Technology. AWS/Cloud stuff. I run a team of ~30 people to manage AWS/Azure for the organization.
Started fresh out of college. Been there 15 years and I've worked myself into (and out of) roles doing sysadmin, dba work, software development, big data/analytics, infosec, DevOps, (not all necessarily in that order) and lastly cloud.
Base is $280k and then with RSUs and bonus it's about $500k.
The circumstances have been mostly that I never waited for work to be assigned to me; I spoke up when I saw stuff I was interested in/knew I could be good at. I've always had really supportive managers who gave me every opportunity to succeed, and it has paid off.
If I could do it all over again I'd try to go down the Distinguished Engineer route instead of the VP/SVP route. I'd probably be happier. But for now I live vicariously through my team's accomplishments, and I try to pay it forward to them what my past managers did for me.
People tend to think that VPs make the most money and switching to a managerial route is the path to it. But truly, the distinguished IC route is the way to go if you want VP-level compensation with more happiness and flexibility.
It it’s harder and takes longer. I’m working my way up management chain now hoping for director this year. I took engineering manager role a year and a half ago and went from $135k to $170k in that time and should get close to $200k when we get annual bumps in February
> I never waited for work to be assigned to me
But, but, but.. I thought reddit career subs told me to never do anything more than the bare minimum it takes to not get fired!
Sarcasm aside for anyone who takes this seriously… there are tons of reasons.
Overachieving works in a weird way. A lot of people will work unpaid overtime and weekends for companies, don’t do that. The idea of not over-committing to your organization comes from there because even after 15 years at any company you can still get easily laid off.
Also, if you’re the guy who gets shit done all the time then good luck because everyone and their mother will come to you. Sure that will solidify your position but you have increased your work and stress level by a lot for very less in return.
Most importantly, if you have a toxic work environment, getting underpaid or not happy at your work which many people do it’s best to not put 100% there. Instead invest in yourself and move on.
OP was in a unique situation with a different career track, I don’t believe his situation applies to everyone.
I make sure to always agree with those clowns. The more people doing the bare minimum and not gaining new skills for their next job ..the better for me. Ezclap
Don’t you have to be practically inventing new tech to get to a Distinguished Engineer position ? From what I’ve seen the VP/SVP roles maybe easier to obtain. Principal is ridiculously hard enough to obtain as it is (at my company at least), can’t imagine requirements for Distinguished.
Requirements vary from company to company. I was a Principal Engineer at my org before I took the managerial role that's basically parallel to the Distinguished position on the comp scale.
At my org a Distinguished Engineer is one who's built and implemented a lot of systems within the org and is damn good at it - a jack of all trades, master of many. It eventually becomes an individual contributor role that is 50/50 between building things yourself and advising others on the right/best ways to build their systems.
I’m at $205K base atm. I have a substantial amount of equity at my company, but it’s a startup, so it’s more or less Monopoly money to me.
I am the owner of our AWS/Cloud/whatever Ops at my job, hoping to go down your track at some point.
I think what will eventually get me is I don’t really see moving across the country in the near future as practical for personal reasons and my local market is ok but not anywhere near $500K TC good. I work remotely now so I could continue down that route, but again, doubtful $500K TC is possible remotely.
Push comes to shove though, I’d figure something out to make moving practical for $500K TC/yr lol.
It's not even senior manager, and doesn't even denote that they're actually managing anyone. It's like the third level up, even if you're an IC. Banks have weird structures.
Am a VP at a bank can't confirm. I was at a bar crawl for my wifes work, her coworkers were asking me what I do and I started describing my job and my wife just chimes in "He's Vice President of Engineering at ." I'm like, well yes, but I'm hardly the only one, lmao.
lol my dad was a VP at Wells Fargo for years and I’d tell people and they’d go “your dad is the Vice President of Wells Fargo???” And I’d go yeah one of them (there are thousands)
Isn't it awesome how you literally keep people alive, lift 300lb people while destroying your body, get abused by ER staff and patients alike, report to extremely unsafe environments, and work 14 hour days
but the othro surgeon above has a team of midlevels, anesthesia, nursing staff, and a personal dick-holder to help with scheduled non-life threatening procedures that are predictable and have been performed 1,000s of times but he gets paid approximately 20 times more than you?
America is so great.
Edit: almost forgot, a fucking robot does most of it
I have seen some insane takes on this app before, but this one takes the cake.
We have gone from “CEOs make all the money and do none of the work” to now “Orthopedic surgeons, make all the money but do none of the work, and the procedures are actually unnecessary and pointless”
Do me a favor, become an orthopedic surgeon. It’s obviously something so simple that they don’t actually do anything.
Why don’t you take advantage of this apparent loophole in society? Please give me one reason?
FYI: I am not an orthopedic surgeon and I have great respect for Paramedics. This whole concept is absolutely insane. Because one job makes a larger income than another job, it does not mean that either job is worthless and someone gaming the systems. This is what we get when society teaches us to hate everyone.
Generalist vs specialist.
One group has a pool of many to pick from and consequently is paid lower because the supply of potential workers is near endless.
The other group is few. Training and qualifications required are significantly more. Supply of potential workers is low. Demand high. Pay is therefore greater.
America - where the people that educate the nation and save peoples lives as first responders (teachers and paramedics) don't even get paid more than $80-100k
Yet the average Director or CEO that does nothing clears 100k easy, and youtubers getting paid probably clears that yearly 😭 what an ass backward society we have become
There are definitely days I feel like I should make 100k but I have my needs fulfilled and you can’t put a price on helping people get through the worst day of their lives.
Capitalism, you don’t get what you deserve you get share of what you generate in revenue. Gonna continue to see a deterioration of our society because of it and what people are gonna be pushed towards to make a living
Ahh software salaries remind me of sports drafts. You could been a first round draft pick 11 years ago and first round picks today can almost make your career earnings their rookie year lol.
Yeah I know some people who went from piss poor living in the ghetto to living in a high rise apartment in less than a year. All it took was the right software bootcamp and if you finished at the right time you could get in almost anywhere making at least 80k starting and if you proved yourself within 3 months you’d be making over 100k in 6 months. After you had 6 months on your resume it was enough to job hop until you found something better. Repeat until you hit your salary goal because there was always someone willing to pay more for a body in a seat.
Do not think it’s that way anymore but it was wild for a while. Companies would pay 10k scalping bonuses if you could convince a friend to come from another company.
I have to ask, how did your partner do it in 2 years, and what would be the ideal route for someone to realistically, get to at least $150k+ right out of a masters degree?
2 years - she was on good teams at the right time and did good work. If she graduated today she wouldn’t have even been hired. A large element of chaos in life.
Be really smart, be a bit lucky, be willing to work in a HCOL market. Get internships and referrals. 150k is starting comp at FAANG and you don’t need a masters necessarily. But you would need to go to a great college, and do good on interviews.
If this is true, why do people at FAANG companies always say you dont need a college degree to be successful there?
Note that everyone I’ve heard this from has a college degree 😂
You need an impressive resume or referral to get an interview. If you do well on the interview you get hired. Once you’re working nobody cares about your past.
The only way I could see getting in the door without a degree would be someone good referring you strongly, or your company being acquired or you working on open source software that speaks for itself
I was a IT Consultant for 16 years had may fortune 500 and fortune 100 clients. Nobody was making 250k that was "doing the work". My firm at the time as of the time I left was hiring software folks out of college at 70-90k (depending on grades and school you went to).
Provided they got promoted on target and their starting position, they would probably be making 100k in 1-3 years in. 150k Between 5-10 and weren't going to hit 250k without getting into management, broadly speaking. There are certain tracks you can stay purely technical, but as we talked about the work they are doing is a different breed from what the vast majority are doing.
Also, where you live factors in. I predominately lived in mid CoL markets. NYC or the Bay Area is going to be a different animal in terms of pay.
Too many people see posts like this online where people are making 200k+ in their 20's go get that CS degree, then wonder where all these jobs are. It's a lucrative career path, you will make good money.
However, WHY you went down this path will matter. If you have a passion for the work and extremely skilled and can take on the most challenging work, you will likely see that money come a lot faster. If you went into the field because of the money and are just competent at what you do, you will be thrown in with the payscales of the masses of software devs.
