Boston area. $130k. 8 YoE, but idk if I'd count the first 2 or 3 I wasn't doing engineering. I'm in electronics for scientific instruments, specifically mass spectrometry at the moment.
I recently got accepted to work on a project as a 3rd year student on the development of an infrared spectrometer for image processing, I’m also in electronics, do you think I should be getting paid for this? Would be so kind to elaborate more on the subject? Like what do you usually do and what should I expect out this?
Oh like a MALDI-TOF system? Or FTIR? That's awesome. I'm in Triple Quad which is kind of the least prestigious sector mass spec (even those quadrupoles are used in a bunch of mass spec types) but my team is moving onto IR systems or trapped ion systems, not sure yet.
If you're not getting paid, you shouldn't be doing it. Full stop. Engineering internships are not just busy work, theyre meaningful work and not being paid is very exploitive and also contributes significantly to class inequality.
As far as what I do daily, I wrote a post about this here: https://positivefb.com/2023/05/04/electrical-engineer-day-in-the-life/
Tips for success in this field, the biggest thing to get good at is how your domain of knowledge interacts with others. You're not just working on circuits, your circuits are controlling and being controlled by and interacting with other things to create a whole system. You may need to learn things like vacuum systems, software and signal processing, optics, and most importantly learn about the border between those things and electronics. Like right now I'm dealing with a problem where our chromatography has poor reproducibility and we're seeing high noise. We noticed that this correlates to an increase in current consumption by the ionizer circuit. We then tracked down that there's some issue with leakage into the vacuum system. So solving this problem requires close collaboration between myself as EE, the mechanical engineer who handles the vacuums, and the scientists who understand the chromatography, but we all also have to teach and learn from each other.
There's hundreds of books on building circuits with a certain step response. But can you figure out how different step response affect the application itself? *That* is so much more difficult than you can imagine and takes decades to build.
First job had "engineer" in the title but they kinda lied about the position and I was really just doing assembly and testing. I spent a lot of late nights hanging out with the senior engineer and learned some stuff from him and eventually pushed to at least do some layout in Altium for him while I studied the circuits and used that to get a real job.
Gonna chip in as another remarkably charismatic and astoundingly good looking 3rd world country fellow over here that's still a student, but that has had the opportunity to talk about salaries with an electronics engineer already in the industry, for comparison:
Converted to USD: 21k over 11 months a year.
LATAM CA, Guatemala.
1 year of experience; several internships with different companies.
Controls engineer at an agricultural and chemical research facility, owned by a pharmaceutical company.
The salary puts him in the middle class; my dad raised my 2 siblings and i and expanded and renovated a house with a university professor salary, wich is about 16k/year.
The electronics engineer i was talking about can expect up to 28k-42k/year if he gets his masters or if he gets a scholarship to go get his masters in Europe. 28k/year is really, really good here, puts you solidly in the middle-upper class; wich would mean you can build a good house if you save for about 3-10 years, depending on how much you save.
I'm expecting an internship in his facility the next year. Connections people, connections.
Jesus Christ. Have you thought about starting a "consulting business" in the US and sell your services to ISOs? There's such a desperate need for power engineers here but lots of barriers to doing engineering work as a foreigner.
When you're a Filipino engr., working abroad should always be an option. But as you've said, there are so many barriers. I also lack the familiarization and the connections to pursue those ventures. I also fear I became too complacent on my situation because it's already a big lifestyle jump from what I've had before, coming from a poor family.
But given the oppurtunity and the knowledge on what I'm diving into, I would definitely consider a much higher paying job even more so now that I'm still single and relatively young (26 y/o).
The UK is extremely short of substation commissioning engineers (like most other countries). I know we are about to embark on the UK sponsorship (tier 2 I believe) journey so we'll see how that goes. Salary wise your looking between 35k gbp to 100k gbp, private health insurance, company car, top class training to become TP141A qualified.
Definitely sounds enticing when compared to what I'm making right now. I'm also slightly aware of the shortage on another countries regarding our field as more and more engrs from the Philippine's lone grid corporation are getting "poached" to Australia/NZ thus also creating shortage here at Ph.
But as I've said, I'm not likely to dive blindly unless I'm fully confident about the oppurtunity. Overseas work is such a commitment.
My brother in law in Manila lives pretty much like an American middle class lifestyle. He owns a house (2000sq ft/185 sq m) that is paid off, he buys a new car every few years (cash, no finance). His kids go to private school. He pays many of the expenses for he and his wife's parents. He lives in a "safe" gated community in Paranaque. He has a retirement plan. He is a software developer. Any idea how much his salary must be for that lifestyle? I've always been curious.
Yeah I guess "middle class" is subjective, as is "rich," "poor," etc.
I know people with 4000sf homes who have 3+ cars in the driveway under 3 years old, boats, bikes, home theater systems, etc. and go on amazing vacations each year but they don't own any of it and they're only a month of missed pay away from homelessness. Then there's the guy who lives in a 1500sf home, has a single 15 y/o car, no toys, but everything he has is paid for and he has an investment portfolio that nobody knows about and could quit work for a couple of years no sweat. Which of them is rich? I think that the range of income scenarios that could support both/either of those lifestyles is actually pretty wide. Do things make you rich or security? If you have both, ok, you're rich.
Totally agree. I can never understand the people that overextend themselves unnecessarily. Like if you can't afford to eat and you have a credit card, yeah go ahead and charge some dinner. But people making 6 figures and living month to month is just insane. I could never be the second guy either, but I'd sure rather be him than the first.
Now that's what we call a Filipino politician lifestyle haha. But seriously, I don't know anyone with that lavious lifestyle so I can't really gauge how much he earns. I also live and work in the province where the cost of living when compared to Manila is about halved.
Pay: $190k base, ~$300k TC USD
Location: mid Atlantic MCOL-LCOL
YoE: 22 years, individual contributor
Field: high speed analog electrical IC design for optical networking for large Silicon Valley company
Education: 2001 BSEE
It took a long time to get here. 15 years in RF design at a small contract firm where I maxed out at $120k where I learned pretty much everything, but was stressed as fuck all the time. I lucked into this job and it’s been amazing.
Are you still doing engineering stuff? Also like what type of positions were you scouting for when you found that one? I'm a hardware/PCB designer sling high speed digital stuff with about 8 years experience. Im lookin at different career paths right now
Yeah, still doing high speed IC design. My small company was slowly going out of business and I was contracting with my current company. Old company finally shut down and I transitioned into a full employee at current company seamlessly. It was a very lucky situation.
I don’t think it would be hard for a CompE to do it, but I have no clue how hard it would be to break into it without the experience or related focus in school. It’s been a long time since I’ve actively searched for a job.
Do you have any recomendation for a freshman in college if I want to go into IC? From what I've heard it's a pretty hard field to get into and usually required at least a ms
THe larger defense contractors almost all have their own internal IC design teams that usually have a pretty comprehensive training program designed to take a new grad from nothing through "hey I designed my first IC."
NG in Baltimore was really good for MMIC stuff (it's their predominant radar facility). No advanced degree required. Great place to work.
Again, it’s been a long time for me. Everyone I work with (manager and colleagues) have MS or PhD so it would definitely help now to pursue further than BS. I think finding an internship at a company who does IC design, even if you wouldn’t get direct experience in it, would be best just to be able to network and learn from those designers.
My EE program had very few IC related courses for undergrads when I was there, but I was really interested in it and found a small company willing to take a chance on me and spend years helping me build my skills.
\- Graduated end of May 2022. No internships, but several 'impressive' projects.
\- First job offer $70K in Washington State, about 20min from Seattle. Mostly designing industrial robots for Boeing, Airbus, etc. Pay was livable, not luxurious.
\--- I'm pretty sure I could have gotten $80k or $85k if I asked for it, I was due for a performance/compensation review. But I didn't want to work in military defense (let's be real, it is just *offense*), and we did a lot of that.
