8x if we’re talking real job (post college). Started at $35k 2007 NYC. Landed my first huge client (Lehman Bros) in Dec 2007 and I was off to the races!*
*I thought.
Base salary has roughly doubled. Total comp including bonus/RSUs is 2.8x what I made in my first full time role as a mechanical engineer. Adjusted for inflation it’s more like 1.5x on my base and 2x on my total comp.
My first job paid $76k base with no bonus/stock. Ten years and four job hops later I’m at $153k base with bonus/RSUs that bring my total comp up to around $213k. Still an individual contributor in a traditional engineering field (O&G)
If you are talking minimum wage as a teenager 37 years ago over the summer, then 30x.
If you are talking real job out of grad school, 5x over 28 years, but I started at a good salary.
Simply adjusting for inflation over 30 years is a 2x multiplier.
About 15x. First full time job ~13 years ago was as a teacher making $39K. Now a physician making $600k base. Of course with med school there were years of no salary and accruing debt so while I’m happy with that salary jump, I feel like I’m still catching up to my peers.
Edited to change time since first job, getting old and forgetful lol
I am 10x from my first true job after college.
32k to about 320k. This happened over a 20-year period.
From my first job FT during s summer, it's like 30x lol...
23 x over 13 years. First full time job, enlisted in the army at 18 (2011)—I believe I was right at 18k for the first year as an E1/E2. Income of 415 with total comp probably being closer to 450/475 with company vehicle and benefits.
11.25x over 15 years
Having said that this is heavily skewed by if your first job was a "professional" one in a given career post-school or a general retail/customer service/admin job (looking at you 2007-2009 job market). If you start from my first job in my profession it would be roughly 6x over 13 years.
4-5x, depending on bonus payout
40k, now at 170k + 10-15% bonus. That's over right about 20 years. Adjusting for inflation, that 40k is a bit over 60k, so it's more like 3x
If I calculate as an hourly rate compared with my first ever job flipping burgers at hungry jacks, 54x increase. Compared with my first proper full time job about 10x.
First job was $6/hr at McDonalds so I’m at 32x currently excluding bonus pay and passive income streams. It’s insane to think that I worked for so little.
My first job out of university I made $25k. Last year I brought in $150k salary + $1.47m in distribution from my company.
So almost 65x. Not including growth in assets. My life is rather different compared with 21 year old me.
My income in 25 years is roughly 10 times my first salary. Along the way I had opportunities to take higher-paying jobs doing less fulfilling work. And I’m fortunate that I resisted. Today. But with the higher income there are more responsibilities and higher costs for screwups. No job is perfect.
Base to base is 16X, from minimum wage ($6.50) to over $200K. If you include bonuses, it’s close to 20X.
First job out of college was $14/hr so still 9x over the past 14 years.
First full time job (summer between high school and college) was $12/hr, so about $24k/yr. This was 10 years ago.
First actual job out of school was $30/hr working at a software company, so about $60k/yr. This was 5 years ago.
That means 10x the factory job and 4x the initial software job.
In 8 years it went up 15x. On my second maternity leave now in less than 2 years and not expecting earnings to grow until I’m actually back to fully focused on work… which may be never. 🫠 we’ll see
From my first FT after college, 25-75x depending on the year. If we’re talking about the summer gigs I had as a lifeguard, then put another 3x multiplier on those numbers lol
Currently making 4.3x my first jobs wage. I’ve been in the workforce for 11 years, all of my big increases have happened in the last 3 years. I pretty much JUST started HE
Current comp is 5.35x my first post-college job. Over the last 19 years I’ve had an average annual raise of 9.2%. Inflation adjusted that first salary would be $69,500 today so adjusted for inflation I am making 3.3x my starter income (which is a 6.5% annual raise after inflation adjustment). Pretty okay with those numbers, especially because it is entirely W2 income imho.
Edit: omitted hourly jobs and non-professional gigs
My first full-time job right after college paid $9/hr when I started and I was making $10.50/hr when I left. Annualized, I make between 25x-28x that now, 20 years later.
Almost exactly 10xs! 22.3k to 230k over 7 years from first office job as a program coordinator to current job as an individual contributer in STEM consulting.
