How to get to 100k by 30?

I'm just looking for some advice on how to get to that goal.

A little bit about me. From the age of 15 my goal was to make 6 figures by 30. I currently just turned 25 and I'm making $60,000 a year (I just got the bump to 60k). I started at $39,000 and have been working for about 1 and half years and I have had a few raises on the way. I graduated with my B.A in Computer Information Systems in December of 2011 and found a job about 5 months later.

I'm currently the network admin/security engineer for a small private healthcare software as a service company. I mange their AWS domain, all the security reviews for clients, and day to day network operations. My company pays for some nice training and I just got back from the AWS invent conference in las vegas so I have that too.

My question is am I going down the right technical track to be at $100,000 by 30? I don't know if network admins or security professionals can really make 100k?. Everything on pay scale etc is so random depending on the company. Also should I stay here another year and hope for another raise in a year or see if I can job swap and get $70-75k?

Just looking for thoughts of what one would advise me to do to meet my goal.

Thanks,

Random IT Guy.

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Comments

tprice5

jibbajabba wrote: »

I think the problem is that literally is one of the most over(wrong)used words out there ... Driving me nuts

It's truly maddening. It's been used incorrectly for so long that it created a new definition for the word. I don't want to live in a world where you can just be wrong enough times until you make it correct.

literally.JPG

vlad06

tprice5 wrote: »

It's truly maddening. It's been used incorrectly for so long that it created a new definition for the word. I don't want to live in a world where you can just be wrong enough times until you make it correct.

I second that. It's similar to the use of the word 'ignorant.' People used it wrong so much that it is now acceptable to refer to someone as "ignorant" of they are ignoring you.

philz1982

tprice5 wrote: »

It's truly maddening. It's been used incorrectly for so long that it created a new definition for the word. I don't want to live in a world where you can just be wrong enough times until you make it correct.

butt knowone litterally kares iff u use inproper engrish ase rong ase u make de bucks.....

MSP-IT

philz1982 wrote: »

butt knowone litterally kares iff u use inproper engrish ase rong ase u make de bucks.....

I don't even know how to respond to this.

wolfinsheepsclothing

lol This thread took a strange turn.

jibbajabba

Back to topic - 100k.

Actually wonder - are there even 100k I.T. jobs in the UK (non-exec) ?

TheMechanic

I'm a little over 100k and its not all I thought it was. Of course, it doesn't help I live in NYC.

The new target is 150k. I hope that I can get to a point I can enjoy things instead of always trying to make MORE

vlad06

What do you lot get taxed on a 100k?

Asif Dasl

vlad06 wrote: »

What do you lot get taxed on a 100k?

The US tax code is 74,000 pages long, generally less taxed then us in Europe.

I'll post this link and maybe someone can tell me if it's accurate or not...

Dual Scenario Salary Paycheck Calculator | Payroll Calculator | Paycheck City

GoodBishop

vlad06 wrote: »

What do you lot get taxed on a 100k?

I can tell you this - the more you make, the more you get taxed! Then all of a sudden it's like, damn, 33%. A third of money goes to Uncle Sam. Ouch!

tkerber

If inflation keeps up 100K won't be too great of a number several years down the road.

Any if you play around with this calculator?

Kind of depressing...

philz1982

Usually taxes are around 28% of my gross income. I made 160k last year and I was taxed 32k after all my deductions. I also live in Texas with no income tax but higher real-estate tax.

GarudaMin

philz1982 wrote: »

Usually taxes are around 28% of my gross income. I made 160k last year and I was taxed 32k after all my deductions. I also live in Texas with no income tax but higher real-estate tax.

...I'd appreciate tips on how you do your deductions. I paid more taxes than you even when I made last than you.

GoodBishop

GarudaMin wrote: »

...I'd appreciate tips on how you do your deductions. I paid more taxes than you even when I made last than you.

It's important to keep a eye on what you can do to lower your taxable income.

Items like maxing out your 401k to 17500 (or more if you are older) lower your taxable income.
Contributing to a HSA lowers your taxable income.
Same with contributing to a dependant care account if your employeer offers it - pretax money, lowers taxable income.

Plus then there's deductions too to keep a eye on:

Mortgage interest
Student loan interest
Contributing to a IRA counts as a deduction up to a certain income bracket.

and so forth. It's good stuff to learn about this information to see about lowering your taxes.

philz1982

GarudaMin wrote: »

...I'd appreciate tips on how you do your deductions. I paid more taxes than you even when I made last than you.

HSA, Mortage Deductions, Charitable Givings, Living in Texas (No state Income Tax), Writing off my expenses (commute, room, internet, phone, ect) (I work from home).

GarudaMin

philz1982 wrote: »

HSA, Mortage Deductions, Charitable Givings, Living in Texas (No state Income Tax), Writing off my expenses (commute, room, internet, phone, ect) (I work from home).

No state tax and ability to write off expenses is where you got it good. When I was making 3/4 of what you made last year, my taxes were $44k. That's messed up.

