Last year I posted a blog entry about how much snow fell in Spokane in January.  Well, this is December and it snowed a lot more than last year (over 36 inches in a week).  That’s just too much damn snow to fall in just one week.  This year I thought I would be more prepared for this much snow, but my preparations have not been perfect.  For example, I made sure the snow blower was working properly at the beginning of the season, but I managed to break the clutch cable.  The other major thing I have this winter is the Subaru with all-wheel drive, but despite it’s snow going ability, I managed to get it stuck in a snowbank coming off 29th avenue.  With the help of a nearby neighbor and some passers-by on snowshoes, we freed the car from the snowbank.  Tomorrow, I am returning to the now snow-free streets of Seattle.

So I started thinking about salaries. The bulk of my work comes from Seattle, so for me personally this is not a concern, but what about the people here who work for a Spokane-based employer? I went to payscale.com to get some salary comparisons, not just between Seattle and Spokane, but also from cities closer in population to Spokane.

When I did a search on software developer salaries between Spokane, Boise and Seattle, I found that salaries are significantly lower for software developers in Spokane. This could be why there’s few qualified software developers in the area.

The big question is, WHY?

Median Salary by Job – City: Spokane (United States)

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Median Salary by Job – City: Boise (United States)

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Median Salary by Job – City: Seattle (United States)

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