There’s probably a bit of a disparity, but it’s not nearly as much as you’re making it out to be.
In the US it depends greatly on the industry and company - I don’t know anybody making 200k-400k in software development (CTO? sure. Devs writing code? Nah), but I also don’t know or work with anybody that’s in FAANG world. Those are the companies paying $100k+ for a junior.
I live and work in a lower cost of living area, for a company that’s not ‘software first’ and our juniors come in between $50k-75K. And that’s not the lowest I’ve seen for junior engineers starting out.
That said - it’s also not unusual for mid-career folks to be in the $100-150k range, and seniors/leads moving up from there.
So with all that in mind - some of it is market forces (are there more devs and/or fewer dev jobs in Europe than in the US? Potentially less mobility?) but one of the bigger causes (I’d guess, anyway) is the lack of FANG type “Master of the Universe” companies. Part of the reason juniors and seniors command that kind of pay in the US is because the rates that the FANGs pay tend to ‘trickle down’. The average senior/mid career dev may not be interested (or capable!) of working at a FANG - but if the other people in their hiring pool are, they’re still going to command that kind of salary.
As a point of comparison - my understanding is that financial services is sort of the same thing. Most Euro bankers/stockbrokers/finance bro types are pretty heavily underpaid compared to their US counterparts. Some of that is regulatory, but a lot of it is that there are more higher paying jobs in the US, mostly at the big multinantional conglomerates you can think of off the top of your head (Goldman Sachs, Bank of America, Citibank, JP Morgan), and that tends to drag the scale up throughout the whole system. A rising tide raises all boats.
Anyway - I don’t have any research or statistics to back any of these suggestions up - hopefully Cunningham’s Law gets us a ‘real’ answer. :)
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There’s probably a bit of a disparity, but it’s not nearly as much as you’re making it out to be.
In the US it depends greatly on the industry and company - I don’t know anybody making 200k-400k in software development (CTO? sure. Devs writing code? Nah), but I also don’t know or work with anybody that’s in FAANG world. Those are the companies paying $100k+ for a junior.
I live and work in a lower cost of living area, for a company that’s not ‘software first’ and our juniors come in between $50k-75K. And that’s not the lowest I’ve seen for junior engineers starting out.
That said - it’s also not unusual for mid-career folks to be in the $100-150k range, and seniors/leads moving up from there.
So with all that in mind - some of it is market forces (are there more devs and/or fewer dev jobs in Europe than in the US? Potentially less mobility?) but one of the bigger causes (I’d guess, anyway) is the lack of FANG type “Master of the Universe” companies. Part of the reason juniors and seniors command that kind of pay in the US is because the rates that the FANGs pay tend to ‘trickle down’. The average senior/mid career dev may not be interested (or capable!) of working at a FANG - but if the other people in their hiring pool are, they’re still going to command that kind of salary.
As a point of comparison - my understanding is that financial services is sort of the same thing. Most Euro bankers/stockbrokers/finance bro types are pretty heavily underpaid compared to their US counterparts. Some of that is regulatory, but a lot of it is that there are more higher paying jobs in the US, mostly at the big multinantional conglomerates you can think of off the top of your head (Goldman Sachs, Bank of America, Citibank, JP Morgan), and that tends to drag the scale up throughout the whole system. A rising tide raises all boats.
Anyway - I don’t have any research or statistics to back any of these suggestions up - hopefully Cunningham’s Law gets us a ‘real’ answer. :)