In brief: It's no secret that the tech industry offers plenty of benefits, one of which is usually an excellent salary. But a recent report reveals that slightly less than half of tech workers are satisfied with their compensation, with 93% either actively seeking a new job or open to new opportunities. Why the dissatisfaction? Much of it is related to the constant and significant layoffs employees have to deal with.
The Dice Tech Salary Report, conducted by the IT and engineering job website Dice.com, surveyed 6,166 registered users and visitors at the end of last year to provide insight into the industry and its workforce.
The key takeaways were that tech salary growth slowed between 2022 and 2023, with average dissatisfaction regarding current compensation increasing year-on-year. Fifty-five percent of tech professionals were satisfied with their compensation in 2022, but this dropped to 49% in 2023. It was found that 35% of workers were "somewhat" or "very" dissatisfied with their pay, up 5% YoY.
What is the main reason for your salary decrease?
Young tech workers at early points of their careers were the group most dissatisfied with their compensation. It's interesting to note that salary satisfaction among tech professionals outpaced their non-tech counterparts by a significant margin (49% vs. 34%), suggesting many tech professionals don't feel that they're getting paid what they are worth.
Dice puts this dissatisfaction down to a combination of rising costs caused by inflation and other economic factors, as well as the flattening of average tech salaries. While only 6% of tech workers said their salaries decreased in 2022, that figure doubled to 12% in 2023.
The study found that tech workers made an average of $111,193 per year in 2023, almost double the US average of $59,384 (according to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics).
Average Tech Salary by State – Top 25
No industry has been dealing with as many layoffs as tech and gaming. Fifty-seven percent of survey respondents said they had either been laid off (10%), seen a team member laid off (22%) or were worried about/expected to be laid off (25%).
More than 263,000 workers at US-based tech companies were laid off in 2023, about a quarter of whom needed more than six months to find another job – the national average is 9.2 weeks. We're only in the third month of 2024, and there have already been 49,000 layoffs in the industry.
The increasing use of generative AI and the amount of money companies are pouring into the area, as well as their increasing obsession with streamlining and belt-tightening, suggests tech workers' fears of being laid off are justified. Maybe more should be happy just to have their six-figure jobs.