We're curating a small group of SF-based Engineers for a fun night of Texas Hold'em, tacos and AI chatter.

RSVP for location, +1s welcome.

done

done

Is the visa hard to get? How long did it take?

Theoretically 5 months (3 months to is the business panel, 2 months to apply for the visa). Took me 10 months because I didn't quite get everything perfect the first time.

If you've worked in SF or NY I'd say you're almost guaranteed acceptance. Otherwise I've heard it's pretty hard to get, and it will come down to your credentials and business.

It's not a full list, I'm adding new entries every day. Happy to include Turkey if you send over the details.

Both Italy and Spain have the same regime. It can take a year or two to set everything up, but you get citizenship and a passport (not a temp visa)

Italy at least is much more lenient, allowing you to go back as many generations as you like to prove Italian ancestry.

Ah, the magic of the Tiquet Resto and 38 days of paid vacation/year ;)

Is that literally a meal voucher?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meal_voucher

Yes, usually 10-20 Euros a workday.

Fixing.

Cheers! Just trying to help out.

To quote Hackers[0]: "We demand free access to data, well, it comes with some responsibility."

[0] - https://youtu.be/Rn2cf_wJ4f4

Absolutely, I really appreciate it.

From personal friends, I know you can get paid >120k EUR if you have 5-10+ years of experience.

I would be interested to know what these friends do.

From my personal experience in game-dev in Berlin, the highest earning coding individual-contributor (so not a manager) salary I ever saw was 70-something €k per year (and it is quite rare to go above €65k even as a very senior programmer).

You will literally have to be C-level at a large and succesful company to earn €120k+ as far as I can tell (in this sector).

Game development is famously underpaid. After all, you're competing with wide-eyed 23 year olds with no bills or family who have dreamed of making games their whole life.

I was apparently pretty well paid at my last job (Game Dev) at 68k EUR a year.

Also, note that a lot of Europeans quote salary after tax, which can make a big difference.

    you're competing with wide-eyed 23 year olds

Not for senior/lead roles (I've done hiring in several companies). There are lots of people competing for junior roles but its still not that easy to recruit true seniors (10+ years work experience).

> salary I ever saw was 70-something €k per year (and it is quite rare to go above €65k even as a very senior programmer).

That's my impression as well, of the job market in Berlin as dev contributor in many industries. There exists just rock solid ceiling at 70k EUR and that's it. No idea about stricte managerial roles but these are oftentimes reserved to native Germans and the competition is beyond fierce so forget about it (unless you are Abmahnung, Betriebsrat, and Arbeitsrecht virtuoso).

I’ve not experienced managerial roles being reserved for native Germans in the Berlin tech industry at least - had plenty of non-German managers.

Haven't the game industry always relied on offering a "dream job" to underpay?

Sure, I expected web devs to earn maybe €80-90k but not €120k+

I cannot confirm this at all. I have some friends who work in Germany (I left several years ago to the US), and even those in senior tech jobs with years of experience only get up to ~80k EUR and the sky-high taxes push that down to <50k.

I'm working in Munich in a reasonably senior role (but <10 years, of which <3 years at that company), total compensation is ~120k Euros before taxes. It's not super common, but it's definitely possible.

Literally the exact same offer I accepted for me, but in Berlin. I prefer Bavaria but all my biz is in Berlin. +1

In my experience this salary is only available for team leads and only in some companies. Certainly not for 5 years of experience.

However sometimes there seem to be like parallel realities when it comes to salary.

Usually, the Isreal/Tel Aviv tech scene is "grouped" with the European scene. A bunch of publications cover Europe + Israel, so I figured why not.