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> If you pay someone 150k€ in Germany what they see after-tax is just not that much

For Germany this in not true, I have direct experience of this. Your income is really high at 150k€, even taking in account all taxes you pay if you’re self–employed (plus insurances, social security contributions, etc). You’re way above what you would get from the German market, unless you go into management.

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The IGM 9-5 35 hour work-week 30+ holidays job pays nearly 100k€. Add the employer social contributions and it is 116k€. He wants good work ethic so I'd say at least 25% more work time, probably less holidays, say 20. The IGM job scaled for this would be already at 150k€. He wants availability at 5pm US time, that's (best-case) 23:00 here, so night-shift work. The IGM job would pay double for this or something (this is how you get air traffic controllers earning 150k€ here).
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> Why not just admit that you don't want to pay equivalent wages for accessing the western european market?

Is it his responsibility? If some countries have a better tax policy, why should he not take advantage of it, and ultimately end up in a situation that benefits both the employee and his company?

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Well, if he says that a solution for me would be to move to a country with better tax policy. If he says that it is some issue with western European work mentality, that won't help because my CV would show that I am western European.
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> If he says that it is some issue with western European work mentality, that won't help because my CV would show that I am western European.

If you are actually talented, have a good work ethic, and the track record to show that then get a job that relocates you to London.

That is your only option if you want to stay in Western Europe as a SWE long term.

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> get a job that relocates you to London

This is terrible advice. Source: been there, done that (worked my ass off to waste half my TC on taxes and the other half on cost of living). I ended up moving to a low-tax Eastern European country so I can actually feel like I'm being fairly compensated for said talent and work ethic.

I don't actually see how your advice improves the situation - the net disposable income you'll end up with is about the same you'll have from being lazy in Western Europe - except at the very least, some Western European countries are actually nice to live in. If you're gonna be poor anyway, may as well be poor in a nicer place.

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