> Heh, well, almost everybody *claims* they want the most brilliant people. 
> I think some of them are more serious about it than others though. ;-)

Of course, some will have a budget much bigger than others, you never know.

>> No, how on Earth do you imagine that they could find out your salary?
>
> They call my employer and ask them? It's not rocket science.

There is no way your employer would give out such information to anyone 
outside the company.  Even to internal employees they would never give out 
such information, unless authorised to do so by someone quite senior.

> Since the pay is one of my major motivations for wanting to leave, I think 
> I'm going to have trouble explaining that one.

DO NOT tell them your motivation for moving is the pay.  There is no way 
they will employ someone who is just moving to get a higher salary, because 
in 2 years time they will be off to another company for more money.  You 
explain that your motivation for moving is because you have no opportunities 
for progressing your career in the company and the work is very repetitive 
blah blah blah.

> Benny seems to think I should be earning 30K - 40K. (Working for somebody 
> else, that is.) Personally I think that's a little ambitious for somebody 
> of my limited skill.

Not at all, if you had spent 2 years working at your company, then maybe 
moved up and taken some more responsibility for the networking etc (or moved 
to a different company with a more responsible job) you could easily be 
earning that much or more.  The problem you have is that you've spent 6 
years doing essentially the same job with no propspect of career 
progression, so you can't really expect your salary to rise to that much for 
just doing the same thing.

> As I understand it, technical people don't merit such high salaries, only 
> salesmen and managers.

Rubbish, that job I told you about that we thought we needed to pay 70K 
euro, that was for an Engineer with 7 years experience.  I have no idea how 
much we actually offered him, but I know he was earning 56K euro in his 
current job, which we all thought was a bit low given what he was doing.

Google "average graduate salary" and hit the first link, it's 24K euro. 
Even with only 3% pay rises and no promotion you should be on almost 30K 
after six years.

I think you just started out on an exceptionally under paid job, and because 
you've stuck at it for so long you're kind of out of touch with what other 
technical people with 6 years experience are being paid.

BTW just being a manager doesn't mean you're not technical, my manager does 
essentially the same job as me, he just has a lot more experience and does 
more stuff like budget and reporting with senior people.

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