2019 State of
Salaries Report
Data reveals tech worker
salary trends across the globe

Key Findings
Short on time? Here’s what you need to know

1

San Francisco pays tech workers the most: $145K on average

2

Tech salaries in Boston and Toronto grew 9%, more than any

3Austin tech workers get the most bang for their buck — they’d4

Only half of tech talent in London believe they’re paid fairly given

5

Only 23% of techies with master’s and/or doctorates believe they678other major city in the past 12 months

need an $83K raise to maintain the same standard of living in
San Francisco

the city’s cost of living

command higher salaries because of their advanced degree
For techies considering relocation to another city, Austin, Seattle,
and Amsterdam are most attractive
Asian tech workers out-earn their white counterparts by $2K, while
black tech workers are the lowest paid (earning $13K less than
Asian tech workers)
60% of tech talent plan to leave their current city within 5 years

Contents

Hired 2019 State of Salaries Report

Contents
Overview

4

Boston, Austin and D.C. are giving San Francisco a
run for its money

6

Tech workers want more bang for their buck —and will move for it

11

Advanced degrees don’t pay for themselves

14

The wage gap experienced by black tech workers
is widening

17

Salaries plateau after age 40

19

Tech salaries in the communications industry haveroom to grow

22

Tech talent with expertise in GO and Scala are hot

23

Conclusion

26

Methodology

27

About Hired

28

3

Overview

Hired 2019 State of Salaries Report

Overview
For the fourth consecutive year, Hired is releasing its annual State of Salaries report —and, once again, the results reveal that tech salaries in U.S. markets are steadily rising.
We analyzed data from our career marketplace, looking speciﬁcally at salaries for global
technology workers, including software engineers, product managers, DevOps, designers,
and data analytics roles, to help answer the questions that are top of mind for tech talent
today:How does my salarystack up against mycounterparts' in other
cities around the world?

Does an advanced
degree equate to ahigher paycheck?

Beyond salary, which
compensation beneﬁts
are most appealing totech workers?

Where is the next up
and coming tech hub?

What are my techskills worth in thecurrent hiring market?

Because our data is from real job oﬀers made by companies to tech workers on ourplatform, we have a unique window into the key salary trends shaping every industry.

4Overview

Hired 2019 State of Salaries Report

Hired facilitates the job search process from the initial interview request a company
makes, which includes compensation details upfront, all the way to the ﬁnal job oﬀer atech worker receives. With that, we have unprecedented visibility into salary data across avariety of geographies, companies, and positions.
In addition to mining our marketplace data, we also surveyed tech talent on Hired tobetter understand how compensation aﬀects their job satisfaction and personal
fulﬁllment.
The real salary data in this report comes from more than 420,000 interview
requests and job oﬀers facilitated through our total marketplace of 10,000
participating companies and more than 98,000 job seekers. Survey data is basedon responses from more than 1,800 global tech candidates on our marketplace.
Sharing real tech salary trends from our marketplace empowers tech talent to ﬁnd a job
they love with a salary they deserve — in a city that makes sense for their wallet, lifestyleand career development. For companies, we recognize that their hiring funnel is just as
important as their revenue funnel and that great people are the foundation of every
successful business. It’s more important than ever for companies to have a robust hiring
process that enables them to build strong teams.
When companies are able to oﬀer salaries that are competitive in an ever-changing hiring
market, it unlocks the opportunity for more predictable hiring.

5

Boston, Austin and D.C. are giving San Francisco a run for its money

Hired 2019 State of Salaries Report

Boston, Austin and D.C. are giving San
Francisco a run for its money
For the fourth year in a row, the San Francisco Bay Area comes out on top as thehighest paying market for tech workers, with salaries up 2% in the last year. This doesn’tcome as a surprise considering its skyrocketing rents and booming technology sector.
However, many cities — nationally and globally — are giving the Bay Area a run for its
money, literally. The average Boston tech worker was paid 9% more in 2018 than in 2017
— and tech workers in Austin and Washington D.C., aren't far behind, making 6% morethan last year. Paychecks are growing even faster on the east coast, with tech salaries inboth Boston and Toronto increasing by 9%, more than any other major city in the past 12
months.

