Before covid I switched jobs. Got about $12k more. Months go by, COVID hits and I can't do my job (didn't have the flexibility and daycare was shut down). So I get my old job back but said I'd do it for $X where X was another $10k above from the new job.
Switching jobs definitely works. It sucks giving up a sure thing and the comfort zone though
It sucks giving up a sure thing and the comfort zone though
Very much. It's also kind of a privilege to be able to do that. Often this requires mobility - which you don't have if your spouse is also working (could not find a job in the same place) or if you have kids (school, friends etc). I think in the USA it is very common to constantly move, but here people usually avoid moving too often. Taking a risk when it's not just you on the line is also a bit harder.
That's empirically testable in my case. Same employer's for ~10 years, went from £13k per annum to almost £30k. In the next 10 years, I went from £30k to £85k. Software developer, in the UK.
There's only been one company that I had worked for almost 4 years. Every company I've ever worked for, on my second year I check the job market, if it looks good I start to submit my resume with the goal to get job offers that offer either more pay or more PTO/sick time/holidays (more time off combined). Take my job offer, present it to my employer, then just leave to the other org because more than likely I'll have a target on my back when it comes time to cut employees / lay off.
I've moved to a couple different employers over the last few years obtaining all kinds of skills, most of the companies went down or moved to cheaper labour countries.
My wage has been stagnant for the past 10 years. It's all bullshit anyway, they just fuck with you just to fuck with you.
Then you realize, since your raises no longer even keep up with inflation, your current job is now underpaying you - making it more difficult to hold on to what you do have.
Or alternately you jumped around a lot, make much more than your peers, and getting towards mid/late in your career where you become the target of layoffs for costing more than everyone else.
You get laid off... and then one of your connections from the last 15 roles has an open position that you fit in.
alternatively: you as 50something tech worker who has only had one gig for 15 years gets canned for whatever reason goes to the streets and every single employer who interviews you sees just how out of date you are with technology because you haven't learned anything new in forever. You end up working at an arcade until eventually taking a huge pay cut becoming tech support or working for a low paying company nobody with experience wants to work for.
I have never seen a good worker who moves on not do exceptionally well in a year or two years. Maybe one role or two will be awful for a 20k raise so you stay a year... then the next role gives you ANOTHER 20k raise (so +40k now in just one year) and the new role is phenomenal. Two or three more years you find another role for another 10-20k and then 50k in equity that matures in x years to try and keep you. Odds are by then you have multiple offers to pick from because past managers/companies are interested in you. Maybe now you're going back to a former company but into a more senior role because of all that modern experience you've gained.
As long as you get minimum 1 year in most roles, and do not have significant gaps, you're gonna be desired. I will as a hiring manager 100% of the time be more interested in the resume of a guy who has been at 5 roles in 10 years for 1yr+ each, than one guy who has been in one role for ten years.
There are definitely reasons not to change jobs constantly. It kind of depends on industry.
Finding a new job might mean you need to relocate, which is inconvenient and becomes harder if you own a home or have a family.
There is also always a risk that the new company’s culture or your new boss are bad. It’s not something you can really know for sure until you switch, but if they aren’t good, it might not be worth the extra money.
It also takes time to ramp up and figure out the way things work. Being new in a job kinda sucks for a lot of reasons.
Your current job might offer something that is hard to find elsewhere like flexibility to work remotely when you want, or free food, or a good 401k match.
Some benefits take time to accrue and starting over at a new company might mean starting over on benefits accrual. For example, some companies increase vacation days based on years of service. Same goes for other things like percentage of 401k match. You might also miss out on claiming the full 401k match that you’ve earned at your current job if you leave early depending on vesting schedules.
Some companies have better job security than others. A new company might pay more, but also do regular layoffs. If your current company is fairly stable, it might not be worth it to move to one that does more layoffs.
Your current employer might pay close to top of market already. It could be hard to find another employer that actually would pay you more, and even if they could, it might not be worth the little extra for all of the other above cited risks of changing jobs.
Negotiating with your current boss is significantly more difficult than negotiating with a future prospective firm, because your future prospective firm doesn't have the power to fire you.
It's 10000x better in the blue collar world because right off the bat you're assumed to be as useless as a person can possibly be so you either do the futile argue for a raise (which never matches what you should get) or you take a huge pay cut when finding a new job...
I've been stuck in the same cycle for 15 years now... Get shitty raises for 5 years, get burned out and bail, take massive pay cut, prove my worth to get back to shitty wage I left for but am now burned out again, find a new job and take another massive pay cut etc etc... adjusted for inflation I make as much now as I did 10 years ago...
These articles are always about white collar work. :(
My job doesn't like to give titles so no one can determine their value, but I'm something like a supervisor/manager/QC in a factory that makes luxury products for the ultra wealthy and the military.
