The example does work well if a company makes the mistake of not even going over salary early in the process. It's generally advised for the candidate to not b

The example does work well if a company makes the mistake of not even going over salary early in the process. It's generally advised for the candidate to not bring up salary early on, but every situation that's involved a recruiter, it's the recruiter that brings salary up early - often before a phone screen. They don't want to waste the company's time if you're way to far off with salary. I'm also making the assumption that the 105k and 90k salaries both have the same benefit packages, option grants (if applicable) and work environments for the sake of simplicity in the article, but in practice, I've learned the hard way that the things beyond the salary matter most. One does want to maximize salary for a given company, but remember, that once you've been there for short while, all the other things start to matter much more. At least that's my experience.