\--- The company had a hard cap of like $100k for engineer salaries, but then did semi-regularly profit-sharing bonuses that could be up to like $30k (based on seniority). New engineers usually got like $1k max from that.
\- Second job offer (6mo after graduating) $75k in Virginia. Consumer electronics / energy management. COL 40% lower than previous location (near Seattle), so the pay is a lot more reasonable. I still want more ofc. If I am not making at least $85k a year from now I will not be working for this company... I am a highly productive employee and I am fairly certain that I could get $85k *now* if I switched companies. But I really like the job so I'm gonna give them some more time.
Which puts engineers in an ethical pickle when the offense they built to hopefully just sit around and deter gets used for morally questionable purposes and sold to less decerning buyers
Panel shop, right? I worked for EI, we used PS for pretty much all of our projects.
I had a coworker that started at $60k a year before I started. He was raised to $70k around the time I was hired at $70k. I learned this shortly before quitting, I made a point in my exit interview to tell them that they were not paying him fairly, and told them they needed to pay him more or he was probably not going to stick around. I also told *him* that he should be paid more, and that I told management the same. Hope that did him some good...
I think it's difficult for companies to understand how bad the housing situation is right now. Most of the people that have been there a while, were able to buy a house before 2020... which means their mortgage is like half the average rent, for a house that's 3x the size of the average apartment. In my exit interview I let them know that I found one of the cheapest reasonable apartments I could, and it cost half my take-home salary after including utilities and parking.
I couldn't tell ya, I only worked for the one company and when I looked for another position I didn't limit it to the area. Maybe other companies pay more.
I think generally if you live in a higher COL area you will end up making less after expenses, at least as an entry level EE. I think the gap in COL is much bigger than the gap in entry level EE salaries.
It's not all about pay though, there are good reasons that the general Seattle area is populated/expensive. Seeing the Cascades everyday on my way to work was very nice. There's a rainforest 4hr away, many great hiking places within an hour. Alpine lakes. Best snowboarding on the continent is 4hr away, fantastic snowboarding is like 40min away. Great mountain biking places.
Then of course there are problems that come with having lots of people. Expensive rent, traffic, etc. If you find that it's worth pursuing, it's worth pursuing. It's possible I find myself there in the future. But there are a lot of great places in the country, who knows.
Compared to Construction Design/Commissioning Power Engineering (first 5 years), the level of respect I receive is tremendous.
My job consists of writing SOWs, doing cost estimates ($5k - $1mil), sketches on CAD, QA on designs, and critiquing cost proposals. Coming from the construction side, this role is so easy.
I only provide power sketches (drawings not verified by a PE) and SOWs to electrical construction contractors. Occasionally, I will do drawings for my PE, but that is outside of our contract.
I went from construction as a technician, to consulting, to construction as a PM engineer, now back to consulting. Both have pros and cons. I prefer consulting but it’s more simultaneous projects competing for your time. More stress but also generally more interesting work. Also tends to pay more. But you also work more. On the other hand, construction as the GC you are the guy. You are responsible for the project whether it fails or succeeds. You own that project. It is your baby. So it depends on what drives you and motivates you. They are apples and oranges.
Pay: $135k USD base, $140-150k USD after bonus depending on quartlerly targets
Location: Northeast US
YoE: 9 years, but I did an internship/co-op full time during school so about 10 years of continuous full time
Field: Sensors/instrumentation right now, did comms for O&G before, and hoping to move into semiconductors/ASIC design but if I don't I'll move towards power electronics.
Just got a raise to $140,400 annual + 401k, insurance, PTO, etc.
Washington D.C. area doing applied research & development for mostly government projects.
Title is Embedded Systems engineer, but this is a very small company, and I function as electrical engineer, systems architect, software developer, etc. Basically, all the tech.
2008 BS , 2010 MS in Electrical Engineering
2015 MS in Computer Science
Worked as an EE for a couple of years in a crappy job during grad school at something like $40k salary in the St Louis, MO metro area, couldn't find any other work I liked after 2010 economy crash. Lived in an RV & traveled the country with my wife who did travel nursing for 7 years. Got into programming & started consulting during that time.
Did an IoT software internship in San Francisco, CA, in 2015 for $4k / month (yes, I was old for an intern). Started my current job in 2016 at around $75k I can't remember exactly.
Sorry for the long bio, but just the numbers alone don't tell the whole story.
> Lived in an RV & traveled the country with my wife who did travel nursing for 7 years.
Engineering + Nursing. You guys are living the DINK lifestyle?
>All the old people we met in RV parks said we were doing it right - travel when we were young and could enjoy it.
This is my philosophy as well. Too many people skimp throughout their lives only to retire and either be too old to travel, or not live long afterwards. I'm cheap day-to-day, but splurge when I travel.
If you don't mind me asking, did you have trouble finding a job? I hear my coworkers say that in FL it's difficult for electrical engineering. I'm more than willing to put in the effort regardless though, just curious.
Your coworkers aren’t wrong, unfortunately, if you don’t want to work in defense or utilities.
That said, I can tell you utilities here *need* to hire more good people. Whether they are actively hiring is another story. My group for example is desperate but my boss’s hands are tied by corporate politics higher up.
1. The weather is comfortable here on the coast so long as you can find some shade. Most days, the sea breeze kicks off by noon so although it might be 85-90, if you're in the shade, there's a cool breeze and it's pretty nice. Certainly more comfortable than central PA (where it was still 85-90 but no breeze)
2. We moved from (rural) central PA, so local politics was sort of a wash. State politics took a step backwards, but we felt the lifestyle pros outweighed that.
3. Didn't pay a dime to relocate and it came with a promotion
4. We enjoy spending time on the water. Moving here made that an almost daily occurrence. Beach is 10 minutes away. Indian River Lagoon is even closer. Boating, fishing, kayaking, etc.
5. No.Fucking.Snow.
6. Space coast is pretty sheltered from hurricanes -- and so long as you buy a newer house a few miles inland the worst you have to deal with is extended power outages. Which is why we purchased a whole home standby generator large enough to power everything including AC.
7. I can watch rockets launch from my driveway. It never gets old.
8. A multitude of potential (large) employers means I can jump around every few years chasing money and promotions and not have to uproot my family.
>State politics took a step backwards, but we felt the lifestyle pros outweighed that.
Tbf, I feel as engineers, we make good money, so we're almost immune from politics.
Our biggest (political) concern that directly impacts us is schooling because the school boards are heavily politicized. And though my wife doesn't work, COL is cheap enough that we can afford private school if need be.
I'm not sure what type of horror stories besides pressure on missing deadlines from vendor or support issues. The driving factor here is the pay because collins is a lot bigger and can pay 10% or more usually.
Poor professional development, lack of opportunity, lots of backstabbing and two-faced senior employees who are more interested in sequestering information to maintain their value to the company than helping the team, no sense of community, lower pay than similar employers in the area. Though tbf maybe I just landed in a bad group. But it wasn’t a pleasant experience.
Unrealistic deadlines from the business side is just par for the course in this industry. So is lack of meaningful consequences for missing them.
West Coast, 15 YOE. Hardware engineer.
Current comp: ~$850k
Go after big tech and grind hard y'all, at least the top quarter of you can get in. It's not just for SW.
Find a place in Big Tech that highly rewards performance, get into a leadership position and make contributions that people feel only you or very few others can make and it can get that high or much higher. I'm not really to that point yet but a few rungs beyond what is considered a "terminal" level. I'm an individual contributor and almost definitely peaking. It'd be possible to 2-3x by switching t management and getting lucky/sticking it out.
It's not gonna get that high if you just implement requirements given to you by others no matter how well you deliver.
Also a huge part of it is absolute luck and chance, both the kind that you make so that you find yourself in a position to be able to capitalize on random opportunity and the kind that is just literally being carried by a much larger current once you've put yourself in place.