One in three tech workers expect a raise withineight months of starting at a new company if theyreceive a positive performance review

The growth in salaries also reﬂects certain attitudes tech workers have regarding theircompensation and equity. One in three tech workers expect a raise within eight monthsof starting at a new company if they receive a positive performance review — possibly
putting pressure on companies to boost salaries across the board. And despite this year's
IPO wave, more than half of global tech workers (54%) are on the fence about forgoing ahigher salary for company equity. Similarly, 69% of UK tech workers are unsure about
accepting equity in lieu of a higher base salary.
6

Boston, Austin and D.C. are giving San Francisco a run for its money

Hired 2019 State of Salaries Report2019 Average Tech Worker Salaries

Seattle$138K ( 5%)TorontoCAD 100K ( 9%)USD $74K

SF Bay Area
$145K ( 2%)
Los Angeles$128K ( 1%)San Diego$113K ( 5%)

Denver$117K ( 4%)Chicago$114K ( 1%)Washington, D.C.
$123K ( 6%)

Boston$127K ( 9%)

New York$133K ( 3%)Austin$125K ( 6%)

Global Average*$129K

London£62K ( 6%)USD $79K

U.S. Average
$135K

Paris
€52K ( 8%)USD $60K*This year, the global average tech worker salary decreased as a result of Hired's growth insecondary tech markets including Denver, Boston, Chicago and London, where on average techworkers receive lower salaries than their peers in more established tech hubs.

7

Boston, Austin and D.C. are giving San Francisco a run for its money

Hired 2019 State of Salaries Report

Year-Over-Year Salary Change in Each Local Market
$118K
$108K

$110K

2015

2016

2017

$125K

2018

Austin

$127K

$120K

$118K

$117K

2015

2016

2017

2018

Boston

$107K

$106K

2015

2016

$117K

$113K

$114K

$112K

$114K

$112K

2017

2018

2015

2016

2017

2018

$129K

$128K

2017

2018

ChicagoDenver£70K($94K)£57K($73K)£58K($78K)£62K($79K)
$118K

2015

2016

2017

2018

2015

London*

$121K

2016

Los Angeles

$122K

$129K

$133K

No data

2015

$122K

2016

2017

2018

2015

New York€50K($59K)

2016€48K($56K)

2017€52K($60K)

2018

Paris*As Hired launched in Paris in 2016, 2015
data is not available

8

Boston, Austin and D.C. are giving San Francisco a run for its money

Hired 2019 State of Salaries Report

$129K

$125K
$108K

$107K

$108K

$113K

2015

2016

2017

2018

2015

San Diego

$133K

2015

$135K

2016

$109K

2015

2016

2017

$138K

2018

Seattle
$142K

2017

$145K

2018

SF Bay Area
$121K

2016

$132K

89K CAD($69K)$88K CAD($68K)

2015

2016$92K CAD $100K CAD($74K)($73K)

2017

2018

Toronto*

$116K

2017

$123K

2018

Washington, D.C.
*To account for cost of living and exchange rate effects, two axes were used: a U.S. andnon- U.S. axis.

9Boston, Austin and D.C. are giving San Francisco a run for its money

Hired 2019 State of Salaries Report

Salaries for Top Software Engineering RolesSF Bay Area

New York
$157K

$147K

Search engineer

Gaming engineer
$156K

$137K

Security engineer

Blockchain engineer
$155K

$136K

Blockchain engineer

Backend engineer

TorontoLondon$112K CAD (USD $83K)£71K (USD $90K)

Natural language processing engineer

Embedded engineer$108K CAD (USD $80K)£69K (USD $89K)

Machine learning engineer

Blockchain engineer$107K CAD (USD $79K)£68K (USD $87K)

Blockchain engineer

Data engineer

Paris€58K (USD $67K)

Blockchain engineer€56K (USD $65K)

Machine learning engineer€54K (USD $62K)

Data engineer

10Tech workers want more bang for their buck — and will move for it

Hired 2019 State of Salaries Report

Tech workers want more bang for theirbuck — and will move for it
Despite the Bay Area’s large paychecks, job seekers are feeling underpaid due to the highcost of living and sky-high real estate prices. They have begun noticing the perks ofrelocating, which include oﬀsetting certain expenses or avoiding high taxes. To see how
other cities fare in a cost of living comparison, we asked, “How much further do averagetech salaries stretch in other cities compared to San Francisco?”

Average Tech Worker Salary Adjusted
for Cost of Living in San Francisco

Seattle$182K

Toronto$151K CAD

USD $111K

SF Bay Area
$145K

Denver$185K

Chicago$171K
Washington, D.C.
$149K

Los Angeles$171K
San Diego$166K

London£76K

Groceries
Local taxes
Transportation

Source: Ranked list of salary by COL adjustment (USD
and local converted as of 12/31/2018)

New York$134K

Austin$208K

Main factors that aﬀect thecost of living in a city:
Rent
Real estate
Utilities

Boston$158K

USD $99K

Paris
€79K
11

USD $89K

Tech workers want more bang for their buck — and will move for it

Hired 2019 State of Salaries Report

For the third consecutive year, Austin tops the list at an adjusted salary of $208K,
meaning Austin tech workers would need a $83K raise to maintain their current standardof living in San Francisco. Denver and Seattle take second and third place with adjusted
salaries of $185K and $182K, respectively.
Tech workers are considering the beneﬁts of living and working in those cities, too: When
we surveyed our marketplace, Austin, Seattle, and Denver landed in the top ﬁve fordestinations tech talent would most like to relocate to.
When analyzing our survey data, we also learned that 60% of tech talent have plans toleave their current city within 5 years; and we wanted to know: why?