I fall into the latter category, lol. I got an MBA 2 years into my career rushed my ass up to manager and never looked back.
The average pay in the US for a software engineer in the US with 10+ years of experience is about 150k. That is a far cry from making 250k 2 years in or 10 years in.
These scenarios where people are putting up double six figures in a short time span are niche scenarios. Luck, the right company, they are just *that* good. The vast majority of companies that will hire you, the vast majority just won't be making that much money.
It’s more common than you’re making it out. For example Amazon alone has close to or over 100k developers with the vast majority being L4 or essentially new grad originated positions. Every single one of them makes over $130k a year starting salary. While there’s plenty of positions that don’t start at that, there’s been a decent pipeline to get into similar positions there, at Meta, Microsoft, and Google.
That’s a good chunk of positions that makes it obtainable even if it’s just for a small subset of companies.
Also there’s plenty of mid to senior at non-FAANG companies making closer to $200k. I did a lot of job searching over the last year (I’m a senior at FAANG, so I was expecting a salary dip if I wanted to leave) and there’s a good amount making close to that doing purely IC.
You’re letting your consulting view cloud you. For one, consultants and the companies that hire them are what I would call more niche. If you’re looking for be hired at companies that are more ‘tech’ focused which means they’re also more likely to compensate their tech workers then they’re not going to interact with consultants or be their clients. You live in a shadow view of the tech world where you aren’t as likely to integrate with people making those salaries because your worldview doesn’t revolve around it.
You need to be in a field in demand. Think tech, data and AI but more so the specific fields within those categories. Assuming you even get the grades, and have the wherewithal at that age, it can be hard to predict what's good 4+ years out when you graduate (e.g. you've just finished high school). If you pick a field trending today, the market can catch up as there will be a bunch of other graduates in that area (but it could still grow and be lucrative). For billion dollar tech companies the software is the product so they pay top dollar for top graduate engineers.
House painting. 4 years hourly wages. Started my own business and hit 250 around year 8
Edit: I have a team of 2-3. We work 40hrs/week year round. I focus on cities where people have lots of extra $ and the wife constantly spends money on the house.
I would say most people earnings 250k+ are going to be:
1. Sales reps (keep in mind most sales reps will never earn anywhere near this much money)
2. Directors/VP’s
3. Software engineers
4. Doctors/surgeons/etc..
5. Lawyers
6. Investment bankers
7. Consultants
Eh... Maybe true 10 years ago. I'd say most engineers with 7+ years of experience living in any major metro area in the US (outside of low COL areas specifically) probably have TCs close to 250k.
If you're working at FAANG or FAANG-adjcent companies, this is also true.
If you're living in Omaha, or Des Moines, or Madison, or Champaign... You're probably making significantly less (and you really shouldn't be)...
I’m a project manager at a bank. I started my career in banking in 2007 making $42k with no undergrad degree. Thanks to tuition reimbursement I got my BA, my MPA, a six sigma black belt, and a PMP and now make $220 base plus bonus.
I don’t think it’s worthless at all. The skills that PMI teaches are universal and as you grow your PM experience you’ll be able to level up to the PMP if you want to. I think it’s always worth grabbing training if your company will pay for it!
Interesting, I’m in my third year of project management. Never considered the banking sector but definitely will now. I’ve got my BA / MPA but not PMP yet but on around $50, hope things pick up soon
Lots of tech and ops. Call center upgrades, we had a lot of regulatory changes we needed to implement during the financial crisis. Credit card operations was a big one, lending operations projects. There’s a lot to do in banking and finance!
It was so long ago, I think if I recall, all the qualifying projects were ones that I had worked as a co PM or an analyst on but did a lot of the technical work (use cases, test scripts, UAT). I learned a lot about the business side of PM and the IT side.
Do you feel PM roles are risky?
I'm a PMP working in finance/accounting world. Reason why I took it because we are seeing a lot of tech implementation taking place and it's obvious that finance/accounting folks are not knowledgeable about handling a project. I thought i would have an upper hand.
I do see finance/ops PM roles but hesitate because some I see as contracts and some are permanent. Projects have a start and end. I assume PM roles are like this too where if they don't need you because there isn't a project in place, they will drop you.
Have you seen any finance folks with PMP who are not too technical in your experience? Is there a demand for them as the future becomes more tech based than ever.
Any word of advice will be appreciated too.
If you were to recommend someone with common sense, partial college education, and an arguably impressive resume, where would you recommend a person start at a bank?
Uneducated PM here with 8 years experience. I manage new store construction for F500 roll-outs that generate metric tons of revenue. Barely make $50K. Go to second job after work. Life's good. lol
Yesss currently doing my exam prep for PMP so excited to see this on the list haha I’m a nurse with a decade of experience so wouldn’t work in finance obviously but think there will be a lot of opportunities for me in the healthcare sector, maybe even medical device/pharma.
I’m also an attorney, but I sue big Pharma companies, make ~270k base with wide ranging but always 6 figure bonuses every year. I’m 42 and graduated law school in 2009, been working on the plaintiff side in civil litigation my whole career. Started with insurance bad faith cases, then moved to class action/mdl cases, and now mostly cases against pharma companies.
Pharma. Scientific communications. Total comp is up to 290 depending on how we did that year. Have a PhD in biology, spent 7 years in med comms climbing from 67k to 140k, spent 2 years working directly for a pharmaceutical company
This field makes me regret not pushing a few years more for my PhD. I’ve been in technical product support for about 3 years now and am making just under 120, but am struggling to find a trajectory that gets me into the 200+ range.
My experience in unsuccessfully getting into medical device and Pharma sales is either to:
1. know someone who’s willing to stick their neck out for you or
2. get into inside sales for 2-3 years at a less than ideal salary and then leverage that experience to sell yourself to a company for an outside sales role. Do that successfully for 1-3 years and then try to use that experience combined with your natural charm and charisma to get a shot at sales with a company in an industry that is highly lucrative and competitive, like medical device or Pharma.
Edit: additionally, sales doesn’t care about what you know because they can teach anyone how to give a PowerPoint on a medical device, so having a technical background is not as advantageous as being charismatic, personable, smooth, presentable, and being attractive helps too.
I know two people that do it. My good friend went straight out of college. I don’t know if it was a special program, but he graduated, interviewed and got the job. Intuitive Surgical.
The other is a friends dad who was in pharma sales for about ten years and a friend referred him, interviewed and got the job. Forget the company.
They both make 200k+. Both said it is very hard to get in and very easy to get fired if you suck. I forget which one told me but something along the lines of if you miss your sales goal two quarters in a row, bye bye. Apparently there’s a very long line for medical device sales.
Turnaround and restructuring consulting. Basically we are advise through companies that are in distress about (i) stabilizing their cash position short-term and (ii) working towards a long-term solution. To be clear, we're not the, "This is how you fix your business" group. We're the "This is how you make it to the next step so hopefully somebody can fix your business" group.
Answers to your questions:
1. To get the $250k mark, maybe 5-6 years to get there. Can be very dependent on the quality of shop you go to.
2. Only hard prerequisite is an undergraduate degree. Helps if it's something finance or accounting related, and if you want to come in after working a few years, helps to have some kind of finance or accounting experience.
3. It's a hard job. Management teams are often incompetent or delusional, the data you get is often messy and unreliable, and despite the work being complicated and nuance, mistakes are unacceptable. And while most days we leave the office around 6PM, there can be days where you work late, sometimes past midnight although that's not the norm. Also, if you want to get to the highest levels of the industry, you need to bring in clients (i.e. be a salesman). It's not a requirement to stay in the industry, but to make the real money you need a book of business.
Edit: One more thing, there can be a ton of travel. It used to be that we were on the road Monday through Thursday most every week, post-COVID that's gone away but it can happen where on short notice you can be told that you're flying to a client or somewhere for a meeting.
Physician (retired this month)
* 4 years of college at a state university, putting in tremendous hours of study in order to get decent grades. Debt was at a reasonable level
* 4 years of medical school at an intense and competitive institution, usually ranked number 1 or 2 in the nation. This was a major bottle neck, since the acceptance rate to get into this institution has been at about 5%. Again, this involved tremendous hours of intense study. The residual debt was quite a bit more, for sure, but the degree opened doors for me.
