maybe become a commercial airline pilot? won't make you a living wage in the valley but you can live well virtually anywhere else plus you get to fly planes which is cool
Isn't the divorce rate ridiculously high?
Ask HN: How to get out of Tech and still make a decent living?
81–90 of 107 posts
Re: Ask HN: How to get out of Tech and still make a decent living?
#82I know of one guy who got burned out on corporate IT and opened a game store. Several years later, each year being just as close to bankruptcy as the previous, he realized it was the corporate BS he was burned out on, not programming per se, and he would have been far better off looking for a different way to earn money with his programming skills, but by that time it was too late, he was too committed to the game store to switch.
I recommend taking a few weeks off to chill out, relax, get the corporate BS out of your system, then think about less BS-intensive ways to earn money with your skills. Even if you have to take a big pay cut, you'll probably take an even bigger one switching professions at this stage.
Re: Ask HN: How to get out of Tech and still make a decent living?
#83Earlier quoted context omitted.
Good advice for probably every field except law. Law is so different in most European countries that it won't be of much use in the US. Also a lot in civil law hinges on subtleties in the respective language.
Possibly; I've met two Israeli lawyers and two British lawyers who moved to the US and were able to pass the bar exam within a year or so - I have no idea how hard they worked at it (and what preparations they did before moving to the US), but it was certainly cheaper then going to school in the US.
I'm confident that most people on HN can pass the bar exam without law school. Law school really wasn't much of an advantage for the bar exam, just do the prep course and study hard full time for six weeks and you would be fine. Unfortunately I don't think any states still allow sitting the bar exam and being admitted without a law degree.
Re: Ask HN: How to get out of Tech and still make a decent living?
#84Earlier quoted context omitted.
Possibly; I've met two Israeli lawyers and two British lawyers who moved to the US and were able to pass the bar exam within a year or so - I have no idea how hard they worked at it (and what preparations they did before moving to the US), but it was certainly cheaper then going to school in the US.
I'm confident that most people on HN can pass the bar exam without law school. Law school really wasn't much of an advantage for the bar exam, just do the prep course and study hard full time for six weeks and you would be fine. Unfortunately I don't think any states still allow sitting the bar exam and being admitted without a law degree.
Some states have a sort of apprentice style path to the bar.
For example:
http://admissions.calbar.ca.gov/Education/LegalEducation/Law...
It's multiyear and supervised by a lawyer, so not quite at the level you are talking about.
Re: Ask HN: How to get out of Tech and still make a decent living?
#85Earlier quoted context omitted.
I once rubbed a friend the wrong way when he said "maybe I'll just get out of tech, take a few years of courses and become an electrician or something like that. Make 100k and be happy with that... leave the computer behind." My response was: "Fine plan but don't think you'll just go make 100k after a couple years of trade school and not have any stresses!" A few people showed me I was wrong about that but we were al…
I would not advise a job in the oil industry if you are a minority in. I've heard lots of traumatic experiences from friends in Texas and Alberta. Lots of good reviews in Norway though
Houston oil execs: we need you to help us negotiate with this Arab guy.
Iranian-American: but I'm Iranian. Not Arab.
Execs: blank stares Same thing though right?
Happened. That said, I wouldn't expect one to experience any malice in a corporate Texas environment based on ethnicity or race. Rather, there's often a narrow perspective, in that they want you to be as Texan as possible, ideally an alumnus of their favorite Texas university, and stick to the norms, as opposed to say NYC where diverse experiences are appreciated more.
Re: Ask HN: How to get out of Tech and still make a decent living?
#86Earlier quoted context omitted.
I've been looking for someone with this perspective. Do you think it is just AI and ML? Do you feel the same way about data scientists, data analyst (not actuary,statisticians,mathematicians, etc)? What other domains do you recommend instead?
If you are new, I recommend that you pick a discipline with long-term proven value, and go as deep as you can into it. If you have a bit more experience, pick a second discipline, and define yourself as the specialist in X-meets-Y. Just don't be a magpie: make a choice, and stick to it. This is the hard part, because it will be excruciatingly tempting to follow all of the other magpies to the new field when they leav…
Most businesses would have no clue what to do with an expert statistician, though.
