In 2021, the average income of engineers and other tech professionals in the U.S. went up to $160,097 from $154,443 in 2020. The IEEE-USA 2022 Salary & Benefits Survey revealed the bump in pay.
However, when converted to real dollars, this ‘increase’ turns into a nearly $3,500 decrease. It is the first significant dip in tech salary recorded by IEEE-USA since 2013.
This gives readers a good overview of the current landscape of tech employment in the U.S. The analysis was based on responses from 3,057 full-time professionals in their technical areas of competence. They reported their main income, but excluded their bonuses, profit sharing, overtime pay, and side hustles. When included, their average income goes up to $167,988.
This survey reports bad news for female engineers, as the pay gap between their salary and men’s widened even further from $5,900 to $33,900. Although a bit technical to measure, especially considering that the male respondents had more experience as a group than the women, and more women entering the engineering field could reduce the average salary. The proportion of female engineers remained flat— under 10%, as it has been for the last 10 years.
The survey reported that the salary gap between Caucasian and African American engineers reduced to $13,000 from $24,000 in 2021, and the salary gap between Caucasian and Hispanic engineers fell to $12,278.
Salaries in the technical field of solid-state circuitry claimed the Number 1 spot on the salaries-by-specialty list. Engineers working with machine learning, circuits and devices, medicine and biology went home smiling with big gains.
There was a drop in the job satisfaction of engineers with regards to advancement opportunities and compensation, but satisfaction with the technical challenge went up significantly.
By Marvellous Iwendi.
Source: IEEE Spectrum