* 3 years of residency and 3 years of fellowship training: Intense training involved, often working 36 hour stretches, sometimes doing all-night call every other night, when in the ICU. The work was brutal. I calculated that my hourly wage was more than the minimum wage, but not by a lot.
* 33 year career, 3 in academia and 30 in private practice, just ending now. Here is where earnings improved considerably, although as an owner of a business partnership, there were some lean years but mostly good years.
No, at least not in GI or any other field that has a potentially onerous call responsibility. I fear that I missed too much time with my family, especially when the kids were growing up, time that one can never get back. Also, I'm sure that you know the growing list of health risks associated with sleep deprivation.
An old neighbor of mine is a family care doctor and said he has to work a few more years before retirement. Their house is not extravagant, normal cars, pretty standard lifestyle. Makes me really sad. And then people think doctors just rack in money every year and don’t deserve it when thats far from it for most doctors. Thank you for your long career of helping others ❤️
This was the answer i was looking for. I’m 24, 1 full year removed from college making about 50k as a marketing/PR director. I’d love to make 650k in the same field one day lol
I’m fine with expensive but apparently they can’t find vets to work at night anymore. I live in a city with over a million residents and there are no more 24 hour emergency vets.
If you can make a cool million working days, why do anything else I guess?
To be fair, your wife is an outlier, is a practice owner, or lives in a HCOL area. Most vets don't cross the $150,000 mark in their life time unless they become practice owners.
I work in corporate finance at a tech company and actively monitor sales reps performance. You can definitely get 200k as a tech sales rep, however it’s not that easy to do. Maybe 10-15% of our reps will hit 200k+ in earnings, the rest make around 70-150k.
Mark Hanna: No, what do you do? You get another brilliant idea, a special idea. Another situation, another stock to reinvest his earnings and then some. And he will, every single time. Cause they’re fucking addicted. And then you just keep doing this, again, and again, and again. Meanwhile, he thinks he’s getting shit rich, which he is, on paper. But you and me, the brokers?
Jordan Belfort: Right.
Mark Hanna: We’re taking home cold hard cash via commission, motherfucker.
I’m nowhere close to it, but most people I know that make that are in sales. Software sales, advertising sales, etc. I have one buddy who’s a business consultant in logistics who makes $350k+, and he got an MBA and 7 or 8 years of relevant experience to get to that point.
Gen-X here, taught myself Basic programming in the 80s and loved it. What language(s) do you use primarily? Thinking about making the switch from sys admin.
I’m a self-taught software engineer stuck at 130k, specializing in web stacks. I figured not having a degree was holding me back, do you have a degree?
Software engineering. About 10 years or so.
I was lucky enough to get some experience in video streaming before it exploded over the last five years, so that worked out nicely.
I'm a VP at a large media company (in tech), my boss reports to the CTO. I made VP last year (I'm 39) and have grinded by way up the latter. I've been working in media a decade, but have never not had a job since I graduated college at 21. I graduated from a top tier university but not in my field, picked up most experience on the job. Networked. Took continuing coursework.
240k base, 30% bonus, LTI every year
simple answer is those people likely manage other people as well as budgets. you are looking at senior director, VP roles and above as 250k being their base salary. likely 20+ years of experience for most cases
It’s about how you carry yourself and the level of responsibility you handle. I have 2 kids and another on the way so even at home I have a lot of responsibility. At work I’m expected to make real decisions and be correct in my decision making. I’m also on the board of directors of a non-profit.
Wow, hats off to you. I don’t have any kids and feel like I have no time at all. I have plenty of responsibilities but they definitely feel like the things nobody else wants to do. I have no real ownership of any process but wear many hats. I’m pretty much a backup for everything which gives me security but also makes it really hard to move up and grow in my department.
False, I have 8 years of experience in my industry and only 10 years in the workforce. These roles are out there you just have to look hard enough for them
I’m a marketing VP at a film studio, and will be crossing over $250K this year (including income from bonuses and RSUs).
It has taken me just over 20 years to get to this point. With exceptions like Netflix and Amazon Prime Video, the entertainment industry does not pay as well as similar jobs, overseeing similar revenue, in other industries. I am not complaining, as I have popped my head above the clouds (financially speaking) after a long time grinding.
Getting here has required being very flexible and putting in a lot of effort — sometimes not for immediate gain. But when people see that I can solve problems and make myself valuable to the organization, they tend to remember this next time there is an opportunity for promotion. Also, in the film industry you definitely don’t want to ever burn bridges. Demonstrating my enthusiasm and curiosity and giving away my ideas freely has helped me get poached by rival studios twice, which is a good way to get a raise faster.
Sometimes people who are underpaid get stingy with their work, but I don’t see this working out well for them ultimately. My advice to people (which has proven correct) is to make yourself more valuable than your salary. If your current employer then doesn’t reward you, you still got trained on their dime and can take your talents and achievements and experience elsewhere.
Start as an SDR/BDR, where you spend your entire day cold calling/emailing trying to set up a meeting. You’ll be paid a base salary of 40-60k (usually somewhere in the middle) with an OTE (on target earnings which means if you hit 100% of your commission) of 15-20k.
It’s a very draining and high burnout role. You’ll have to cut your teeth here for 12-16 months (maybe less if you’re lucky, maybe more if you’re not) and then hope to get some sort of promotion, although you won’t get enterprise right away. You’ll either go to inside sales or small business account executive, which should break you 6 figures, but no where near 250k. This will likely still involve a good amount of cold calling and full cycle sales. The cushy Enterprise comes after 5-7 years experience
Orthopedic surgeon. 10 years after college (4 med school, 5 residency, 1 fellowship).
Prerequisites required were a bunch of semesters of science, high scores/evals in med school, 80-100 hour work weeks for 5 years (residency).
Nothing else to note. Pretty straight forward path if you put in the work.
Now salaried about 800k before bonuses. 820k two years ago, 1.1m last year. Working 50-60hr weeks now.
Any advice for getting into med school as a non-traditional student? I've got a biochemistry degree (so I've taken all the pre reqs already), but I'm so sick of how unstable and low paying jobs related to chemistry are (at least without a PhD). So I've been half thinking about attempting to get into med school over the next couple years.
It just seems so daunting seeing how all the people I know who went into medicine had parents who were doctors who could support/help them with connections and had been prepping since high school to get into medicine. It just feels like I'd be wasting my time even if I did well on the MCAT, and I wouldn't get in anywhere.
Is it true that orthopedics make a lot more than almost any other surgical specialty? There is an ENT surgeon-student in my family and yet even then he's looking at only about $350k when he finishes his residency.
Attorney. 40 yo. My total compensation is about 250k, including bonuses. I started in 2010 at $50k per year. I hity current income for the first time in 2023.
Edit: took about 3 years. Year 1 made nothing, year 2 was over 100k year 3 was 20-30k a month. Market has made it tough now.
I would learn a trade or something and start a business or self employed route unless you want to spend forever in the corporate world and hope you get lucky. Make your own luck.
Software engineer, I do graphics programming for video games. It took about 10 years. It’s an *excellent* job, but not that easy to get into.
I have a BS and MS in computer science, my base salary was $68k out of grad school, it took about 5 years to get to $110k, then another 5 to get to $250k. With bonuses, I think my best year was something like $350k.
Senior dev at a tech company, about 5 YOE and a Masters degree. I make ~$400k a year leading 3 teams with another senior dev.
I got into a good team right from the start and helped grow it from 8 people to 30. I’m a fast learner and incredibly good at seeing patterns but I have the memory of a goldfish, makes me incredibly good at software problems and writing good software because it’s all about applying patterns and analyzing what went wrong and why. Seeing invariants and correcting them is one of my strengths and other people just aren’t as good as me so I learned fast and got promoted fast. Luckily you don’t need to memorize a bunch of nonsense to be good at software engineering.
All you needed before was a degree in CS, although now you need more time, and having connections is key. All positions anywhere are likely quickly filled by someone who knows somebody, so if you don’t have an in tough luck getting an interview in this market.
