I think the psychology of pay raises and inflation is interesting. I’ve never heard anyone when inflation was low taking about how their 20% pay raise (from moving to another company for example) was 18% over inflation. This comparison of pay raises to inflation only happens when inflation is higher THAT YEAR, which I emphasize because technology salaries as a whole are one area that has greatly outstripped inflation over the the years.

I’m not trying to dismiss or minimize people who are not happy they effectively got a negative pay adjustment this year, just commenting that the perspective on how to measure pay relative to the economy and market doesn’t seem consistent, and I think that says a lot about psychology of rewards for work.

Obviously this also has different meaning in jobs where wages have been largely stagnant for many years, and weren’t keeping up with cost of living even before large inflation.

Anyway, if you are a software engineer or other highly paid professional, it might be an good thought exercise to examine your lifetime (or some other timeframe) increases vs inflation, or look at your spending that will be actually impacted by inflation (groceries etc) and calculate the tangible impact on your life in terms of cost. Again not to say that high inflation is positive or anything, just as a way of adding context and additional perspectives that are missing if you look at this year in isolation and it wasn’t a year you got a substantial increase in pay.