My Salary Growth Over The Years
Ups and downs, luckily mostly ups
Started out in 2016 in Italy as a Software Engineer Intern in a small software house.
I’m not gonna share the exact numbers, at least for now, but let’s say, in the scale of this graph, 1 is equal to my salary in that first intern job in 2016: which was enough for me to cover most of my expenses living in Milan with a student lifestyle (shared flat, no luxuries, etc).
The other salary numbers are to be considered as multiples of this first salary: if it’s 2, it means it is twice as big as that first job, if it’s 16, it means it is 16 times the salary of that first intern job.
I’m considering gross yearly compensations. If in a job I’ve stayed less than a year, I took the gross monthly salary and multiplied it by 12 to get an annualised version of it.
Why share this?
I like when other people share their salary numbers over time, contextualised with their career history.
I find it insightful and ‘juicy’ to read. There’s always some nice insight I get from it.
That’s why I’m sharing my salary history too. Maybe some of you will some of it insightful.
I have nothing against flexing per se, but I’m not doing this to flex.
If anything, it even feels a little bit uncomfortable to share this data with the world as it still is kind of a private matter. But since I think it’s valuable content and it fits the type of things we discuss in this newsletter, I share it.
Did the salary bumps make me happier?
A question worth asking, IMO.
The answer is yes, in all cases.
First bump - Intern job
When I got my first intern job, it was a big relief that I could finally support myself. At the time I was 22. Since then, I never got a penny from my parents again.
This was a big deal because, before that, I would kind of feel guilty if I were to go out to a bar and spend 10 euros for a couple of beers, or eat out in general, etc. I would always think that every single euro was a sacrifice that my mom was making for me, and I shouldn’t allow myself to use it for non-essential stuff.
In fact, even before that first job, I always had some side hustles of some kind to pay for this type of things.
With this first salary, I felt a bit more confident as well as more relaxed. It was a dignifying experience.
Second bump - First Swiss job
When I got my first Swiss job, even if it wasn’t really on the high scale of what’s possible to earn in Switzerland, I legit felt rich.
Not only I was able to afford rent, food and to go out, but I could even buy stuff like a new phone, noise cancelling headphones, clothes, some nice parties, frequent travel and even an intercontinental trip to Boston, NYC and Cuba with some friends.
Consider that at this time I was just 24 and before that I had been on a shoestring budget for all my life, so the relative lifestyle upgrade was quite significant.
I was able to do something for my family as well, like buying some gifts to my younger sister (I remember buying her her first pair of Jordans 😄) or making some biggish purchases at my mom’s boutique.
Here I also learned that money could be traded with freedom and time, when after a few months of spending around, I started being more frugal and saving up enough money to leave the job and spend 2 years doing a master’s degree.
Third bump - Amazon’s Job
This wasn’t the highest salary I received (it was lower than my Swiss job), but I was coming from a pretty messed up period where due to Covid I had a few part-time job offers rescinded and had been able to make less money than I thought during my master’s.
I even had to take almost 5k euros in debt from friends and family.
So with this job I was able to breathe a bit, pay back some of the debt, and allow myself to have a good time in Barcelona :)
Fourth bump - 6 figures Swiss job
Here I was finally in a position to fully recover financially and to, at 27, get a lifestyle that was that of a young adult and not of a teenager. And to start saving as well.
Last bump - Swiss big tech job
Getting the Oracle job was kind of a dream come true, and the financial part was very important.
The bigger compensation allowed me to increase my saving rate, which ultimately allowed me to purchase a rental property and to have enough security to take some risks doing some of the things I’m doing right now. Like creating this sort of content :)
Conclusion
Money matters.
The only people who say money doesn’t matter are those with rich parents or without an understanding of how much better their life would be if they had more money.
At the same time, it’s not everything. If you need to sacrifice too many things just to get more money, it might not be worth it.
In the end even when I had little money, I can’t say I was all that unhappy.
And even now that I have more money, it’s not like everyday I wake up with a big smile.
Also, chasing more money can get stressful, so there’s also that…
Conclusion 2
Money shouldn’t be taboo. I think there’s value in talking openly about it.
I hope you enjoyed this piece!
Peace ✌️
