I hope she retires early and enjoys life after work.

That's the thing, being able to pay bills makes me happy. Work will never make me happy.

Yeah, I like my job and love my team. I'm truly afraid of losing that.

Yeah, i have a friend like that. Gets paid twice (maybe 3x?) what i do but has no friends and is miserable. Well, things have been getting better for him at least and i've been making more money lately so i guess things are looking up.

I have a lot of acquaintances in my field that seem to have no problem changing jobs every 1-2 years and keep doing better each time.

My manager does this. If he sees that a job candidate hops jobs a lot he won't give them an interview. That being said, our yearly raises meet/exceed inflation and he's a pretty good manager

This is pretty dumb advice, because someone who's hopping every 2 years and getting passed on interviews is still getting more interviews than someone who's not applying at all.

How much is moving around a lot? Because 2-3 years turn over is pretty common in IT and it doesn't seem to prevent being hired. It may even be considered as better experience than the one of an engineer that worked on a single system for 10 years.

I'm not saying you're wrong...and as I age, I'm asked more and more about my job hopping history...but I am starting to feel like the negatives of a long history of job hopping are in many ways balanced out by the long history itself.

I'm a CAD drafter with 17 years of experience in 5 different jobs. In interviews it's more and more common to get questions about my plans for the future and how long I plan to stay with (company that is interviewing me). Each time, I tell them that I'm prepared to retire from their company in a few decades as long as they take care of me and keep a good working environment and competitive compensation.

Whether I'm just in a good market for my skills, or job hopping isn't the deterrent some people seem to think it is, I have been getting a constant stream of recruiters filling my inbox for the past decade, whether I've been looking or not, and I've honestly never not gotten an offer for any position I was actually interested in.

If I felt it was a good fit and was interested in talking to them, it has always led to an interview, and if I was still interested after that, an offer. Every time. Granted, often the offer was way less than I was currently making or in the interview we realize it's not a good fit...but never once has my job history been an issue that comes between a position that's a good fit and a job offer.

I jump jobs something like every 2-3 years and frankly have never found that to be an impediment to finding new employment. And every time it's been for more money. I'm sure that some hiring managers see this as a problem but I also think that most of them understand the realities of today's job market.

From one person's experience (mine): They don't read CVs that closely. I've got a couple of 1 year jobs (not contracts) and they're more interested in what I did rather than why so short. If they ask I tell them it's because I didn't like the position but gave it a go for a year. I also have a 2 year gap in employment none of them are interested in for 4 jobs now, they don't even spot the missing years and I've had to point it out in interviews because it's a story of how I deal with big tasks.

If they are that petty that they'll pass me over because of something like that then that employers policies would raise more flags than I'd want to deal with anyway.

When hiring you have hundreds of CVs pass by, I'm looking for experience, we'll sort out these other details in the interview.

Caveat: I am older now, more senior but never had issues finding work.

Doesn't hurt to check out your options. And almost any job will welcome you back (usually at your new pay rate) if you change your mind down the road.

Over my career, lateral moves have netted me +80%, +30%, and 20%. Not to mention quality of work/life improvements.

Most companies basically offer a < 5% raise every year, which is just around inflation. Maybe a 10% bump if you get promoted. The wider world values your skills much more.

Follow the ABCs. Always Be Checking.

It doesn't cost you a dime to keep your resume up to date and to check Indeed and Linked In one every few weeks for jobs like yours in your area.

Worst case, you look around and find there's nothing in your area paying much better than you are currently earning. Congrats. You're in as good a position as you can reasonably expect.

More likely though, you'll see one or more of a few other trends in your search:

• Employers are all looking for a specific skill adjacent to your skill set that you don't have. Might be time to look into a class or something to pick this skill up and increase your potential.

• Employers around you are all willing to pay more than you're making but want more experience. In this case you can sit tight...or throw your hat into the ring even with less experience. They may take a flier on you, especially in this tight labor market.

• Employers around you are willing to pay more for your skills and experience. This is most likely but you now need to check out why, and decide if you're interested.

Even if you're not really interested (maybe the specific opening is too far away or not a big pay increase or something) it may still be worth reaching out, even if just for interview practice. Lots of people really struggle with interviews, and being able to do one where you're not really intent on landing the job may be a valuable experience.

So interesting story. The company I work for, and have for over 10 years (right out of grad school), started to fall behind in my salary in 2020. I was beginning to consider other companies despite loving my job, but they apparently realized they were about to have a huge issue with a lot of mid-career staff leaving and gave us huge raises. Last year I got a 20% raise, this year a 8.5% plus a 2% bonus. I started at $86k in 2013, and am now up to $179k. I could do a little bit better with other companies, but not by a huge margin, and I really love my company and the work I do. It's a non-profit, so it's nice getting to focus on doing good engineering without answering to share holders.

My first job after I got my BSME was $45k in 2012. I was there until 2017, and left at $62k. Next job started at $72k, left at $76k in 2020. Next job was back at my first company, at $82k. So, my value went up to them 20k in a couple years. I just started a new job last month, left my old place at $96k and started at $115k.

I want to stay in one place, with coworkers and work that I like. But clearly, you have to keep moving at least every few years to really make anything. I knew guys that had been at that first company for 20+ years. Working with them again at this new place, they got like 50k increases from where they were because they were basically just getting cost of living increases for two decades.

Right!

Also, if your employer only bumps you up to where you should be after you threaten to leave after years of under-compensation, they've still won, not you. Sure you're now being paid fairly but you'll never get back all that pay you should've been getting all along. And if you don't have that money, they do.

Suddenly no more office-only or office-first policies, suddenly there is money to offer, suddenly there is possibility to have a better computer.

Also suddenly HR system couldn't work for a week, so signing a new counter-offer contract might not be possible at the moment. "Cancel your offer, you will sign in next week".

Interesting stuff :)

Stupid question, wasn't that a risky move? I mean, the way I was raised to think by my parents I can hear their voices in the back of my head if I went through a situation like this, similar to this:

"But aren't you worried they might hire you then fire you just out of spite for switching companies? And then what are you gonna do?"

And if you left based on that stagnant wage, I bet they gave you the guilt trip about loyalty, and how hard it is to operate a small business, as if that somehow makes it okay to underpay you.

Insane that a company will pay you a 20% premium to hire someone that they'll spend 6-months training just to watch said person fly off to another firm.

Contracting is even worse. Bring someone on to do menial piecework at 2x-5x the median company salary, then kick them out so you can bring on another person who has no idea how your company operates to do the same entry-level jobs. All so you don't have to tell investors how many people are actually on your payroll.

No wonder the business failure rate is so fucking high.

Show me a union web dev job.

Since you mention it and I have little knowledge on the subject: How would your average person in the U.S. (in this case) find and apply for union jobs?

It's not worth it if you chase money. Even the biggest assholes at your previous job might end up in a place adjacent to you, especially if you don't look internationally (or at least out of your area) for jobs.

I wouldn't recommend burning any bridges you don't have to.

Though my last employer was pissed when I got an offer for 30% more when he spent the last 6 months training me.

He immediately counter-offered to match and he didn't even have to check with anyone. I called him out on underpaying me by 30%. This was probably a mistake, but he was kind of an asshole anyway so meh.

This comment makes no sense. You can change jobs any time, and the sooner you get paid more, the sooner you can switch to a position that pays even higher

I think interest rates are usually lowered to combat a recession. I.e. when you really do not want to be looking for a job.

which china?