8 ms·

Coding as a Career Isn't Right for Me

73 points by tomreece 11y ago

sly_foxx 11y ago
$65k in student loans to learn programming? The author is clearly an idiot. Programming can be learned from home for next to nothing, because you have all the tools you need there. It's not like you're a surgeon and you're working with expensive/complex equipment.
- striking 11y ago
  Yeah, but getting a degree (so that people know you're any good) is a tad more expensive than "next to nothing." Perhaps not $65k, but not too far off (depending on where you go). If you choose a cheaper school, there can be issues with getting a job or getting the salary you want (as I've heard it said, anyway).
  - sly_foxx 11y ago
    Just look at programming jobs ads. When it comes to degree requirements, ads can be divided into 4 cases: 1) No degree required (not mentioned). 2) Stated that you need either a degree or show some code you've created. 3) Stated that a degree is required. Here you could contact them, show them samples of your work, list all of your experiences and offer to do additional tests if you don't have a degree. 4) Stated that a degree is required and they will only hire you if you got a degree.
- hanniabu 11y ago
  I graduated with a degree in mechanical engineering and decided to quit my job to learn programming at home. Took me a year to get to the point where I'm comfortable and know my way around. However, just because I taught myself doesn't mean that it was free. I had a year of lost wages which is about 65K, so all in all it costed about the same amount for me.
  - sly_foxx 11y ago
    He had 4 years of lost wages + $65k in debt. When you're in college, you don't work. So, again, he's in much worse situation than someone who learns programming at home in 1 year.
    - hanniabu 11y ago
      I went to college for 4 years as well, so again, you can say we were in the same boat: 4 years of lost wages + $65k in debt for him, 4 years of lost wages + $65k in lost wages for me
      - YeGoblynQueenne 11y ago
        The difference is that you lost that money, but you don't owe it to anyone. Nobody can come over and take your stuff because you owe them that money. And then there's the matter of a debt being an amount agreed upon by all stakeholders, whereas your "lost wages" are just a number you calculate in an arbitrary manner, which may or may not reflect reality. Maybe you did lose $65k by not working. Maybe if you hadn't gone to college you'd have been hit by a car and you'd have lost far more than that. Maybe you'd be unemployed. Who's to say? Money is not money unless it's in your pocket (or bank account) or in an IOU.
    - Ao7bei3s 11y ago
      Except he didn't have an engineering degree, so its not clear he'd have had any job at all, much less a well-paying one.
- tomreece 11y ago
  > The author is clearly an idiot. Wow. I didn't realize Hacker News folks were like redditors. The 65k comes from the fact that I had to pay tuition and living expenses. My family is from a small town. The nearest college was 2 hours away (Indiana University). 15k a year adds up fast. I honestly didn't NEED the education, I think if I spent 4 years teaching myself I would have been just fine. I just felt that I needed the degree to get my foot in the door anywhere. Maybe I was wrong, but do you dispute that?
- dang 11y ago
  > The author is clearly an idiot. This and other of your comments break the HN guidelines. On this site, please comment civilly and substantively or not at all. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html
YuriNiyazov 11y ago
You call yourself "Old, Tired, and Bitter" but it actually sounds like this is your first, maybe second job out of college.
- tomreece 11y ago
  Third. I've only been at it for 6 years now. I'm 27. I'll correct the title for you to be "Older, Tired, and Bitter"
  - YuriNiyazov 11y ago
    Did you pick these companies to work for, or did they approach you?
    - tomreece 11y ago
      I picked all three. The first was a medium sized startup (90 employees, mostly sales, only 5 devs). The second was a small startup (15 employees, 5 devs). My current job is a huge hosting company with like 3000+ employees in my location.
      - YuriNiyazov 11y ago
        There's something wrong with how you evaluate your potential employers, then. I understand how one can make the mistake that working at any startup would mean that it is going to be an exciting job. If you want to be excited about what you are working on, the fact that a company is a startup or a huge company isn't important; the question is always, what are they making, and are you excited about that?
        tomreece 11y ago
        They're all making glorified crud apps, stuff that I could make solo. I'm not excited by it.
        11y ago
outericky 11y ago
Change your lifestyle temporarily, go heads down and pay off your debt in 12 months. Probably could. Alternatively, there are plenty of places to work that won't make you feel like a small cog in a giant machine. Self improvement comes from, improving your situation. No one will do it for you.
- tomreece 11y ago
  This is my third try at improving my situation, each time the money has increased and is helping me pay that debt off. So I'm getting closer on that front, but I don't want the money. I want to be excited to wake up every morning and go build something amazing.
