Such is life. What's even more depressing is the fact that some people who shouldn't be in possession of wealth(El Chapos of the world) are among the richest people on earth
Ask HN: Delivery guy is a chemist with 2 teenage kids. Can this happen to me?
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Re: Ask HN: Delivery guy is a chemist with 2 teenage kids. Can this happen to me?
#12I don’t know how common it is but a chemist friend of mine retired early. His situation was his company was bought and layed off people, he survived. That company was bought, he survived. The 3rd time this happened, he didn’t survive.
Add ageism to the mix and I think it’s quite likely you will be out a job before you are ready to retire.
These guys that are saying “maybe he wanted to shlep boxes” are whistling past the graveyard because they don’t want to believe it could happen to them.
Re: Ask HN: Delivery guy is a chemist with 2 teenage kids. Can this happen to me?
#13Tech is experiencing probably the biggest boom we've ever witnessed. What we're experiencing completely blows away the dot-com bubble. If you need to trade your labor in order to keep a roof over your head, you are in the same boat as any other person who needs to do the same, no matter the sector or role. The overall trend for labor has been that of stagnation, undercutting via contracting and outsourcing, and repla…
I always wondered about this... What if those big tech giants such as Facebook, Microsoft and Google are pushing coding bootcamps and coding education at such a young age in order to dramatically reduce labor costs in like the next 10-20 years.
Re: Ask HN: Delivery guy is a chemist with 2 teenage kids. Can this happen to me?
#14Short answer, yes, it absolutely can. The reason they call it a rat race is that if you stop running (producing at a certain level) you will likely be thrown off the treadmill.
Or, perhaps the added stress (both to them and home life) was more than they wanted and they decided to stop running and go for a nice easy walk in the park.
Re: Ask HN: Delivery guy is a chemist with 2 teenage kids. Can this happen to me?
#15Ageism, disagreeableness, changes in motivation, etc.
Re: Ask HN: Delivery guy is a chemist with 2 teenage kids. Can this happen to me?
#16Start of my junior year in chemistry at Alabama, went in to talk to my adviser (his fifth year teaching there). He was sweating over paperwork, said it was the first time he made enough to file a tax return. I said, "Excuse me, I've got to go change my major." And I did. Never looked back.
Re: Ask HN: Delivery guy is a chemist with 2 teenage kids. Can this happen to me?
#17Is this UofA as in University of Arizona? As in Tucson, Arizona? Tucson is one of the most economically depressed regions in the nation, for a major city (see: https://www.azcentral.com/story/money/business/economy/2018/...).
I imagine this man just might be overqualified for an already poor job market, and is doing whatever he can in the mean time to make ends meet.
Side note, I did attend UofA for undergrad. Loved it, the school and the education were great. Unfortunately Tucson just isn't a good place to be if you're trying to have a real career. Unless its a medical career at Banner or some research career that aligns with the university's strengths, I recommend to a lot of UofA grads leave Tucson.
EDIT: If its not UofArizona that you're talking about, just ignore everything I said
Re: Ask HN: Delivery guy is a chemist with 2 teenage kids. Can this happen to me?
#18Even Rocket Scientists - https://www.npr.org/2011/07/11/137677198/end-of-shuttle-prog...
Always plan for a rainy day, and don't take it personally.
Re: Ask HN: Delivery guy is a chemist with 2 teenage kids. Can this happen to me?
#19Tech is experiencing probably the biggest boom we've ever witnessed. What we're experiencing completely blows away the dot-com bubble. If you need to trade your labor in order to keep a roof over your head, you are in the same boat as any other person who needs to do the same, no matter the sector or role. The overall trend for labor has been that of stagnation, undercutting via contracting and outsourcing, and repla…
Biggest boom we’ve ever witnessed and we still accept demeaning interviews ...
Re: Ask HN: Delivery guy is a chemist with 2 teenage kids. Can this happen to me?
#20Short answer, yes, it absolutely can. The reason they call it a rat race is that if you stop running (producing at a certain level) you will likely be thrown off the treadmill.
And remember kids, even if you win the ratrace, you're still a rat.