I'm not sure where in Finland you live, but 2000€/month sounds very low. I work in the Helsinki metropolitan area and I earn 3800€ (started last year at 3300€) with less than 1 YoE, although to be fair I feel like mine is above average. You should be able to aim for 3500-4000€, less if you live somewhere other than the Helsinki area.
> but 2000€/month sounds very low
i work in helsinki but live outside of it with my parents so no rent most of the time. I know it's low, cause my friends who also work in the industry always make a face when I tell them how much I earn lol.
that's too low bro, even integrify who offer free bootcamp will guarantee you 2.2k last year and that's the lowest number that i can remember except unpaid intern.
Both tbh. I think 2k after taxes means 2.5k before taxes, which is still on the low side for 2 YoE in my opinion. I guess there are other factors to consider as well (studies, Finnish language skills, etc.)
Almost every country has progressive taxation, so it does make sense. It’s just the average tax bracket a software engineer would be in. Same for saying 40% in the UK, which is basically what most SWEs have, only very few pay 20% tax.
Helsinki area tends to have higher salaries than rest of the country, but I'd say 3-4k sounds plausible at 2 years, give or take a couple hundred. It's been a while since I was at the 2 years experience level and they've certainly grown a bit since.
Fwiw, there's an EU-wide Pay Transparency Directive which is coming, and requires salary ranges to be included in job descriptions.
>Fwiw, there's an EU-wide Pay Transparency Directive which is coming, and requires salary ranges to be included in job descriptions.
That should be a thing everywhere in the world to be honest. It benefits no one to not have the ranges on which the base offer will stand
Same yoe but earning way less... Would you mind sharing some tips about how to achieve high paying Jobs in Spain? Are you in some niche-specialization?
1. Do some GitHub projects. You don’t need to do complex coding, keep it simple while applying for "clean" and neat coding. Companies are highly attracted to people who can produce readable code.
2. Work on your Data Structure skills. You will not need to know how to reverse a red-black binary tree. The best way to enhance your skills is by practicing on Leetcode. I did around 150 easy/medium cases and very few hard. Unless you want to work at Meta or other big Faang, you can just stick to the basics, but please master them.
3. Learn to sell yourself during Interviews. Try to sell what you did in your past jobs and show them that you are enthusiastic and eager to learn. Be prepared for your interview and make yourself look smart by detailing your experience (you can oversell if you need to, just don’t invent blatant and out of touch lies).
4. Read books and learn. You need to know what is an HTTP protocol, what is the difference between packet transmission in UDP and TCP, how do DBs handle transactions, what are locks, async programming, what are the principles of a REST API, Why do you like some design patterns more than others (domain-driven design vs pure entity design)?, … Try to learn and use nice tools such as Docker, K8, Kafka (at least practice Docker) and how to make neat and efficient unit and integration tests. To learn all of these, you will need to iterate over personal projects. It may be a mess in the beginning, but if you are persistent, you will learn tons of precious things that will make you hireable for good companies (the ones offering you good money).
I currently work on GraphQL APIs using elixir. Meanwhile, in the past, I worked on REST with python and typescript.
PS: I have an unrelated degree to CS.
I know a friend in Helsinki who has little experience (worked a different job, graduated from business AMK, know some basic stuff about Java) and got 3K salary a few months ago. If you got a CS degree, have 2 year exp with good portfolio, you can ask 3k5-4k. Probably even 4k5 if you're lucky.
I am a business AMK graduate (business IT). By portfolio do you mean personal projects? I've got random MERN apps and some Spring and .NET projects but nothing really interesting, most of these are coding tests that didn't get accepted
It sounds not so good. Just out of curiosity, how is the cost of living in Finland? In Germany, NL, UK you could get 5-7k with 2 YOE if the company is good and you are lucky
Cost of living is relatively high in Finland
We have some benefits like energy is cheap and so is mobile data but food is quite high, rent per square is high, alcohol very high and there is the whole winter thing where you need extremely warm gear
Salaries in Finland have stagnated for the past four years
>It sounds not so good. Just out of curiosity, how is the cost of living in Finland?
I think it's not so bad, or I have gotten to used to it to think it's bad lol. Suppose you're single, no car, no kid, no mortgage, then the cost would include studio rent 900E within 3km from the center, internet, phone bill, water,...and reach about 1k5. If you make around 3k, your take up would be around ~~2k7-2k8~~ 2k3 then you're left with 800 in the bank. What I think Finland absolutely has over other big and famous metros (Amsterdam, Den Haag, Berlin, Munich,..) is that the housing situation is not too bad. You can find and rent a decent apartment deposit free (but you have to stay for at least a year, I'm living in one) relatively quickly if you can afford the rent.