  - moron4hire 11y ago
    Try part-time freelancing. That's how I've been able to survive these last 5 years. I spend about 20 hours a week working for clients and the rest of my time (usually another 40 hours a week) I spend on my own projects. I don't make a lot of money, but I make enough to live on. And I get to spend most of my time doing what I love. Freelancing is hard. It's especially difficult to get into a part time situation. Most clients don't want a consultant, they want an employee they don't have to file HR paperwork for. But if you network enough, you'll get there and it will be fine. I think, if you can get out of the soul-crushing chasm of despair that is wage employment, you'll find that software development is indeed your calling. You just don't like being treated like a child in that calling.
  - nostrademons 11y ago
    Money buys freedom. Save up a couple years of living expenses and you can go do what you want for a couple years. If you're prudent, this could also develop the skills that'll make sure your next job is both more fun and more lucrative than your past ones. Actually, you don't even have to quit. Just knowing that you can quit, if you're not happy, changes how you interact with your employer. Don't like what you're doing? Do something else, either there or at a different company.
    - 11y ago
grillvogel 11y ago
the entitlement is strong with this one
- tomreece 11y ago
  Indeed it is. Haven't I accrued debt, worked hard, and earned the right to be in a job I should be happy at? I deserve that. So do you and so does every body else.
  - grillvogel 11y ago
    no one deserves anything
    - moron4hire 11y ago
      Everyone deserves everything. We live in a society that is capable of creating a post-scarcity economy (and in many cases, such as media and software, has) yet is putting itself through ever more convoluted contortions to make sure poor people don't get to have anything. Eff. That. Noise. Work is not a moral imperative.
      - solipsism 11y ago
        If one of our descendants happens to be born into a society that grants him/her the _entitlement_ to happiness, that person will be very lucky indeed. We haven't been born into such a society, however.
        Apocryphon 11y ago
        We're on the threshold of one. We should start living and working that way.
        leshow 11y ago
        no we aren't, happiness is to nebulous to just be 'solved'
ocfx 11y ago
This resonates a lot with my current situation. I'm hoping a job change will fix that since I'm still with my first big programming gig (3 years now), but I'm so burned out. Tired of working with people who give inconsistent directions and don't have their shit together. Tired of people being able to act like idiots and never deliver on time, yet if I make the smallest mistake I go under a microscope. It's just so mentally exhausting day in and day out and it's making me extremely depressed. I don't want to go out anymore or do anything and all my passion for hobbies is gone. I'm moving within a year, so until then I guess I'm stuck.
Mithaldu 11y ago
> I want to get away from coding for you and code for me. > I don't like coding for you. I don't think any of us do. I'm sorry you haven't found anything to like and be excited by, but i assure you it is out there. I personally have never worked in a company with much process, so i haven't experienced that kind of hell. But do keep in mind, there's also another kind of hell: Where everybody is a cowboy coder and walks all over anybody's changes; where everybody codes 9-5 and then doesn't think about code ever, never improves, coding the same as when they started, 15 years after they start. I've found my enjoyment in taking such companies and teaching them how to produce quality code without compromising on speed. I've found my enjoyment in encouraging such companies to take on young coders who i can then teach, and see flower into excellence they could otherwise only reach with years of investment. And occasionally there is the one or two projects that are just for fun, or really touch many many customers. Don't give up and blame the world. Look harder. Maybe even change your language. I mainly do Perl, which gets a bit of a bad rap by people who don't use it. But compared to companies doing e.g. Java or PHP i find a marked difference in culture. Maybe you're just stuck with the wrong focus in your skill set? Or, if you feel brave: Maybe your problem is that you keep getting into the kind of company that wants an employee. Maybe you can change your situation by becoming a freelancer. Keep in mind that as a freelancer, you eventually, if you're good enough, end up in the position where you may fire clients. You also tend to see a lot more projects of much more variety.
- tomreece 11y ago
  Thanks for the advice. My first job was full stack Java backend (SpringMVC) and jQuery hell front end. Second was full stack, Python backend, AngularJS front end. My new job is writing Protractor tests for multiple AngularJS applications. I enjoy writing Python. Javascript isn't that thrilling to me. Not super excited by the countless FooJS libraries and Promises and async everything. In Protractor if I want to get the text of an element in the DOM, that's a promise. I mean come on? .getText() should not return a promise. I'm not a Javascript expert, so this will sound whiney-ish, but I think Promise hell is a thing just like Callback hell is.
