by Laura Conaway

Just got this from Steve in Portland, Ore.:

So maybe this won't help stem the tide of unrelentingly negative news, but I actually received a (modest — 4%) pay increase a couple weeks ago.

 

I work as a programmer /analyst for a small-ish tech company who provide a suite of management utilities and other services to corporate real estate companies (or just companies that own and lease real estate, really). Our clients include Lehman, Merrill Lynch, Citigroup, among others, so you can imagine how nervous I was for the couple weeks where every day at least one of our large accounts' names were in the news going bankrupt or close to it. So it was very surprising (and relieving!) to hear this from my boss. I wasn't expecting it in the least, and was just praying to keep my job given how bleak the market is out there. So maybe I'm the exception and not the rule, but I just thought you'd like to know that it's not 100% bad right now.