For high-earning workers, it's hard to break free from 'golden handcuffs'(bbc.com)
bbc.com
For high-earning workers, it's hard to break free from 'golden handcuffs'
https://www.bbc.com/worklife/article/20240221-workers-shake-off-golden-handcuffs
54 comments
No mention of what seems more likely to me than it being down to prestige or feelings of self-worth: if you're making a fortune, you may well have huge mortgage payments, car payments, expenses related to your children, your parents, etc. 'Escaping' those is likely much harder than finding the confidence to switch careers.
Certainly the trick is to choose not to make these expensive commitments to spend money before you earn it. It’s much harder to claw back once you and your family get used to luxuries.
way way way easier said than done for many people
And expensive cities with.. of course return to office! So crazy high rents. It's more than golden handcuffs, since it means moving town.
Houses can be sold, especially in this market, a seller's market. Cars can be sold. Children don't need to be spoiled.
Agreed, the original commenter was highlighting how difficult those decisions can be psychologically. I mean, you try to convince your spouse to sell the house and move into a cottage and see how it goes.
A "cottage" sounds like an exaggeration, but in any case if your spouse would prefer that you spend endless hours at work rather than home with the family, then you've actually got bigger problems than "golden handcuffs".
[deleted]
Husbands can be divorced. Alimony/child support can be ordered.
If your spouse married you for your money, then you probably should get divorced. Unless of course you only wanted a "trophy", in which case you got exactly what you bargained up for.
(And don't say you married for kids if you spend all your time at work instead of with them.)
(And don't say you married for kids if you spend all your time at work instead of with them.)
If you've found a woman who really will love you in sickness and poverty, cherish that because I sure haven't; it always seems that there's a transactional nature to things and ends that have to be kept up. Certainly I've never been married.
> If you've found a woman who really will love you in sickness and poverty
This is neither sickness nor poverty. It's simply not being fabuously wealthy.
Another comment talked about living in a "cottage". Why do we need to exaggerate? Not having a high-earning job simply makes you normal, like most other people, indeed most other married people.
This is neither sickness nor poverty. It's simply not being fabuously wealthy.
Another comment talked about living in a "cottage". Why do we need to exaggerate? Not having a high-earning job simply makes you normal, like most other people, indeed most other married people.
I live quite modestly and always have. A cottage would not have been a bad description for my house. I actually like living that way, eating simple food and driving a beater car, but people do not seem to consider it attractive. Se la vi.
As someone who has spent much of their working life doing low-paying software development contracts, I have to say excessive hours and other unpleasant conditions are not in any way restricted to high paying jobs.
Right now I feel trapped in an Upwork contract. Not because it's too much money to pass up, far from it, it's near the federal poverty line, but because my bank account is still close to red. The low paying contracts came because I spent too much time trying to "launch my own startup" and became somewhat desperate and had to start taking any contract I could get. The last few times I didn't wait so long and was able to be more careful and had nice clients. This time the clients have been problematic.
The boss is in eastern europe and has extremely high expectations for work output and seems to inevitably find deficits in my work on a daily basis.
I actually had someone contact me from HN about a potential contract, but had to put them off due to the critical bank account level and daily demands of the current contract. There is no room for error really.
Right now I feel trapped in an Upwork contract. Not because it's too much money to pass up, far from it, it's near the federal poverty line, but because my bank account is still close to red. The low paying contracts came because I spent too much time trying to "launch my own startup" and became somewhat desperate and had to start taking any contract I could get. The last few times I didn't wait so long and was able to be more careful and had nice clients. This time the clients have been problematic.
The boss is in eastern europe and has extremely high expectations for work output and seems to inevitably find deficits in my work on a daily basis.
I actually had someone contact me from HN about a potential contract, but had to put them off due to the critical bank account level and daily demands of the current contract. There is no room for error really.
If you feel the contract is reasonable and are honor-bound to keep it, that's one thing, but it sounds like you disagree with their demands and are just desperate for cash. In that scenario, does something like doordash fit the bill (in my tests in the Bay, with a bit of planning it's $30-$40/hr post-tax and depreciation, $40-$50 revenue, the latter of which is more relevant if you're trying to escape a situation)? A few 80-hour weeks might be unpleasant, but it's just a few weeks to give you the buffer to let you escape from your current situation.
I don't own a car (hate driving) and 80 hour weeks would literally kill me (assuming I didn't crash the car). Thanks for the suggestion though.
Without a car, definitely don't try doordash. I'll briefly touch on 80-hour weeks and then spend some more time trying to offer more tailored advice.