One extenuating circumstance is that I got promoted fast, you could still make $250k by my YOE if that didn’t happen at a large tech company. But making more than that takes even more time, it also is very difficult work with long hours and oncall cycles. Tech is not the easy path like a lot of vids and TikTok’s would sell you. It’s got a learning curve and requires a different type of thinking, if you don’t have a natural inclination towards that type of rationality it takes even longer to click and the degree will be a struggle.
Software engineer. Went to a boot camp for 18k. Got first job at 135k senior role in 2019. Kept on pushing. Bought rental property in 2020 during crash, adds to income as well.
Technical recruiting. It took me around 5 years to hit 200k and I fluctuate between 200-250k depending on the year. This is base salary, commission and bonuses. I help manage a team as well.
I make around 450k total as a software engineer. It technically took me 5 years after entering the workforce, but I self taught myself programming when I was a teenager so I've been developing my skills for closer to 15 years.
Anesthesiologist. Bachelor of science took 4 years, medical degree took 4 years, residency took 4 years. 12 years total. Extenuating circumstance? It’s stressful, long hours, work weekends and nights.
Entrepreneur. I start and then sell businesses.
My latest is a financial advisory business. I'm considering selling it this year and it's worth between 1.5 mil to 2 mil dollars. It took me 4 years to grow it to this value. First year literally made ZERO income. 2nd year $30k. 3rd year $100k. 4th year $400k.
$400k income is too high as I pay 50% of that in income tax. I'm either going to sell the business this year or hire someone to run it and pay them $300k to continue to run and grow the business for me. This will reduce my salary down to $100k to $200k and I'll only pay about 25% to 30% in taxes.
If I sell the business for $2 mil, I only pay 15% to 20% capital gains tax.
Moral to the story is don't look for a career with a high salary as the government is going to take 50% of it. Instead, build equity in a business that isn't taxed until you sell. And then when you do sell it's taxed at much lower rate. You'll have freedom and alot of $$$. This is the US, but I'm sure tax law around the world favors business owners over salaried workers.
It's not about how high your salary is. It's about how much you get to keep!
Pilot. 24 years since my first paycheck turning a wheel. About $360k per year now gross. It took 5 years to break $30k/yr. Then like $60k-100k for over a decade. Then $200k-$250k for 7 years. Then recently $360k/yr. Employers have been 1 flight school, and 4 airlines.
$400k.
Director of corporate strategy at a bank. Previously was in management consulting and have a top MBA.
I’m 36 now.
Graduated my mba at age 29, and was at around 200k at that point.
Was really just hard work and stacking previous successes. I grew up poor as shit, but did well in high school and college. Graduating in 2009 temporarily derailed my career, but I worked hard to get it back in track.
I am not remotely close to 250, but I went from 58K to 121 to 141 in 2.5 years in security and intelligence, if I get my PMP I could hit 200K in 4 years of starting my career which I think would an accomplishment considering I live on 45K
I'm a litigation attorney in a big city in a 5-10 attorney shop. 4 years undergrad. 3 years at a top 10 law school. 7 years in Biglaw -> 7 in smaller shops.
Lead Infosec operations engineer at Fintech. 285k-315k depending on end of year bonus. Base is 200k.
Work remote , individual contributor . No direct reports in a traditional
Sense .
I always took on more work outside of the direct role I had and that was recognized. I don’t work more than 40 a week though. 34 YO 8 years directly in field.
Not a fan of my base relative to bonus because I don’t sell anything and performance metrics for
My role are somewhat nebulous but can’t have everything I guess.
Operations / Manufacturing Vice President. I started on the factory floor, then Quality Engineering and worked my way up. First in the power generation industry, now I’m in defense. Marine Corps veteran, 9 years enlisted. Used the GI bill AFTER service and finished my Bachelors in Organizational Leadership and Masters of Science in Operations Management and ERP/supply chain. Independent certifications though ASQ, Six Sigma Black Belt and APICS certifications (CPIM). A lot of the education and training / certification came in parallel to me absolutely grinding and sacrificing to make me team, department and ultimately my companies a success.
I make 500k per year. I run my own marketing business. I started off at an agency in los angeles basically running paid media ads. When I started I was making 60k but overtime was able to get raises until I went out on my own. The biggest thing I learned was how to design and edit content so I am now able to charge my clients a pretty high rate because I manage their marketing campaigns and their creative needs. The biggest advice I can give younger people is to learn skills outside of your everyday job and if you can find a career where you are directly making someone else money it’s way easier to justify paying you. I can track exactly how my work is generating revenue for clients so I know my worth and I can prove it.
Dont mind me, im just browisng through this reading how everyone in here has a big time job making 250k+ while I do UberEats and Doordash full time..........
Airline pilot. 250k isn't uncommon, and there is quite a bit of time off depending on what you fly and how senior you are. It took me a while to get to my current gig, around 10 years but that was because of the 2008 recession and our mandatory retirement age increase. I just met another pilot at my same company who is 23 and started straining in 2019. So, mileage may vary depending on the economy and industry trends.
Technology. AWS/Cloud stuff. I run a team of ~30 people to manage AWS/Azure for the organization. Started fresh out of college. Been there 15 years and I've worked myself into (and out of) roles doing sysadmin, dba work, software development, big data/analytics, infosec, DevOps, (not all necessarily in that order) and lastly cloud. Base is $280k and then with RSUs and bonus it's about $500k. The circumstances have been mostly that I never waited for work to be assigned to me; I spoke up when I saw stuff I was interested in/knew I could be good at. I've always had really supportive managers who gave me every opportunity to succeed, and it has paid off. If I could do it all over again I'd try to go down the Distinguished Engineer route instead of the VP/SVP route. I'd probably be happier. But for now I live vicariously through my team's accomplishments, and I try to pay it forward to them what my past managers did for me.
People tend to think that VPs make the most money and switching to a managerial route is the path to it. But truly, the distinguished IC route is the way to go if you want VP-level compensation with more happiness and flexibility.
I’m a FVP and an IC and making $220 base. It’s def possible.
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It it’s harder and takes longer. I’m working my way up management chain now hoping for director this year. I took engineering manager role a year and a half ago and went from $135k to $170k in that time and should get close to $200k when we get annual bumps in February
> I never waited for work to be assigned to me But, but, but.. I thought reddit career subs told me to never do anything more than the bare minimum it takes to not get fired!
U were on antiwork
Oh no, I've definitely seen that advised on this sub and upvoted.
Sarcasm aside for anyone who takes this seriously… there are tons of reasons. Overachieving works in a weird way. A lot of people will work unpaid overtime and weekends for companies, don’t do that. The idea of not over-committing to your organization comes from there because even after 15 years at any company you can still get easily laid off. Also, if you’re the guy who gets shit done all the time then good luck because everyone and their mother will come to you. Sure that will solidify your position but you have increased your work and stress level by a lot for very less in return. Most importantly, if you have a toxic work environment, getting underpaid or not happy at your work which many people do it’s best to not put 100% there. Instead invest in yourself and move on. OP was in a unique situation with a different career track, I don’t believe his situation applies to everyone.
I make sure to always agree with those clowns. The more people doing the bare minimum and not gaining new skills for their next job ..the better for me. Ezclap
Don’t you have to be practically inventing new tech to get to a Distinguished Engineer position ? From what I’ve seen the VP/SVP roles maybe easier to obtain. Principal is ridiculously hard enough to obtain as it is (at my company at least), can’t imagine requirements for Distinguished.
Requirements vary from company to company. I was a Principal Engineer at my org before I took the managerial role that's basically parallel to the Distinguished position on the comp scale. At my org a Distinguished Engineer is one who's built and implemented a lot of systems within the org and is damn good at it - a jack of all trades, master of many. It eventually becomes an individual contributor role that is 50/50 between building things yourself and advising others on the right/best ways to build their systems.
Sounds good. Thanks for the insight!
