Am i underpaid?

Hello,I've registered here to learn more about SEO, i'm a software programmer working with .NET, PHP, python and javascript.

Over the last 6 months i've been working for a local company. This company is new, 2 employers only and i feel like i'm giving money to my boss who never give me more than my sallary and real bad headache. They didn't have nothing in level of libraries, frameworks, software licenses, etc. They only make design for flyers, buy wordpress templates and mount websites and stuff like that. So far i've developed:

PHP Base library

A library built with a few dependencies (Slim for REST, Redis and Mongo drivers, Respect for validation). i tried to implement a SOA and i've structured the application modules in services. The most important ones are: Account (register, recover, update information, etc), Payment gateway (with paypal for now), Inbox chat, realtime notifications with websockets, Feedback (consumed by others modules to implement rating, likes and comments), a Rating modules for users with score and level.

This library is consumed by all based applications and it's extended mostly by providers. Implements OAuth 2.0, websockets and it was designed to be a backend with a REST API endpoint.

Auction Library

It's an extension for Base Library providing real time auctions. You create a project with N auctions, users have the join/follow option for projects and auctions. The publish and end action are scheduled with resque .

Those are backend APIs.

Angular Applications

I've developed 4 angularjs websites with a common angular library as well for consuming APIs, reusing directives and other javascript code. This directive have base services like userApi, accountRegisterSvc.

The same for the layouts, i've implemented Bootstrap with custom classes shared by projects. I've followed this schema to implement as much projects my boss asks without having to deal with frameworks i don't know. Oh, i'm a C# developer and this was developed with PHP. (the reason why i don't know any PHP framework).

My idea is to maintain this library while releasing the company own projects with it. Both for server side and client side.Now this is the real thing. I'm paid 580 euros per month, so far this projects costed something like 3600 for the company.

That bid system was the bigger project, you can create projects with N auctions, schedule the auctions publishing (with PHP resque), watch auctions state, after the auctions reports are generated and exported to pdf as well, all handled by notifications, emails, etc.

Most PHP code is unit tested because i use TDD. The same for angular code of the main library, tested with karma and jasmine.

Am i being a little arrogant or am i real underpaid?

I've got to be honest, when i signed this company 6 months ago the boss told me i would only develop small projects without any worries (i told him that i would only work in this town on small projects to have time for myself) but that's not true, i work something like 10 hours per day on company plus 2 more learning and reading new stuff to write PHP.

Can you please advise me on this. I don't want to leave this town because it's where my parents are leaving and software programming is unknow for most companies (cms based only).

Btw i'll also have to provide a ionic framework application for Android application for that bid system, just a new the UI sharing the angular auction library used by the website.

It's an average pay dude. You could probably make more working on your own. Don't quit your job yet though. Save some cash up as a buffer, and then see how you do on your own.

Or ask for a raise. It's up to you.

The stuff you are building for them & they are only paying you 580 euros per month... They are definitely underpaying you. No doubt in that...

Is it really the average? I'm 23, three years ago i've worked as a Junior developer in Lisbon on consulting companies earning 1200 per month. Ok, it's the capital and the city expensives don't compare with my hometown but even so, i just earn 60 euros plus my father who's really close to the minimum salary average!

The thing is that i've to write most of this code. Even the websockets stuff, this is because the company and the customer don't want to order third parties services like websockets, chat systems, etc spending money. So it lefts for me, working at the night.

Typical Feeling in a Job You always feel you are underpaid
If you are brave Enough Quit job and establish your own buisness

Guilherme Cardoso said:

Is it really the average?

Click to expand...

I could have worded that better, I meant average as in mediocre. It's not a great pay. I actually had a really stressful job too, for a very similar salary a few years ago. It's not worth the effort imo. I wouldn't work as hard as you for that amount of money. But maybe I'm just lazy.

Create a web presence and sell direct to the customers.

Cut your boss out of the equation.

c4rtel can't do that, it's against my principles and believes. Although i'm being a dumb person i'll keep in the law

I do am codding a similar solution in C# for mono environments but it's a solution for creating frontend websites based on angularjs and bootstrap, providing a backend API with similar modules (including a community/forum, ecommerce, tickets and a small cmr included). In this one i already have domains ordering from my ISP provider API automatically, i'm writing a template editor to deal with angular directives and i'll be able to share content among the applications.

It's designed with scalability in mind and i'm aiming to sell it for 10 years for 1 year with 4GB on database (local mongodb, don't know yet how i'll quote memory data of redis). But a few weeks left to finish all core code, i'll try to find side work like freelancing or stuff like that. (if someone can recommended me a startpoint i would really be apreciate!).

Elance & freelancer are popular sites for finding work. Also you can check out BHW Freelancer section for work.