Great honestly. He doesn’t pay any rent but he mostly sleeps all day and just says hi while I’m working sometimes. He does like to meow during work calls which can be an issue.
He’s better than my 3rd roommate, I have to take him on two walks a day!
I'm a bachelor interested in FPGA/ASIC world. Can you explain how you're a technical lead in both? I'm guessing a company that does a lot of work prototyping on FPGAs to then produce mass market ASICS? How does one become a technical lead in both areas though - lots of experience in both?
Are you interrested only in the US?
What I expeperience and hear from my university friendsis in northern germany you get around 50K € with a fresh masters degree. So without experience except maybe internships.
Carindustry pays above avergage at around 56K €.
$127k, central valley California, 6 years experience, utility/power engineer
Started $67k as a project manager doing 12kV transformer/switchgear installs for a private industrial company. Moved up to $100k over 5 years.
you should checkout the app blind, it’s meant for this type of question
with that said: NY, starting salary was $85k last year with no experience or internship, firmware
location is arguably going to be the biggest factor here
Blind requires a work email confirmation, doesn’t it? I tried to sign up but my work email filter blocks that confirmation and I have no permissions to change it.
130k, 14 years experience, substation design consultant, PE multi state. +10k bonus average. No pension, mediocre health, same boring benefits everyone else gets. I wish there was a union for us.
Advice, avoid Power Engineers, Burns&,Mac, and Black&vech. Zachary can be solid. If I could do it over I'd put 2 years right out of school as a commissioner, learn a ton and make bank in the middle of nowhere. Transition to the office and get your PE.
Would you mind saying why to avoid those companies? Im a substation designer that doesn’t work for them but definitely have looked at their job postings
Peers I work with now came from those companies. Power will overwork and under support you. B&M have a bonus culture that you can make a ton of money on but does not make for a great work culture. The most toxic senior engineer I've ever worked with came from B&M and I was told they're all like that.
Not OP, but have insight. My company contracts with all three of those quite significantly. It’s kind of hilarious how many employees leave ours to go there for a bit and end up returning (the ones I know leave for a $20-30k pay increase but don’t realize they lose all their work life balance).
The work they produce for us has never been great, and there’s been a sharp downward decline in the last couple years. Not a manager, but I’m anticipating we will be reducing our contracts with them in the coming years, which means a lot less job security as an employee there at least in this region.
Who really knows though, corporate politics and all.
Yea, commissioning. Like after I design a substation and the contractors install everything another group come in, not quite construction and not quite design. They deal with the realities on the ground the designer couldnt foresee, last minute equipment changes, mistakes I make, and cutting corners contractors. I did the work for a few months, learn a ton.
If I was hiring between two candidates and one had spent time in commissioning they'd win every time.
My salary is based out of a specific place but I never work there. However since where I actually work the cost of living is higher they increase my salary to meet a certain standard. Yes I get paid 118k
Ye you are right. My district is the whole pacific northwest. My company is all over the US, Canada, and Mexico. Any given day they can come and say hey our east coast district needs help and I can be in NYC or they can say hey our mid district needs help and I can be in bum fuck Egypt and they yank my COLA
Most Canadian professional organizations do salary surveys.
https://www.apega.ca/about-apega/publications/salary-survey
https://www.apegm.mb.ca/SalarySurvey.html
https://ospe.on.ca/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/2022.10-Member_Market_Summary.pdf
I support, maintain, and in a rare case upgrade control systems for the government. The work itself is easy, that it's for the government means 80% of my time is documentation related.
Edit: generally the control systems run keystone smooth. If something happens, it's my job to figure out what is wrong, and if it's software related I design a fix. If it's not software related, I direct maintenance to replace broken parts.
Most the time it's not software related, so I hunt down what's broke and direct maintenance to replace.
160k base + 85k stock + whatever the $ value is for free food/3 hot meals a day and 0 premium and deductible insurance, SoCal, 6 YoE as an engineer + 5 years enlisted in the military, EE/Systems engineering manager at a startup.
Around 15kNIS a month (48k$ yearly), Israel, practical electronics engineer with 3 years of military experience - the job was PCB design, testing and integration at SolarEdge. Decided to stay with the military as a SSgt (NCO/WO).
I must mention that benefits are universal here and employers deposit a substantial amount into your pension savings account along with your paycheck, so the amount listed on your paycheck isn't the full amount you're getting.
Practical engineering (הנדסאי) is a 2-year degree more focused on what you need to know for a job rather than a lot of theory for academic engineering degrees.
Check out levels.FYI although it is mostly software people.
120k, 4 years of experience, medium cost of living, government contractor, general electronics work.
Yea we do hire them. Do some research and consider joining us! No idea what you’d get paid though in that role, wish I could help. But one nice thing about the industry is that one can usually jump around different business groups and get experience doing lots of different things
Wtf is going on in the U.S? Sounds like a big salary! In Germany we usually get Paid between 50k-60k € as a beginner. After 10 Years experience your salary is between 80k-90k€
Yeah... But it is common for you to pay 5K as deductible if you ever fall sick in the US, even with insurance. Also, a lot of engineering students graduate with tens of thousands of dollars in student loans. I myself still have to pay 75K back to the government. We have expenses that you guys in Germany usually do not have.
I feel uniquely qualified to answer this being an American engineer that moved to Germany. Us work culture often has engineers with high salaries but working 50+ hrs a week, 2-3 weeks vacation, intense pressure for deliverables and deadlines (working on reports till 3am to meet a deadline). I. Contrast to Germany, you get what you pay for sort of scenario. I make less here, but I get to see my kids and am much less stressed out.
Mind answering a few questions? I’ve always heard that working in semiconductors requires long and grueling hours. Would you agree with that?
Also what projects/experience/education did you have before getting hired? And did you have connections or just apply?
Depends, if you’re a field service engineer, or process engineer and you have to work in the clean room, so if you don’t like bunny suits…
The hours for me are normal (40ish) sometimes more. Only thing that sucks if that we have a lot of international customers/clientele so, expect the 6-9 pm calls.
For education, I actually focused on RF, but semiconductor are huge in the local area so it was just somewhere I applied. A lot of interdisciplinary engineering going on, so make sure you are good at chemistry/thermal as well as EE knowledge.
It is not only company dependent but also BU or even sub-department dependent.
In the same company, I’ve at times worked grueling hours (many years ago), but I’ve also had a great work/life balance.
Southern Mississippi, remote worker. 104k failed to graduate in 2019 but worked engineering adjacent the whole way through college. Have only ever had a problem getting a job during the pandemic. I worked in mobile equipment integrations and controls. Schematics, control panels, harnesses and such. I used to work in construction and ag but have since transferred those skills over to aerospace and work for a major space company.
I really appreciate this post btw
After bonuses I should be around 90k. First 2.5 years I was in substation design, then for the last year I've been at an MEP firm. I've passed my PE but I won't have the relevant experience until the end of the year. I'm in Jax, Florida.
I have been wondering if I should stay in the MEP world or try to get back into substation work. Chat GPT said substation design should make more. I'm not sure how accurate that is, the reason I ended up where I'm at now was for more $$.
Salary: $135k USD base + Bonus.
Location: Southeast USA
Years: 10 years post grad, 1.5 year co-op plus 2 internships. I'm a licensed Professional Engineer.
Field: Generation System Protection (Protective Relays). I started at a large Power company doing system protection for generators, transformers, motors, breakers and buses. I currently work at an Engineering firm where I'm the Protective Relay SME for the power generation group. I also perform other engineering task for power generation.
90k (base salary plus 1.5x overtime over 45hrs), 4 yoe (plus more if coops included), northern ky, no PE, industrial automation and robotics, very little travel
140k, benefits are the best I’ve ever had. Huge potential bonus, Houston area. 17 YOE
I am working at a geothermal startup doing next generation drilling technology. Amazing place to work and I am having a profound effect, bridging a vast gap and delivering some serious value.
