[throwaway000123]

2500 after the tax ? That's not bad after 2 years. I've only heard horror stories in France when it comes to salary negotiation. Basically the regular devs (=not very specialized field) have no bargaining power and there is this silent seniority (sometimes plain cronyism) in which only a few people CAN become harder to replace (working on core things) and get slowly promoted - no matter what they do. The rest are being deliberately kept out of important/complicate/sensitive work. My observation is that there are basically 2 ways to get a raise in France (again, if you are not very specialized) :

1) jump from job to job every 2 years max asking for more and hoping there is no recession

2) stay in the same company forever and/or become friends with the important guys.

Both are risky. In my limited experience the French companies put significantly less value on experience and/or skill compared to US.