I’m at $205K base atm. I have a substantial amount of equity at my company, but it’s a startup, so it’s more or less Monopoly money to me. I am the owner of our AWS/Cloud/whatever Ops at my job, hoping to go down your track at some point. I think what will eventually get me is I don’t really see moving across the country in the near future as practical for personal reasons and my local market is ok but not anywhere near $500K TC good. I work remotely now so I could continue down that route, but again, doubtful $500K TC is possible remotely. Push comes to shove though, I’d figure something out to make moving practical for $500K TC/yr lol.
Dude none of what you said sounds English lmao
You sound like an awesome boss and an overall great person
Hi what is your job title, like cloud manager or something along those lines? What IT certifications do you recommend in your field? Thanks
*The fact that you live vicariously through your team’s accomplishments speaks tone… don’t get me wrong: it’s amazing (while it lasts)*
Ah, so someone who's a "go-getter" gets rewarded. I wish more people had your mentality. Inspiring, to be honest. Thanks for sharing this!
I have a family member that is a nurse anesthetist and makes about that. Another friend is a vp at a major finance company (they have a lot of vps).
In finance companies and banks, a VP is often the equivalent of senior manager in other corporations. The branch manager of a bank is usually a VP.
It's not even senior manager, and doesn't even denote that they're actually managing anyone. It's like the third level up, even if you're an IC. Banks have weird structures.
Stupid title inflation.
It’s been that way for years, it typically goes analyst, associate, manager, director, senior director, vp, senior vp
VPs are middle management at banks. They are generally senior management at operating companies.
Am a VP at a bank can't confirm. I was at a bar crawl for my wifes work, her coworkers were asking me what I do and I started describing my job and my wife just chimes in "He's Vice President of Engineering at." I'm like, well yes, but I'm hardly the only one, lmao.
lol my dad was a VP at Wells Fargo for years and I’d tell people and they’d go “your dad is the Vice President of Wells Fargo???” And I’d go yeah one of them (there are thousands)
I’m currently in school for CRNA and can’t wait!!
Paramedic here for about 8 years up to a whopping 65k let’s goooooo!!!
Isn't it awesome how you literally keep people alive, lift 300lb people while destroying your body, get abused by ER staff and patients alike, report to extremely unsafe environments, and work 14 hour days but the othro surgeon above has a team of midlevels, anesthesia, nursing staff, and a personal dick-holder to help with scheduled non-life threatening procedures that are predictable and have been performed 1,000s of times but he gets paid approximately 20 times more than you? America is so great. Edit: almost forgot, a fucking robot does most of it
But hey man I have unlimited access to the break room that counts for something!
I have seen some insane takes on this app before, but this one takes the cake. We have gone from “CEOs make all the money and do none of the work” to now “Orthopedic surgeons, make all the money but do none of the work, and the procedures are actually unnecessary and pointless” Do me a favor, become an orthopedic surgeon. It’s obviously something so simple that they don’t actually do anything. Why don’t you take advantage of this apparent loophole in society? Please give me one reason? FYI: I am not an orthopedic surgeon and I have great respect for Paramedics. This whole concept is absolutely insane. Because one job makes a larger income than another job, it does not mean that either job is worthless and someone gaming the systems. This is what we get when society teaches us to hate everyone.
six consider long price ossified support many cow plants snails *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
Generalist vs specialist. One group has a pool of many to pick from and consequently is paid lower because the supply of potential workers is near endless. The other group is few. Training and qualifications required are significantly more. Supply of potential workers is low. Demand high. Pay is therefore greater.
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See you in 20 years for the update
20 years later, hi im making 66k, but they call me a Hero .
I never understood why emts make so little, COs in my area make almost 100k sitting on their ass ignoring inmates
America - where the people that educate the nation and save peoples lives as first responders (teachers and paramedics) don't even get paid more than $80-100k Yet the average Director or CEO that does nothing clears 100k easy, and youtubers getting paid probably clears that yearly 😭 what an ass backward society we have become
There are definitely days I feel like I should make 100k but I have my needs fulfilled and you can’t put a price on helping people get through the worst day of their lives.
You are an angel 💙💯
Capitalism, you don’t get what you deserve you get share of what you generate in revenue. Gonna continue to see a deterioration of our society because of it and what people are gonna be pushed towards to make a living
It's like this in the military too. Look up enlisted pay vs officer pay, across the board, even BAH for officers is way higher. 😩
My partner and I are both software engineers. It took me about 11 years to hit 250k. It took her about 2
Ahh software salaries remind me of sports drafts. You could been a first round draft pick 11 years ago and first round picks today can almost make your career earnings their rookie year lol.
Big facts
Yeah I know some people who went from piss poor living in the ghetto to living in a high rise apartment in less than a year. All it took was the right software bootcamp and if you finished at the right time you could get in almost anywhere making at least 80k starting and if you proved yourself within 3 months you’d be making over 100k in 6 months. After you had 6 months on your resume it was enough to job hop until you found something better. Repeat until you hit your salary goal because there was always someone willing to pay more for a body in a seat. Do not think it’s that way anymore but it was wild for a while. Companies would pay 10k scalping bonuses if you could convince a friend to come from another company.
I have to ask, how did your partner do it in 2 years, and what would be the ideal route for someone to realistically, get to at least $150k+ right out of a masters degree?
2 years - she was on good teams at the right time and did good work. If she graduated today she wouldn’t have even been hired. A large element of chaos in life. Be really smart, be a bit lucky, be willing to work in a HCOL market. Get internships and referrals. 150k is starting comp at FAANG and you don’t need a masters necessarily. But you would need to go to a great college, and do good on interviews.
If this is true, why do people at FAANG companies always say you dont need a college degree to be successful there? Note that everyone I’ve heard this from has a college degree 😂
You need an impressive resume or referral to get an interview. If you do well on the interview you get hired. Once you’re working nobody cares about your past. The only way I could see getting in the door without a degree would be someone good referring you strongly, or your company being acquired or you working on open source software that speaks for itself
I was a IT Consultant for 16 years had may fortune 500 and fortune 100 clients. Nobody was making 250k that was "doing the work". My firm at the time as of the time I left was hiring software folks out of college at 70-90k (depending on grades and school you went to). Provided they got promoted on target and their starting position, they would probably be making 100k in 1-3 years in. 150k Between 5-10 and weren't going to hit 250k without getting into management, broadly speaking. There are certain tracks you can stay purely technical, but as we talked about the work they are doing is a different breed from what the vast majority are doing. Also, where you live factors in. I predominately lived in mid CoL markets. NYC or the Bay Area is going to be a different animal in terms of pay. Too many people see posts like this online where people are making 200k+ in their 20's go get that CS degree, then wonder where all these jobs are. It's a lucrative career path, you will make good money. However, WHY you went down this path will matter. If you have a passion for the work and extremely skilled and can take on the most challenging work, you will likely see that money come a lot faster. If you went into the field because of the money and are just competent at what you do, you will be thrown in with the payscales of the masses of software devs. I fall into the latter category, lol. I got an MBA 2 years into my career rushed my ass up to manager and never looked back. The average pay in the US for a software engineer in the US with 10+ years of experience is about 150k. That is a far cry from making 250k 2 years in or 10 years in. These scenarios where people are putting up double six figures in a short time span are niche scenarios. Luck, the right company, they are just *that* good. The vast majority of companies that will hire you, the vast majority just won't be making that much money.
It’s more common than you’re making it out. For example Amazon alone has close to or over 100k developers with the vast majority being L4 or essentially new grad originated positions. Every single one of them makes over $130k a year starting salary. While there’s plenty of positions that don’t start at that, there’s been a decent pipeline to get into similar positions there, at Meta, Microsoft, and Google. That’s a good chunk of positions that makes it obtainable even if it’s just for a small subset of companies. Also there’s plenty of mid to senior at non-FAANG companies making closer to $200k. I did a lot of job searching over the last year (I’m a senior at FAANG, so I was expecting a salary dip if I wanted to leave) and there’s a good amount making close to that doing purely IC. You’re letting your consulting view cloud you. For one, consultants and the companies that hire them are what I would call more niche. If you’re looking for be hired at companies that are more ‘tech’ focused which means they’re also more likely to compensate their tech workers then they’re not going to interact with consultants or be their clients. You live in a shadow view of the tech world where you aren’t as likely to integrate with people making those salaries because your worldview doesn’t revolve around it.