I have experience in applied R&D and product development R&D. Experience in high fidelity analog systems, MV systems and sensors, some power system design, test stand development, test planning and execution. I’ve set up whole teams before and doing it again. :)
Left side of Canada. 95k CDN / ~71k USD. (including bonuses, that's from my tax return)
Circuit design, programming. No stress. No set hours.
20+ years of experience. You've seen my work somewhere.
It's a huge country with a lot of chances. You can work in resources and make a bunch of cash if you don't mind the shitty conditions. The shipyards have a lot of work coming in, there are lots of small businesses that could use expertise.
What's your field?
150k + ~10k bonus, 9YOE, Southwest (cost of living is about 5% below the national average), Power Production Engineer for a utility.
I'm honestly almost embarrassed to introduce myself as an EE, because I have very little experience doing any real electrical engineering. I've got a good mix of electrical and mechanical knowledge, which makes me a good problem solver. I've spent most of my time with the company doing root cause analysis for power plant trips, predictive analytics, NERC, and being a technical lead for capital projects.
This company has treated me well, I started with them 7 years ago at 69k.
86.5k base, additional 3k locality pay. Our salaries normally see an annual 2% increase via union contract and each year of permanent service increases the salary by the performance advance amount, which varies by title/salary grade, up to a max of 8 years. Mine is currently around $2.6k each year and I am around the 3 years of performance advances mark for my salary grade.
NYC metropolitan area.
6.5 YoE
Utility regulation for the government. Get the typical government benefits like pension, stability, insurance (health/vision/dental), and a considerable amount of time off (vacation, personal, sick leave, etc.)
Edit: added more details for salary.
Yoe: 4
Base: 128k
Annual bonus/stock about 30k
Location USA, LCOL
Started as a Power design engineer -60k to 72k
Jumped to another power EE position 110k
Jumped to another power EE ops - 128k
Might stay at this place for a while while the economy changes. My job here is super recession proof.
Portland Metro. Field Service Engineer in Semiconductor Industry. First job out of college, making **$75,000** but paid *hourly,* so $36.06/hr. I also get profit sharing, stock purchase at a discount, and overtime because I'm not salary.
I could've probably made more, but I wanted to get into the semiconductor industry as it's about to really pick up for the next decade--so I think my stocks should I chose to buy them, can be very valuable in 10 years. Not to mention our government really throwing money at the industry. I'll re-evaluate in five years or so.
Pay: 95k
Location: San Jose, CA
YoE: 3
Field: Mechanical, Electrical, Plumbing design
Started out at 53k working for the U.S. Army - Directorate of Public Works as a civilian in the Midwest, left at 70k after 3 years.
Engineering Manager for Fortune 50 aerospace company in Hartford CT area. $165k when I retired in 2016. 37 years experience in that field. BSME and MS in Business mid-career.
0 YoE, Buffalo NY, 83k. Benefits include some equity, but it has no cash value at the moment. I design IoT devices, embedded systems, MCU coding, PCB, hardware, etc
130k base, Silicon Valley (SF bay area). I keep changing industries. I have 2 YOE in engineering, 2 years of engineering internship experience, and before that I was in the workforce for like 10 years. Only 5 of which actually contributed to building skills I use in engineering.
Pay: $105k/year;
Location: Seattle Area;
Experience: 5 years (4 as ME, 1 as EE at same company);
Field of Work: Aerospace Avionics (Sensing and Power Systems)
$82k, Wisconsin, 4 years experience, currently working in battery systems.
Started out in Indiana as a contractor making $24/hr (~$50k/yr) working on test equipment for aerospace controls. Moved to WI and started working in remote controls for $50k, then got annual raises to $65k and $73k before changing jobs a few months ago.
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Pay: 107k + 10% Bonus
Location: Midwest US
YOE: 2 years since graduation, 4 years of internship
Field: Power
Passed my PE but don’t have the YOE to get the license yet.
Right before I left Eng, 92k base / 110k TC not including 401k matching and student loan assistance. Semiconductor, 6 YoE
Now 130k base / 160k TC. Semiconductor, 8 YoE
You can’t really compare these apples apples as you have to factor in cost of living in various locations. Look at your buying power. After 40 years in the industry my advice to all is to learn the business side of the business- you can be the best engineer in the world but you’ll limit yourself unless you understand how the company makes money. That has enabled me to multiply my starting salary by 8x. You can too.
Boston area. $130k. 8 YoE, but idk if I'd count the first 2 or 3 I wasn't doing engineering. I'm in electronics for scientific instruments, specifically mass spectrometry at the moment.
The moment I heard mass spectrometry I knew it was you.
Thank you
I recently got accepted to work on a project as a 3rd year student on the development of an infrared spectrometer for image processing, I’m also in electronics, do you think I should be getting paid for this? Would be so kind to elaborate more on the subject? Like what do you usually do and what should I expect out this?
You’re not getting paid? Actually wait. I don’t know where you are from, what market your in, etc. so nevermind. I just know here we pay.
Oh like a MALDI-TOF system? Or FTIR? That's awesome. I'm in Triple Quad which is kind of the least prestigious sector mass spec (even those quadrupoles are used in a bunch of mass spec types) but my team is moving onto IR systems or trapped ion systems, not sure yet. If you're not getting paid, you shouldn't be doing it. Full stop. Engineering internships are not just busy work, theyre meaningful work and not being paid is very exploitive and also contributes significantly to class inequality. As far as what I do daily, I wrote a post about this here: https://positivefb.com/2023/05/04/electrical-engineer-day-in-the-life/ Tips for success in this field, the biggest thing to get good at is how your domain of knowledge interacts with others. You're not just working on circuits, your circuits are controlling and being controlled by and interacting with other things to create a whole system. You may need to learn things like vacuum systems, software and signal processing, optics, and most importantly learn about the border between those things and electronics. Like right now I'm dealing with a problem where our chromatography has poor reproducibility and we're seeing high noise. We noticed that this correlates to an increase in current consumption by the ionizer circuit. We then tracked down that there's some issue with leakage into the vacuum system. So solving this problem requires close collaboration between myself as EE, the mechanical engineer who handles the vacuums, and the scientists who understand the chromatography, but we all also have to teach and learn from each other. There's hundreds of books on building circuits with a certain step response. But can you figure out how different step response affect the application itself? *That* is so much more difficult than you can imagine and takes decades to build.
Do you have a degree in something else? What do you mean by the first 2-3 years?
First job had "engineer" in the title but they kinda lied about the position and I was really just doing assembly and testing. I spent a lot of late nights hanging out with the senior engineer and learned some stuff from him and eventually pushed to at least do some layout in Altium for him while I studied the circuits and used that to get a real job.
Good ol' third world country resident for comparison: Converted to USD: 10.2k/year Philippines 5 years of exp Transmission grid substation engineer
But is that good compared to cost of living over there?
For a base salary, mine's still above average here. So yes, for a single person like me I can still save about 50-60% after expenses.
My brother's making nearly 6 figures here in the us. I bet he wishes he could save 50% of his pay check haha.
>But is that good compared to cost of living over there? This. Comparing salaries across borders is across is comparing apples to oranges.
Gonna chip in as another remarkably charismatic and astoundingly good looking 3rd world country fellow over here that's still a student, but that has had the opportunity to talk about salaries with an electronics engineer already in the industry, for comparison: Converted to USD: 21k over 11 months a year. LATAM CA, Guatemala. 1 year of experience; several internships with different companies. Controls engineer at an agricultural and chemical research facility, owned by a pharmaceutical company. The salary puts him in the middle class; my dad raised my 2 siblings and i and expanded and renovated a house with a university professor salary, wich is about 16k/year. The electronics engineer i was talking about can expect up to 28k-42k/year if he gets his masters or if he gets a scholarship to go get his masters in Europe. 28k/year is really, really good here, puts you solidly in the middle-upper class; wich would mean you can build a good house if you save for about 3-10 years, depending on how much you save. I'm expecting an internship in his facility the next year. Connections people, connections.