You might be different (not judging, not asking, decide for yourself if the following applies), but most people can work a couple 6-hour shifts every day with a 3-hour lunch/nap break in between. I've known a lot of people in shitty financial situations and a lot of people who decided to work harder up-front to pull out of them (obvious sampling bias, we'll pretend it doesn't matter), and I'm pretty sure that in retrospect almost everyone would prefer a few weeks of discomfort to a few years of stress, lack of resilience to financial upsets, being set back to zero when you find out your surplus is less than what you owe in taxes, ....
Expanding on that slightly, a 40-hour week often roughly covers expenses, allowing for roughly epsilon in savings, requiring tons of effort and time to actually break free. Most people I've talked to in that scenario take years to escape, if they ever do. Life has a heavy probalistic long-tail on its costs, so if you average your costs over a year you're likely to be surprised by how expensive the next 2-3 years are, wiping out your meager savings. Contrast that with an 80-hour week, all the rest is truly surplus (minus taxes). You work 2x the hours, but you make 4x or 8x or more the actual in-your-pocket income after rent and beans and rice and all that bullshit. It's the same sort of argument from "overemployed" circles if you want to read about more details, but it applies even when you just work longer at a single employer.
The following suggestions are basically going to be a set of things you can do for money with a modest amount of stability. If you want to keep your contract, it would be extra hours (so obviously pick the things with higher dollar-per-hour values, don't work too many extra hours if that's bad for you, and try to save the surplus), and if you don't then you'd want to work as many hours as you reasonably could while you look for your next gig (probably software, the way your experience sounds?).
- Dog-walking and dog-sitting (also cats to a lesser degree) is extremely profitable. If you're walking a few dogs at a time, expect something like $30-$40/hr for each (you can walk several at a time, if they get along), more if you're just walking one person's dog. I normally get $200/hr or so feeding and taking care of some nearby dogs. It's hard to fill your schedule with this, but it's probably worth adding in (especially if it lets you drop a gym membership). A poverty-line contract won't allow you to build much of a financial buffer, but adding in a couple dog-related activities gets you another $5k-$15k/yr with minimal time investment. If you're not good with dogs, maybe fix that first (some of your neighbors are almost certainly willing to let you walk their dogs with them if you want practice and exercise), but it's worth looking into.
- In major metros, you can doordash or uber-eats or whatever on scooter/bicycle. Any time you're free and not feeling overwhelmed, throw that into your schedule. You quickly get a feel for local eats that you didn't have before, and even an hour a day is $8k/yr ($20/hr) toward your savings. It's not as good (since it's slower) as the equivalent car versions, so I wouldn't recommend working a ton of extra time to grind it out, but any time you're able and willing it lets you save roughly 1-major-metro-month of expenses per 6 major-metro-months of work (at 1hr/day), and the time flexibility means you really don't have to plan to fit it into your schedule; you just get extra savings when you're able.
- There are similar gig jobs for filling grocery orders, if you don't like the delivery aspect.
- Knife sharpening is an easily and quickly learned skill that pays incredibly well. Much like dog-walking, you won't fill your schedule with it, but per-hour earnings are far in excess of the majority of software jobs.
And so on. A variety of activities either with the property <high dollar-per-hour> (and any hour constraints), or with the property <can-slot-into-my-schedule-with-zero-warning-whenever-I-want> (and not paying too little per hour) can mesh together to let you build the financial buffer you need quickly and start looking for whatever your actual next thing is (good luck on a next startup?) quickly.
You might be different (not judging, not asking, decide for yourself if the following applies), but most people can work a couple 6-hour shifts every day with a 3-hour lunch/nap break in between. I've known a lot of people in shitty financial situations and a lot of people who decided to work harder up-front to pull out of them (obvious sampling bias, we'll pretend it doesn't matter), and I'm pretty sure that in retrospect almost everyone would prefer a few weeks of discomfort to a few years of stress, lack of resilience to financial upsets, being set back to zero when you find out your surplus is less than what you owe in taxes, ....
Expanding on that slightly, a 40-hour week often roughly covers expenses, allowing for roughly epsilon in savings, requiring tons of effort and time to actually break free. Most people I've talked to in that scenario take years to escape, if they ever do. Life has a heavy probalistic long-tail on its costs, so if you average your costs over a year you're likely to be surprised by how expensive the next 2-3 years are, wiping out your meager savings. Contrast that with an 80-hour week, all the rest is truly surplus (minus taxes). You work 2x the hours, but you make 4x or 8x or more the actual in-your-pocket income after rent and beans and rice and all that bullshit. It's the same sort of argument from "overemployed" circles if you want to read about more details, but it applies even when you just work longer at a single employer.
