Ask HN: What is a reasonable salary for an image processing engineer?

6 points by verdatel 15 years ago | 2 comments

I've been interviewing for jobs in image processing as a researcher/developer and I'm always asked what are my salary expectations. Now I've been interviewing for entry-level jobs for people with a Master's or a Ph.D (I have a Ph.D in CS) and I'm not sure what a reasonable estimate is. I live in British Columbia, Canada and the cost of living is pretty high here. I estimate a reasonable range to be between $70k - $75k but I'm always low-balled to $60k - $65k as a counter-offer. Can somebody advise on what a reasonable range is? Assume there are no additional benefits to the salary package. The basic responsibilities are to develop computer vision/ image processing algorithms in C/C++ with an aim towards later porting them onto FPGAs with the camera sensor. I'd appreciate any comments/advice/links to resources.

antoinevg 15 years ago |

Rule #1 for devs during salary negotiations:

  Don't answer questions about salary expectations.

Any company worth working for already knows the value of the work you are offering to do for them to their bottom line.

You, on the other hand, do not.

The best outcome for both parties is one where the salary you get paid corresponds to the value of the work you are doing.

For the company, it reduces systemic risk by providing a critical diagnostic for management decisions. Any company unable to reliably hire people to produce the product they are selling at this rate has a huge problem which will not be solved by creating opportunities for competitors to poach their staff by offering marginal pay increases.

For you, it provides a shared context within which to negotiate future salary increases with the company you love working with and not needing to go through the soul-sucking process of finding a new job every 12-18 months.

staunch 15 years ago |

$100k +/- $20k in a major US city at a minimum.