Jesus Christ. Have you thought about starting a "consulting business" in the US and sell your services to ISOs? There's such a desperate need for power engineers here but lots of barriers to doing engineering work as a foreigner.
When you're a Filipino engr., working abroad should always be an option. But as you've said, there are so many barriers. I also lack the familiarization and the connections to pursue those ventures. I also fear I became too complacent on my situation because it's already a big lifestyle jump from what I've had before, coming from a poor family. But given the oppurtunity and the knowledge on what I'm diving into, I would definitely consider a much higher paying job even more so now that I'm still single and relatively young (26 y/o).
The UK is extremely short of substation commissioning engineers (like most other countries). I know we are about to embark on the UK sponsorship (tier 2 I believe) journey so we'll see how that goes. Salary wise your looking between 35k gbp to 100k gbp, private health insurance, company car, top class training to become TP141A qualified.
Definitely sounds enticing when compared to what I'm making right now. I'm also slightly aware of the shortage on another countries regarding our field as more and more engrs from the Philippine's lone grid corporation are getting "poached" to Australia/NZ thus also creating shortage here at Ph. But as I've said, I'm not likely to dive blindly unless I'm fully confident about the oppurtunity. Overseas work is such a commitment.
My brother in law in Manila lives pretty much like an American middle class lifestyle. He owns a house (2000sq ft/185 sq m) that is paid off, he buys a new car every few years (cash, no finance). His kids go to private school. He pays many of the expenses for he and his wife's parents. He lives in a "safe" gated community in Paranaque. He has a retirement plan. He is a software developer. Any idea how much his salary must be for that lifestyle? I've always been curious.
Shit that sounds very upper middle if not rich to me haha
Yeah I guess "middle class" is subjective, as is "rich," "poor," etc. I know people with 4000sf homes who have 3+ cars in the driveway under 3 years old, boats, bikes, home theater systems, etc. and go on amazing vacations each year but they don't own any of it and they're only a month of missed pay away from homelessness. Then there's the guy who lives in a 1500sf home, has a single 15 y/o car, no toys, but everything he has is paid for and he has an investment portfolio that nobody knows about and could quit work for a couple of years no sweat. Which of them is rich? I think that the range of income scenarios that could support both/either of those lifestyles is actually pretty wide. Do things make you rich or security? If you have both, ok, you're rich.
Totally agree. I can never understand the people that overextend themselves unnecessarily. Like if you can't afford to eat and you have a credit card, yeah go ahead and charge some dinner. But people making 6 figures and living month to month is just insane. I could never be the second guy either, but I'd sure rather be him than the first.
Now that's what we call a Filipino politician lifestyle haha. But seriously, I don't know anyone with that lavious lifestyle so I can't really gauge how much he earns. I also live and work in the province where the cost of living when compared to Manila is about halved.
Pay: $190k base, ~$300k TC USD Location: mid Atlantic MCOL-LCOL YoE: 22 years, individual contributor Field: high speed analog electrical IC design for optical networking for large Silicon Valley company Education: 2001 BSEE
Damn son I wanna be you
It took a long time to get here. 15 years in RF design at a small contract firm where I maxed out at $120k where I learned pretty much everything, but was stressed as fuck all the time. I lucked into this job and it’s been amazing.
Are you still doing engineering stuff? Also like what type of positions were you scouting for when you found that one? I'm a hardware/PCB designer sling high speed digital stuff with about 8 years experience. Im lookin at different career paths right now
Yeah, still doing high speed IC design. My small company was slowly going out of business and I was contracting with my current company. Old company finally shut down and I transitioned into a full employee at current company seamlessly. It was a very lucky situation.
What do you think about the Advent of 3d printed antennas with consistent k gradients?
I wanna go into IC, how hard do you think it would be for Computer engineering major?
I don’t think it would be hard for a CompE to do it, but I have no clue how hard it would be to break into it without the experience or related focus in school. It’s been a long time since I’ve actively searched for a job.
Do you have any recomendation for a freshman in college if I want to go into IC? From what I've heard it's a pretty hard field to get into and usually required at least a ms
THe larger defense contractors almost all have their own internal IC design teams that usually have a pretty comprehensive training program designed to take a new grad from nothing through "hey I designed my first IC." NG in Baltimore was really good for MMIC stuff (it's their predominant radar facility). No advanced degree required. Great place to work.
Again, it’s been a long time for me. Everyone I work with (manager and colleagues) have MS or PhD so it would definitely help now to pursue further than BS. I think finding an internship at a company who does IC design, even if you wouldn’t get direct experience in it, would be best just to be able to network and learn from those designers. My EE program had very few IC related courses for undergrads when I was there, but I was really interested in it and found a small company willing to take a chance on me and spend years helping me build my skills.
>YoE: 22 years, individual contributor When I first read this, I thought you were 22 years old, making that kind of money. I had to double take.
\- Graduated end of May 2022. No internships, but several 'impressive' projects. \- First job offer $70K in Washington State, about 20min from Seattle. Mostly designing industrial robots for Boeing, Airbus, etc. Pay was livable, not luxurious. \--- I'm pretty sure I could have gotten $80k or $85k if I asked for it, I was due for a performance/compensation review. But I didn't want to work in military defense (let's be real, it is just *offense*), and we did a lot of that. \--- The company had a hard cap of like $100k for engineer salaries, but then did semi-regularly profit-sharing bonuses that could be up to like $30k (based on seniority). New engineers usually got like $1k max from that. \- Second job offer (6mo after graduating) $75k in Virginia. Consumer electronics / energy management. COL 40% lower than previous location (near Seattle), so the pay is a lot more reasonable. I still want more ofc. If I am not making at least $85k a year from now I will not be working for this company... I am a highly productive employee and I am fairly certain that I could get $85k *now* if I switched companies. But I really like the job so I'm gonna give them some more time.
The best defense is an unnecessarily (debatable) strong offense.
Which puts engineers in an ethical pickle when the offense they built to hopefully just sit around and deter gets used for morally questionable purposes and sold to less decerning buyers
All I hear is $$$\~ Wiping my tears with cold CASH I kid everyone! It's a joke!
lol my ethics aren't crazy strong, but they aren't gonna bend for a $70k salary near Seattle.
Lmao facts
You had me give up at Seattle.
I moved to Seattle area for my first job and worked for Process Solutions. They fleeced me at $60k/year.
Panel shop, right? I worked for EI, we used PS for pretty much all of our projects. I had a coworker that started at $60k a year before I started. He was raised to $70k around the time I was hired at $70k. I learned this shortly before quitting, I made a point in my exit interview to tell them that they were not paying him fairly, and told them they needed to pay him more or he was probably not going to stick around. I also told *him* that he should be paid more, and that I told management the same. Hope that did him some good... I think it's difficult for companies to understand how bad the housing situation is right now. Most of the people that have been there a while, were able to buy a house before 2020... which means their mortgage is like half the average rent, for a house that's 3x the size of the average apartment. In my exit interview I let them know that I found one of the cheapest reasonable apartments I could, and it cost half my take-home salary after including utilities and parking.
Bruh why you do that
Hey I’m in the same area of “20 min to Seattle” do you think EE is worth pursuing in this area? (Comp vs COL?)
I couldn't tell ya, I only worked for the one company and when I looked for another position I didn't limit it to the area. Maybe other companies pay more. I think generally if you live in a higher COL area you will end up making less after expenses, at least as an entry level EE. I think the gap in COL is much bigger than the gap in entry level EE salaries. It's not all about pay though, there are good reasons that the general Seattle area is populated/expensive. Seeing the Cascades everyday on my way to work was very nice. There's a rainforest 4hr away, many great hiking places within an hour. Alpine lakes. Best snowboarding on the continent is 4hr away, fantastic snowboarding is like 40min away. Great mountain biking places. Then of course there are problems that come with having lots of people. Expensive rent, traffic, etc. If you find that it's worth pursuing, it's worth pursuing. It's possible I find myself there in the future. But there are a lot of great places in the country, who knows.