The following suggestions are basically going to be a set of things you can do for money with a modest amount of stability. If you want to keep your contract, it would be extra hours (so obviously pick the things with higher dollar-per-hour values, don't work too many extra hours if that's bad for you, and try to save the surplus), and if you don't then you'd want to work as many hours as you reasonably could while you look for your next gig (probably software, the way your experience sounds?).
- Dog-walking and dog-sitting (also cats to a lesser degree) is extremely profitable. If you're walking a few dogs at a time, expect something like $30-$40/hr for each (you can walk several at a time, if they get along), more if you're just walking one person's dog. I normally get $200/hr or so feeding and taking care of some nearby dogs. It's hard to fill your schedule with this, but it's probably worth adding in (especially if it lets you drop a gym membership). A poverty-line contract won't allow you to build much of a financial buffer, but adding in a couple dog-related activities gets you another $5k-$15k/yr with minimal time investment. If you're not good with dogs, maybe fix that first (some of your neighbors are almost certainly willing to let you walk their dogs with them if you want practice and exercise), but it's worth looking into.
- In major metros, you can doordash or uber-eats or whatever on scooter/bicycle. Any time you're free and not feeling overwhelmed, throw that into your schedule. You quickly get a feel for local eats that you didn't have before, and even an hour a day is $8k/yr ($20/hr) toward your savings. It's not as good (since it's slower) as the equivalent car versions, so I wouldn't recommend working a ton of extra time to grind it out, but any time you're able and willing it lets you save roughly 1-major-metro-month of expenses per 6 major-metro-months of work (at 1hr/day), and the time flexibility means you really don't have to plan to fit it into your schedule; you just get extra savings when you're able.
- There are similar gig jobs for filling grocery orders, if you don't like the delivery aspect.
- Knife sharpening is an easily and quickly learned skill that pays incredibly well. Much like dog-walking, you won't fill your schedule with it, but per-hour earnings are far in excess of the majority of software jobs.
And so on. A variety of activities either with the property <high dollar-per-hour> (and any hour constraints), or with the property <can-slot-into-my-schedule-with-zero-warning-whenever-I-want> (and not paying too little per hour) can mesh together to let you build the financial buffer you need quickly and start looking for whatever your actual next thing is (good luck on a next startup?) quickly.
It just seems to be so brutal to be poor.
After years of living in San Mateo county, I moved across the bay to a reasonably nice apartment complex in Hayward. Within a week, I noticed pro-nazi messages in Spanish carved into the picnic tables at the local park. Within a few months, my car had been broken into twice, my garage had been broken in 4 times, and someone set a bush on fire next to my car and it melted some of the plastic on the front driver's quarter panel. I moved away but not everyone has the option.
I get why people work so hard to avoid being poor!
After years of living in San Mateo county, I moved across the bay to a reasonably nice apartment complex in Hayward. Within a week, I noticed pro-nazi messages in Spanish carved into the picnic tables at the local park. Within a few months, my car had been broken into twice, my garage had been broken in 4 times, and someone set a bush on fire next to my car and it melted some of the plastic on the front driver's quarter panel. I moved away but not everyone has the option.
I get why people work so hard to avoid being poor!
That seems brutal, indeed. Why did you move there in the first place?
Hack to life: Always always aim to only spend 50% of your salary each month.
Housing makes that very difficult. Throw in some kids (daycare, summer camps, sports and music enrichment if you want them to have a chance in dog eat dog world) and you need big $$$ to hit 50%. I mean 30% goes to taxes right away!
50% is high for most, but seems like a good target for the upper-middle class outside of HCOL areas. I'm amazed at how many high-income folks save 5-10% and view the rest of their income as blow money.
If you have the means save aggressively, you may well be able to retire 10+ years earlier than the standard. Yet millions people are foregoing a decade of freedom in exchange for the fleeting satisfaction that comes from having marginally better stuff.
If you have the means save aggressively, you may well be able to retire 10+ years earlier than the standard. Yet millions people are foregoing a decade of freedom in exchange for the fleeting satisfaction that comes from having marginally better stuff.
Have quite few friends who spends nothing and does nothing, I don’t even think they will regret it either because they have nothing to compare to. No ups and no downs. Programming is addictive.
A lot of the expensive stuff for kids to “have a chance” is BS, not very relevant to their life outcomes, basically parents being grifted and engaging in status competitions you could choose to opt out of.
When my kids were applying to summer programs, they asked them what they do in their free time, and listing things like reading and practicing crocheting got a very unenthusiastic responses. The expectation is your kid will do a lot, maybe it could be free stuff, but generally free stuff requires more time from the parents.
