> paying them each €120 an hour

Those must be some of the best programmers in Europe at that rate.

Anyone know how one can get one of those sweet €120 an hour gigs? Whenever I talked to recruiters they say their customers pay way below that, so there must be some scam I'm not in on.

My experience was that recruiters tried lowballing me, because they wanted to set up a system, where they ran the contract, and I subcontracted with them.

They wanted to pay me $50/hr, but they would charge the customer $150/hr.

It got quite insulting. They would dis my capabilities to me, but I’ll bet I walked on water, when they talked to the customer.

Pretty normal senior contractor rate in London.

I think billing rates for experienced seniors like architects are around there or higher. But this is basically before cut to company, taxes and any employment costs.

What companies can pay to employees is always significantly lower.

Probably includes circa 30% employer contributions to various taxes (employer side, the employee will be paying their own of course). And possibly VAT.

> Whenever I talked to recruiters they say their customers pay way below that.

Recruiters gotta eat too :)