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THE RESOURCEFUL CLUB
· Issue #002 · Week of April 25, 2026
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Career · AI · Money
The Resourceful Club
Figure it out. Before everyone else does.
| Est. 2026 |
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Issue 002 |
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~7 min read |
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Sponsor
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[Sponsor name] — [Sponsor copy goes here.] Learn more →
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Hey {{first_name}} —
The salary gap just got a number attached to it. Workers with AI skills are now earning 56% more than peers in the exact same roles. That’s not a projection — it’s happening right now. This week: why the cost of waiting is higher than you think, a 10-minute career drift audit, and the contrarian take on volatility.
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This week's implementation
Map your career drift in 10 minutes
Most people have a vague sense they might be underpaid or under-positioned. This prompt makes it concrete — with numbers, a market comparison, and a script for the conversation you’ve been putting off.
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Copy this prompt
I want to understand the real cost of staying in my current role without moving.
Here’s my situation:
- Current title: [your title]
- Industry: [your industry]
- Years in this role: [X years]
- Current base salary: [$X]
- Last raise or promotion: [timeframe]
- City/market: [location]
Please do the following:
1. Estimate the current market range for someone with my profile at a competing company.
2. Calculate the compounding salary gap if I’ve been 10–15% below market for 2 years.
3. List 3 specific, concrete moves I could make in the next 60 days to improve my positioning — internally or externally.
4. Draft one paragraph I could use to open a compensation conversation with my manager.
Be direct. Don’t sugarcoat the math.
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Edwin’s reaction →
I ran this myself before putting it in the issue. It didn’t just give me a number — it handed me a full playbook. Market range, the arguments to make, and a paragraph I could paste straight into a conversation with my manager. But the part that hit hardest? It showed me exactly where I should be in my career right now. Took ten minutes.
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Works in Claude, ChatGPT, and Gemini. Run it once before any salary conversation. The number it surfaces is usually the one you already suspected but didn’t want to say out loud.
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Job switchers outpaced stayers by 3–4x. The gap is still compounding.
Based on Pew Research Center wage data and LinkedIn Workforce Report, 2021–2024.
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15–20%
Median salary increase for job switchers, 2021–2022. Stayers got 4–5%.
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During the 2021–2022 wage surge, job switchers saw median pay increases of 15–20% while people who stayed saw 4–5% raises. The gap compounded. Two years later, the stayers are still catching up.
This isn’t a reason to panic-apply. It’s a reason to know your number before you need it. The people who moved during the surge didn’t time the market perfectly — they just stopped waiting for permission. The window looks similar right now. Fewer people are moving, which means less competition for the ones who do.
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This week’s contrarian take
Volatility creates windows. Most people sit them out.
Everyone is waiting for things to calm down before they do anything. That’s the wrong read.
The people who made financial moves during uncertain markets — contributed to their 401(k) when indexes were down, made career moves when everyone else was frozen — almost always look smart in hindsight. Not because they predicted anything. Because they acted when the cost of acting was lower.
The move right now: figure out what “acting” would look like in your specific situation. Not a plan. One decision. What’s the one thing you’ve been putting off because it didn’t feel like the right time?
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✦ AI assist: I used Claude to stress-test this against historical market data from 2008 and 2020. The pattern held. As always, this is analysis, not advice.
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1
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Tool
Levels.fyi 2025 Salary Report
The only number that matters in a negotiation is the one your employer hopes you don’t know. This is how you find it.
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2
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Read
The Market for Lemons Applied to Your Job Search
Akerlof wrote this about used cars in 1970. It describes the job market in 2026 better than anything published this year. If you don’t know your value, the market will decide it for you.
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3
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Tool
Sonara AI
I’ve been using this. You set your criteria once and it applies to matching roles in the background while you’re focused on your actual job. Set it and forget it.
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The right time isn’t something you find
Staying still feels like a neutral choice. It isn’t. Every year you wait, the gap between where you are and where you could be gets a little harder to close.
A guy I worked with wanted to become a radiologist for years. Smart, capable, absolutely had what it took. But the timing was never right. Money was tight. Work was busy. And underneath all of it — a quiet voice that said maybe he wasn’t smart enough to pull it off.
He waited. And waited. And every year the window felt a little smaller. Last I heard, he’s still in the same role. Still waiting for the right time.
Here’s what I’ve learned watching people do this: it never feels like the right time. It isn’t supposed to. The right time isn’t something you find — it’s something you make.
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The takeaway
The right time isn’t something you find. It’s something you make.
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The Resourceful Club
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