Given the cost of living in your current city,
do you think you’re compensated fairly?

53% Yes
47% NoAlmost half of tech workers
don’t think they’re compensatedfairly given the cost of living intheir current city.

What are the main motivators for you to relocate?

41%

26%

19%

14%

I want to experience

I want to live in a

I am interested in a

I want to live closer

a new cityless expensive city

specific job

to familyopportunity outsideof my current city
12

Tech workers want more bang for their buck — and will move for it

Hired 2019 State of Salaries Report

Which city tops your list of places to relocate?
1

AustinDid you know that Austin is the fastest growing large metro in thenation — 8 times running?

2

SeattleSeattle has experienced a massive rise in housing costs; averagerent prices increased by 35% between 2010 and 2017.

3

Amsterdam
Amsterdam has been named the best European tech city to workin, hosting 578 international information and communications
technology organizations, 170 of which have chosen Amsterdam
as their headquarters.

4

Los Angeles
Our global survey respondents ranked LA as the third mostpopular city to relocate to for tech talent without children, and #7
for tech talent with children. London techies consider LA the mostappealing U.S. city for relocation.

5

DenverColorado has one of the nation’s lowest unemployment rates,
especially in IT which has resulted in huge shortages forin-demand roles like IT engineers and software developers.

13

Advanced degrees don’t pay for themselves

Hired 2019 State of Salaries Report

Advanced degrees don’t pay forthemselves
Tech giants like Apple, Google and PayPal have moved away from traditional education
requirements and are increasingly interested in candidates with speciﬁc in-demand techskills and on-the-job experience that may not be acquired through higher education.
Though earning an advanced degree can have a lot of beneﬁts, many struggle with thesame question: is it worth it ﬁnancially? This year, we decided to get to the bottom of it
and raised the question to tech workers who have earned master’s or doctorate degrees.

Do you think your master’s or doctorate
degree has impacted your career?

31% No, I could have the exact same job without it
Yes, I couldn’t have the job I have today
25% without it
23% Yes, I earn a higher salary because of it
21% Not sure

14

Advanced degrees don’t pay for themselves

Hired 2019 State of Salaries Report

Are you interested in earning a master’s ordoctorate degree?

46%

54%

Yes

No

Why aren’t you interested in earning amaster’s or doctorate degree?

45% than additional schooling
24% It’s too expensive
16% I’m not interested in continuing my education
The companies I am interested in working for
15% don’t value advanced degrees

I think on-the-job experience is more valuable

We’ve also found that tech workers are looking into alternate forms of learning. Our 2019
State of Software Engineers Report revealed that as innovative companies become more
open to other forms of education, coding bootcamps are earning their stripes as alegitimate alternative to a college degree. In the London hiring market speciﬁcally, we areseeing a stronger propensity to hire software engineers that have attended bootcamps
versus markets in the U.S.

15

Advanced degrees don’t pay for themselves

Hired 2019 State of Salaries Report

Where Developers Learn to Code46%

Earned a computer science degree21%Self-taught
20%

Have a relevant college degree (such as mathematics or engineering)
13%

Participated in developer bootcamps

Do you think your bootcamp helped you
prepare to get an engineering job?

76% Yes
24% NoAs a technical hiring manager, would you
hire a bootcamp grad for an open role?

57% Yes
36% Not sure
7% No
16

The wage gap experienced by black tech workers is widening

Hired 2019 State of Salaries Report

The wage gap experienced by blacktech workers is widening
At Hired, we believe we have a responsibility to our community, our employees, and thehiring industry at large to serve as a catalyst for a more inclusive, diverse, and equitable
workforce. This includes creating transparency through shared data in hopes of one dayreaching fair pay, regardless of a person’s gender, age, sexual orientation, or race. This
year, when examining how race impacts a person’s salary, we found that for the ﬁrst
time, Asian tech workers are out-earning their white counterparts by $2K on average.

