Professionally, only about 4 years, also a year as a sysadmin and a few in the Air Force a while back. That's why the peanuts. I'm not the most amazing programmer ever, but I am pretty good. I also have business sense and the ability to talk convincingly to non-technical people.
These things ultimately mean much more to a company, at least my company, than years at firm. I'm also constantly pushing myself to build more skills, not just programming, but also social skills too. I've noticed the longer I do this, the more people are willing to listen to and value my input. My company hierarchy is very flat for one that does $40 million in revenue. I see my CEO whenever he's in the office, his office is right next to my workspace.
It's a case of, sure, I could go somewhere and get a $X0,000 raise and finally check that six figure salary box, or I work here towards middle / upper management and reach that goal in just a few years and get a $X00,000 raise. I'm comfortable right now, no need to make a decision right now, I don't hit two years here until July anyway. If by then it doesn't look like the vision I have for my career here is really viable, then sure I'll start looking.
I started with a fairly low salary of ~50k USD in my first job in 2009, mostly because I screwed up salary negotiations. I've changed jobs twice since, and roughly tripled my salary.
> I'm not the most amazing programmer ever, but I am pretty good. I also have business sense and the ability to talk convincingly to non-technical people.
If you can deliver at all, you are probably better than most programmers out there. Talking to non-technical people is an awesome skill in its own right.
Yes, my asking about how many years you've been working was just as a rough proxy.
If you want, you can shoot me an email (see profile) for some more in-depth chats. I'm interested to see how typical my trajectory is. I don't think I did anything extraordinary, but most people I talk to seem to be getting inferior results.
How long have you been programming professionally?