There is a huge difference between companies where software is the product (Google, Microsoft, Silicon Valley startups), and companies where software supports a business that has nothing to do with software (most IT jobs).<p>When software is the product, you tend to consider your software developers as money makers and pay them better. When you think of your engineers as a necessary evil to sell other stuff, you tend to pay them as little as possible.<p>Europe is full of the second scenario. That&#x27;s the problem.