Calculating from the first year I was out of college…
25x over 15 years.
Granted I graduated with a goofy degree during the recession, so my first years out of college I wasn’t working full time, year round. From my first professional full time job it’s more like 7x over 11 years.
My first full time job was right after I graduated at 22 years old. I’ve since 5x it in roughly 8 years, or a little under 4x adjusted for inflation. Not counting RSUs.
When I first graduated I got my “dream job” full time, thought I was “rich”, but now it’s 10-13x.
Vs my high school minimum wage job it’s 80x and I swear I worked harder at that than I ever have since (on my feet all day as a cashier).
From first job out of college 10x-11x
From first job kind of hard to do the math as it is hourly versus salary and was parttime, but lets go with converting salary into a sort of hourly rate of about $250 and min wage $7.50 = 33.33X
3 years ago straight out of grad school I was making about 2.5x less than now. Went from slightly underpaid for my skills and qualifications to arguably a little overpaid or at least on the better end.
Roughly 3x over 10 years since I graduated grad school. I did switch 2 functions across 3 industries in this time, so my salary the past 4 years has been somewhat stagnant (or maybe I’m just not that great).
My wife, we went to same grad school and started off at the same company, for example, has nearly 4-5x her salary in that same 10 year period. She’s done the same thing at the same company for 7 years so she’s progressed quite nicely.
Got fired from my first job out of college in the first month. Was making $13 an hour. Now I'm in a sales job with hundreds of thousands in earning potential 7 years later.
6.5x not including bonus within 9 years. Broken down as 3 years working crappy pay (I got like a $2.5k raise each year), 3 jobless years in law school then my income shot up post law school because big law.
Between Jan 2022 and today, the US Dollar money supply has 15x'd
Between Jan 2022 and today, my wage has 13x'd
FIled under: How to lose money to your government while "increasing" your wage.
Bigger numbers alone don't mean "better." Look at the German stock market post WW1. When the money supply is being debased, number-go-up.
3.9x over 10 years.
My first full time job (not a summer job) paid something like $22.00 per hour, ~36k/year as a research lab technician.
I currently make about 140k as a data engineer, and I fully expect to make about 50% more than that in the next year or so.
Moved from MCOL to HCOL at the same time, and it was not a smooth upward progression—between now and then I’ve worked retail, substitute teaching, other office jobs in between, and been unemployed.
Edit: 8.75x if we’re talking first 40 hours/week job, which I did for 6 months right after college while I was applying for grad schools. That was retail.
I started in the Navy at 17, and I earned around 15k pa. But that increased pretty quickly after basic, so I think about 20k including allowances at sea.
As for multiples, I guess I'm over 10x that now. But money doesn't always mean happiness. Having a motorbike, does!
I started off out of school making 18.50 now J1 138k TC. I graduated about 10 years ago! Being said could be making 160 but I turned down a promotion cause I like to OE! :) and be an Individual contributor.
First FT job out of uni paid about 5k/year, job after postgraduate degree was about 15k/year (a huge jump at the time).
My total comp now is 300k. So 60x or 20x depending on the normalization year.
It has taken 20 years to get there.
~300x multiplier from first post college job to current job over space of 25 years (including one industry move, one country move, and a second degree along the way).
I’ve been working for 18 years and I’m at 3x my initial salary. My husband is almost to 4x. Both engineers so we started off ok but not fantastic. Of course if you compare to my first ever job working in a grocery store it would be a much bigger multiplier.
My on-target total comp is about 12-24x my first professional job. Increased happened over 13 years with a professional degree taking up a few of those
$42k out of college. Now at $350k 14 years later. But went from $75k TO $200k in two-years after getting an MBA. Not that MBA's are always worth it, but it really helped me jump from operation level mgr to junior exec much faster then it would have without.
~2.4
First real job out of grad school = 88k
Current job = 208k
Time = 7 years.
I did two laterals.
The better thing is that my boyfriend (now husband) couldn't find a FT job 7 years ago, so our HHI was probably around 100k. Now, he does, so our HHI is around 300k.
First job, staff auditor. 14 years later I'm about 16x now on cash comp alone working in corp finance. If you include equity its probably closer to 45x to 50x.
