I started working for a mid sized family owned company out of college making about 40ish thousand a year. I was promoted 3 times within 4 years but always felt the pay bump was inadequate. Come to find out, my manager let it slip that new hires externally were being paid (significantly) more than I was with a quarter of the work load.
Fast forward to my final year there, I was making about 75K a year. I went to HR with a packet of market research showing that I was highly confident the market value for my role and experience should land me an annual salary of at least 95k. I asked for them to raise my salary to 90K (I thought this was reasonable). Of course, I was immediately denied and my boss thought I had a bad attitude and was only thinking about money.
My final months at the company were met with double the workload and sideways comments from leadership stating I wasn't doing enough work.
Finally had enough, looked for a new job and found one immediately. The pay was exactly as much as my market research told me it would be & it's fully remote. I put my notice in and stapled the packet of market research to the resignation letter.
I now do about 1/4 the amount of work for 25% more pay. Trust me, it's ALWAYS better to search externally than attempt to 'climb the ladder'.