• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

Note

The best way to get the salary you want is to make yourself a desirable employee. This means you have to work hard and well, which puts you in a position to ask for—and get—a better salary.

Here are Chapman's five rules for negotiating your salary when interviewing for a job:

Postpone salary negotiations until you're offered the job. Let your potential employer decide whether you're the right candidate, and then talk about money. The same is true of raises—discuss them after you have your performance review. (The next section has more about asking for a raise.)

Let them go first. It's hard to come out ahead by naming a number, so let your employer suggest a salary. Lots of people find it awkward to evade direct questions about salary history. For these folks, Chapman has posted a short video that explains how to answer questions about salary expectations: http://salarynegotiations.com/Video.htm. (Also see Penelope Trunk's advice on the subject: http://tinyurl.com/BCsalary.)

When you hear their offer, repeat the top value—and then stop talking. "The most likely outcome of this silence is a raise," Chapman writes. This technique buys you some time to think while putting pressure on the employer. For more on this step, check out Chapman's video about it: http://tinyurl.com/theflinch.

Counter their offer with a researched response. Next, make a counter-offer based on what you know about yourself, the market, and the company. This means you have to do some research beforehand so you know the reasonable salary range for the position.

Clinch the deal—then deal some more. Finally, lock in the offer, and then negotiate additional benefits like extra vacation days or a company car. This is like agreeing on the price of a car before you negotiate the value of your trade-in (see Sell your old car separately).

Chapman's book has detailed info on each of these five steps. It also offers tips for determining your fair-market value (though you can do a lot of that online at sites like PayScale.com, SalaryScout.com, and GlassDoor.com) and applying these techniques to raises and performance reviews. It also explores situations where you should break these rules.

The average person doesn't spend enough time looking for ways to boost his income. Learning how to negotiate your salary when applying for a job is one of the best ways to improve your financial position. And as the next section explains, once you have a job, it's important to know how to ask for a raise.

On The Money: The Value of a College Education

Does earning a college degree make a difference in your financial future? Absolutely! The facts are striking: On average, people with college degrees earn almost twice as much folks who never attend college.

Here are the U.S. Census Bureau's median 2007 income levels based on education (see Caught Up in the Rat Race for a refresher on medians):

Highest Level of Education Completed

Median Income

Increase over Level Below

Some high school

$19,405

—

High school degree

$26,894

38.6%

Some college

$32,875

22.2%

College

$46,805

42.4%

Advanced degree

$61.287

30.9%

Of course, these are just statistics: Getting a college education doesn't guarantee you'll end up earning more money than you would otherwise. Some English majors wind up working in convenience stores and some high-school dropouts end up running multi-million dollar corporations. But in general, completing college has a huge impact on how much you earn in your lifetime—it can be worth a million dollars!

For more on the financial benefits of a college education, check out http://tinyurl.com/college-census.

How to Ask for a Raise

If you do a good job, keep a positive attitude, and help your boss meet her goals, you should expect regular raises. But not every company is as free with the salary bumps as they ought to be. (In fact, some employers—such as government agencies—can't give discretionary raises at all!) And, of course, if the economy is in the toilet, even