[mrks_]

That's fair. I expanded on the details further in another comment, which I'll copy below.

> My question stems from the fact that I make about median market rate for my experience and location. I'm having trouble making a plan for how my salary should increase as my experience and career evolve. If I'm currently making median market rate, I'm unsure if it's reasonable to expect a jump into the 75th percentile for my next position during the negotiation process.

Median market rate in my location (Pittsburgh) for my skills is around $75k. The 90th percentile for someone of equal skill is about $100k. To clarify my question, using the details from your comment, what can I reasonably expect for the growth rate between jobs as I approach the 90th percentile of pay?

[acconrad]

Thank you, given what you've just added I'd defer to other's comments about relying on negotiation skills. I wouldn't accept anything less than a 10% increase (mixed between equity and cash) unless the title bump was meaningful and could actually have an impact on your career growth (i.e. not being VP of Engineering for a 1-person engineering team). If you're right in the middle, it shouldn't be hard to find salaries for 10% more.

[mrks_]

Thanks for the advice! I was initially concerned that negotiating for a 20-25% increase would make me unreasonable for my currently median-level skills. It seems that if 10% is a fair, but low-end, increase, then I can continue to target ~ 20%, so long as I practice negotiating.

[le-mark]

It depends on the employer as well. For example we have local companies here with horrible reputations that sometimes pay well above market rate for developers.

Makes negotiating much easier, also more risk in working there, as another comment says.