A survey of information technology (IT) professionals found that the average IT salary increased 1.7 percent in 2007, down from 5.2 percent in 2006. The survey also examined what factors impacted average salary increases for these workers.
The results came from Dice.com, a career site for technology and engineering professionals. Dice found that the average salary of an IT professional now stands at $74,570. Dice explains that in 2006 there was an almost 9 percent increase in the average contractor salary, which accounted for an overall increase of 5.2 percent. In 2007, contractors still saw the biggest increases (3.7 percent, for a salary of $93,017) while full-time workers received average increases of 1.7 percent ($72,003).
Dice's results reflected that the most experienced IT Managers received the biggest salary increases: MIS Managers received 7.8 percent average increases and Project Managers received average increases of 5.0 percent.
Company size also matters, notes Dice, explaining that IT pros at large companies (with over 1,000 employees) received an average increase of 2.3 percent while their counterparts at the smallest companies (less than 50 employees) experienced an average salary decline of 1.8 percent.
Unfortunately, gender was also a factor that had bearing on average increases for IT professionals, as men's salaries increased 2.4 percent (to $76,582) while women's average salaries experienced no increase (remaining at $67,507) thus widening the gender gap to 11.9 percent.
Other factors that determined average increases were geography and industry. IT professionals in Silicon Valley made out the best in terms of highest percentage increase and highest paying metro area (3.95 percent increase to $93,876), followed by Boston (3.93 percent, $83,465). The next three highest paying areas in terms of salary were Baltimore/Washington, D.C.($81,750), Los Angeles ($81,039) and New York ($80,770). In terms of industry, E-commerce employees saw the largest increases (4.6 percent) and Government/Defense and Computer Software IT professionals saw better than average increases (2.8 percent).
Dice notes that while IT professionals experienced slower salary growth in 2007 versus 2006, they remained in high demand and had a low annual average unemployment rate of 2.1 percent.
"Technology workers remain among the highest paid employees, especially those with management experience and hard-to-find skills, said Scot Melland, Chairman, President and CEO of Dice Holdings, Inc. in a press release.
Dice's 2007 Annual Salary Survey was conducted among 19,000 IT professionals.
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