An analyst with a balanced combination of programming and stats skills and business domain knowledge will always, always be able to find work, regardless of whatever the latest fad is.
Re: Ask HN: How to get out of Tech and still make a decent living?
#87Earlier quoted context omitted.
On a 30-year forward looking basis, we appear to be fucked, though - the only 50-year old software guys I know are either self employed, or have been working at the same place for 20 years. Even "stable" employees who only switch jobs every 5 years have problem finding new jobs when they are older. Ageism is definitely a problem in software, but not in other specialized fields, which suggests to me that it is fixable…
> Ageism is definitely a problem in software, but not in other specialized fields, which suggests to me that it is fixable. It will take decades to fix if ever, and the fixed state won't be recognizable. In my opinion, ageism in software exists mostly because it is a fashion business, and (statistically speaking, and rather objectively), older people are not as good at catering to the latest fashions. This also happe…
> It will take decades to fix if ever, and the fixed state won't be recognizable.
It will fix itself. Software became popular with the rise of the Internet which didn't happen till the late 90's. If we assume people at that time were in their mid-late 20's, then they would be in their mid-late 40's now.
Basically, there just isn't that many 50+ developers out there. In another 10-20 years there will be a lot more and older programmers will be much more common and therefore won't be as out of place.
Re: Ask HN: How to get out of Tech and still make a decent living?
#88This thread is full of personal stories so I'll add mine. Writing software is fun but burned out on doing it professionally for 10 years. Frustrated I was just making my bosses rich and building their dreams not mine. Frustrated at programming's long-term career trajectory (Nobody will hire you after 40). Dreamed of doing my own thing but no capital to start a company. Went into debt for an MBA, goal of getting into finance or somewhere without tech's various career limitations and "ceilings." Graduated from highly ranked MBA school. A month later Lehman and Bear explode and suddenly nobody is hiring MBAs (oops!). Back to programming. Programming is still fun, but I continue to just making my bosses rich. Moved into product management thinking it will be different. Still no career trajectory. Moved into project management. Still no career trajectory. Made it to 40 and still have a job but no capital to start a company. Still figuring out what to do when I grow up.
Lesson learned I suppose is you can change your role, your industry, your company, but it doesn't change the fact that you'll be stuck on the burnout treadmill building someone else's dream.
Re: Ask HN: How to get out of Tech and still make a decent living?
#89This thread is full of personal stories so I'll add mine. Writing software is fun but burned out on doing it professionally for 10 years. Frustrated I was just making my bosses rich and building their dreams not mine. Frustrated at programming's long-term career trajectory (Nobody will hire you after 40). Dreamed of doing my own thing but no capital to start a company. Went into debt for an MBA, goal of getting into…
You make interesting points, but I want to correct some false assumptions that may discourage younger, less experienced people browsing this thread for advice.
A large part of my job is understanding the culture of companies and the software engineers best suited to join them; in doing that, one metric is the age of the individuals, because it does play a role in the hiring decision. It's unfair, but age does become a factor at a certain point, just around the 50-55 point as a software engineer at a decent amount (but definitely not all) companies. But your statement "nobody will hire you after 40" is false - software engineers in their 40's will be welcomed at 90%+ companies. Perhaps you're in San Francisco and experiencing more ageist attitudes inside the latest young bro-filled startup bubble, but this represents a small minority.
Second, literally every for-profit job involves making money for your bosses; this is how capitalism works. If you want to make more money tired to your own contributions, then you either climb the ladder - through merit - to become a boss or run a successful business. These are the facts of life that one should know by the age of 40.
Re: Ask HN: How to get out of Tech and still make a decent living?
#90Earlier quoted context omitted.
How much of that is paid in rent tho'? Classic landlord tactic, get a business in, if it's a success capture all of its profit, if it goes bust get another one. As with all things, if it was easy everyone would be doing it...
Including the business outside the campus are around 100k-5million after rent. I have not seen any landlord doing what you've mentioned.
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