Thread: web programming career?!

  1. #1
    Unregistered Leeman_s's Avatar
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    web programming career?!

    Ok, so I was looking on www.princetonreview.com about careers. I looked at web programming...

    Compared to most careers that say starting salary is around $30,000 the web programming salary said:

    Average starting salary: $57,000
    Average salary after 5 years: $80,000
    Average salary after 10 to 15 years: N/A

    Two Years Out


    While a large project can take anywhere from eight months to a year to complete, a junior programmer unused to managing time and juggling work will often be assigned smaller tasks. These can include fixing errors in a code, or changing the appearance of a client’s existing Web site-jobs that can take can take anywhere from one hour to one week.


    Five Years Out


    As Web programmers become more proficient with various languages, their work will steer more toward designing applications, and away from the actual implementation. Senior programmers are more involved in meetings that discuss the technical aspects of projects, and will spend 25 percent or less of their day in front of computers.


    Ten Years Out


    While Web programmers have not been around for ten years, there is a huge difference between a first-year programmer and someone who’s been in the field for ten or fifteen years. Your experience in programming, your facility with various programming languages, and the number of people that you manage all add up to a higher salary at this level. A senior programmer can earn about $150,000. At this stage, some programmers become independent contractors and charge their clients up to $150 per hour, bringing in as much as $250,000 per year.

    $150,000 - $250,000 / year?! Crap man that's insane! Isn't that a little too much? I was under the impression that despite how interesting computer related things are, that they are usually low paying cubicle jobs.

    Is this thing accurate or what?

  2. #2
    Code Goddess Prelude's Avatar
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    >Is this thing accurate or what?
    More or less, yes.
    My best code is written with the delete key.

  3. #3
    Unregistered Leeman_s's Avatar
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    Doesn't $150,00 - $250,000 per year seem a little high for a web programmer?

  4. #4
    Code Goddess Prelude's Avatar
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    >Doesn't $150,00 - $250,000 per year seem a little high for a web programmer?
    Programming is arguably the most strenuous and difficult of mental tasks that a person gets paid for on a day to day basis. Rest assured that such a high salary can easily be justified. If the definition of web programmer means you build web pages with HTML, then yes, I think that kind of salary is insane. Especially since I get paid a fraction of that for systems programming.
    My best code is written with the delete key.

  5. #5
    & the hat of GPL slaying Thantos's Avatar
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    I belive most web programmers are a lot more then web page designers. Creating secure databases and e-stores along with a bunch of stuff I'm sure I to overlook is what comes to mind when I hear the term web programmers. One important thing is this:
    and the number of people that you manage
    Managers make significatly more then the underlings and a senior programmer would very likely to be in the management catagory (abit very low in the management scale)

  6. #6
    Senior Member joshdick's Avatar
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    "Consultants" make an insane amount of money.

    Those numbers look about the same for CS majors.
    FAQ

    "The computer programmer is a creator of universes for which he alone is responsible. Universes of virtually unlimited complexity can be created in the form of computer programs." -- Joseph Weizenbaum.

    "If you cannot grok the overall structure of a program while taking a shower, you are not ready to code it." -- Richard Pattis.

  7. #7
    Still A Registered User DISGUISED's Avatar
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    Like everything else in life, it also depends heavily on where you live and how much it costs you to live there. Someone with that type of experience would certainly be making that kind of money in my neck of the woods. You also have to take into account the major difference between the terms "web designer" and "web programmer".

  8. #8
    'AlHamdulillah
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    Those numbers look about the same for CS majors.
    except a CS degree is barely worth more than the paper it is printed on anymore, due to a certain country's people which still have their H1 visas from the early '90s.

  9. #9
    5|-|1+|-|34|) ober's Avatar
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    Others have hit on this point... but I'll make it again. The ones that are making the big money haven't typed a line of HTML in years, I'm sure. They're using more scripting languages, interacting with databases, making secure networks. It's not just creating links, I assure you.

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