Cyber X is right on the money It is very unlikey you'll be making that amount of money in that short of a time. hahaha....he's right, this isn't the 1990's.

In fact a lot of my co-workers here make that amount, but many of them have a masters. I have two skill sets which sets me apart....Getting both didn't come easy.

I remember seeing and talking to several of my classmates in college, in where they came into the industry to make tons of money. When in fact a majority of them switched majors or just didn't climb up as fast as they thought they would.

CyberX is right.....this is a competitive market and you've got to really become passionate about your career. I've seen guys with B.S. and all the certs behind their name only to get 40-70K w/ Experience!!!!! Unfortunately everyone jumped on the bandwagon and to compensate there are ton's of IT trade schools that offer training for this field.

My advice is to look for yourself. Get in there and call around. Your area my pay that amount but I'll tell you that from all the recruiters and all the interviews I've done or have been in heard in the bay and socal, I've not heard anyone hire for that amount....ever.

 

My brother-in-law was one of the first people in the country to become an expert in the SAP product. For a few years, he made $500k/year.

Now that there are thousands of people out there who know the product, he makes less than $100k/year.

It's all cyclical

 

Heres my plan... Basically im going to school in Pittsburgh and then once i have the money i want to move to the bay area or Socal depending on where i can make more money.

15 years down the road i want to have my own house, and being living comfortably... by comfortably, i mean having money in the bank, being able to spend a couple grand and not worry about during any given month... To me, I got this impression from IT that this program and this field would make that possible for me.

So.. based on the idea that i could only make about 70k in the IT field in CA...

What type of specialization should i look into in order to be in a supervisor type position without leaving the IT field???

Whats the avg pay for like a systems administrator around the Bay area???? Ive looked at monster.com and such places and its showing 100-150k for like 5 yrs or so experience.. IS a systems admin something that id be interested in??? Or is there something else IN the IT field that you guys know of thats another type of supervisor position???

 

If you're interested primarily in making money, then you might want to consider a career in business as well. When tech blew up in the '90s, it was very easy to make a crapload of money very quickly. That's no longer true, but the impression still lingers. You can make the same, and often better, money in business.

Ultimately, you need to like tech to stay in it over the long haul. If you get into it just for the money, then you're eventually going to wonder why others work shorter hours, call the shots, and/or make more money than you. There's a good reason that many people in tech -- myself included -- eventually want to move to the business side of things.

On top of it all, doing something because it pays well is cool for a while, but it eventually wears thin. Work days are long if you're doing something you hate. And if you're part of the middle class, you'll be spending the vast majority of your life working. That's a lot of life wasted if you're not enjoying it to at least a small extent.

Post some links to the jobs you're seeing that pay high salaries for a few years' experience. I'd wager there's a catch to just about all of them. Either that, or those are the one in a million jobs that have the entire Bay Area competing for them.

Sys admin jobs used to be widely available, but the market is saturated now, so that's no longer true. $100k for a sys admin with 5 years of experience is within the realm of possibility, but you still need to be extremely good and get lucky. $150k, in my opinion, is unrealistic. In the past, sys admins just needed to know one platform -- say something as basic as Windows NT -- and that was good enough. Now, companies have undergone a lot of consolidation, and they have to know a hell of a lot more.

Your goal of owning a home and living comfortably 15 years later, though, is completely attainable. You can easily do that with even a $50k salary if you spend wisely early on.

Bottom line for me is, if you're interested only in money, then business sounds like a great fit for you. You could do something like technical marketing so that you'll have some connection to tech. But if you're set on going into tech, you need to research a bit more and not get giddy just because of a few job listings. Those are hardly a reflection of reality.

Well, that's all from me. Good luck.

 

To add one final thing -- don't let naysayers like myself influence your career choice. If you want to do tech and truly believe you can make that kind of money, then go for it. I don't know you personally, and you might just be the one in a million who excels above everyone else. Goals are good, and confidence is good. I'm just saying that they should be tempered with reality and solid research. I don't want to see you get into tech and then realize that it's not the pot of gold you expected. A lot of people have made that mistake already.

 

Cyber,

Thats what im worried about, I dont want to get into something and waste a couple years on something that wont pay off..

So IS there something IN the IT field that also deals with the management part of IT??

Im under the impression that things are expensive in CA and its very hard to survive if your making under 100-150k... I dont know for now because i dont know from experience only that i used to live in the bay area and i know what housing costs are like..

I am very interested in the Technology field, but i def want to be paid well for it.. Whether that be a hands on type thing or a supervisor of some sort.. I just want to know what kind of supervisor jobs i should be looking for because Im starting to think thats what ill be more happy with.

BTW thank you Cyber for your amount of input in here.. your helping me out alot, I want to make the right decision for my future.. Thanks for your time!!! AND please.. share more with me!

 

You don't need a degree to earn 12 bucks an hour slapping ram in machines for CompUsa.

No. There are segments that pay better than others, but you need to spend a few years in the trenches and you must be an independent consultant. For instance, if you know certain Oracle or SAP packages you can whore yourself out for 150-300/hr -- if you know the right folks and have a good name. Still there are no guarantees and you must always be looking ahead for the trends as eventually enough Indians are thrown at the market niche to lower rates for everyone.


You can't be a supervisor without experience.

The folks who can't code generally become analysts -- and some of those folks manage to make decent project managers and resource managers after years of experience.

My take, don't go to an ITT tech or the like school, you are throwing your money away. In the past these votech centric places did a good job of turning out blue collar mechanics -- nothing wrong with that as the world needs those folks. But what do software development and engine building have in common? Nothing. You are paying for an education from an institution with no background -- and honestly most people are going to ignore it as a positive on your resume.

If you can't or don't want to get into a 4 year real university, why not spend some time in junior college and figure out exactly what it is you want to be doing -- and then take that knowledge to a real school.

 

^^what steve said..I agree

you are never going to make $200K off of payroll unless you are exec level.
They've outsourced the sh!t out of IT jobs in corp america. Outsourced to India.

Careful of the Vo-techs. Do a google search on news articles regarding their snakey tactics when recruiting.

My brother graduated from one in Chicago...paid $18K for 18 months. Was "placed as promised" into a dead-end job.

Don't mean to be a downer here...the good news is that you are dam ambitious. Keep that attitude and you WILL make that six-figure income
Be sure you strive for a job where YOU are making big decisions daily. That is where the $ is.

 

also, i don't know why you are so obsessed with living in CA. You could do the same work in TX, FL and many other places. I work as a financial analyst, but half my job is building advanced computer models and databases...I'm not in the norm as I am the only finance analyst in the company that knows a lot about coding and such (so, you can consider me quasi-IT, right?). I make good money for my area. No, I don't make $100K and neither do any of the non-exec IT people in my corp, either.

$100K in CA is not a whole lot...but you still have to be lucky to get that. When basic houses are several hundred thousand vs <$200K for a NICE house in other areas, why live there? You could make $60K in a low-cost area and be VERY high on the hog. That is attainable within 5-10 years.

 

My take on outsourcing is that people who are fluent in DESIGN and engineering are fairly safe. It is the people who are commodities that are at risk.

tech schools spit out commodity graduates. Even IT degreed people are this. It is your computer scientists and engineers who are not. Many equate IT and computer science...they are very very different.