As a student of CS, I always thought that engineers in Avionics will make the most as the seniority goes up. But, it's completely the opposite, I live in Bay Area and working at start up as a Sr. Flight Software Engineer and my TC is still much lower then what I see on blind and level.fyi that other for people working in any other industry including #auto , #finance , #faang , #media , #hardware and anything else. Also, in this market it has become super hard to switch industry or companies tend to avoid Avionics for some reason. TC 190k YOE 8 Masters
Low volume in general aviation. Lowest bidder for military aviation. High regulatory and liability costs. What made you think engineers would make a lot of money? The margins just aren’t there compared to write it once sell it to hundreds of millions software.
I did my undergrad in LA where apparently aerospace industry is pretty big, very hard to leave this cycle.
I have had multiple interviewers saying they would filter out mid/senior SWE candidates from traditional aerospace or defense. It is a serious wake up call for me and I am trying my best to get out.
Yeah I am at a start-up but even thats a aerospace company and the pay is compares nothing to what you could make in any other industry
What you see on Blind is not representative of the field as a whole. On Blind everyone is rich and you wonder why anybody is still working past 30. Meanwhile, the average starting salary in the US for a software engineer is $120K, so there is a disconnect.
Average starting salary is 120k ?. I started with 75k. So much work to get to 190k and I already feel like I am hitting a cap in aerospace. If I say I want something more then 190 aerospace company are like for that kinda pay you would have to get in as principal which is usually 15 yoe or plus. I screwed up bad 😭
Does getting into management earn you big bucks in aerospace?
Nope. I personally cannot recommend people to go to aerospace. Leave as early as possible.
If TC is what you looking for at this stage of life, no, it's absolutely not late. Get started and be prepared to grind for interviews and new jobs. Embedded knowledge is mostly transferable. You can find jobs in HW companies, Autonomous companies, Apple, Meta, Google etc.
In process of looking for a new job, but it feels like most the recruiters skip your resume when they see most of your backgroud in filled with big defense companies.
You were badly misinformed, you don't go into aerospace/defense for big bucks. Some people do it for passion because they found it interesting, some for stability/WLB, but never for the money.
Yeah, now I get this and would guide any of my younger friends to get out if they can. Idk, if I can get out now.