It doesn’t surprise me that one part the status rat race (selective summer programs) cares about another (after-school activities). The big question is how do either of these play into your kid’s overall life satisfaction. You just have to get over the tragedy of them going to U Michigan instead of Cornell.
I'd rather be able to retire than have children. I suspect I'm not alone given falling birthrates.
So don't live in a top tier city, or if you do, have roommates like a college student.
I'm sorry, that's ridiculously naive.
I'm sorry, that's ridiculously naive.
At some point /shrug. If you want to live like you're richer than you are, go on right ahead. Incredibly illogical but whatever.
That's dismissive. At a certain age you can't live like a college student anymore.. Jobs are in expensive cities, and they're getting thinner. Remote is out the window.
Plenty of people do it. I roomed with 40 yo right out of college. It's fine if you want to live a high class life, but otherwise, its not hard to not get on the hedonic treadmill.
That won't protect you from lifestyle creep over the years though.
How do you figure? If you're always saving/investing half, you've capped the creep.
You're still spending half on ... stuff because once you're at sufficiently high amounts it's not going to necessities anymore. Then you lose your $500k job in tech and have to find a lifestyle that can fund you $250k expenses a year you've gotten used to. It's a real thing. Not for everybody but for many.
One trick is to always save bonuses. Live on salary and save anything extra.
Agreed and here's a better hack: Alway aim to only spend 40% of your salary each month.
Agreed and here's a better hack: Alway aim to only spend 39% of your salary each month
Or go for 33% of your salary or even better, live on 1% of your salary… at some point you simply can’t make it work unless you are making 7 or more figures. Which then it really doesn’t matter anyway. :-/
7 minute abs
There is also a sunk cost element to things, esp if the comp is in stock with a vesting schedule. "If I stay here just a little bit longer, $xx stock vests". And before you know it, you are five years in, burned out, but can't bring yourself to leave.
In my experience the vast majority of people just don't actually think about money in a holistic way beyond specific purchasing goals.
They might think of a home deposit, or keeping up the payments on their mortgage, maybe even paying off the mortgage, having a pension, etc.
But it's very rare that people think, well, I spend X a month, if I had 2X I could get by for 2 months without working, 12X a year, etc.
So then the entire focus just becomes raising the salary. Taking a pay cut, taking time off, etc, basically becomes an impossibility like moving the Moon.
They might think of a home deposit, or keeping up the payments on their mortgage, maybe even paying off the mortgage, having a pension, etc.
But it's very rare that people think, well, I spend X a month, if I had 2X I could get by for 2 months without working, 12X a year, etc.
So then the entire focus just becomes raising the salary. Taking a pay cut, taking time off, etc, basically becomes an impossibility like moving the Moon.
> "Pre-2008, it was easier to grind it out and retire early – but very few now are able to make their millions and stop working at 35," she says.
I kinda doubt that "more than a few" were making their millions and retiring at 35 even pre-2008, but perhaps someone can correct me. Was there a wave of early retirements that stopped at the great recession?
I kinda doubt that "more than a few" were making their millions and retiring at 35 even pre-2008, but perhaps someone can correct me. Was there a wave of early retirements that stopped at the great recession?
A lot of people at Microsoft, but as the country as whole goes, that's still "very few".
[deleted]
Anybody who writes code should be earning north of 500k at least either through salary and stocks or a business. Anything less than that and you're better off being a HVAC guy.
That's quite a bit more than a senior engineer at a FAANG makes. For most people senior is the terminal level. So, most engineers would be better off as HVAC guys?
Interestingly, I once met a plumber who used to be an engineer. He said he is much happier. So the HVAC thing could be true, but the Bay Area doesn't need this many HVAC guys...
Interestingly, I once met a plumber who used to be an engineer. He said he is much happier. So the HVAC thing could be true, but the Bay Area doesn't need this many HVAC guys...
Not everyone lives in the Bay Area or NYC.
I am about a decade into this career and only 5 months ago signed an offer that, assuming absolute max bonus every cycle, barely gets me to a bit shy of half of that TC.
Opportunities to change that outside of FAANG are few and far between, but sure, I guess I have chosen a pointless path in life, I'll go abandon my ability to work 100% remote from anywhere in the US and go be an HVAC guy instead. Seems legit.
Opportunities to change that outside of FAANG are few and far between, but sure, I guess I have chosen a pointless path in life, I'll go abandon my ability to work 100% remote from anywhere in the US and go be an HVAC guy instead. Seems legit.
Not many HVAC guys make anything approaching 500k.
Yup completely agree
OK. How?
[deleted]