← Back to context

Comment by pigpop

5 hours ago

My thoughts exactly when I read "Instead of taking on IT jobs, Biesma hired two app developers, paying them each €120 an hour" like holy shit bro, you already have a subscription, you could have prototyped your idea for essentially zero additional cost and tested it for PMF. He wouldn't even have needed to turn down contracts since it doesn't take full-time effort to steer a coding model. Would have been much better off with a somewhat buggy AI prototype and spending extra on marketing to see if it got any traction.

> paying them each €120 an hour

Those must be some of the best programmers in Europe at that rate.

Anyone know how one can get one of those sweet €120 an hour gigs? Whenever I talked to recruiters they say their customers pay way below that, so there must be some scam I'm not in on.

  • My experience was that recruiters tried lowballing me, because they wanted to set up a system, where they ran the contract, and I subcontracted with them.

    They wanted to pay me $50/hr, but they would charge the customer $150/hr.

    It got quite insulting. They would dis my capabilities to me, but I’ll bet I walked on water, when they talked to the customer.

    • It's because companies reduced sourcing and supplier to two to four companies.

      You either get in with those companies or zero chance.

      They know that and abuse the shit out of the situation.

      Rumours has it, that companies are thinking about to end this setup and allow "anyone in" because recruiters ( Accenture, sthree and what not) are abusing this. With we get 150 we pay 60. What do you think what kind of developers you get?

      The bad and left over..

  • I think billing rates for experienced seniors like architects are around there or higher. But this is basically before cut to company, taxes and any employment costs.

    What companies can pay to employees is always significantly lower.

  • Probably includes circa 30% employer contributions to various taxes (employer side, the employee will be paying their own of course). And possibly VAT.

    • Still an amazing deal compared to the rates I got quoted by recruiters. I'm guessing you must first live in Amsterdam for that. In Vienna you get laugh if you asked for 120, and there you pay even more in taxes than NL.

      8 replies →

  • > Whenever I talked to recruiters they say their customers pay way below that.

    Recruiters gotta eat too :)