From my own experience and my SO's, a 2-5 percent per year seems normal. What seems to happen is your manager's manager gets approval from finance to offer 2-5

From my own experience and my SO's, a 2-5 percent per year seems normal. What seems to happen is your manager's manager gets approval from finance to offer 2-5% raises per report. If your manager thinks that is unfair he/she needs to complain (spending their own political capital on someone other than themselves). Your manager gets told to figure out raises and thinks there is no reason not to just give everyone the max raise. I then get told I'm getting 5% and it feels woefully inadequate because I do the majority of the work. Knowing that my buddy makes much more than me, I start looking for a job. What was anyone supposed to do here? If my manager could give 20% per employee he/she would (maybe the company really can't afford it). If my manager was told they had a pool of money to distribute that then turns into stacking (also something people are really unhappy about). The employee with the least amount of power (me) requires someone above me to advocate on my behalf. Because your manager has to pick-and-chose their battles, it always seems to happen when I threaten to quit.