Posted by Mike Willbanks on 11/15/49 11:23

> I have been with a small company in Laguna Hills, CA for almost two
> years now. I am the only programmer here (effectively anyway--my boss
> knows a bit of ASP and minor scripting stuff). I'm currently only 20
> and not even halfway through college yet. The company shows great
> promise, and I absolutely love working with the rest of the people in
> the company, including my boss. They are extremely flexible with me
> when it comes to getting hours in, and fitting in classes each
> semester. We are on very good terms. There is no reason on earth I
> would want to leave right now, or in the forseeable future.

This is the biggest part, first off they are being really flexible and
also allowing you the time to go to school. Any amount of money and
also experience is worth every penny.

> That said, know that I am currently in a salaried position, 24 hours
> (effectively 3 days) per week, at $20 per hour. I don't feel like I'm
> being exploited in any way; my boss is not the type who would take
> advantage of me because I'm just some young college student and I still
> live at home. But I'm also fairly confident I could ask for more.

I would take that consideration into much more thought. $20 is fairly
average... thats $40K/yr but also for CA I am not sure around the
salary... Salaries are normally per state but that is a pretty good pay
for how flexible they are being with you.

> Now, I'm not an absolute guru, but I am completely confident that I
> *don't* suck. I've been programming in various languages since I was 8
> (starting with copying GW-BASIC program listings out of the back of
> Usborne science books), and have worked extensively with many
> implementations of BASIC (DOS and Windows), C/C++, PERL, ASP, and now
> PHP and MySQL. My strongest language used to be C++, since I spent
> most of my teenage years working and playing with that. However, I've
> now been working with PHP for a very solid two years, and I've gotten
> quite proficient with it. I write easy-to-read, structured code. I
> comment. I divide files logically so that all related functions are
> grouped together.

The code is not the important part... anyone can write.. its the
conceptual and proven models that you are working with. Also having
education and having been certified to back it up.

> My 2-year review is coming in a couple weeks, and I want to know what I
> can ask for. I realize my station in life (live-at-home college
> student) *should* have absolutely no bearing on my wages; I know the
> quality of work should be the only thing that affects that. So, based
> on the above information, what should I ask for?

Normally at reviews a 5% wage increase... So that would be $21 maybe go
for $22-24. $24/hr if you are fulltime would be right around $50K.
Remember although your employeer is being very flexible so be careful
what you ask for that reason.

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