portion of associates continue to VP, etc.
Tech is very different. It’s quite common for tech employees to change companies quickly. Many of the most well known SV companies keep tech employees for less than 3 years on average. However, the vast majority of these continue working in tech at a different company, often in a similar position to their previous one. Few switch industries or plan to switch industries. Again there also numerous exceptions among specific tech companies or types of companies, including some with starting salaries on par with the most well known SV tech companies. Some do earn millions when their start up goes public and retire or decide tech is not for them and switch to an unrelated career, but this is more the exception than the rule. Most continue working in tech for many years, a much longer average career length than investment banking.
Salary structure is also very different. It’s my understanding investment banking often has a salary progression. After ~3 years, a promotion and job title change is possible that may result in large salary increase, sometimes nearly doubling compensation. Much of this compensation may be tied to bonuses. Large tech companies do usually have different job title levels, but generally have far more mild changes in salary with those job title levels, which is a point the original article tried to highlight. More modest salary increases are also standard without changes in job title, often each ~1 year. Compensation may be highly dependent on stock value. Again there is a lot of variation at specific tech companies or types of companies.
I could go on, but the point is while tech and IB both often have high starting salaries, by most measures, the bulk of tech employees and tech positions are very different from wall street banking and should not be grouped together.
It is indeed an outlier. As previously posted, none of the top CS schools I am aware of list any FAANG computer software grads with starting salaries of $170k in their post graduate survey and instead list a median salary of ~$110k. As listed in the earlier post, both MIT and CMU’s maximum was under $170k. These same colleges reported FAANG as among their most common employers of students. I don’t doubt that it is possible, as a rare few were quite close to this threshold, but those few were outliers from the more typical not much above $100k. A $300k base salary offer would obviously also be an outlier, and would be near impossible for a new grad with a bachelor’s degree.
However, there is a trend toward moving into less technical roles (e.g. management) at higher seniority levels. This is not unique to computing or engineering, since a common career aspiration (and social expectation) in many fields is to move up the ranks in management. Individual contributors at higher seniority levels tend to be uncommon.
I agree than a significant portion do move into more management related positions at higher levels of seniority, or take on increased management related activities while still spending their bulk of their time on tech activities. However, unlike many other fields, larger tech companies often have separate and comparable job title levels for technical and management, which often have similar base salary ranges for tech and management. For example, Google employee job title levels are below. These L5+ levels tend to be more senior employees. The vast majority of employees on LinkedIn at these more senior levels have job titles on the tech track, rather than the management track. Many tech types prefer to remain on the tech track, and there is ample opportunity to do so. In addition to management, a significant portion also prefer to move into more independent or flexible hours roles such as entrepreneurship, consulting, or isolated projects of their choosing.
Level 5 – Senior Software Eng (tech track) or Software Eng. Mgr. I (manage track)
Level 6 – Staff Software Eng (tech track) or Software Eng. Mgr, II (manage track)
Level 7 – Senior Staff SW Eng (tech track) or Software Eng. Mgr. III (manage track)
Level 8 – Principal Software Eng (tech track) or Director (manage track)
Level 9 – Distinguished Software Eng (tech track) or Senior Director (manage track)
Level 10 – Google Fellow (tech track) or Vice President (manage track)
At higher seniority levels, the opportunity to stay in a more technical individual contributor role narrows, especially if changing employers, where the most senior applicants are expected to be elite, rather than merely good. Hence the percentage in management or other roles tends to increase at higher seniority levels.
I would add to this discussion that a LOT of BA/BS recipients go on for further training or degrees. Every MBA earner began with a baccalaureate degree, which could have been in CS, English, Psychology, Economics, or even – as in the case of my daughter – Art. Looking at mean salaries of BA/BS recipients doesn’t help very much in understanding career paths or strategies.
I’ve mentioned before that careers are more like going up a climbing wall than a ladder. There can be numerous job changes, employer changes, breaks for added education, relocations, etc.
“That example salary for CS is not an outlier. It’s a typical offer from FAANG and such for CS new grads from top schools.”
You’re confusing base salary with total compensation, as your next post shows.
"Google
116k base, 10% or more annual bonus
130k stock
50k sign-on
FB:
115k base, 10% or more annual bonus
Apple:
130k base, unsure of bonus structure
Uber:
110k base, 10% or more annual bonus"
Base salaries usually are not higher than 125-150, because again hiring managers have budgets, that’s why the 170K is an outlier. They can be more flexible with stock and signing bonus.
I don’t want to belabor the point, but you and I are obviously talking about different type of tech workers. The type of STEM students who have opportunities in both high tech and high finance (not investment banking jobs, BTW) has competitive offers from both industries. That’s why compensations for them have become comparable from either industry. At that level of compensation, the stress levels are comparably high too.
The tech jobs that have been the focus of this thread and tend to have the highest base salary generally expect new grad hires to have a CS degree. They also tend to have interview questions that students without a CS background (or at least taking a few specific types of CS courses) would be unlikely to answer correctly. I’m not sure what type of non-banking finance jobs you have in mind, but the finance jobs I am familiar are far more flexible in expected/required degree backgrounds . The overwhelming majority of hires for such finance jobs do not have CS degrees and were not contemplating a similar salary SV tech offer. This results in a very limited overlap between the discussed tech (CS/software) and finance groups.