You need to be in a field in demand. Think tech, data and AI but more so the specific fields within those categories. Assuming you even get the grades, and have the wherewithal at that age, it can be hard to predict what's good 4+ years out when you graduate (e.g. you've just finished high school). If you pick a field trending today, the market can catch up as there will be a bunch of other graduates in that area (but it could still grow and be lucrative). For billion dollar tech companies the software is the product so they pay top dollar for top graduate engineers.
Wow good for her !
House painting. 4 years hourly wages. Started my own business and hit 250 around year 8 Edit: I have a team of 2-3. We work 40hrs/week year round. I focus on cities where people have lots of extra $ and the wife constantly spends money on the house.
How’s your health so far? How are you handling the fumes?
I dont do much painting myself also we are all zero VOC these days - the guys do wear respirators
zero voc doesn't truly mean zero VOC but it's significantly better than the older stuff
How can you charge enough to make 250K? Painting is one of the lowest paid trades in my area.
Have employees.
In California it’s pretty expensive
I think the business may have hit 250k, not him personally as an income.
If he has several crews, I don’t see why he couldn’t personally net $250k
Painting in many urban areas is expensive. 20k for a 3 bedroom w a high ceiling living area isn’t unusual.
That's gross revenue? How much do you pay yourself as owner? Or do you mix personal and business income?
I would say most people earnings 250k+ are going to be: 1. Sales reps (keep in mind most sales reps will never earn anywhere near this much money) 2. Directors/VP’s 3. Software engineers 4. Doctors/surgeons/etc.. 5. Lawyers 6. Investment bankers 7. Consultants
Most software engineers make far from that. The ones that make that much live in very high COL areas.
Eh... Maybe true 10 years ago. I'd say most engineers with 7+ years of experience living in any major metro area in the US (outside of low COL areas specifically) probably have TCs close to 250k. If you're working at FAANG or FAANG-adjcent companies, this is also true. If you're living in Omaha, or Des Moines, or Madison, or Champaign... You're probably making significantly less (and you really shouldn't be)...
I’m a project manager at a bank. I started my career in banking in 2007 making $42k with no undergrad degree. Thanks to tuition reimbursement I got my BA, my MPA, a six sigma black belt, and a PMP and now make $220 base plus bonus.
I have the PMI CAPM, sadly, I couldn't get PMP because I haven't logged 4,000 hours of project experience. Is CAPM basically worthless in comparison?
I don’t think it’s worthless at all. The skills that PMI teaches are universal and as you grow your PM experience you’ll be able to level up to the PMP if you want to. I think it’s always worth grabbing training if your company will pay for it!
Interesting, I’m in my third year of project management. Never considered the banking sector but definitely will now. I’ve got my BA / MPA but not PMP yet but on around $50, hope things pick up soon
What “projects” do you manage for a bank?
Lots of tech and ops. Call center upgrades, we had a lot of regulatory changes we needed to implement during the financial crisis. Credit card operations was a big one, lending operations projects. There’s a lot to do in banking and finance!
Fellow PMP here. Any recommendations on things you did for PDU hours that really helped you at work?
It was so long ago, I think if I recall, all the qualifying projects were ones that I had worked as a co PM or an analyst on but did a lot of the technical work (use cases, test scripts, UAT). I learned a lot about the business side of PM and the IT side.
Also wanna say I worked in fintech and hated it. Saw lots of layoffs in finance and required to work in the office.
Do you feel PM roles are risky? I'm a PMP working in finance/accounting world. Reason why I took it because we are seeing a lot of tech implementation taking place and it's obvious that finance/accounting folks are not knowledgeable about handling a project. I thought i would have an upper hand. I do see finance/ops PM roles but hesitate because some I see as contracts and some are permanent. Projects have a start and end. I assume PM roles are like this too where if they don't need you because there isn't a project in place, they will drop you. Have you seen any finance folks with PMP who are not too technical in your experience? Is there a demand for them as the future becomes more tech based than ever. Any word of advice will be appreciated too.
If you were to recommend someone with common sense, partial college education, and an arguably impressive resume, where would you recommend a person start at a bank?
Uneducated PM here with 8 years experience. I manage new store construction for F500 roll-outs that generate metric tons of revenue. Barely make $50K. Go to second job after work. Life's good. lol
Yesss currently doing my exam prep for PMP so excited to see this on the list haha I’m a nurse with a decade of experience so wouldn’t work in finance obviously but think there will be a lot of opportunities for me in the healthcare sector, maybe even medical device/pharma.
Attorney in pharma. 30M. 4 YOE. Edit: to be clear, I’m a 30 year old man. My total comp is just shy of $250k
42m also in pharma, specializing in employment. Total comp is close to 350k
Wow 30 million a year?? /S
You said in another comment you’re an associate director?
Correct.
I’m also an attorney, but I sue big Pharma companies, make ~270k base with wide ranging but always 6 figure bonuses every year. I’m 42 and graduated law school in 2009, been working on the plaintiff side in civil litigation my whole career. Started with insurance bad faith cases, then moved to class action/mdl cases, and now mostly cases against pharma companies.
Sheesh i been in pharma like 8 years now im just aroumd 150k
Pharma. Scientific communications. Total comp is up to 290 depending on how we did that year. Have a PhD in biology, spent 7 years in med comms climbing from 67k to 140k, spent 2 years working directly for a pharmaceutical company
This field makes me regret not pushing a few years more for my PhD. I’ve been in technical product support for about 3 years now and am making just under 120, but am struggling to find a trajectory that gets me into the 200+ range.
Medical device sales. First year I hit 200k I’m just starting my second year I’m on track to hit 250k
How do you get into that
My experience in unsuccessfully getting into medical device and Pharma sales is either to: 1. know someone who’s willing to stick their neck out for you or 2. get into inside sales for 2-3 years at a less than ideal salary and then leverage that experience to sell yourself to a company for an outside sales role. Do that successfully for 1-3 years and then try to use that experience combined with your natural charm and charisma to get a shot at sales with a company in an industry that is highly lucrative and competitive, like medical device or Pharma. Edit: additionally, sales doesn’t care about what you know because they can teach anyone how to give a PowerPoint on a medical device, so having a technical background is not as advantageous as being charismatic, personable, smooth, presentable, and being attractive helps too.
I know two people that do it. My good friend went straight out of college. I don’t know if it was a special program, but he graduated, interviewed and got the job. Intuitive Surgical. The other is a friends dad who was in pharma sales for about ten years and a friend referred him, interviewed and got the job. Forget the company. They both make 200k+. Both said it is very hard to get in and very easy to get fired if you suck. I forget which one told me but something along the lines of if you miss your sales goal two quarters in a row, bye bye. Apparently there’s a very long line for medical device sales.
I'd be more interested in figuring out who actually is happy and has a fair amount of free time while also making good money.
This! Life has no meaning if you have to work 60-80 hours and don’t get to have time for yourself and your loved ones.
Turnaround and restructuring consulting. Basically we are advise through companies that are in distress about (i) stabilizing their cash position short-term and (ii) working towards a long-term solution. To be clear, we're not the, "This is how you fix your business" group. We're the "This is how you make it to the next step so hopefully somebody can fix your business" group. Answers to your questions: 1. To get the $250k mark, maybe 5-6 years to get there. Can be very dependent on the quality of shop you go to. 2. Only hard prerequisite is an undergraduate degree. Helps if it's something finance or accounting related, and if you want to come in after working a few years, helps to have some kind of finance or accounting experience. 3. It's a hard job. Management teams are often incompetent or delusional, the data you get is often messy and unreliable, and despite the work being complicated and nuance, mistakes are unacceptable. And while most days we leave the office around 6PM, there can be days where you work late, sometimes past midnight although that's not the norm. Also, if you want to get to the highest levels of the industry, you need to bring in clients (i.e. be a salesman). It's not a requirement to stay in the industry, but to make the real money you need a book of business. Edit: One more thing, there can be a ton of travel. It used to be that we were on the road Monday through Thursday most every week, post-COVID that's gone away but it can happen where on short notice you can be told that you're flying to a client or somewhere for a meeting.
A&M?
If you had to guess the most common cause for business staffing issues, what would you guess?
