I did the opposite - since college I've job hopped quite a bit between startups, SMBs, and the smaller end of public companies. Salary varied from ~100k to ~190k. Got laid off last year which I do attribute to being one of the newer employees.
I do feel like I would be in a better place if I had stuck around longer in some of these positions, but it's hard to tell at the time! Each change was to a better and higher paying job. I do feel like I got a good perspective on the industry but I hear about people who were my peers getting into management, getting into staff or distinguished engineer positions, assume they are having all their options vested, and they are probably ahead of me financially.
My understanding is that to make "real money" i.e. what a manager at a car dealership makes, or 300k+, the reliable paths are either getting hired at the google/netflix/openai/apple type companies, getting into management pretty much anywhere (check BLS.gov. Average salaries for managers even in older industries are above what a staff engineer at e.g. Pagerduty or Onesignal probably gets), or getting a good amount of stock options at a low cost basis and eventually getting to cash them out.
This does not answer your question exactly but to that point I would say hop on linkedin and talk to some recruiters, keeping your skeptical hat on for everything they say. A good manager of someone who's been productive for 8-10 years is not going to be surprised or annoyed that they try and see what the market is.
One last point, tech is especially sensitive to the fluctuations of interest rates. We are all subject to the whims of Jerome and depending on what he does in the coming months, the market for engineering talent may look much different next spring than it does now.
I do feel like I would be in a better place if I had stuck around longer in some of these positions, but it's hard to tell at the time! Each change was to a better and higher paying job. I do feel like I got a good perspective on the industry but I hear about people who were my peers getting into management, getting into staff or distinguished engineer positions, assume they are having all their options vested, and they are probably ahead of me financially.
My understanding is that to make "real money" i.e. what a manager at a car dealership makes, or 300k+, the reliable paths are either getting hired at the google/netflix/openai/apple type companies, getting into management pretty much anywhere (check BLS.gov. Average salaries for managers even in older industries are above what a staff engineer at e.g. Pagerduty or Onesignal probably gets), or getting a good amount of stock options at a low cost basis and eventually getting to cash them out.
This does not answer your question exactly but to that point I would say hop on linkedin and talk to some recruiters, keeping your skeptical hat on for everything they say. A good manager of someone who's been productive for 8-10 years is not going to be surprised or annoyed that they try and see what the market is.
One last point, tech is especially sensitive to the fluctuations of interest rates. We are all subject to the whims of Jerome and depending on what he does in the coming months, the market for engineering talent may look much different next spring than it does now.