[Anonymous]

Anyone have any advice? When I leave my CPA firm I’ll have 2 years experience in a controller role at a small private company, 3 busy seasons at a mid sized CPA firm, and my CPA license. Currently I’m at like 50K :(. I do A&A and tax.

I’m looking to finish this busy season, get up to 60K for a raise, then get more after next busy season (will be my third) then look elsewhere.

[titoav15]

I would check Robert Half salary guide for your area as a starting point. 🙂

BEC: 5/21/14 82! PASSED HALF WAY THERE!
FAR: 4/2/15 80! Almost there!
AUD: 69, 74, 4/3/14 81! PASSED
REG: TBD

[Anonymous]

Remember: your qualifications allow you to get the job; the job you get determines what you will be paid. As a very extreme example, if you get a job flippin' burgers at Burger King, they're not going to pay you any extra because you're a CPA. Same goes for various accounting jobs… You're not going to get paid $80k for being a CPA with public and Controller experience. But, you might qualify to be a “big time” Controller, and being a “big time” Controller might pay $80k (or more).

So…with that being said…I found an interesting, governmental salary estimator tool. In order to qualify for a H1B Visa, one of the requirements is that you must be paid at least the actual or prevailing wage for your occupation. My understanding is this would be the average acceptable/standard pay. So, if you look up your area and the position you think you qualify for, this can give you a baseline wage: https://www.flcdatacenter.com/OesWizardStart.aspx When I discovered using it is that, if I'm understanding it correctly, I'm even more underpaid than I thought I was. 🙂 But, I still found the site fascinating, cause it's based off government data so should be more thorough than some other sources, and it's got fairly specific jobs broken out.

[Author]

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