<p>“You say that engineers with 6 to 7 years of experience can make $100,000/year. What kind of engineering work will pay that kind of money? I work in power plants and there are engineers with 30 years of experience who only make $85,000/year”</p>
<p>That was my thought. I don’t think 100,000 is realistic for engineers until late in their career.</p>
<p>“That was my thought. I don’t think 100,000 is realistic for engineers until late in their career.”</p>
<p>Again, software engineers (depending on specialty) can make $100K after only 6 or 7 years. Java and Oracle developer/DBA’s command $100K+ here in the Washington DC area…and that is WITHOUT a top-secret security clearance.</p>
<p>WITH a top-secret security clearance…add on $25K+.</p>
<p>Check out the Bureau of Labor Statistics site for engineer earnings – they break it down by field (aerospace, civil, chem, etc). The median earning is generally between 70-100k.</p>
<p>[url=<a href=“http://www.bls.gov/oco/ocos027.htm#earnings]Engineers[/url”>http://www.bls.gov/oco/ocos027.htm#earnings]Engineers[/url</a>]</p>
<p>Go to the big software companies and look on their job databases for salary ranges. Principal should easily get you over $100K. Senior should have $100,000 within the range. The question is how fast can you get promoted to those levels?</p>
<p>Agree with global traveler. That security clearance is a big plus. Also must be willling to travel and relocate.</p>
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<p>In most companies, senior is only about 7 years of experience. Principal varies, but most of the time it’s in the 10-15 year range.</p>
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<p>A lot of it also depends on where you’re working. I know the Department of Water & Power here in LA starts their engineers at over $70k and it’s not terribly long until you can expect to break $100k. From what I’ve heard there’s similar opportunities over at Southern California Edison.</p>
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<p>It will vary by industry, but in most, engineers make $100,000/yr (in salary alone) before age 30.</p>
<p>edit: especially in rural areas. Plants in Iowa cornfields have a low cost of living, but also have a hard time attracting talent, so they pay more. Plants in places like Houston or California are more in demand, so they usually pay somewhat less.</p>
<p>We had one guy hired as a senior and promoted to principal in two years. He came in with a Phd though. We had a hire a few years ago in the 80s I think with a masters degree. He stayed for two years and then moved on.</p>
<p>Back in the internet boom, salaries were really crazy. I’d say that salaries today are lower than they were leading up to the bubble.</p>
<p>
To be exact it’s $ 71,451.36 to start.
The next step raise after 6 months @ $ 75,439.44.
Next raise after 2 years @ $ 84,960.72.</p>
<p>So $100k (w/ PE) within 6-7 years is realistic…</p>
<p>If you went to school to learn a profession to get a job, then you’ll never get wealthy.</p>
<p>If you went to school to learn a profession to own a business, then you could get wealthy. </p>
<p>DS is going parttime on his job and remainder on a startup. He’s giving himself a raise to do it too.</p>
<p>^^^ Just be careful about starting up a company in your field. For example, I was doing a little structural moonlighting on the side at my first job. Didn’t see anything wrong with it because the tiny projects weren’t anything my big firm would ever do, but when word got out, I was politely told to stop it.</p>
<p>Then when DH and I quit our jobs to start our own firm, his boss tried to raise a fuss about our ever contacting anyone they had EVER worked for, which was ridiculous. Our attorney said we could blow him off, and he quieted down.</p>
<p>Thankyou, MLH. </p>
<p>DS, is doing this startup with his mentor/employer/prof. He’ll be coming off of prof’s grant money and unto a government grant/startup seed program.</p>
<p>I want to say that these kids need to recognize how they view their profession in terms of making a living and degrees of freedom.</p>
<p>Why are you so concerned about the money? Focus on what you like or you’ll be wasting your time and efforts</p>
<p>When it comes to how much money you will make, folks have to understand the stress level of the job as it relates to the money. In an industry like high-finance…yes folks make more money than engineers but your decision and execution on a task and/or product BETTER BE CORRECT the first time or you are in trouble. In most areas of engineering, the actual “engineering approach” allows for a nice little testing phase that allows you to “iron out the kinks” before releasing the product to the users.</p>
<p>Personally, I think it is less stressful to know that you can make a mistake here or there and have a chance to correct it before implementation. Also, many engineering jobs (systems engineering comes to mind) have been given high rankings because of the income-to-stress comparison.</p>
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<p>Oh really? Are you sure? Surely you’ve been reading the news in the last few years? Investment bankers have managed to not only run their own companies and the greater economies into the ground, necessitating billions in taxpayer bailouts, yet are paying themselves record bonuses once again. This during a time when the rest of the nation languishes in double-digit unemployment, and the government balance sheet has been deeply compromised by bailouts and stimulus packages to rescue the economy from the catastrophe that the banks caused. </p>
<p>[Wall</a> Street Bonuses Rise as Big 3 May Pay $30 Billion (Update2) - Bloomberg.com](<a href=“Bloomberg Politics - Bloomberg”>Bloomberg Politics - Bloomberg)</p>
<p>[Wall</a> Street On Track To Award Record Pay - WSJ.com](<a href=“http://online.wsj.com/article/SB125547830510183749.html]Wall”>http://online.wsj.com/article/SB125547830510183749.html)</p>
<p>[Royal</a> Bank of Scotland to pay record bonuses of up to £5m - Times Online](<a href=“The Times & The Sunday Times: breaking news & today's latest headlines”>The Times & The Sunday Times: breaking news & today's latest headlines)</p>
<p>[AIG</a> Executives’ Bonus Repayment Vow Broken - CBS News](<a href=“http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/12/23/politics/washingtonpost/main6012585.shtml]AIG”>http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/12/23/politics/washingtonpost/main6012585.shtml)</p>
<p>I have to (grudgingly) tip my hat to the banking industry for developing a compensation scheme that is divorced from performance. When times are good, bankers are paid well. When times are bad, bankers are still paid well. The rest of us are stuck cleaning up the mess, but that’s not their problem. They got theirs, and that’s all that matters to them. It’s an ingenious system: make terrible decisions that burn the economy to a cinder, and get paid well anyway.</p>
<p>Well…</p>
<p>They may not be in “trouble” (because they did get paid) but they are definitely under more scrutiny now. My point was that at least in engineering, we can “test” before releasing a product.</p>
<p>Well, to be fair, engineers also release plenty of ‘tested’ products that turn out to be terrible. Anybody remember Windows Vista? Vista was arguably actually worse than Microsoft Bob (anybody remember that?) Not that I mean to single out Microsoft. Whatever happened to the Apple Pippin? How about Macintosh TV, or its most recent incarnation, the Apple TV - how successful have they been? How about WebVan, EToys, and Pets.com? How about the video game Daikatana? All these products were (supposedly) tested before release, whereupon they garnered notoriously terrible reception. </p>
<p>Yet all of the engineers who developed those terrible products were paid, and they’re not giving any of that money back.</p>
<p>There something great in sakky bringing up Daikatana.</p>
<p>**Sakky’s about to make you his ***.</p>
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<p>Not to mention that lawyers work tons more hours than engineers. When you break it down hourly they can be very similar in pay.</p>