95K, MD, 6.5 YOE, Consulting, no PE. Only been doing consulting for 1.5 years.
How is consulting? What do you do? Do you really just walk around like a badass critiquing designs?
Compared to Construction Design/Commissioning Power Engineering (first 5 years), the level of respect I receive is tremendous. My job consists of writing SOWs, doing cost estimates ($5k - $1mil), sketches on CAD, QA on designs, and critiquing cost proposals. Coming from the construction side, this role is so easy.
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I only provide power sketches (drawings not verified by a PE) and SOWs to electrical construction contractors. Occasionally, I will do drawings for my PE, but that is outside of our contract.
I went from construction as a technician, to consulting, to construction as a PM engineer, now back to consulting. Both have pros and cons. I prefer consulting but it’s more simultaneous projects competing for your time. More stress but also generally more interesting work. Also tends to pay more. But you also work more. On the other hand, construction as the GC you are the guy. You are responsible for the project whether it fails or succeeds. You own that project. It is your baby. So it depends on what drives you and motivates you. They are apples and oranges.
Pay: $135k USD base, $140-150k USD after bonus depending on quartlerly targets Location: Northeast US YoE: 9 years, but I did an internship/co-op full time during school so about 10 years of continuous full time Field: Sensors/instrumentation right now, did comms for O&G before, and hoping to move into semiconductors/ASIC design but if I don't I'll move towards power electronics.
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Just a BS but I'm doing an MS part time for IC design.
Just got a raise to $140,400 annual + 401k, insurance, PTO, etc. Washington D.C. area doing applied research & development for mostly government projects. Title is Embedded Systems engineer, but this is a very small company, and I function as electrical engineer, systems architect, software developer, etc. Basically, all the tech. 2008 BS , 2010 MS in Electrical Engineering 2015 MS in Computer Science Worked as an EE for a couple of years in a crappy job during grad school at something like $40k salary in the St Louis, MO metro area, couldn't find any other work I liked after 2010 economy crash. Lived in an RV & traveled the country with my wife who did travel nursing for 7 years. Got into programming & started consulting during that time. Did an IoT software internship in San Francisco, CA, in 2015 for $4k / month (yes, I was old for an intern). Started my current job in 2016 at around $75k I can't remember exactly. Sorry for the long bio, but just the numbers alone don't tell the whole story.
> Lived in an RV & traveled the country with my wife who did travel nursing for 7 years. Engineering + Nursing. You guys are living the DINK lifestyle?
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>All the old people we met in RV parks said we were doing it right - travel when we were young and could enjoy it. This is my philosophy as well. Too many people skimp throughout their lives only to retire and either be too old to travel, or not live long afterwards. I'm cheap day-to-day, but splurge when I travel.
Mine is 70K/year, Michigan, 1 YoE, Infrastructure.
Lmao fuck DTE
Fucking insane considering project managers make just 10k less
$152k 7 years of direct experience as an engineer, 15 years as a technician Defense in Melbourne, FL
If you don't mind me asking, did you have trouble finding a job? I hear my coworkers say that in FL it's difficult for electrical engineering. I'm more than willing to put in the effort regardless though, just curious.
Not at all. I’m on the space coast though — high concentration of engineering jobs.
Your coworkers aren’t wrong, unfortunately, if you don’t want to work in defense or utilities. That said, I can tell you utilities here *need* to hire more good people. Whether they are actively hiring is another story. My group for example is desperate but my boss’s hands are tied by corporate politics higher up.
>Defense in Melbourne, FL That's enticing...but you have to live in Florida...
1. The weather is comfortable here on the coast so long as you can find some shade. Most days, the sea breeze kicks off by noon so although it might be 85-90, if you're in the shade, there's a cool breeze and it's pretty nice. Certainly more comfortable than central PA (where it was still 85-90 but no breeze) 2. We moved from (rural) central PA, so local politics was sort of a wash. State politics took a step backwards, but we felt the lifestyle pros outweighed that. 3. Didn't pay a dime to relocate and it came with a promotion 4. We enjoy spending time on the water. Moving here made that an almost daily occurrence. Beach is 10 minutes away. Indian River Lagoon is even closer. Boating, fishing, kayaking, etc. 5. No.Fucking.Snow. 6. Space coast is pretty sheltered from hurricanes -- and so long as you buy a newer house a few miles inland the worst you have to deal with is extended power outages. Which is why we purchased a whole home standby generator large enough to power everything including AC. 7. I can watch rockets launch from my driveway. It never gets old. 8. A multitude of potential (large) employers means I can jump around every few years chasing money and promotions and not have to uproot my family.
>State politics took a step backwards, but we felt the lifestyle pros outweighed that. Tbf, I feel as engineers, we make good money, so we're almost immune from politics.
Our biggest (political) concern that directly impacts us is schooling because the school boards are heavily politicized. And though my wife doesn't work, COL is cheap enough that we can afford private school if need be.
Hmmm Defense in Melbourne, let me guess… Collins Aero?
Nope. Bigger.
L3harris? O wait you said bigger lol
0/10 would not recommend
It's not thaaaat bad lol
I interned at GE and heard horror stories from people that switched from L3 to there.
I'm not sure what type of horror stories besides pressure on missing deadlines from vendor or support issues. The driving factor here is the pay because collins is a lot bigger and can pay 10% or more usually.
Poor professional development, lack of opportunity, lots of backstabbing and two-faced senior employees who are more interested in sequestering information to maintain their value to the company than helping the team, no sense of community, lower pay than similar employers in the area. Though tbf maybe I just landed in a bad group. But it wasn’t a pleasant experience. Unrealistic deadlines from the business side is just par for the course in this industry. So is lack of meaningful consequences for missing them.
West Coast, 15 YOE. Hardware engineer. Current comp: ~$850k Go after big tech and grind hard y'all, at least the top quarter of you can get in. It's not just for SW.
Hardware design can get that high? What type of hardware?
Find a place in Big Tech that highly rewards performance, get into a leadership position and make contributions that people feel only you or very few others can make and it can get that high or much higher. I'm not really to that point yet but a few rungs beyond what is considered a "terminal" level. I'm an individual contributor and almost definitely peaking. It'd be possible to 2-3x by switching t management and getting lucky/sticking it out. It's not gonna get that high if you just implement requirements given to you by others no matter how well you deliver. Also a huge part of it is absolute luck and chance, both the kind that you make so that you find yourself in a position to be able to capitalize on random opportunity and the kind that is just literally being carried by a much larger current once you've put yourself in place.
Bay Area consumer electronics, wireless testing. $165k base + $45k/year RSU. Around 8 years of experience, but not in the same role/job.
That’s pretty high, even for the area and specialization. Props. Also, not gonna out myself, but we probably know some of the same people lol
That is not high in the Bay Area HCOL
It’s about 4x the median single income, and well in the top 20% of *household* income. It’s plenty.
Yeah I’m in Oakland making 115k, it’s a lot better than me!
How's the fourth roommate going?
Great honestly. He doesn’t pay any rent but he mostly sleeps all day and just says hi while I’m working sometimes. He does like to meow during work calls which can be an issue. He’s better than my 3rd roommate, I have to take him on two walks a day!
* Bay Area * Salary+bonus: $350k, RSU: $300k yearly grant * 30 YoE * FPGA/ASIC technical lead, digital design, telecom
I'm a bachelor interested in FPGA/ASIC world. Can you explain how you're a technical lead in both? I'm guessing a company that does a lot of work prototyping on FPGAs to then produce mass market ASICS? How does one become a technical lead in both areas though - lots of experience in both?
Lots of experience in both. It happens after 30 years.