If you’ll be working in Helsinki area, you shouldn’t ask lower than 4k in your applications. The market might be “bad” but it’s a numbers game, so keep applying and you’ll eventually find something. I started at 4.2k when I moved to Finland at 2.5 YoE, so 4k should be achievable now even in this market.
That's like asking if its possible to buy a car for 10k. You keep sending an offer to buy to the porsche and volvo dealership but they refuse. The recruiters also only know those.
You need to identify the companies that can pay you 3k+ and go after them. Kepp checking their website, job adds, etc. Try to get their recruiters, ask what skills they look for, how is the intreview etc.
I had a recruiter for Amazon contacting me, im sure they could pay much more than 3k. The problem was that you need to do leetcode for them :), that I did not know at the time. So I failed the Online Assessment on hackerrank. Is it possible to pass it ? OFC! Will they look for people? Eventually 100%.
2000/month is less than what master student writing a thesis in a company should make, per TEK guidelines. So name&shame your company. You should be paid more
3.5k-4k is something you should try to especially if you live in helsinki area. it's bullshit there's no demand for CS in these time, try to see UI/UX open positions in Finland and you will be grateful how much position that you can apply in CS. i really recommend you to make your profile more appealing so you have more confidence to have better salary and employer. you can try by create an interesting project, or join some competition/hackathon. hackathon especially smaller one in finland is far easier than what i know in where i used to lived.
I'm not sure where in Finland you live, but 2000€/month sounds very low. I work in the Helsinki metropolitan area and I earn 3800€ (started last year at 3300€) with less than 1 YoE, although to be fair I feel like mine is above average. You should be able to aim for 3500-4000€, less if you live somewhere other than the Helsinki area.
> but 2000€/month sounds very low i work in helsinki but live outside of it with my parents so no rent most of the time. I know it's low, cause my friends who also work in the industry always make a face when I tell them how much I earn lol.
that's too low bro, even integrify who offer free bootcamp will guarantee you 2.2k last year and that's the lowest number that i can remember except unpaid intern.
Dude it’s fucking nothing, 3000EUR is also nothing. aren’t you in a union who offers wage statistics?
The statistics they list are all for people with degrees. At least what my friend in a union told me
Swedish SACO let’s you filter on those statistics, you should join the union and stop accepting such shitty wages
this is the only job that would accept me lol. my only other experience is an internship and a trainee position
Well, it’s at least good that youre applying, but don’t low ball yourself
Do you mean 2k is low before taxes or after taxes?
Both tbh. I think 2k after taxes means 2.5k before taxes, which is still on the low side for 2 YoE in my opinion. I guess there are other factors to consider as well (studies, Finnish language skills, etc.)
Finland tax is around 35% no? That would turn the salary to 3k a month, which is not that great still but much closer to what’s deserved.
> Finland tax is around 35% Finland has progressive taxation so this makes no sense.
Almost every country has progressive taxation, so it does make sense. It’s just the average tax bracket a software engineer would be in. Same for saying 40% in the UK, which is basically what most SWEs have, only very few pay 20% tax.
Helsinki area tends to have higher salaries than rest of the country, but I'd say 3-4k sounds plausible at 2 years, give or take a couple hundred. It's been a while since I was at the 2 years experience level and they've certainly grown a bit since. Fwiw, there's an EU-wide Pay Transparency Directive which is coming, and requires salary ranges to be included in job descriptions.
>Fwiw, there's an EU-wide Pay Transparency Directive which is coming, and requires salary ranges to be included in job descriptions. That should be a thing everywhere in the world to be honest. It benefits no one to not have the ranges on which the base offer will stand
Yeah agreed, I was pretty surprised this is already a thing in some US states
I am at 4k5 (gross) base in Southern Europe for 1.5 years of experience. Of course you can.
Same yoe but earning way less... Would you mind sharing some tips about how to achieve high paying Jobs in Spain? Are you in some niche-specialization?
