After working for a company for 7 years, I assumed that my salary would be increased depending on my performance which was top notch. Every year I got minimal increase for inflation but never any significant increase that was commensurate with my performance.

Finally I decided to look elsewhere to see how much I would get paid and was surprised to get an offer that was 50% more than what I was making. When I told my current employer they said they would match that pay.

Moral of the story. You will not get salary increase unless you actively ask for it.

changing job every now and then is the only way to know your worth if you are in tech or medicine .spent almost 5 year in the same company and what it did was cut my salary by 12% citing ongoing recession . now working as an independent consultant making almost double but taking away some company benefits which i hardly need .

What's the best way to get into being an independent consultant?