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While tech careers can pay more than other careers, you shouldn't approach it with the expectation that you will be making a six- to seven-figure salary right at the start. As you saw in the previous discussion of pay, the low- and high-end salary figures for different types of tech jobs can vary greatly.

A friend once told me that they had a friend who was making nearly $300,000 as a developer for a top technology company in San Francisco. Very impressive indeed.

But after asking a few more questions, I discovered that the friend who is receiving this salary had nearly seven years of professional, hands-on development experience and had many professional certifications under their belt. This made the story more believable versus this being someone who was commanding that kind of salary right after completing a four-year degree or coding boot camp.

Also, certain types of tech jobs will pay more than others due to overall demand. For example, as cloud computing becomes more of the standard for businesses, the need to have dedicated employees to handle and maintain physical hardware is decreasing. Those businesses now need employees who thoroughly understand computer networking and how computers talk to one another over short/long distances versus someone who maintains desktop computers.

As we discussed earlier, as businesses have begun to integrate artificial intelligence in their operations, they will need people who have a firm understanding of data science, machine learning, natural language processing, and more. People with these skills will likely be making more, as there aren't as many people trained in these areas.

Finally, in addition to your education and experience, where you live will influence what you can command salary-wise. Cities that have a higher cost of living, like San Francisco and New York, tend to pay higher salaries than places in less populated, more rural areas. In 2018, the average tech worker salary for the San Francisco area was $113,629, compared to Baton Rouge, Louisiana, at $69,212.

That's not to say that major cities are the only places you can go to be paid well as a tech professional. Many professionals are leaving San Francisco and New York due to how expensive it is and are heading to growing tech cities like Nashville, Tennessee; Provo, Utah; and Cleveland, Ohio—cities that all experienced significant growth in tech jobs from 2017 to 2018 (more than 7 percent and up).

We will discuss how to negotiate salary in a later chapter, but keep in mind that you may only be able to negotiate for a limited amount in certain situations.