  - stonith 11y ago
faitswulff 11y ago
I reached the same conclusion recently. I'm about the same age, but instead of going through college to get there, I was one of the early "bootcamp" grads (though I took issue with my so-called bootcamp). Yes, we should be glad to have these high paying jobs doing knowledge work. But there is something thoroughly dissatisfying about writing another meaningless CRUD app that spins the cogs just a little faster. More efficiently? Who knows. Besides, it probably does one of three things: ecommerce, ads, or glorified coupons. What's the point? Coding isn't the right career for me, either. I do think it's a useful tool, but I think I've got to do something else with my life. I wish you luck figuring what that something else is, as well.
meric 11y ago
You remind me of me. I'm 26. I'd much rather work on my own stuff than my company stuff. I have this plan after my current job to burn up some of my savings and spend a couple of years to build something I'm excited by. I've been paying off student debt. I think I'm okay with working a 10.30-6.30 job. The pay-check is what will grant me my freedom. Every week I work, I save 3 weeks of expenses. I've already enough savings to pay off my student debt two times over. After another year I'll have enough savings to live as I do currently for 5 years. (Can double that if I don't take the train every day & eat out during office hours). The product is important. Does it help someone? Does it make their task easier? Are the bugs in it tolerable? At all three of my big boy jobs, I've been so far removed from the user that I have no clue if the product helped them or not. This hurts and it hurts a lot. You're writing test automation. Think of your users as your colleagues. You're not saving random people time. You're saving time of people you go out to lunch with. All you have to do is ask "Are my tests saving you time?" And that's something.
- derekp7 11y ago
  Don't forget that once you get enough saved up, you can live off the interest alone (i.e., retire). So at your rate, 5 years gives you 15 years of expenses. At 7% return on investment, that money will never run out.
- stretchwithme 11y ago
  Sometimes I think its test automation that should be automated :-)
russelluresti 11y ago
My suggestion would be to move away from the idea that there's only "code for you" and "code for me" - try to "code for us." If you're passionate about something, there's bound to be a couple of companies that are working in that field. Find one that shares your values and code for them. It can still be frustrating, but you move forward every day because you care about what you're doing.
sdenton4 11y ago
'One says to me, "I wonder that you do not lay up money; you love to travel; you might take the cars and go to Fitchburg today and see the country." But I am wiser than that. I have learned that the swiftest traveller is he that goes afoot. I say to my friend, Suppose we try who will get there first. The distance is thirty miles; the fare ninety cents. That is almost a day's wages. I remember when wages were sixty cents a day for laborers on this very road. Well, I start now on foot, and get there before night; I have travelled at that rate by the week together. You will in the meanwhile have earned your fare, and arrive there some time tomorrow, or possibly this evening, if you are lucky enough to get a job in season. Instead of going to Fitchburg, you will be working here the greater part of the day. And so, if the railroad reached round the world, I think that I should keep ahead of you; and as for seeing the country and getting experience of that kind, I should have to cut your acquaintance altogether. 'Such is the universal law, which no man can ever outwit, and with regard to the railroad even we may say it is as broad as it is long. To make a railroad round the world available to all mankind is equivalent to grading the whole surface of the planet. Men have an indistinct notion that if they keep up this activity of joint stocks and spades long enough all will at length ride somewhere, in next to no time, and for nothing; but though a crowd rushes to the depot, and the conductor shouts "All aboard!" when the smoke is blown away and the vapor condensed, it will be perceived that a few are riding, but the rest are run over- and it will be called, and will be, "A melancholy accident." No doubt they can ride at last who shall have earned their fare, that is, if they survive so long, but they will probably have lost their elasticity and desire to travel by that time. This spending of the best part of one's life earning money in order to enjoy a questionable liberty during the least valuable part of it reminds me of the Englishman who went to India to make a fortune first, in order that he might return to England and live the life of a poet. He should have gone up garret at once. "What!" exclaim a million Irishmen starting up from all the shanties in the land, "is not this railroad which we have built a good thing?" Yes, I answer, comparatively good, that is, you might have done worse; but I wish, as you are brothers of mine, that you could have spent your time better than digging in this dirt.' Probably my favorite passage from Walden...
- tomreece 11y ago
  Excellent.
danso 11y ago
Hey, kudos for thinking this: > And then I want to get away from coding for you and code for me. I don't like coding for you. I don't think any of us do. Too many people think of coding as only a career...thus, we shouldn't teach coding to non-comsci-majors because not everyone should be a programmer as a job. Programming is an intellectual and productive pursuit in it of itself, and there is a huge difference between programming for someone else, and programming for your self and for what you care about. It's no different from writing prose. You could love to write for yourself, or for your own novels and projects...while having a writing job (technical writing, journalism) that you dislike. But it's not the writing itself that's the problem.
