alt Hacker NewsIf you have $5 million USD wealth you're in the top 5% of the US (and top 0.5% of the world).
If you cannot have a happy life on that, well...
But I get it--if your goal is to accumulate more wealth (no judgement--that's a legit goal) then it gets harder. When I was at Microsoft, partner-level engineers were making $1 million per year; now it's probably $2 million. Staff-engineer at FAANG is probably similar, I bet, to say nothing of the AI labs. I bet you could reach $25 million after 10 years with the right investment strategy. And $25 million throws off at least $1.25 million per year if you invest right.
Beyond that, you probably do need a startup or some other significant ownership stake.
Replies
I know these are just spit-balled numbers but getting to $25M in 10 years even with $2M annual comp would require pretty risky investment I think. Assuming you spent $300K per year and paid US taxes you’d have about $900K left over. 7% average returns would mean you’d have about $13M saved after 10 years. Getting more than 7% on the whole portfolio is going to require significant risk.
> When I was at Microsoft, partner-level engineers were making $1 million per year; now it's probably $2 million.
This seems...high. The levels.fyi data for 68/69 shows them maybe crossing 1M, and the highest available data point at a bit under 1.5 mil. Staff engineers at FAANG are not making 1M a year except in cases of significant stock growth. 700-800K is more reasonable. The AI labs pay a significant premium, yes (2-3x!).
My math on it was basically "I can work for 10-15 more years and retire meeting my financial goals, or work until my 4 year grant at an AI lab finishes and meet all the same goals, with more interesting work".
> Beyond that, you probably do need a startup or some other significant ownership stake.
That would be what I'm trying to avoid.
You probably mean a level or three above Staff at FAANG.