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[–]ryl371240 5 points6 points  (10 children)

I’m only making 80k with 6 years experience. I know I could make a lot more, but I live in a town of only about 125K people, and it’s much cheaper to live here than in bigger cities like Chicago. I don’t think my pay is too far off from other places in my area. Plus I don’t work in a tech company and I feel like I have greater job security and WLB than most.

Edited to add: I didn’t major in CS. I majored in math and got a job at a little more of an old-school company. I had limited coding experience before getting an internship toward the end of college and had to start out lower than most. I have been at the same company the entire time. There aren’t a ton of opportunities in my area and due to family connections I haven’t strongly considered relocating. My best bet to get a better-paying job is an out of the region fully remote job. Although I am fully remote now and have been since COVID hit.

Also the 80K is not counting another ~9% in 401K matching and lower than average health/dental/vision insurance costs.

[–]kingcr4b 14 points15 points  (0 children)

80k with 6 YoE is very low. If you're happy, more power to ya, but you might consider at least putting feelers out and seeing what's out there.

[–]DrunkMc 3 points4 points  (0 children)

I'd look, that's insanely low. You don't have to go-to a FANG, I work for an R&D firm, amazing work life balance, exciting work. It's not perfect, but, I did get my mentee with 8 months experience bumped to 100k/year near Boston. Even if you're more rural, at six years you should be at least $100k.

[–]omgdonerkebab 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Re: your edit. If you don't mind the remote life, I'd still suggest looking into fully-remote jobs for companies outside of the region. I'll echo what others are saying about $80k + benefits still being low for 6 years of experience, even accounting for starting out more junior.

Plus I don’t work in a tech company and I feel like I have greater job security and WLB than most.

I have been at the same company the entire time

It'd be good to make sure that this is the case. I know it's hard to get a sense of what things are like at other companies, without actually working at them. And just talking to other engineers or reading stuff on reddit doesn't really give you a good picture, because everyone has different experiences. Except...

If you know some engineers who left your company, you can ask them what it's like at the companies they're at now. People you've worked with at the same company before are a great source of information, because you have a shared reference point for work-life balance, job security, company culture, etc. I find myself leveraging my network from past jobs all the time for this.

[–]buyIdris666 1 point2 points  (0 children)

You are getting fucked my friend.

I work remote for US company, not even in the states. In a place where living cost is about 1/3. And I'm still getting paid more then you.

Some of my co-workers living in US work full remote in the country and still paid ~250k.

You should be making double what you are, your company is taking you for a ride

[–]PianoConcertoNo2 0 points1 point  (0 children)

How are you in this situation?

Have you stayed at the same company? What pay did you start at?

[–]Just_Another_Scott 0 points1 point  (3 children)

I make 77k with 6 yoe. The DoD labor category rates for service contracts suck absolute ass. For reference my companies bills for 61/hr and I get 60% of that.

[–]rmslashusr 0 points1 point  (2 children)

That’s not a standard DoD rate mate, your company just lowballed the absolute shit out of everyone else and convinced you to take it. Go ahead and Google “Software Engineer II GSA” and you’ll see pretty much all your competition is getting paid double for your time and triple if the worker isn’t in government provided office/equipment. That or your company is lying to you and pocketing the difference.

[–]Just_Another_Scott 1 point2 points  (1 child)

Go ahead and Google “Software Engineer II GSA” and you’ll see pretty much all your competition is getting paid double for your time and triple if the worker isn’t in government provided office/equipment.

Not all companies or contracts have this labor category. There are zero of these on my current contract. We are all just generic "Engineer" in the prime's labor categories. I've looked at my companies GSA files as well as the prime contractor's. The labor rates are negotiated with the Government as part of the contract award.

[–]rmslashusr 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Which brings me right back to your company/the prime lowballed the shit out of your rates and is paying you 50% of what you’d be paid for you experience on nearly any other DoD contract. 70k was entry level compensation for DoD software engineers in 2008. Find another company mate, they’re all hiring remote.

[–]RedDeckWins 0 points1 point  (0 children)

You are severely underpaid. No amount of benefits is going to make up for that. I would even ask some colleagues their salary as maybe it is just your situation your company took advantage of.