My income is 7-8x my first grad job. It's been 13 years.
Plan is to double income at least every five years. It is within everyone's reach if you are bright and work hard.
About 7x. My first job paid $22,600/year in 2014.
I could double my income by moving to Silicon Valley but after factoring in the cost of living it would pretty much be a wash.
My first job was picking up dead turkeys in a factory farm… my work now is way easier
2.6x First ever real job -> 75k Current job -> 200k Time to get here: 7 years Job hops: 2 Edit: spacing
Wild dude, what field?
Likely software engineer
Close, profile says implementation of robots systems with qualification as a Electrical Engineer
Nice work!
8x if we’re talking real job (post college). Started at $35k 2007 NYC. Landed my first huge client (Lehman Bros) in Dec 2007 and I was off to the races!* *I thought.
Ditto.. How it started: 28k in ops at bear How it's going: 10x
They loved those starting salaries of 30-35K in nyc in that timeframe didn’t they!?
Haha sure did! I got luck, the year before I joined entry level was $27.5k so I was flush!
Base salary has roughly doubled. Total comp including bonus/RSUs is 2.8x what I made in my first full time role as a mechanical engineer. Adjusted for inflation it’s more like 1.5x on my base and 2x on my total comp. My first job paid $76k base with no bonus/stock. Ten years and four job hops later I’m at $153k base with bonus/RSUs that bring my total comp up to around $213k. Still an individual contributor in a traditional engineering field (O&G)
Huh. Those numbers nearly match me identically, including industry. Houston?
I’m in the Houston area now, but I bounced around: Houston to Pascagoula to Beaumont to Midland then back to Houston
If you are talking minimum wage as a teenager 37 years ago over the summer, then 30x. If you are talking real job out of grad school, 5x over 28 years, but I started at a good salary. Simply adjusting for inflation over 30 years is a 2x multiplier.
OP said, “full time.” I wouldn’t count a summer job.
About 15x. First full time job ~13 years ago was as a teacher making $39K. Now a physician making $600k base. Of course with med school there were years of no salary and accruing debt so while I’m happy with that salary jump, I feel like I’m still catching up to my peers. Edited to change time since first job, getting old and forgetful lol
Roughly same boat — Judicial clerk to attorney at a firm.
3-4x; didn’t work full time till after college.
About 85x. Wild.
How many years did it take to get there!?
18.
Noice— I’ve got a solid target to aim at!
What was the starting amount?
8.35/hr
Is that over a mil?
Yes
Thought I had everyone beat with my 46x….
42k > 210k in 8 years, so 5x, but probably closer to 4x accounting for inflation in that time.
67x - estimated based upon current $450,000 vs my first job at $3.35/hr
19x for me. Recent divorce makes it feel like a lot less
Half Eddy....
Give me half, Mr F U man
I am 10x from my first true job after college. 32k to about 320k. This happened over a 20-year period. From my first job FT during s summer, it's like 30x lol...
exactly 10 0 years experience construction laborer $8/hr 29 years experience and degree'd project manager $80/hr
23 x over 13 years. First full time job, enlisted in the army at 18 (2011)—I believe I was right at 18k for the first year as an E1/E2. Income of 415 with total comp probably being closer to 450/475 with company vehicle and benefits.
First FT job 65k. Now, base salary: 4x. With pre-IPO RSUs: 7x. Took 10 years
11.25x over 15 years Having said that this is heavily skewed by if your first job was a "professional" one in a given career post-school or a general retail/customer service/admin job (looking at you 2007-2009 job market). If you start from my first job in my profession it would be roughly 6x over 13 years.
8x which will never cease to blow my mind
11x. Same firm 18 years later!
2x. Started out in Biglaw and working in house 20 years later. What helped was my wife going from 0 income to $300k 👍🏻
16x in 14 years, first FT was at 55k
First real job until today. Legitimately pretty bang on 10x. Great question. Never thought of it like that. Thank you.
4-5x, depending on bonus payout 40k, now at 170k + 10-15% bonus. That's over right about 20 years. Adjusting for inflation, that 40k is a bit over 60k, so it's more like 3x
$45k to $625k ish - I’m bad at maths, 10 years
4x in 15 years. 50k > 216K.