NOC-Ninja

You will get paid on the technologies you are good at.
You are comparing network vs security. From my experience, security pays a lot more. Example, Network sec engineer vs network engineer, network admin vs security admin...As of right now, data center is in demand so there is a big wave of guys going for data center.

I believe that if you are the best on 1 technology, you will break 100k. I get a lot of calls that offers minimum 110k to 140k + bonus.
I know some people that are making 150k + bonus.
From my experience, the business is changing. They want hybrids. A guy that knows RS and Datacenter, RS and Security, RS and Voice and etc. You get my point. If you can be a hybrid then there will be businesses that will offer you more than 100k.

We are in the time where we are judge on what we can produce.

Keroberos

jibbajabba wrote: »

Anyway - in the UK, the only way to make 100k is going as a contractor using your own Ltd. company

100k USD or GBP? Big difference.

darkerz

NOC-Ninja wrote: »

You will get paid on the technologies you are good at.
You are comparing network vs security. From my experience, security pays a lot more. Example, Network sec engineer vs network engineer, network admin vs security admin...As of right now, data center is in demand so there is a big wave of guys going for data center.

I believe that if you are the best on 1 technology, you will break 100k. I get a lot of calls that offers minimum 110k to 140k + bonus.
I know some people that are making 150k + bonus.
From my experience, the business is changing. They want hybrids. A guy that knows RS and Datacenter, RS and Security, RS and Voice and etc. You get my point. If you can be a hybrid then there will be businesses that will offer you more than 100k.

We are in the time where we are judge on what we can produce.

I'd like to take this 1 step further regarding the "hybrids" model.

Not only do employers want a R&S + "Business Enabling Trend or Technology" here in the network space (depends on the company, space and direction of infrastructure), but you're now seeing am emerging army of engineers who can script everything, parse magically, pivot those spread sheets and turn those show xxxxx, netflow, snmp, ip sla and etc. details into "touchable, understandable" financial metrics.

More devices, less time in CLI & GUI means it's time to adapt or die.

Whenever we open up a position, there are 100's of candidates applying. What I've found is most Sr. engineers and Mid level guys who have been in the industry for 5,10,15 years have a serious disconnect with how the protocols work, or even how to differentiate data forwarding plane versus control plan concepts. By this point, it's a sure thing that their project management, fiscal comprehension and business acumen is non-existent, they're Tier 1/2 admins who've stuck around due to CIO's that enable mediocrity and glorified titles.

Yuck.

For now, the folks on this board are going to do pretty damn well because we take it upon ourselves to study in depth. Most (95%+) do not. But in a world where more technology, more tools, more automation and more infrastructure are needing less engineer, wages increase - then expectations do, too.

It's not about "how to get" to 100k by 30's, it'll happen organically if you try hard, learn applicable skills and move a bit.

...

Besides, IT is not where money is. We're an OPEX. If you are in this field for the money and not the challenge, passion and vigor of enabling technology to "do cool sh*t every day", you're in the wrong career.

fredrikjj

darkerz wrote: »

Besides, IT is not where money is. We're an OPEX. If you are in this field for the money and not the challenge, passion and vigor of enabling technology to "do cool sh*t every day", you're in the wrong career.

Nice post, but I'm going to pick on this. In my opinion, this is just semantics. Every employee is OPEX. I'm assuming that you are trying to say that there's a limited amount of benefit that you can bring to the business while being in IT; either the network works, or it doesn't work. You are not really innovating, just running infrastructure, but this applies to pretty much every job in the world, and "IT" is very well paid at the high end, comparable to, or better, than other white collar professions.

darkerz

fredrikjj wrote: »

Nice post, but I'm going to pick on this. In my opinion, this is just semantics. Every employee is OPEX. I'm assuming that you are trying to say that there's a limited amount of benefit that you can bring to the business while being in IT; either the network works, or it doesn't work. You are not really innovating, just running infrastructure, but this applies to pretty much every job in the world, and "IT" is very well paid at the high end, comparable to, or better, than other white collar professions.

Perhaps I can word it better,

We're not directly involved in increasing profit from the businesses perspective*. Whether or not it's true doesn't change how the real world looks at IT expenditure.

philz1982

fredrikjj wrote: »

Nice post, but I'm going to pick on this. In my opinion, this is just semantics. Every employee is OPEX. I'm assuming that you are trying to say that there's a limited amount of benefit that you can bring to the business while being in IT; either the network works, or it doesn't work. You are not really innovating, just running infrastructure, but this applies to pretty much every job in the world, and "IT" is very well paid at the high end, comparable to, or better, than other white collar professions.

100% commission sales folks are not OPEX

....

tprice5

phoeneous wrote: »

You're doing it wrong.

Am I? I guess I just value having a roof over my head, proper (albeit expensive) healthcare, reliable transportation, adequate clothing and the means to purchase food for my family. I would love to hear what you consider to be more important than these things...