2019 Average Preferred Salaries and Salary Offers
by Race in the U.S.
$137K

$131K

Asian

$124K

$123K

$128K

Black

$111K

Hispanic

2019 Offered Salary by Race2019 Preferred Salary by Race

17

$135K

$132K

White

The wage gap experienced by black tech workers is widening

Hired 2019 State of Salaries Report2018 Average Preferred Salaries and Salary Offers
by Race in the U.S.
$133K

$127K

Asian

$130K $124K

$131K

Black

$124K

Hispanic$136K $130K

White2018 Offered Salary by Race2018 Preferred Salary by Race

Unfortunately, we’re disheartened to report that black tech workers are still paid theleast, earning $13K less than Asian tech workers. Since last year’s report, average salaryoﬀers have increased for Asian workers but have decreased across all other races.
Additionally, the wage gap between black tech workers and their white colleagues has
widened by $5K.

18

Salaries plateau after age 40

Hired 2019 State of Salaries Report

Salaries plateau after age 40
Our data also shines a light on a less talked about form of bias within tech: ageism. This
year, our data shows that the average tech worker’s salary plateaus after age 40 in the U.S.

Average Preferred Salaries and Salary Offers by Age in the U.S.
$
$147K $147K

$153K
$149K

$154K
$149K

$148K
$146K

$141K

$146K
$143K

$144K
$140K

$136K
$128K
$120K
$115K
$106K

20-24

25-29

30-34

35-39

40-44

45-49

50-54

55-59

60+

Age
Offered Salary

Preferred Salary

Homeownership is a symbol of success for many, but the high cost of living in many techhubs has caused people to rent for far longer than past generations. So we asked thequestion: can tech workers aﬀord to buy a house?

Tech workers who own vs. rent

65%

71%

of global tech talent currentlyof London tech workers currently

rent their homes/apartments

rent their homes/apartments

19

Salaries plateau after age 40

Hired 2019 State of Salaries Report

NON-PARENTS

PARENTS

54%
own

18%

own

Almost a quarterof global tech renters say they can
aﬀord to buy, but choose to rent

What are the most compelling company
beneﬁts for global tech workers?

1
2
3

Better health, dental and vision insurance
Unlimited PTO
Paid maternity/paternity leave

We recognize that for most tech workers, their careers are more than a salary number;work is an opportunity to help solve challenging problems that aﬀect all of our lives.
That's why we asked tech workers to tell us which pressing global issues they most hope
to solve in their careers.

20

Salaries plateau after age 40

Hired 2019 State of Salaries Report

Here’s what they said:

What are the top three global issues thattech workers are interested in solving?

1
2
3

Economic opportunity/unemployment
Global warming
Lack of access to education

21

Tech salaries in the communications industry have room to grow

Hired 2019 State of Salaries Report

Tech salaries in the communicationsindustry have room to growTo better understand what types of companies oﬀer the most competitive salaries totech workers, we broke down salary oﬀers on Hired by industry. We found thatcompanies in the technology industry oﬀer the most in the U.S. at $141K on average.
In the UK, tech workers in the healthcare and ﬁnance sectors are earning the most. The
technology sector does not pay the top salaries that it does in the U.S., with techies inthis vertical earning the second lowest average salary. U.S. companies in communications
and transportation oﬀer technology workers the least, with salaries averaging $130K and$135K respectively.

Average Tech Worker Salary by Industry
USA

UK

Technology $141K

Healthcare £67K ($85K)

Retail (ecommerce) $140K

Financial Services £64K ($82K)

Entertainment $140K

Entertainment £62K ($79K)

Healthcare $140K

Communications (media) £61K ($78K)

Education $138K

Retail (ecommerce) £59K ($75K)

Financial Services $136K

Education £59K ($76K)

Transportation $135K

Technology £59K ($75K)
Transportation*

Communications (media) $130K*Not enough sample size to report average salary22

Tech talent with expertise in GO and Scala are hot

Hired 2019 State of Salaries Report

Tech talent with expertise in GO andScala are hot
The demand for highly skilled tech workers is not slowing down anytime soon, but certain
roles and skills are more desirable than others. Among software engineers, full stackdevelopers are the most in-demand in the U.S., while backend engineers are most sought
after in the UK.

