Apple Inc. beat analysts’ expectations on Tuesday, reporting first-quarter net income of $6 billion, or $6.43 a share, up from $3.38 billion, or $3.67 a share, in the same period last year.

Sales of 16.24 million iPhones in Apple’s fiscal quarter that ended Dec. 31 helped drive record revenue of $26.74 billion, up from the year-ago quarter’s $15.68 billion.

Analysts had expected Apple to show at least a 47 percent increase in earnings on a 55 percent increase in revenue, totaling up to $5.38 a share in earnings on $24.3 billion in revenue. Looking ahead, the company said it expects second-quarter earnings of $4.90 per share on $22 billion in revenue.

Though Apple’s doing great, U.S. technology professionals overall aren’t getting a bigger slice of the pie, according to the 2011-2010 Annual Salary Survey from Dice.com.

Tech workers, on average, garnered salary increases of about 0.7 percent to $79,384, from $78,845 in 2009, after receiving a similar increase the previous year.

Despite the marginal increase, there are glimmers of the business recovery within the study. Nearly half of those surveyed (49 percent) received a salary increase in 2010, compared to just 36 percent who saw raises in the previous year.  And more technology professionals received bonuses: 29 percent, compared with 24 percent of respondents in 2009.