It's a separate part of the company. The parts are similar but not made to be luxurious and some are just completely different things that aren't luxury at all. I wrote the initial comment without the military part added, but I edited it to add that so I guess it kinda reads a little odd now.
I don't think there are many companies at all that do what we do so I'm being kinda vague lol
I wonder how this looks when compared to a decent union shop. In union shops you probably tend to not move jobs a lot, or like in some trades you take your union creds with you no matter where you work.
You certainly can increase pay by jumping around a lot in regular work, but union gigs tend to have set progression based on seniority.
Unions periodically renegotiate their salary and benefits through broad company-wide contracts, so its not just a single small bean asking to be paid a bit more. Its an entire department or firm demanding a bigger percentage of the gross revenue.
Seniority solves a lot of the "how much money do I even ask for?" questions when renegotiating salaries. It also establishes a clear-cut cost of living track. You know what you'll be making in five years, so you can buy a house or get married or have kids with some underlying expectation of how much you'll earn when your cost of living goes up.
Well, yes…I’ve been union for decades so I’m quite familiar. This comment is helpful to summarize for some people a bit of how unions do things, but when I originally commented it was more a question about how the two compared as far as earnings. Do you have to constantly jump around non-union jobs to keep up with union wages? Will the mobile employee outpace union wages? At what rate? Overall lifetime earnings? My understanding is that union gigs for comparable jobs may not offer high pay off the bat, but over a lifetime often do better than non-union with wages, benefits, and retirement. However, some normal jobs will allow you to jump right in to good pay relative to a union gig but you may not advance much in pay or have to leave to advance.
The public sector model, there's definitely something good about knowing exactly where you are and where you're going, only a problem when the scale is totally off of whack with current CoL etc.
Old article, but it’s certainly true in my industry. Having said that, I’m a bit conflicted with this at least for my own personal situation.
I’ve been with my current employer for a decade. I’m sure I can get a significant pay bump if I switch, but I’m in a comfortable position where I think the trade off is worth it. I earn enough to support myself and my wife on a single income. Work from home, unlimited PTO, and the job itself is not super stressful that I get good work/life balance. My manager and teammates are awesome. The company has great benefits and lots of perks.
I’m at a point in my life where I no longer want to be “challenged” with work. Meaning, I just want to clock in, do work, clock out. I don’t yearn for promotions, new challenges, and moving up. I just want to get paid for work I’m familiar with and good at, and focus my energy on my personal life. And my current job allows me to do that plus all the perks mentioned. So the question is, will I be willing to potentially sacrifice all the comfort I currently enjoy to get paid more? Sure, there’s a chance I could get a better paying job AND all the same perks, but that’s not a guarantee and I will never know until I’m working that new job. Also take into account all the effort required to learn everything on the new job and having to “perform” to impress as a new hire.
But who knows, it might come to a point where my current pay is no longer enough. Only time will tell.
It sounds like you are in a good place, and are satisfied. For what it's worth, IMO, just stay happy. If that means staying where you are, you don't gotta impress nobody but yourself. So don't worry about all the other noise. Always keep one eye on the prize, like in today's professional world, you always have to be prepared for the rug to be pulled up from under you with a layoff or if the company hires a new boss for you and they are a zeeb, but once you got that concern appropriately hedged, always put professional well being above everything else.
I left my last job to make double what the previous one paid, and my job is a nightmare job. Each successive job pays me more, makes me more miserable, the people are always worse and more money just means more problems. Money ain't everything, and I mean it. Make enough to survive, live your happy idea of a perfect lifestyle, save for rainy days and retirement, and the rest is just noise.
I think job-hopping helps people who still need to climb the ladder until they land some “senior” position into which they can settle in, safe in the knowledge that they can always find another job elsewhere with their experience.
By changing workplaces twice I tripled my income in under 2 years. The biggest thing that happened is that I was promoted to a much more senior position 6 months into the middle workplace, but they screwed me on the salary thinking that because it was a big bump from my lower position it would keep me around.
So I did that job for a year and got hired for the same job elsewhere for a 50% pay increase.
Or, as my omniscient relatives and neighbors who have on countless occasions provided unsolicited commentary on my career would say, "a nice stable job, why don't you ever stay in one place?"
This has been well documented for at least a decade.
Meanwhile, employers feign concern over turnover but know it's a better bottom line and their bonus to let employees with standards leave than to do the right thing.
Well, it's different if you work for good companies. I've stayed at my last 3 jobs for well over 2 years each and my career is going great, making twice as much money as I need. IT / technical stuff. 6 years at one, 4 years at the next, currently at 3 years with current.
I've never lasted that long at any former employer though. My shortest employment was half of one shift at a factory, it sucked so bad I left on my first lunch break. The moral of my story is that it's OK to stay with a good company, if you can find a good job like that. Experience counts for a lot towards getting hired to these good jobs.