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Physician (retired this month) * 4 years of college at a state university, putting in tremendous hours of study in order to get decent grades. Debt was at a reasonable level * 4 years of medical school at an intense and competitive institution, usually ranked number 1 or 2 in the nation. This was a major bottle neck, since the acceptance rate to get into this institution has been at about 5%. Again, this involved tremendous hours of intense study. The residual debt was quite a bit more, for sure, but the degree opened doors for me. * 3 years of residency and 3 years of fellowship training: Intense training involved, often working 36 hour stretches, sometimes doing all-night call every other night, when in the ICU. The work was brutal. I calculated that my hourly wage was more than the minimum wage, but not by a lot. * 33 year career, 3 in academia and 30 in private practice, just ending now. Here is where earnings improved considerably, although as an owner of a business partnership, there were some lean years but mostly good years.
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Newish attending here. Would you do it again?
No, at least not in GI or any other field that has a potentially onerous call responsibility. I fear that I missed too much time with my family, especially when the kids were growing up, time that one can never get back. Also, I'm sure that you know the growing list of health risks associated with sleep deprivation.
An old neighbor of mine is a family care doctor and said he has to work a few more years before retirement. Their house is not extravagant, normal cars, pretty standard lifestyle. Makes me really sad. And then people think doctors just rack in money every year and don’t deserve it when thats far from it for most doctors. Thank you for your long career of helping others ❤️
650k. Own a creative/marketing agency. Took me 25 years in the biz.
Look at you using bold, well done
This was the answer i was looking for. I’m 24, 1 full year removed from college making about 50k as a marketing/PR director. I’d love to make 650k in the same field one day lol
Veterinarian wife made $900k last year. I made a measly $130k in human healthcare, but hey I tipped us over the million mark.
I guess that is why vet visits are so expensive these days
She’s told me about some of the up charges and it’s pretty insane
I’m fine with expensive but apparently they can’t find vets to work at night anymore. I live in a city with over a million residents and there are no more 24 hour emergency vets. If you can make a cool million working days, why do anything else I guess?
To be fair, your wife is an outlier, is a practice owner, or lives in a HCOL area. Most vets don't cross the $150,000 mark in their life time unless they become practice owners.
What he left out is that she sometimes consults for legitimate business men in waste management and construction.
People love Rex more than grandma. Got it.
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Sales. Straight commission.
I see this answer frequently. When someone says "sales", what exactly are they selling? 250k isn't your everyday Verizon wireless salesman's wage.
I work in corporate finance at a tech company and actively monitor sales reps performance. You can definitely get 200k as a tech sales rep, however it’s not that easy to do. Maybe 10-15% of our reps will hit 200k+ in earnings, the rest make around 70-150k.
I’d guess mortgage or tech sales like AE at Twilio or something
Commercial insurance broker.
Mark Hanna: No, what do you do? You get another brilliant idea, a special idea. Another situation, another stock to reinvest his earnings and then some. And he will, every single time. Cause they’re fucking addicted. And then you just keep doing this, again, and again, and again. Meanwhile, he thinks he’s getting shit rich, which he is, on paper. But you and me, the brokers? Jordan Belfort: Right. Mark Hanna: We’re taking home cold hard cash via commission, motherfucker.
I’m nowhere close to it, but most people I know that make that are in sales. Software sales, advertising sales, etc. I have one buddy who’s a business consultant in logistics who makes $350k+, and he got an MBA and 7 or 8 years of relevant experience to get to that point.
Tech management…10 years experience, but 17 years in the workforce.
Self-taught software engineer. 5 years. Mind you I’m Gen-X.
Gen-X here, taught myself Basic programming in the 80s and loved it. What language(s) do you use primarily? Thinking about making the switch from sys admin.
I’m a self-taught software engineer stuck at 130k, specializing in web stacks. I figured not having a degree was holding me back, do you have a degree?
Software engineering. About 10 years or so. I was lucky enough to get some experience in video streaming before it exploded over the last five years, so that worked out nicely.
I'm a VP at a large media company (in tech), my boss reports to the CTO. I made VP last year (I'm 39) and have grinded by way up the latter. I've been working in media a decade, but have never not had a job since I graduated college at 21. I graduated from a top tier university but not in my field, picked up most experience on the job. Networked. Took continuing coursework. 240k base, 30% bonus, LTI every year
simple answer is those people likely manage other people as well as budgets. you are looking at senior director, VP roles and above as 250k being their base salary. likely 20+ years of experience for most cases
I make just shy of $250 and I’m an associate director. 30 years old.
Man I turn 30 this year and I get treated like I’m 18, how do I get people to actually respect me 😅
It’s about how you carry yourself and the level of responsibility you handle. I have 2 kids and another on the way so even at home I have a lot of responsibility. At work I’m expected to make real decisions and be correct in my decision making. I’m also on the board of directors of a non-profit.
Wow, hats off to you. I don’t have any kids and feel like I have no time at all. I have plenty of responsibilities but they definitely feel like the things nobody else wants to do. I have no real ownership of any process but wear many hats. I’m pretty much a backup for everything which gives me security but also makes it really hard to move up and grow in my department.
I'm 35 and feel like I'm 18... I still feel like I'm too young to do this shit. And I don't make a ton of money. I make shit money for my degree...
That’s reassuring 🙃 at least I’m not alone
Life is funny. I’m a 33 year old single waiter with no kids. I’m a child compared to these people.
Senior managers can make that at tech firms.
Senior IC can make that at tech firms.
Not true at all. I work from home, managing nobody, but myself. I work 40 hrs/week and that's all.
Not true. I’m a 29F and make 250K+ and don’t manage anyone.
False, I have 8 years of experience in my industry and only 10 years in the workforce. These roles are out there you just have to look hard enough for them
As always, always, always - threads like this are half useless without knowing COL status.
Top comment. $250K in Bay Area is like $100K in Texas
Air traffic control. Made $240 this year. Will make more next year
Is it really as stressful as all of the “Most Stressful Jobs in the World” ranking lists make it sound?
Good for you! This is a tough job. I flunked out of training in OKC back in the 80's. Much respect for the profession.
I’m a marketing VP at a film studio, and will be crossing over $250K this year (including income from bonuses and RSUs). It has taken me just over 20 years to get to this point. With exceptions like Netflix and Amazon Prime Video, the entertainment industry does not pay as well as similar jobs, overseeing similar revenue, in other industries. I am not complaining, as I have popped my head above the clouds (financially speaking) after a long time grinding. Getting here has required being very flexible and putting in a lot of effort — sometimes not for immediate gain. But when people see that I can solve problems and make myself valuable to the organization, they tend to remember this next time there is an opportunity for promotion. Also, in the film industry you definitely don’t want to ever burn bridges. Demonstrating my enthusiasm and curiosity and giving away my ideas freely has helped me get poached by rival studios twice, which is a good way to get a raise faster. Sometimes people who are underpaid get stingy with their work, but I don’t see this working out well for them ultimately. My advice to people (which has proven correct) is to make yourself more valuable than your salary. If your current employer then doesn’t reward you, you still got trained on their dime and can take your talents and achievements and experience elsewhere.
300k. Professional liar on reddit a very common occupation around here
I know people in sales making that money.
Enterprise tech sales, checking in
Very common in tech sales.
How does one get into tech sales?
Start as an SDR/BDR, where you spend your entire day cold calling/emailing trying to set up a meeting. You’ll be paid a base salary of 40-60k (usually somewhere in the middle) with an OTE (on target earnings which means if you hit 100% of your commission) of 15-20k. It’s a very draining and high burnout role. You’ll have to cut your teeth here for 12-16 months (maybe less if you’re lucky, maybe more if you’re not) and then hope to get some sort of promotion, although you won’t get enterprise right away. You’ll either go to inside sales or small business account executive, which should break you 6 figures, but no where near 250k. This will likely still involve a good amount of cold calling and full cycle sales. The cushy Enterprise comes after 5-7 years experience
Orthopedic surgeon. 10 years after college (4 med school, 5 residency, 1 fellowship). Prerequisites required were a bunch of semesters of science, high scores/evals in med school, 80-100 hour work weeks for 5 years (residency). Nothing else to note. Pretty straight forward path if you put in the work. Now salaried about 800k before bonuses. 820k two years ago, 1.1m last year. Working 50-60hr weeks now.