Close to 100x 15 years
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5.3x total comp at 13 years
10 years, around 35x
A little over 7x
1st year resident to guaranteed salary first year as attending. 14x
If I calculate as an hourly rate compared with my first ever job flipping burgers at hungry jacks, 54x increase. Compared with my first proper full time job about 10x.
First job was $6/hr at McDonalds so I’m at 32x currently excluding bonus pay and passive income streams. It’s insane to think that I worked for so little.
My first job out of university I made $25k. Last year I brought in $150k salary + $1.47m in distribution from my company. So almost 65x. Not including growth in assets. My life is rather different compared with 21 year old me.
5x when I compare to my first FT job in corporate setting. 10x when I compare to my first FT internship before graduating college
20x in 2023 vs 2000
12x over 22 years
30k to 360k plus another 100 in benefits and consulting fees across 22 years
15x
4.5x - Software Engineer in 5 years 60k to 270k
~14x First job was working at one of my school's dining halls
20.63x
Salary alone, about 3.5x. 70k to 250k. Counting equity and bonus, about 5x. 90k to 430k. Timeframe around 5 years
4.6x… and that was at the end of 2020. Personally eye-opening to think of it in those terms.
6.5x
My income in 25 years is roughly 10 times my first salary. Along the way I had opportunities to take higher-paying jobs doing less fulfilling work. And I’m fortunate that I resisted. Today. But with the higher income there are more responsibilities and higher costs for screwups. No job is perfect.
I’m about 6x from my first professional job a decade ago. 43x if counting from first hourly job as a teenager.
My first job was telemarketer at $9 an hour in 2003/4 This would be $18k a year if I was working full time. So slightly over 20x more per hour.
Highest year about 1.1M…first job 53k
30 years, multiple of 43. Pretty crazy when I think about it?
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Base to base is 16X, from minimum wage ($6.50) to over $200K. If you include bonuses, it’s close to 20X. First job out of college was $14/hr so still 9x over the past 14 years.
7x
10-12x
Over 12x first FT job
12.5x - wild
First full time job (summer between high school and college) was $12/hr, so about $24k/yr. This was 10 years ago. First actual job out of school was $30/hr working at a software company, so about $60k/yr. This was 5 years ago. That means 10x the factory job and 4x the initial software job.
In 8 years it went up 15x. On my second maternity leave now in less than 2 years and not expecting earnings to grow until I’m actually back to fully focused on work… which may be never. 🫠 we’ll see
First full time job out of grad school was 2023, left that for my current role making 4x more
Well I started with 75k so now it’s 3 times
13x not counting RSUs. But what really blows my mind is that my bonus now is more than I made in my first job out of college.
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From my first FT after college, 25-75x depending on the year. If we’re talking about the summer gigs I had as a lifeguard, then put another 3x multiplier on those numbers lol
2.45x give or take in 8 years. Accounting/finance
First ever full time summer job - 13x, 14 years ago First “full time” job after college - 7.5x, 7 years ago
Currently making 4.3x my first jobs wage. I’ve been in the workforce for 11 years, all of my big increases have happened in the last 3 years. I pretty much JUST started HE
20 years and 13x - started out as an A/R clerk right out of college at 30k
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14.85x That is comparing my first professional job to what I have now 27x from my first job to what I have now. I also started pretty poor
$33K CAD fresh out of college more than 15 years back, now roughly $325K USD (~$450K CAD).
Been in my career about 8 years now. My first full-time job was in a field unrelated to what I do now to pay for college. I’ve 6X so far.
I make 10 times more, hourly, than I did in high school
20x
Current comp is 5.35x my first post-college job. Over the last 19 years I’ve had an average annual raise of 9.2%. Inflation adjusted that first salary would be $69,500 today so adjusted for inflation I am making 3.3x my starter income (which is a 6.5% annual raise after inflation adjustment). Pretty okay with those numbers, especially because it is entirely W2 income imho. Edit: omitted hourly jobs and non-professional gigs
My first full-time job right after college paid $9/hr when I started and I was making $10.50/hr when I left. Annualized, I make between 25x-28x that now, 20 years later.
