Salary for a full-time translator

[orochi]

Hey there! Does anybody have a figure on the average starting salary for a full-time, in house (working directly for a company) translator. The job would be translating Japanese to English. Job's in Tokyo.

 

[Mike Cash]

You'd have better luck asking your question on the Honyaku list on Yahoo Groups.

 

[GaijinPunch]

I got a quote one time, but can't recall. If you're fast, it's not bad pay... it's a job you have to get good at though. For E->J, it's broken down by character. For J->E, I think it's similar. Also worth noting, you'll likely make more (probably 2 or 3 times as much) as a contractor, not a full time employee.

 

[Nebiki]

"In Japan, combined that with the fact that using an interpreter from an
agency on a daily basis will easily run more than 2 million yen a
month."
Apparently in the US a translator can make $30K to $60K. I suck at Maths so I have no idea how that compares to the salary of 2 million yen.
I do know that a security firm in Tokyo routinely pays its local in-house translators Y1.2mn/month for doing general research reports and company documents.
So it would seem there's a pattern for the rate of pay that most businesses seem to pay their translators.
Sorry I couldn't be anymore help. :sorry:

 

[Mike Cash]

Don't confuse "using an interpreter from an agency" running more than 2 million per month with a translator receiving a salary of 2 million per month.

 

[GaijinPunch]

Or "anything" from an agency. The agency will take more or less half of that money... however much they think they can get while keeping the person doing the work happy.

Apparently in the US a translator can make $30K to $60K.

Got a source for this? $30k seems awfully low for interpretting anything other than Spanish.

I do know that a security firm in Tokyo

Security or Securities? Very big difference. I assume it is the latter, in which 1.2 mil gross seems about right. For certain translating financial documents requires a very special set of vocabulary. I know many "almost bilinguals" in the industry that have trouble translating that stuff.

 

[Hiroyuki Nagashima]

A site to mediate about work of translation in Japan
http://www.isssc.co.jp/

 

[GaijinPunch]

Nice link, but poor pricing. Obviously aimed for Japanese. As before - you should never be paid by hour in translation (unless it's interpretting, and it's a very high wage). Should be decided by page/character.

 

[Silverpoint]

Sure... and you should never accept a company car unless its at least a porsche - but good luck finding the job! ;-)

Translation like everything else is not something that you can just dictate your own terms on. There's always someone willing to do it for less money, and as with everything else in the weak Japanese economy, prices have gradually been squeezed. Agencies are trying to push things like hourly rates (instead of number of pages) because they know that there are people that will take it.

If you're just starting out and its your first job, you might well find it difficult to find a salary that is any better than that of an English teacher (usually around 250,000 yen per month). I know of one guy who recently quit as an in-house translator who was on exactly that money. If you've been at it a long time and have either stayed with a company (in which case you'll probably have received a number of traditional small incremental Japanese annual pay rises) or you have built up some freelance contacts then I would agree that you could probably make pretty good money.

But as with all jobs, a starting salary for a new guy is likely to be somewhat lower than someone with a lot of experience.

 

[GaijinPunch]

Translation like everything else is not something that you can just dictate your own terms on.

If you're completely new to working (a recent grad), probably not. But why anyone would accept a job that's much harder to do but pays so much less than teaching I do not understand (unless you're dying for experience, and not money). I only know people in the business... I've never actually done it (as a seperate job) but I've had it pushed on me, and it's always on a per page pay scale.

There's always someone willing to do it for less money

I've always looked at the market as "there's always someone that will pay more". Guess it's a half-empty/half-full thing.

 

[Silverpoint]

Maybe if you try it for a living the reality of the situation might present itself more clearly. Optimism is always a positive thing (the half-full scenario) but optimism can only go so far before reality hits. However, I agree that as a translator it's not worth settling for the same price as a teacher when the job is a lot more specialist. You should be able to earn more (although I know one teacher who pulls in nearly 700,000 per month!!!)

Actually surprisingly enough, I know one company who uses an hourly rate, and it's great! The woman who I have dealt with, grossly overestimates the time taken per page, and agrees a time based fee in advance. I did a job for them before where I was paid based on their estimate of 14 hours, and the actual job took me less than 3!
However this is an exception. The per page rate is normally much better.

 

[Mike Cash]

But why anyone would accept a job that's much harder to do but pays so much less than teaching I do not understand (unless you're dying for experience, and not money).

Maybe because some people find they are not temperamentally suited to "teaching" and prefer to do harder work that pays less if it means never having to play eikaiwa monkey/host(ess) again. That was certainly the case with me.

 

[GaijinPunch]

I see your point Mike, and it is indeed very valid one. My first job was a hybrid of teaching and working. I guess I should've said, "why would someone do much harder work for less which usually pays mroe money". Or am I being completely naive in thinking 1700/hr is a completely legit rate for douji tsuuyaku in the financial sector -- perhaps the hardest of sectors.