From that post:
“Value of shares is stock’s fair market price at vesting”
Now we’ll have to agree to disagree.
My whole point in bringing it up in the first place is that they can be a great adder to salary and should be viewed as such.
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Yes, but not number of shares.
Not at all true in my experience. Seemingly uncommon enough that Schwab don’t even bother mentioning the possibility: https://www.schwab.com/public/eac/resources/articles/rsu_facts.html
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We may want to move the discussion of RSUs to its own thread.
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Sometimes there is a high personal cost to go with the high salary:
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You may need a year or two of experience, but a lot of travel nurses make more than $100k. This is a sore spot for many staff nurses.
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I am not in the tech world, but this seems counterintuitive. The attraction of working for stock compensation in a high growth company is upside as the value of the stock increases between issuance/grant and vest dates (when you can sell it). In fact if you are very bullish about your company, you can exercise an 83(b) election which taxes you immediately on the FMV of the restricted stock at grant so that any gain is taxed as a capital gains.
For kicks, I looked up Google (Alphabet), Meta and Apple employee stock programs and at the time of grant, they are expressed in units=shares, not a dollar amount. Now for new employees or for existing employees who are told that they will receive $xxx in RSU’s at a future grant date, that determination is = $ promised/value of shares at grant (could be closing price or some avg price) – maybe that is what you are recalling?. I think it would be unusual to base the number of RSU at the time of vesting for a couple of reasons. First as mentioned above, it reduces the upside potential during the vesting period (it is more like deferred comp than equity). Also as part of each Plan, there is a designated number of shares reserved for the Plan. If this number is not set at the time of grant, then it will be harder for a company to budget granted awards to come within the Plan limitations. Investors in startups would also balk at these plans. I think they are fine with giving employees incentives that align with the stock price. But in a situation where employees are granted more shares when the company’s value goes down, the incentives are misaligned as investors besides having a poorly performing company, get diluted to boot.
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You could be right. That’s how my son’s company framed it though. It’s also how it’s expressed on Levels and Blind. No bigs either way. My point wasn’t to get into the weeds, a place I’ve kept us 
, but to point out that stock can add a significant amount to compensation.
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I’m sure there are young folks on both sides - no doubt there - just not that many city lovers from my school/area.
I suspect the appeal of where I live is why many around me don’t want to go elsewhere - people move here, not away from here. We’re increasing in population well beyond the norm. The area is semi-rural and many love it, plus kids here often want to stay close to family. Even when kids visit city colleges, more come back turned off by the atmosphere than turned on, esp if there’s no college bubble for the campus.
My own kids also prefer more rural living, though my medical son lives in the city to be close to his residency. My other two purposely bought land/houses away from cities, though near enough to go to one if they want to for something. It’s very similar to where we live, even if in totally different areas.
I grew up in an area that was rural and poor. Many left it, including many of my classmates. Jobs are difficult to find, the climate is harsh. It’s easy to see why other places appeal more, whether cities or not.
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While many examples have been listed, I think the answer to the “how common” original question is that, among the 4,000,000 college graduates every year, $100k plus is quite rare - a fraction of a percent.
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Just pointing out there are about 2M people graduating with a bachelors degree each year. 4M includes those graduating with Associates, masters and PhD degrees as well, per the link you shared above.
That was exactly what I was wondering. How many hours per week are expected for that high salary.
I know IB and consulting you are expected to work a ton of hours for that salary. Not sure about tech and CS.
I have one kid who loves urban living and one who loves the suburbs. They are also opposite in almost every other way.
S is working about 50-55 hours a week in consulting. Fortunately no weekend work as yet (although he’s definitely working more hours than any of his college friends). His FAANG roommate is not doing much more than 40 hours so far (both of them started this summer). They are both in the office pretty much every day, as they feel it’s important to absorb the company culture, and get face time with senior people (especially given the impending recession, which they are very conscious of).
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I think it depends both on the company and how critical what they are doing is in the moment. Our son has “unlimited time off,” but has done as much as literally doing two full time jobs on two different continents for a short stretch, to putting in as little as a few hours in a day. I think it goes without saying that when it’s go time, it’s busy. For some companies, it’s always go time.
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Varies by firm and group. Google and Microsoft are expected by kids to be 40hrs/wk. Amazon perhaps 45. Stripe I’ve heard does 50 or more. Citadel is probably 55-60 for software engg jobs, and so on.
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CS kid didn’t put more then 40 hours except when on call. On call it’s one full week 24/7 every couple of months. Her boyfriend in IB puts really long hours and only has one day off
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My CS kid survived 2 lay offs, got promoted 3 times and only works 40 hours. Unlimited vacation, so far she’s been to Europe 3 times already since the end of travel restrictions.
These kids have it made.
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It’s true that IB can be a lot of work. It’s analogous to a medical residency, in that it is an intense amount of work for a fixed duration, but it pays better, and the worst case scenario is that you kill a deal rather than a person.
For undergrads entering IB, it’s a two year commitment, and recruiting for post-IB position starts very soon after joining the IB program. If you happen to get on a good team in your IB company, they are very understanding of the recruiting process and will work with you to lighten your schedule during recruiting season.
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Yes. You should think of the 2yr IB stint like medical residency and training. My son tells me that finance is much less stressful than being in medicine – you don’t kill anyone by mistake 
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I’m afraid that parents browsing through this thread may take it as a norm. It seems everyone AND their cousin is getting $120k+ offers with their diplomas.
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