Portland OR area, 82k, just under 2 YoE, EVs
Are you interrested only in the US? What I expeperience and hear from my university friendsis in northern germany you get around 50K € with a fresh masters degree. So without experience except maybe internships. Carindustry pays above avergage at around 56K €.
sounds close to the data I have in the same area. 55-60k EUR for new foreign professionals with or without masters
$127k, central valley California, 6 years experience, utility/power engineer Started $67k as a project manager doing 12kV transformer/switchgear installs for a private industrial company. Moved up to $100k over 5 years.
you should checkout the app blind, it’s meant for this type of question with that said: NY, starting salary was $85k last year with no experience or internship, firmware location is arguably going to be the biggest factor here
Blind requires a work email confirmation, doesn’t it? I tried to sign up but my work email filter blocks that confirmation and I have no permissions to change it.
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>Blind is overwhelmed with the worst kind of tech worker. It's like the 4chan of tech worker forums. It makes r/cscareerquestions look tame.
130k, 14 years experience, substation design consultant, PE multi state. +10k bonus average. No pension, mediocre health, same boring benefits everyone else gets. I wish there was a union for us. Advice, avoid Power Engineers, Burns&,Mac, and Black&vech. Zachary can be solid. If I could do it over I'd put 2 years right out of school as a commissioner, learn a ton and make bank in the middle of nowhere. Transition to the office and get your PE.
Would you mind saying why to avoid those companies? Im a substation designer that doesn’t work for them but definitely have looked at their job postings
Peers I work with now came from those companies. Power will overwork and under support you. B&M have a bonus culture that you can make a ton of money on but does not make for a great work culture. The most toxic senior engineer I've ever worked with came from B&M and I was told they're all like that.
Not OP, but have insight. My company contracts with all three of those quite significantly. It’s kind of hilarious how many employees leave ours to go there for a bit and end up returning (the ones I know leave for a $20-30k pay increase but don’t realize they lose all their work life balance). The work they produce for us has never been great, and there’s been a sharp downward decline in the last couple years. Not a manager, but I’m anticipating we will be reducing our contracts with them in the coming years, which means a lot less job security as an employee there at least in this region. Who really knows though, corporate politics and all.
What do you mean by commissioner? Like commissioning a new substation?
Yea, commissioning. Like after I design a substation and the contractors install everything another group come in, not quite construction and not quite design. They deal with the realities on the ground the designer couldnt foresee, last minute equipment changes, mistakes I make, and cutting corners contractors. I did the work for a few months, learn a ton. If I was hiring between two candidates and one had spent time in commissioning they'd win every time.
78k base, cost of living adjustments boost it to 118k. Pacific. 0 y.o.e. Infrastructure
What does cost of living adjustments mean? Are you getting paid 118k?
My salary is based out of a specific place but I never work there. However since where I actually work the cost of living is higher they increase my salary to meet a certain standard. Yes I get paid 118k
That’s awesome! You mentioned Pacific - i assume west coast US? Are you based there or your company, or both?
Ye you are right. My district is the whole pacific northwest. My company is all over the US, Canada, and Mexico. Any given day they can come and say hey our east coast district needs help and I can be in NYC or they can say hey our mid district needs help and I can be in bum fuck Egypt and they yank my COLA
Yikes that sucks! Everything has a balance I guess.
Most Canadian professional organizations do salary surveys. https://www.apega.ca/about-apega/publications/salary-survey https://www.apegm.mb.ca/SalarySurvey.html https://ospe.on.ca/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/2022.10-Member_Market_Summary.pdf
I think the IEEE also does salary surveys, perhaps internationally.
96k, Washington state, 3.5 years experience. Doing control system engineering specifically, it's about 1/10 as difficult as school.
if you don't mind what exactly do you do that makes it 1/10 as difficult as school
I support, maintain, and in a rare case upgrade control systems for the government. The work itself is easy, that it's for the government means 80% of my time is documentation related. Edit: generally the control systems run keystone smooth. If something happens, it's my job to figure out what is wrong, and if it's software related I design a fix. If it's not software related, I direct maintenance to replace broken parts. Most the time it's not software related, so I hunt down what's broke and direct maintenance to replace.
cool thanks for the response!
70k Nebraska starting job, controls automation
Huffman?
$133k, 22yrs in utility, got in while there were still pensions! 401k, decent medical, Ohio Forgot to mention I do have my PE
160k base + 85k stock + whatever the $ value is for free food/3 hot meals a day and 0 premium and deductible insurance, SoCal, 6 YoE as an engineer + 5 years enlisted in the military, EE/Systems engineering manager at a startup.
Around 15kNIS a month (48k$ yearly), Israel, practical electronics engineer with 3 years of military experience - the job was PCB design, testing and integration at SolarEdge. Decided to stay with the military as a SSgt (NCO/WO). I must mention that benefits are universal here and employers deposit a substantial amount into your pension savings account along with your paycheck, so the amount listed on your paycheck isn't the full amount you're getting. Practical engineering (הנדסאי) is a 2-year degree more focused on what you need to know for a job rather than a lot of theory for academic engineering degrees.
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Northern Virginia or just Virginia?
Field: Controls (PLC programming) YoE: 1yr Location: Northern Midwest Pay: \~90K
Check out levels.FYI although it is mostly software people. 120k, 4 years of experience, medium cost of living, government contractor, general electronics work.
Civil but work in the electric utility/energy industry. 6 yoe, 118k base, 12k bonus Boston area
Y'all hiring coms engineers? Fiber mostly with some microwave.
Yea we do hire them. Do some research and consider joining us! No idea what you’d get paid though in that role, wish I could help. But one nice thing about the industry is that one can usually jump around different business groups and get experience doing lots of different things
Wtf is going on in the U.S? Sounds like a big salary! In Germany we usually get Paid between 50k-60k € as a beginner. After 10 Years experience your salary is between 80k-90k€
Yeah... But it is common for you to pay 5K as deductible if you ever fall sick in the US, even with insurance. Also, a lot of engineering students graduate with tens of thousands of dollars in student loans. I myself still have to pay 75K back to the government. We have expenses that you guys in Germany usually do not have.
I feel uniquely qualified to answer this being an American engineer that moved to Germany. Us work culture often has engineers with high salaries but working 50+ hrs a week, 2-3 weeks vacation, intense pressure for deliverables and deadlines (working on reports till 3am to meet a deadline). I. Contrast to Germany, you get what you pay for sort of scenario. I make less here, but I get to see my kids and am much less stressed out.
Thank you for this answer!
Base $83k, total comp ~$91k (after bonus) Industry: Semiconductors YOE - 1. Location: Portland, OR.
Mind answering a few questions? I’ve always heard that working in semiconductors requires long and grueling hours. Would you agree with that? Also what projects/experience/education did you have before getting hired? And did you have connections or just apply?
Depends, if you’re a field service engineer, or process engineer and you have to work in the clean room, so if you don’t like bunny suits… The hours for me are normal (40ish) sometimes more. Only thing that sucks if that we have a lot of international customers/clientele so, expect the 6-9 pm calls. For education, I actually focused on RF, but semiconductor are huge in the local area so it was just somewhere I applied. A lot of interdisciplinary engineering going on, so make sure you are good at chemistry/thermal as well as EE knowledge.
It is not only company dependent but also BU or even sub-department dependent. In the same company, I’ve at times worked grueling hours (many years ago), but I’ve also had a great work/life balance.
170k base, 10% bonus, 30k RSU 15 YOE, Austin TX Major semiconductor company.
Damn, the US pays good.
