Comment on Open thread for December 17-23, 2013

Wed, 18 Dec 2013 18:40:31 GMT

I was recently in a similar position, but I nonetheless managed to negotiate a large salary increase by taking a job in a different city, quoting the salary level that I wanted, and pleading cost-of-living increases when I was asked to justify it. They did negotiate me down by about $5000, and I wouldn't say I'm quite at market rates yet for my level of experience, but it did seem to successfully anchor the negotiations on my asking price rather than my previous salary.

The new city actually did have a higher cost of living than the old one, but I get the impression that the hiring manager didn't care about the actual rate so much as he cared about having a rationale that looked good on paper.

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