Year-Over-Year Salary Change for Specific Roles in the U.S.
$129K

$131K

$137K

$139K

2015

2016

2017

2018

$127K

2015

Software Engineering

$118K

$118K

2015

2016

$140K

$145K

$146K

2016

2017

2018

Product Management

$127K

$124K

2017

2018

$135K

2015

2016

2017

$128K

2018

Data Scientist

DesignNote we don’t have data from 2016 & 201523

Tech talent with expertise in GO and Scala are hot

Hired 2019 State of Salaries Report

Year-Over-Year Salary Change for Specific Roles in the UK*£55K($70K)£58K($74K)£61K($78K)

2016

2017

2018

Not
enoughsample2016

Software Engineering£61K($78K)

2017£69K($88K)

2018

Product Management

NOT
ENOUGHSAMPLE£50K($63K)£51K($65K)

Not enoughsample

2016

2017

2018

2016

£61K
($78K)£61K($78K)

20172018

Data Scientist

Design*Hired launched in the UK in 2016, so we don't have 2015 data available to compare to U.S. salaries

Most In-Demand Software Engineering Positions by Country
USA

UK

Full Stack Engineer

1

Backend Engineer

Backend Engineer

2

Full Stack Engineer

Frontend Engineer

Frontend Engineer

Data Engineer

345Machine Learning Engineer

6

Machine Learning Engineer

Mobile Engineer

Data Engineer
Mobile Engineer

As tech talent continues to be foundational to innovative companies, it’s critical for job
seekers to know which skills are table stakes in today’s hiring market. Our data reveals
the most in-demand tech skills; Node.js and SQL made the list this year alongside
JavaScript, Java, and Python.

24

Tech talent with expertise in GO and Scala are hot

Hired 2019 State of Salaries Report

Top 5 In-Demand Tech Skills

1Javascript

2

Java

3

Python45Node.js
SQL

Beyond top ranked tech skills, we took a deeper look at software engineering roles tounderstand demand for speciﬁc programming languages based on years of experienceand how that aﬀects the number of interview requests candidates receive on our platform.

Top Programming Languages by Years of Experience
4-5 years of job experience

6-10 years of job experience

11.0

11.7

Go

Ruby
11.0

10.5

Ruby

Go
10.7

9.9

Scala

Scala
8.6

8.7

JavaScript

TypeScript
8.4

8.2

TypeScript

Kotlin10+ years of job experience
11.7

8.7

Ruby

TypeScript
10.5

8.2

Go

Kotlin
9.9

Scala

25

Conclusion

Hired 2019 State of Salaries Report

Conclusion
While societal norms have perpetuated the idea that discussing salary is taboo, we arebringing transparency to the forefront by publishing salary data and trends for job
seekers. We believe that empowering tech talent with actual salary data is a critical factor
in helping everyone ﬁnd a job they love. This year’s report shows promising trends, withaverage salaries increasing across nearly every U.S. and international market. But it also
revealed unsettling data points that prove inequality still exists: the wage gap between
black tech workers and their white colleagues widened by $5K.
Our annual reports arm candidates with the real data they need to know the value of
their skills and ask for what they are worth. For companies, our real salary data uncovers
the compensation trends and benchmarks they need to ensure fair pay and the ability to
attract top tech talent in a competitive hiring market.
At Hired, we are committed to quantifying the ever-changing state of salaries in tech andhope that our dedication to data transparency will help candidates and the world’s mostinnovative companies make more informed decisions and build a more equitable future.

26

Methodology

Hired 2019 State of Salaries Report

Methodology
This report is based on Hired’s proprietary information, data from real job oﬀers on theplatform from companies to tech workers, gathered and analyzed by Hired’s data scienceteam. For the purpose of this report, we focused on technology workers in 13 cities. The
salaries included reﬂect more than 420,000 interview requests and job oﬀers from thepast year facilitated through our marketplace of more than 10,000 participatingcompanies and 98,000 job seekers. Age and race data was collected through an optional
demographics survey given to Hired candidates that is used only for aggregated research
purposes and not shared with Hired clients. Where numbers have been adjusted toreﬂect cost of living in a given market, we used data from the site Numbeo, which factors
in data such as rent and real estate prices, groceries, transportation, utilities, local taxes,
and more.
In addition to our proprietary data, we collected survey responses from more than 1,800
tech workers across the globe on the Hired platform to inform our understanding of how
education, salaries, beneﬁts and cost of living aﬀect workers’ decision making andsatisfaction.

27

About Hired

Hired 2019 State of Salaries Report

About Hired
Hired (hired.com) is a marketplace that matches tech talent with the world’s mostinnovative companies. Hired combines intelligent job matching with unbiased career
counseling to help people ﬁnd a job they love. Through Hired, job candidates andcompanies have transparency into salary oﬀers, competing opportunities and job details.
This level of insight is unmatched, making the recruiting process quicker and more
eﬃcient than ever before.
Hired was founded in 2012 and is headquartered in San Francisco, with oﬃces in the
United States, Canada, France, and the UK. For more information, news, and tips for job
candidates and employers, visit Hired’s blog.

28