I do appreciate the more detailed comment. I had a misconception about Fog Creek. I'd thought they had totally standardized pay grades! I really can't speak

I do appreciate the more detailed comment. I had a misconception about Fog Creek. I'd thought they had totally standardized pay grades! I really can't speak for engineers, since my experience as an employer wasn't at a tech company. I've been an owner of a painting business and a school. In my experience, I the correlation with the aggressive negotiating and job dedication skewed the other way from yours. In a pinch, particularly at the school, a forceful negotiator could extract higher pay (aka a raise) from me, but afterwards I had very little compunctions with pushing right back or firing if necessary. Less you think I was a terrible employer, I did pay employees between 30% and 80% over the market norms. It's just that employee loyalty is particularly important in that market (children's education), and creating an environment in which negotiation is the norm would have been creating a drain on both time and morale. Now that I'm entering the tech industry, I suppose it could be an entirely different world. There is a limit to what I'll put up with, but for now my focus is on creating value, not extracting it. That said, I'll definitely keep your comments in the back of my mind next time I have a good opportunity to discuss pay.