> which is to say generally a good middle class professional wage.
Working with Suns and other workstations as a teen (so my perspective was limited), I caught the very tail end of software as a modest middle class professional wage for everyone doing it (right before the dotcom boom hit).
The people I worked with were really good at what they do, but not strutting like newcomers started doing pretty much the instant the dotcom boom started, and not rich. (Well, one guy did buy a used MR2, and get his private pilot license, but he also lived with his wife in a trailer on an undeveloped parcel. He was a very solid software engineer, working on important stuff.)
I might have inadvertently tried to preserve some of that modestly-paid excellence of the generation before me, but I don't recommend that. Cost-of-living in my area is determined by people making FAANG-like money (well, and real estate investors, and price-fixing), and you have to either play along with that, or move away.
Mind you, California cost of living was on the high side even in the nineties even relative to at least modestly expensive areas like the Boston area suburbs--there was really very little tech in Boston proper at that time.
But a somewhat high-flying (albeit hardware) company was recruiting me for a CA job and they basically admitted it would be a lifestyle downgrade in terms of salary.
Some people made a lot of money when dot-com hit. A lot also got wiped out and ended up leaving the industry.
I never had the highs or lows. I was probably making something south of $100K in the late 90s.
> But a somewhat high-flying (albeit hardware) company was recruiting me for a CA job and they basically admitted it would be a lifestyle downgrade in terms of salary.
I've been given second hand accounts of similar situations. One was team consolidation, and the business was offering Boston-area engineers positions in San Jose. One of the folks who moved with his family was back in MA within 5 years. His salary was not adjusted as much as it should have been for the cost of living difference.
Working with Suns and other workstations as a teen (so my perspective was limited), I caught the very tail end of software as a modest middle class professional wage for everyone doing it (right before the dotcom boom hit).
The people I worked with were really good at what they do, but not strutting like newcomers started doing pretty much the instant the dotcom boom started, and not rich. (Well, one guy did buy a used MR2, and get his private pilot license, but he also lived with his wife in a trailer on an undeveloped parcel. He was a very solid software engineer, working on important stuff.)
I might have inadvertently tried to preserve some of that modestly-paid excellence of the generation before me, but I don't recommend that. Cost-of-living in my area is determined by people making FAANG-like money (well, and real estate investors, and price-fixing), and you have to either play along with that, or move away.