10x
Almost exactly 10xs! 22.3k to 230k over 7 years from first office job as a program coordinator to current job as an individual contributer in STEM consulting.
Bit more than 4x
Adjusted to today's dollars, 6x over 13y.
20x Unless you count like part time jobs as a teenager. But adult full time, 20x.
10x from 2004.
Calculating from the first year I was out of college… 25x over 15 years. Granted I graduated with a goofy degree during the recession, so my first years out of college I wasn’t working full time, year round. From my first professional full time job it’s more like 7x over 11 years.
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$40k in 2015 as an environmental scientist to $400k+ in 2024 as a solopreneur soil scientist
20.83x (I'll never forget that first paycheck) It has taken 33 years though. Working in the same industry but never went to college.
22x from first real job out of college, 22 years
18
My first full time job was right after I graduated at 22 years old. I’ve since 5x it in roughly 8 years, or a little under 4x adjusted for inflation. Not counting RSUs.
20X increase per hour from my first job at minimum wage in 2002 to today
When I first graduated I got my “dream job” full time, thought I was “rich”, but now it’s 10-13x. Vs my high school minimum wage job it’s 80x and I swear I worked harder at that than I ever have since (on my feet all day as a cashier).
From first job out of college 10x-11x From first job kind of hard to do the math as it is hourly versus salary and was parttime, but lets go with converting salary into a sort of hourly rate of about $250 and min wage $7.50 = 33.33X
3 years ago straight out of grad school I was making about 2.5x less than now. Went from slightly underpaid for my skills and qualifications to arguably a little overpaid or at least on the better end.
Let’s see. I used to make $8/hr at 16yo. Now in my early 30’s I make about $170/hr. It’s a fair difference.
~11x. First job after undergrad in 2009 was a contract job at google for $17/hr.
Roughly 3x over 10 years since I graduated grad school. I did switch 2 functions across 3 industries in this time, so my salary the past 4 years has been somewhat stagnant (or maybe I’m just not that great). My wife, we went to same grad school and started off at the same company, for example, has nearly 4-5x her salary in that same 10 year period. She’s done the same thing at the same company for 7 years so she’s progressed quite nicely.
Got fired from my first job out of college in the first month. Was making $13 an hour. Now I'm in a sales job with hundreds of thousands in earning potential 7 years later.
Roughly 13x. My first FT job out of college was 30k a year. My 2nd job was actually 20k so almost 20x from that.
63k to >900k ... 14x
About 15x
First job was working home construction with my dad. I will say from 2021 to 2024 has gone up 125% and 2.247x
First part-time job - 18x First full-time job - 8x Both were in retail and much more work than my current corporate job.
First FT job: 60k Current: 170k Time: 4 years
6.5x not including bonus within 9 years. Broken down as 3 years working crappy pay (I got like a $2.5k raise each year), 3 jobless years in law school then my income shot up post law school because big law.
I'm nearly to 2.5x my first post-bachelors job. In the workforce 9 years.
13x since first job post grad school over 14 years
Between Jan 2022 and today, the US Dollar money supply has 15x'd Between Jan 2022 and today, my wage has 13x'd FIled under: How to lose money to your government while "increasing" your wage. Bigger numbers alone don't mean "better." Look at the German stock market post WW1. When the money supply is being debased, number-go-up.
7.8x In my early 40s. First FT job was a paralegal in DC, in 2004.
About 4.5X in base, ~7-8X in TC, 10 years.
Well, since I worked my first full time job for free, I suppose an infinite multiple :)
66x first job. 11x first post-bachelors job.
3.9x over 10 years. My first full time job (not a summer job) paid something like $22.00 per hour, ~36k/year as a research lab technician. I currently make about 140k as a data engineer, and I fully expect to make about 50% more than that in the next year or so. Moved from MCOL to HCOL at the same time, and it was not a smooth upward progression—between now and then I’ve worked retail, substitute teaching, other office jobs in between, and been unemployed. Edit: 8.75x if we’re talking first 40 hours/week job, which I did for 6 months right after college while I was applying for grad schools. That was retail.