As such, rather than tech companies setting job offers to compete with finance, tech companies set are far more likely to set salaries to compete alternative job offers at other tech companies. For example, Apple, Facebook, and Google may all want to have competitive salaries with each other for intro software engineering type positions in SV. Many other SV tech companies also offer salaries that are competitive with the more well known names mentioned above (may substitute stock potential or other benefits over base salary), which can help in getting students who have multiple choices to accept job offers from their company over the bigger names. Historically ,this SV tech company competitive salary level has often been very different from the salaries at elite finance type jobs I am familiar with. The two have not tracked each other well over time, suggesting tech jobs were not basing salary based on finance jobs. However, I agree that the initial starting salary has become more similar between tech and finance in recent years, which relates to why CS has become the most popular major at a good portion of “elite” schools in recent years, with far more CS majors than in previous years.
Again, I’m not sure what type of non-banking finance jobs you are referring to, but the ones I am familiar with have completely different typical stress levels, as measured by things like average hours worked or on call.
^Investment bankers aren’t the only jobs on Wall Street. Financial firms (mostly hedge funds, other money management companies and big investment banks) are investing heavily in technologies, for their own survival in a competition with fintech companies as well as other financial services companies. They need talents in AI, data science, quantum computing, blockchain related technologies, etc. The two worlds are converging.
If “senior applicants” is defined as years worked in the industry, then I do not agree that most senior applicants are expected to be elite. Most senior applicants are also not expected to be managers.
Based on my personal experience, experiences of others I have spoken with at different companies, and what I have read; tech companies are more likely hire for managerial positions from within rather than externally. This contributes to managers tending to have more years of experience at that same company than technical track types.
Regardless of whether hiring externally for managers, companies generally do have hires targeting experienced employers, rather than just looking for new grads. These experienced hires are often for technical positions, looking for a particular combination of experience and skill sets that is rarely found in new grads. However, this senior external hire with desired skill set doesn’t necessarily mean he/she is “elite.” Many companies regularly hire experienced tech (non-managerial) employees with desired experience and skillset, who show little indication of being “elite” (defining “elite” as top % ratings), compared to other employees at that company.
I agree that the percentage in managerial roles tends to increase with years worked in the industry, as well as the percentage spending a portion of their time on managerial tasks in addition to spending the bulk of their time on technical tasks.
I’ve been hesitant to add more into this discussion as many of the topics are hitting close to home. But I guess if I keep it pretty high level I’ll be ok. I’m not basing this post on surveys or postings on other websites but rather on what our S is experiencing now. For context, he just finished the first week of his senior year as a CS student.
I’m not sure about the job market in other areas, but the market demand in SV is high. He now has 3 offer letters in hand and is expecting another next week. All the offers are in locations bounded by San Francisco to the north and mountain view to the south. The companies range from the very large publicly traded, to privately held unicorns, to a small well funded startup.
On the topic of base pay, I’m not sure that what’s been described here as an outlier is, in fact, that uncommon. However, I do need to say that my S has very specific knowledge of a niche technology within a larger, in-demand CS field. Once stock options/RSUs and bonuses are added-in the total compensation package is impressive. Signing bonuses are in all offers and the benefits (meals, transportation, vacation, etc) are are attractive.
With offers in-hand, our S is still weighing the benefits of grad school for an MS. I’m not sure which path is better, but his decision making has been pretty sound so far, so we’ll see.
Such positions are more the exception than the rule. The overwhelming majority of new grads at selective colleges who take high salary finance positions do not go into the listed fields, and the overwhelming majority of new grads at selective colleges with CS degrees choose more traditional “software engineering” positions, rather than the listed fields.
As an example, Brown’s public information at https://www.brown.edu/campus-life/support/careerlab/undergraduate-post-graduation-employment-by-industry-employer-sector is especially detailed, and has some unique filter options. Over the most recent class, the average for CS majors were are below. Only 3.6% took jobs in finance fields. ~Half of those who who did take finance jobs majored major in economics and variations, but there were many other non-economics majors as well.
Most common industries for CS majors
58% work in computing
13% work in entertainment (likely includes gaming)
5% work in retail
3.6% work in finance
Most common employers of CS majors
- Microsoft
- Adobe
- Amazon
- AppnNews
- DropBox
Top CS colleges with high average CS salaries show a similar pattern. For example, CMU’s 2018 SCS career destination and salary report is at https://www.cmu.edu/career/documents/2018_one_pagers/scs/1-Pager_SCS%20BS%202018%20rev%202.1.19.kc.pdf and summarized below, listed in order of number of hires. Few go into finance, and instead software engineer positions at Facebook, Google, Microsoft, Amazon, and similar well known names dominate.
- Facebook (27 hires) -- Most are "software engineer"
- Google (21 hires) -- Most are "software engineer"
- Microsoft (13 hires) -- Most are "software engineer"
- Amazon (6 hires) -- Most are "software engineer"
- CMU (4 hires) -- Most are "research associate"
- MemSQL (4 hires) -- Most are "software engineer"
- Uber (3 hires) -- Most are "software engineer"
How long before these stock options vest?
It depends on the company. For new grad software hires at larger SV tech companies, stock options gradually vesting over the course of ~4 years is typical. Companies often have a back loaded vesting schedule to encourage hires to stay at their company. Some companies have no or low vesting during the first year.
Yes, these positions aren’t meant for the English or history majors, or even economics majors from the Ivies or the like. They aren’t for the run-of-the-mill CS majors either.