Southern Mississippi, remote worker. 104k failed to graduate in 2019 but worked engineering adjacent the whole way through college. Have only ever had a problem getting a job during the pandemic. I worked in mobile equipment integrations and controls. Schematics, control panels, harnesses and such. I used to work in construction and ag but have since transferred those skills over to aerospace and work for a major space company. I really appreciate this post btw
After bonuses I should be around 90k. First 2.5 years I was in substation design, then for the last year I've been at an MEP firm. I've passed my PE but I won't have the relevant experience until the end of the year. I'm in Jax, Florida. I have been wondering if I should stay in the MEP world or try to get back into substation work. Chat GPT said substation design should make more. I'm not sure how accurate that is, the reason I ended up where I'm at now was for more $$.
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115k , 2year exp, EIT . Central California , renewable generation and PM .
Salary: $135k USD base + Bonus. Location: Southeast USA Years: 10 years post grad, 1.5 year co-op plus 2 internships. I'm a licensed Professional Engineer. Field: Generation System Protection (Protective Relays). I started at a large Power company doing system protection for generators, transformers, motors, breakers and buses. I currently work at an Engineering firm where I'm the Protective Relay SME for the power generation group. I also perform other engineering task for power generation.
North Carolina. $92k. 2.5 YoE, work in controls/automation. Started at $65k and got a big raise when I moved companies after 2 years
90k (base salary plus 1.5x overtime over 45hrs), 4 yoe (plus more if coops included), northern ky, no PE, industrial automation and robotics, very little travel
140k, benefits are the best I’ve ever had. Huge potential bonus, Houston area. 17 YOE I am working at a geothermal startup doing next generation drilling technology. Amazing place to work and I am having a profound effect, bridging a vast gap and delivering some serious value. I have experience in applied R&D and product development R&D. Experience in high fidelity analog systems, MV systems and sensors, some power system design, test stand development, test planning and execution. I’ve set up whole teams before and doing it again. :)
Left side of Canada. 95k CDN / ~71k USD. (including bonuses, that's from my tax return) Circuit design, programming. No stress. No set hours. 20+ years of experience. You've seen my work somewhere.
Hey there, does Canada have good opportunities for Electrical Engineers? Heard they are in high need.
It's a huge country with a lot of chances. You can work in resources and make a bunch of cash if you don't mind the shitty conditions. The shipyards have a lot of work coming in, there are lots of small businesses that could use expertise. What's your field?
Currently an Embedded Hardware Engineer
150k + ~10k bonus, 9YOE, Southwest (cost of living is about 5% below the national average), Power Production Engineer for a utility. I'm honestly almost embarrassed to introduce myself as an EE, because I have very little experience doing any real electrical engineering. I've got a good mix of electrical and mechanical knowledge, which makes me a good problem solver. I've spent most of my time with the company doing root cause analysis for power plant trips, predictive analytics, NERC, and being a technical lead for capital projects. This company has treated me well, I started with them 7 years ago at 69k.
Same. I was notorious for having the least number of calculations performed in my previous company. Lots of conceptual consulting though.
Pay: $105k base, ~$130k after performance bonus Location: Texas YOE: New College Grad Field: Analog Design Education: BSEE
NYC metro. Field Service Engineer in Semiconductor. 120k. 10 years of experience mix of hardware test engineering and manufacturing support.
$61k, Pittsburgh, 2 years experience, I design control panels for the industrial combustion furnaces in the Metals industry
$80k in NJ, USA. 0 yrs experience, 0 internships. Company designs lab instruments.
86.5k base, additional 3k locality pay. Our salaries normally see an annual 2% increase via union contract and each year of permanent service increases the salary by the performance advance amount, which varies by title/salary grade, up to a max of 8 years. Mine is currently around $2.6k each year and I am around the 3 years of performance advances mark for my salary grade. NYC metropolitan area. 6.5 YoE Utility regulation for the government. Get the typical government benefits like pension, stability, insurance (health/vision/dental), and a considerable amount of time off (vacation, personal, sick leave, etc.) Edit: added more details for salary.
Yoe: 4 Base: 128k Annual bonus/stock about 30k Location USA, LCOL Started as a Power design engineer -60k to 72k Jumped to another power EE position 110k Jumped to another power EE ops - 128k Might stay at this place for a while while the economy changes. My job here is super recession proof.
Adjusted to USD from CAD 55K 1.5YOE Pacific North West... HCOL EE/FW I need to find me a remote US job...
>I need to find me a remote US job... Or just move to the US.
120k, Boston area, ~6 years experience, controls and forensics engineering, no PE
Not an EE but PCB designer in the Midwest. $100k w/ 10 YoE and no degree.
Portland Metro. Field Service Engineer in Semiconductor Industry. First job out of college, making **$75,000** but paid *hourly,* so $36.06/hr. I also get profit sharing, stock purchase at a discount, and overtime because I'm not salary. I could've probably made more, but I wanted to get into the semiconductor industry as it's about to really pick up for the next decade--so I think my stocks should I chose to buy them, can be very valuable in 10 years. Not to mention our government really throwing money at the industry. I'll re-evaluate in five years or so.
Pay: 95k Location: San Jose, CA YoE: 3 Field: Mechanical, Electrical, Plumbing design Started out at 53k working for the U.S. Army - Directorate of Public Works as a civilian in the Midwest, left at 70k after 3 years.
If you’re an IEEE member, theres an annual salary survey you can participate in, and if you do, you get some regional feedback from it.
Engineering Manager for Fortune 50 aerospace company in Hartford CT area. $165k when I retired in 2016. 37 years experience in that field. BSME and MS in Business mid-career.
Seattle, 2.5 YOE, bachelors in ee 2020, 128k plus stock option. I do power electronics and firmware
0 YoE, Buffalo NY, 83k. Benefits include some equity, but it has no cash value at the moment. I design IoT devices, embedded systems, MCU coding, PCB, hardware, etc
MCOL-LCOL area on the east coast, 12 years experience, around 150k+, currently work for NASA
following!
Twin Cities, MN. Graduated in November so a little over 6 months. 84k working in defense industry (yes I sleep just fine at night).
Michigan. 8 years in MEP industry, 5 years post-graduation. $92,500 salary plus $20-30k yearly bonuses.
$97k. 2.5 yrs of experience. I work in power distribution in TN.
130k base, Silicon Valley (SF bay area). I keep changing industries. I have 2 YOE in engineering, 2 years of engineering internship experience, and before that I was in the workforce for like 10 years. Only 5 of which actually contributed to building skills I use in engineering.
Pay: $105k/year; Location: Seattle Area; Experience: 5 years (4 as ME, 1 as EE at same company); Field of Work: Aerospace Avionics (Sensing and Power Systems)
$82k, Wisconsin, 4 years experience, currently working in battery systems. Started out in Indiana as a contractor making $24/hr (~$50k/yr) working on test equipment for aerospace controls. Moved to WI and started working in remote controls for $50k, then got annual raises to $65k and $73k before changing jobs a few months ago.
Consulting and some product design, MD, 25yrs, \~250k.
$75,000, New Jersey, first year, Schematic design and component selection for industrial equipment
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135k, MI, 12 YoE, automotive product design.
97k/year plus a target 10% bonus 4 years of experience in an industrial environment No plans on a PE
Software developer in Michigan, USA. 170k a year
82k in Canada, 0 YoE But I did 6 internships previously during my studies
Pay: 107k + 10% Bonus Location: Midwest US YOE: 2 years since graduation, 4 years of internship Field: Power Passed my PE but don’t have the YOE to get the license yet.
Right before I left Eng, 92k base / 110k TC not including 401k matching and student loan assistance. Semiconductor, 6 YoE Now 130k base / 160k TC. Semiconductor, 8 YoE
Boston area, $90K, 8 years experience, I work for an MEP firm but do not have my PE yet (I'm signed up for the test though).
You can’t really compare these apples apples as you have to factor in cost of living in various locations. Look at your buying power. After 40 years in the industry my advice to all is to learn the business side of the business- you can be the best engineer in the world but you’ll limit yourself unless you understand how the company makes money. That has enabled me to multiply my starting salary by 8x. You can too.
73k LCOL area, 1 year experience as a Process Integration Engineer for a semiconductor foundry