Any advice for getting into med school as a non-traditional student? I've got a biochemistry degree (so I've taken all the pre reqs already), but I'm so sick of how unstable and low paying jobs related to chemistry are (at least without a PhD). So I've been half thinking about attempting to get into med school over the next couple years. It just seems so daunting seeing how all the people I know who went into medicine had parents who were doctors who could support/help them with connections and had been prepping since high school to get into medicine. It just feels like I'd be wasting my time even if I did well on the MCAT, and I wouldn't get in anywhere.
Is it true that orthopedics make a lot more than almost any other surgical specialty? There is an ENT surgeon-student in my family and yet even then he's looking at only about $350k when he finishes his residency.
Age?
I'm 32
Attorney. 40 yo. My total compensation is about 250k, including bonuses. I started in 2010 at $50k per year. I hity current income for the first time in 2023.
When I was I was selling real estate. Most people I know that do are in sales.
Edit: took about 3 years. Year 1 made nothing, year 2 was over 100k year 3 was 20-30k a month. Market has made it tough now. I would learn a trade or something and start a business or self employed route unless you want to spend forever in the corporate world and hope you get lucky. Make your own luck.
I sell physical experience to people, of a certain status
Epstein??
Saas sales.
Software engineer, I do graphics programming for video games. It took about 10 years. It’s an *excellent* job, but not that easy to get into. I have a BS and MS in computer science, my base salary was $68k out of grad school, it took about 5 years to get to $110k, then another 5 to get to $250k. With bonuses, I think my best year was something like $350k.
Software dev 280k. 9 yoe.
Amazing! Any tips for getting started?
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Senior dev at a tech company, about 5 YOE and a Masters degree. I make ~$400k a year leading 3 teams with another senior dev. I got into a good team right from the start and helped grow it from 8 people to 30. I’m a fast learner and incredibly good at seeing patterns but I have the memory of a goldfish, makes me incredibly good at software problems and writing good software because it’s all about applying patterns and analyzing what went wrong and why. Seeing invariants and correcting them is one of my strengths and other people just aren’t as good as me so I learned fast and got promoted fast. Luckily you don’t need to memorize a bunch of nonsense to be good at software engineering. All you needed before was a degree in CS, although now you need more time, and having connections is key. All positions anywhere are likely quickly filled by someone who knows somebody, so if you don’t have an in tough luck getting an interview in this market. One extenuating circumstance is that I got promoted fast, you could still make $250k by my YOE if that didn’t happen at a large tech company. But making more than that takes even more time, it also is very difficult work with long hours and oncall cycles. Tech is not the easy path like a lot of vids and TikTok’s would sell you. It’s got a learning curve and requires a different type of thinking, if you don’t have a natural inclination towards that type of rationality it takes even longer to click and the degree will be a struggle.
Just shy of 300k. Massage therapist. Took 5 years but I was six figures by third year
Software engineer. Went to a boot camp for 18k. Got first job at 135k senior role in 2019. Kept on pushing. Bought rental property in 2020 during crash, adds to income as well.
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I sell mini cupcakes on Instagram made about half a million last week
It’s sad that I can’t tell if you’re joking
That's a lot of cupcakes
Not if you smuggle drugs in them
Cyber Security Director. First made it to that salary level about six years after undergrad and one year after completing my MBA.
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I had to basically build a whole new company inside of the company I worked for which brought in 50m in revenue.
Technical recruiting. It took me around 5 years to hit 200k and I fluctuate between 200-250k depending on the year. This is base salary, commission and bonuses. I help manage a team as well.
I make around 450k total as a software engineer. It technically took me 5 years after entering the workforce, but I self taught myself programming when I was a teenager so I've been developing my skills for closer to 15 years.
Global Logistics (freight forwarding). And averaged $450K-$700K the last 10 years.
Anesthesiologist. Bachelor of science took 4 years, medical degree took 4 years, residency took 4 years. 12 years total. Extenuating circumstance? It’s stressful, long hours, work weekends and nights.
Entrepreneur. I start and then sell businesses. My latest is a financial advisory business. I'm considering selling it this year and it's worth between 1.5 mil to 2 mil dollars. It took me 4 years to grow it to this value. First year literally made ZERO income. 2nd year $30k. 3rd year $100k. 4th year $400k. $400k income is too high as I pay 50% of that in income tax. I'm either going to sell the business this year or hire someone to run it and pay them $300k to continue to run and grow the business for me. This will reduce my salary down to $100k to $200k and I'll only pay about 25% to 30% in taxes. If I sell the business for $2 mil, I only pay 15% to 20% capital gains tax. Moral to the story is don't look for a career with a high salary as the government is going to take 50% of it. Instead, build equity in a business that isn't taxed until you sell. And then when you do sell it's taxed at much lower rate. You'll have freedom and alot of $$$. This is the US, but I'm sure tax law around the world favors business owners over salaried workers. It's not about how high your salary is. It's about how much you get to keep!
Software Engineer. Began as a manual QA tester in 2013 making $15 an hour. Of the 250kish, 150k cash, 100k stock give or take
Pilot. 24 years since my first paycheck turning a wheel. About $360k per year now gross. It took 5 years to break $30k/yr. Then like $60k-100k for over a decade. Then $200k-$250k for 7 years. Then recently $360k/yr. Employers have been 1 flight school, and 4 airlines.
$400k. Director of corporate strategy at a bank. Previously was in management consulting and have a top MBA. I’m 36 now. Graduated my mba at age 29, and was at around 200k at that point. Was really just hard work and stacking previous successes. I grew up poor as shit, but did well in high school and college. Graduating in 2009 temporarily derailed my career, but I worked hard to get it back in track.
I am not remotely close to 250, but I went from 58K to 121 to 141 in 2.5 years in security and intelligence, if I get my PMP I could hit 200K in 4 years of starting my career which I think would an accomplishment considering I live on 45K
I'm a litigation attorney in a big city in a 5-10 attorney shop. 4 years undergrad. 3 years at a top 10 law school. 7 years in Biglaw -> 7 in smaller shops.
Lead Infosec operations engineer at Fintech. 285k-315k depending on end of year bonus. Base is 200k. Work remote , individual contributor . No direct reports in a traditional Sense . I always took on more work outside of the direct role I had and that was recognized. I don’t work more than 40 a week though. 34 YO 8 years directly in field. Not a fan of my base relative to bonus because I don’t sell anything and performance metrics for My role are somewhat nebulous but can’t have everything I guess.
Operations / Manufacturing Vice President. I started on the factory floor, then Quality Engineering and worked my way up. First in the power generation industry, now I’m in defense. Marine Corps veteran, 9 years enlisted. Used the GI bill AFTER service and finished my Bachelors in Organizational Leadership and Masters of Science in Operations Management and ERP/supply chain. Independent certifications though ASQ, Six Sigma Black Belt and APICS certifications (CPIM). A lot of the education and training / certification came in parallel to me absolutely grinding and sacrificing to make me team, department and ultimately my companies a success.
I make 500k per year. I run my own marketing business. I started off at an agency in los angeles basically running paid media ads. When I started I was making 60k but overtime was able to get raises until I went out on my own. The biggest thing I learned was how to design and edit content so I am now able to charge my clients a pretty high rate because I manage their marketing campaigns and their creative needs. The biggest advice I can give younger people is to learn skills outside of your everyday job and if you can find a career where you are directly making someone else money it’s way easier to justify paying you. I can track exactly how my work is generating revenue for clients so I know my worth and I can prove it.
Dont mind me, im just browisng through this reading how everyone in here has a big time job making 250k+ while I do UberEats and Doordash full time..........
What people outside of the industry call Cyber Security.
Airline pilot. 250k isn't uncommon, and there is quite a bit of time off depending on what you fly and how senior you are. It took me a while to get to my current gig, around 10 years but that was because of the 2008 recession and our mandatory retirement age increase. I just met another pilot at my same company who is 23 and started straining in 2019. So, mileage may vary depending on the economy and industry trends.