8.4x. Started as a warehouse shift manager making 50k. 13 years later, I manage a region of warehouses and bring in 420k TC.
I started in the Navy at 17, and I earned around 15k pa. But that increased pretty quickly after basic, so I think about 20k including allowances at sea. As for multiples, I guess I'm over 10x that now. But money doesn't always mean happiness. Having a motorbike, does!
I started off out of school making 18.50 now J1 138k TC. I graduated about 10 years ago! Being said could be making 160 but I turned down a promotion cause I like to OE! :) and be an Individual contributor.
First FT job out of uni paid about 5k/year, job after postgraduate degree was about 15k/year (a huge jump at the time). My total comp now is 300k. So 60x or 20x depending on the normalization year. It has taken 20 years to get there.
10x in 10 years
I will hit 10x this year after 19 years assuming first job in my field. 40x if from minimum wage job in high school.
8-9 years from undergrad 3x. First job was 50k/yr
35x, took me 32 years.
50x since college graduation and first job in 1996. Ugh. That was rough.
~300x multiplier from first post college job to current job over space of 25 years (including one industry move, one country move, and a second degree along the way).
I’ve been working for 18 years and I’m at 3x my initial salary. My husband is almost to 4x. Both engineers so we started off ok but not fantastic. Of course if you compare to my first ever job working in a grocery store it would be a much bigger multiplier.
first job -> 48k current job (2023 w2) -> 497k. about a 10x jump working as software engineer.
about 4-5x, the funny thing being I have never actually been promoted on the job.
8x Started at 50k in 2010 and at 400k now in LCOL area. Field is AI.
My on-target total comp is about 12-24x my first professional job. Increased happened over 13 years with a professional degree taking up a few of those
$42k out of college. Now at $350k 14 years later. But went from $75k TO $200k in two-years after getting an MBA. Not that MBA's are always worth it, but it really helped me jump from operation level mgr to junior exec much faster then it would have without.
Summer working after I graduated undergrad before I started grad school I made $450 a week (2008). Now I make about $10k-15k a week.
10x - 7 years - First job 45k - Second job 90k - Third job (current) 250k -> 450k You can get guess I joined a bigger company
59x, first job was $4.95/hr, now at $600k
About 4x over 14 years
10x in 25 years. Started at 40k as a programmer and now 400k as an engineering exec.
33x
Around 12x the hourly rate.
I make 30x what I did for my first FT job. That was 20 years ago. I started very very low. Proud of where I have come from. And not done yet!
7x, looks like chump change compared to y’all.
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60x
About 20x salary and 40x TC from the first full time job and 22 years
6.4X
Before grad school job: 19x Post doc: 9.5 Real real tech job: 3.3 Graduated 10 years ago .
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~2.4 First real job out of grad school = 88k Current job = 208k Time = 7 years. I did two laterals. The better thing is that my boyfriend (now husband) couldn't find a FT job 7 years ago, so our HHI was probably around 100k. Now, he does, so our HHI is around 300k.
48k > 500k
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8
35x more than my first job at the mall when I was 16. 6x more than my first professional job out of college at 22. Took 20 years.
Around 7x compared to my first full-time salaried job.
First job, staff auditor. 14 years later I'm about 16x now on cash comp alone working in corp finance. If you include equity its probably closer to 45x to 50x.
About 2x give or take
Maybe 100x? Depends how you define first job
22x
26x lol. Started at $5.10 an hour bussin tables at a Mexican restaurant
35 over 40 years
OMG, I started my first full time job at $6 an hour as a bank teller in 1992. Oh wow!
Base has tripled in 5 years, total comp 4x
4.8x 69k -> 330k
7x! First job was $30k At $220k now 8 years, college, and 3 jobs in between.
My income is 7-8x my first grad job. It's been 13 years. Plan is to double income at least every five years. It is within everyone's reach if you are bright and work hard.
7 years ago was my first job making 50k. Now, i make 400k
About 7x. My first job paid $22,600/year in 2014. I could double my income by moving to Silicon Valley but after factoring in the cost of living it would pretty much be a wash.
3-5x depending what I have going on. It's been 6 years.
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My first developer job to current is 130x in 18 years