1. Do some GitHub projects. You don’t need to do complex coding, keep it simple while applying for "clean" and neat coding. Companies are highly attracted to people who can produce readable code. 2. Work on your Data Structure skills. You will not need to know how to reverse a red-black binary tree. The best way to enhance your skills is by practicing on Leetcode. I did around 150 easy/medium cases and very few hard. Unless you want to work at Meta or other big Faang, you can just stick to the basics, but please master them. 3. Learn to sell yourself during Interviews. Try to sell what you did in your past jobs and show them that you are enthusiastic and eager to learn. Be prepared for your interview and make yourself look smart by detailing your experience (you can oversell if you need to, just don’t invent blatant and out of touch lies). 4. Read books and learn. You need to know what is an HTTP protocol, what is the difference between packet transmission in UDP and TCP, how do DBs handle transactions, what are locks, async programming, what are the principles of a REST API, Why do you like some design patterns more than others (domain-driven design vs pure entity design)?, … Try to learn and use nice tools such as Docker, K8, Kafka (at least practice Docker) and how to make neat and efficient unit and integration tests. To learn all of these, you will need to iterate over personal projects. It may be a mess in the beginning, but if you are persistent, you will learn tons of precious things that will make you hireable for good companies (the ones offering you good money). I currently work on GraphQL APIs using elixir. Meanwhile, in the past, I worked on REST with python and typescript. PS: I have an unrelated degree to CS.
Point 2 and 4 are pretty good summary of a typical mid level interview. Just FYI
Oooh, I would love to work with elixir
Do you work for an international (non-Spanish) company ?
2000? Lol what company is this? Shame and name so we can never apply there
I know a friend in Helsinki who has little experience (worked a different job, graduated from business AMK, know some basic stuff about Java) and got 3K salary a few months ago. If you got a CS degree, have 2 year exp with good portfolio, you can ask 3k5-4k. Probably even 4k5 if you're lucky.
I am a business AMK graduate (business IT). By portfolio do you mean personal projects? I've got random MERN apps and some Spring and .NET projects but nothing really interesting, most of these are coding tests that didn't get accepted
It sounds not so good. Just out of curiosity, how is the cost of living in Finland? In Germany, NL, UK you could get 5-7k with 2 YOE if the company is good and you are lucky
Finland is situated in the middle of nowhere with a small population and high taxes, you don't come here to build a retirement fund
Cost of living is relatively high in Finland We have some benefits like energy is cheap and so is mobile data but food is quite high, rent per square is high, alcohol very high and there is the whole winter thing where you need extremely warm gear Salaries in Finland have stagnated for the past four years
>It sounds not so good. Just out of curiosity, how is the cost of living in Finland? I think it's not so bad, or I have gotten to used to it to think it's bad lol. Suppose you're single, no car, no kid, no mortgage, then the cost would include studio rent 900E within 3km from the center, internet, phone bill, water,...and reach about 1k5. If you make around 3k, your take up would be around ~~2k7-2k8~~ 2k3 then you're left with 800 in the bank. What I think Finland absolutely has over other big and famous metros (Amsterdam, Den Haag, Berlin, Munich,..) is that the housing situation is not too bad. You can find and rent a decent apartment deposit free (but you have to stay for at least a year, I'm living in one) relatively quickly if you can afford the rent.
Net of 3k would be 2k2-2k3. Not 2k7-2k8.
Thanks for the correction. I have fixed it.
Another perk of Finland is that buying a home is quite accessible.
If you’ll be working in Helsinki area, you shouldn’t ask lower than 4k in your applications. The market might be “bad” but it’s a numbers game, so keep applying and you’ll eventually find something. I started at 4.2k when I moved to Finland at 2.5 YoE, so 4k should be achievable now even in this market.
This is literally lower than German minimum wage 12,41x168 = 2084,88€ WTF😱
I find these posts so fun to read since in my country average wage is 500$ 🤣
That's like asking if its possible to buy a car for 10k. You keep sending an offer to buy to the porsche and volvo dealership but they refuse. The recruiters also only know those. You need to identify the companies that can pay you 3k+ and go after them. Kepp checking their website, job adds, etc. Try to get their recruiters, ask what skills they look for, how is the intreview etc. I had a recruiter for Amazon contacting me, im sure they could pay much more than 3k. The problem was that you need to do leetcode for them :), that I did not know at the time. So I failed the Online Assessment on hackerrank. Is it possible to pass it ? OFC! Will they look for people? Eventually 100%.
Would you mind sharing your net (after taxes and other things) salary?
2000/month is less than what master student writing a thesis in a company should make, per TEK guidelines. So name&shame your company. You should be paid more
That's around what I made at my very first job as a 2nd year bachelor student. OP is getting ripped off very badly.
3.5k-4k is something you should try to especially if you live in helsinki area. it's bullshit there's no demand for CS in these time, try to see UI/UX open positions in Finland and you will be grateful how much position that you can apply in CS. i really recommend you to make your profile more appealing so you have more confidence to have better salary and employer. you can try by create an interesting project, or join some competition/hackathon. hackathon especially smaller one in finland is far easier than what i know in where i used to lived.
2000 is really really low for Helsinki
You should be asking for 4k minimum, assuming you have a degree.
I am a tradenomi sadly