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I quit the tech industry

eev.ee

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Re: I quit the tech industry

#191

Post by xienze »

skidoo wrote: post #181
xienze wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But those are not made up problems, those are necessities and cost only a minimal amount of time per day Minimal, LOL. What world do you live in? I suggest you pay a visit to Amish country some day and see how people unencumbered with "made up problems" live. Farming and other survival-related tasks are literally ALL they do. And it's all you would ever do without people sitting in offices and factories tending to…

No offense, but I disagree with pretty much all of this. We work more than our ancestors do, not to make an easier life, but for the sake of incorporating the ephemeral and inconsequential into our lives. And an agrarian lifestyle can be loads of fun, actually. I got more of a sense of accomplishment helping on my grandparents' farm than from any blue collar job I've ever held.

Yes the work can be rewarding but I'm really addressing the author's misguided point that all our modern work is to solve non-existent problems. In reality, it's to make our lives easier and more comfortable.

The flipside of a completely agrarian society is very little safety net. Crop disease? Drought? Animal sickness? Broke your leg? Life just got a lot tougher. Like, life or death tougher.

Re: I quit the tech industry

#192

Post by brightball »

probablyfiction wrote: post #17

This is what burnout looks like. Unless Yelp has a toxic work culture, it's likely the author brought it on themselves by pushing too hard. After several months, the author will probably start thinking about work again, and begin the job search once more. Not to say that the author's points are invalid; it's a terrible feeling to have to spend your most productive hours working on someone else's problems. He or she m…

He has actually done one of the best things that he can do in that situation: eliminate expenses.

When I tried bootstrapping my startup years ago with periodic contract work the albatross around my neck wasn't anything to do with the company, it was the mortgage and other home expenses that continually made it harder and harder to go without a steady income.

People always focus on income without looking at expenses as much, but the closer you can get those expenses to zero the wealthier you really are since you NEED so much less cash flow. It's a huge multiplier.

If I had the ability to pay off all my debt overnight, using my time the way I want to would be a whole lot easier. I absolutely sympathize with the author here. There are several things that I want to build but I have a full time job, a wife and 2 kids. At some point I had to decide that being a good father and husband is more important than pursuing those entrepreneurial dreams. There's only so much time in a day.

I'm lucky in that I have a great job with a company who's mission I fully support and ownership that treats their employees better than any company I've ever seen. It makes it significantly easier to put the company over personal ambitions.

Time and a place for everything.

Re: I quit the tech industry

#193

Post by muraiki »

"Do you have any internal libraries or systems or platforms at your company? Do you think no one else has ever had the same idea and built the same thing?"

Isn't this one of the reasons behind the FOSS movement? That we as programmers are often repeating the same uninteresting tasks, so perhaps we should just freely share what we've done so that we can all work on something more interesting.

And in the Libre sense of Free -- in the GNU sense (and perhaps I've interpreted it wrongly here) -- this is why GNU is not just "something to make our lives better". It is rather a moral responsibility towards your fellow users, which includes programmers who use your code, not just end users. Because if people don't share, you end up with people like the author of this article: burnt out on writing something that's been written before.

Of course how this meshes with the real world of capitalism is a whole other story. I'm not saying it's not viable: Stallman of course mentions selling support in the GNU Manifesto, and the article also mentions Patreon.

Note that I'm not saying GNU is the One True Way, but rather trying to stimulate a discussion about something I don't fully understand but have been thinking about lately and which I believe touches upon one of the core issues that prompted the author's action.

Re: I quit the tech industry

#194

Post by zatkin »

jfe wrote: post #150
mpdehaan2 wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While not burnout related, I found out a while back, and this is somewhat paradoxical, that if I care TOO much, I'm less happy. What happens is I notice all the stuff I can't fix, or need to fix, and other people get stressed out making them fix it. The end result is that I stop caring quite as much (I still care), get happy, and then start caring too much again. It's especially hard at times when you have a lot of e…

ditto.

Please make more meaningful contributions rather than simply feeling similarities with other users. That is what the upvoting feature is for.

Re: I quit the tech industry

#195

Post by xienze »

LatencyKills wrote: post #189
mpdehaan2 wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you can probably do better investing than in paying off a mortgage, depending on when you got in on the mortgage rate. Plus, yes, you have that money more liquidated when you need it. (Plus mortgage interest is tax deductible).

I agree with you but on the existential side of things not having that mortgage payment hanging over you every month is quite liberating.

Yes, assuming you also have a job. Having no job (and no desire to get a job) and little savings (the author says it almost all went to paying off the mortgage) is a little stressful, to say the least. In this situation having a big pile of cash and a mortgage would be preferable.

Re: I quit the tech industry

#196

Post by lsaferite »

koliber wrote: post #131
lsaferite wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You know what sucks. As an American I'd still have to pay American income taxes. I cannot wrap my head around how we can say that's ok. Sure, there are ways to get around a portion of the taxes, but those involve things like never coming to the US for more than a set (short) amount of time.

No! You would not have to pay American taxes on the income you have earned while living abroad. There is the foreign income exemption which essentially says that the IRS does not care to tax the first $100,000 you earn. For taxes above that, you first deduct dollar for dollar what you have paid to the foreign tax authority. Ball-parking it, you would have to earn more than $180,000 per year to need to pay US taxes. Y…

> Sure, there are ways to get around a portion of the taxes, but those involve things like never coming to the US for more than a set (short) amount of time.

I know about being an expat and how to avoid SOME of the taxes. Point is, unless you make under that limit and don't spend more than a month per year in the US, you are liable for US taxes. They give credit for foreign taxes paid, but you'll basically be paying the US income tax rates when it's all done. Not to mention the sheer stupidity of having to file in the first place.

Re: I quit the tech industry

#197

Post by kev009 »

Find some group of people and cause bound by something other than simply being coworkers working on bubble-ish webapps or boring corporate software. For me, this is FreeBSD -- the problems are interesting personally from running my laptop to scaling the Internet in my day job, the work and skills will transcend any one job I ever have, and the people are the best I've ever met.

Re: I quit the tech industry

#199

Post by [deleted] »

agentultra wrote: post #180
reitoei wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I did exactly this. Was contracting for 8 years in Dublin, commuting almost 3 hours daily. I was making good (but not amazing) money. Then the kids came, and that 3 hour commute became 3 hours that I could spend helping my wife or spending time with my kids. Got offered a full-time job in the tech industry with (gaaasp pension!) outside of Dublin, 5 minutes from my front door, with better salary, bonuses and healthca…

A pension? I've never heard of a pension in tech (though I am from a different country than you). I've never heard of companies taking part of their earnings to invest in the well being of their people. The most I have heard of are perks like ping-pong, a free beer once in a while, and conferences. They often even give you a computer to work on! And a chair to sit in! (I kid you not, these are often listed as perks i…

[deleted]

Re: I quit the tech industry

#200

Post by jebblue »

shalmanese wrote: post #65

It's sad to me that the industry is pushing out so many great people because they feel so disenfranchised by it. I believe technology is one of the most potent forces of good in the world but for that to sustain, a culture has to develop around it with a deep desire to solve serious, large problems. I attended my first (and last) Hackathon a couple of weeks ago because it was immigration themed and so I thought I cou…

>> I believe technology is one of the most potent forces of good in the world

I believe technology will be the downfall of humankind; but the work is interesting.

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