- mabbo 11y ago
  That said, I've met a few developers where it's just their job. They aren't passionate about code they way I am- their passions lie elsewhere, and that's fine. Being passionate about software development can help you be a better developer- but it's not a prerequisite by any means.
  - danso 11y ago
    Definitely...actually I found after college that I didn't really like programming and didn't feel very good at it, at least not compared to my classmates who hacked all the time in school. But when I started programming for myself, and various side projects, it made me a much better and happier programmer. I'm happy to have become better, because it's helped me expand the scope of things that I want to accomplish...but time is ultimately a limited resource, so I'm mindful of what I've sacrificed by spending late nights tinkering with code.
  - tomreece 11y ago
    I often feel like I'm surrounded by programmers who just come to work every day, write as much good enough code that they can, and then go home. They seem really happy. I want to be like them. But my care gets in the way. My desire to question why we do things the way we do only to be told "that's just how it is" is difficult to hear and only frustrates me further. The happy people around me don't seem to ask questions, they just do.
dudul 11y ago
Damn this is one bitter guy indeed. First of all, everything you do as a kid is more fun than doing it as a professional. I sure loved to play soccer as a kid, but guess what? Being a professional player is full of annoying things like training, lifting weight, being careful with your diet, traveling all the time, etc. And that could probably be said about any career. Being a professional at anything is tough compared to toying around as a child, that's how it is. "At all three of my big boy jobs, I've been so far removed from the user that I have no clue if the product helped them or not." Even during the second job at a "small startup with 15 employees, 5 developers, no testers." ? Hard to believe. "I don't like coding for you. I don't think any of us do. We only do it because you pay us way too much money and we have loans to pay off." Feel free to write whatever you want about your point of view, but leave the rest of us out of your vast generalization.
- vladimir-y 11y ago
  It looks like that kid becomes an adult, and eventually realizes that adult life is full of compromises.
FreedomToCreate 11y ago
Wonder what this guy would say to the countless millions who toil away in factories, big box retail, and accounting offices. None of these people do this for the love of the job. They do it because it needs to be done and they get paid for it. I wouldn't be so critical of your feelings but you whine about how society didn't let you do what you want to do on your terms. Change your circumstances. No one is just given everything. Its a combination of motivation and luck. And that luck comes from generating opportunities for yourself. So it all up to you. I hope you get your debt paid off. Move to the cabin, but if you ever want to come back, just remember that society has her dues.
- sf_rob 11y ago
  I like your post and think it's valid, but I would say that coding in high school/college doesn't prepare you for the real world at all. In high school I was hacking on silly personal projects. In college I was solving cool algorithms, puzzles, and games. But in the real world most programming roles are pretty menial / not a super exciting domain / consist largely of process, code reviews, QA, debugging.
  - jacalata 11y ago
    My friend has a HR degree where she got to study psychology and organizational principles and how to motivate people and run a business, and now she does paperwork all day managing employee sick time and vacation time and making sure all their certifications are up to date. I'd be surprised if any degree fully prepares students for just how much menial work they'll be doing, partly because those bits don't require a university course to learn.
- Apocryphon 11y ago
  But that's the thing, though- the hypesters promises one thing, and the industry delivers another. "Everyone should code." "Software is eating the world." All of this is true, but despite the magic of engineering, which gives you the biggest lever in the world to move the most weight, actual coding jobs are swamped in mundanity. If people going in knew that it was more Office Space than The Social Network, it'd be less of a disillusionment.
staunch 11y ago
If programmers made twice as much money, it would be such a great job. And yet salaries have been relatively flat for over a decade (adjusted for inflation). Something is wrong that salaries never seem to rise with demand in Silicon Valley. We know there was a secret deal to help suppress wages at one point, but it's not obvious why it's been so successful. Is it new graduates, immigration abuse, internationalization, illegal price fixing? A programmers union could probably force tech companies to double salaries. They all could afford to pay it.
- pcurve 11y ago
  Programmers are generally very well paid in the U.S. The issue is, they hit pay-ceiling very quick, unless they go into management position. And really, who wants to be an IT manager? It's probably the second worst job in IT after IT project manager. chuckles A 30 year old sr. software engineer will be paid not much less than a 40 year old one, even if 40 year old is much more talented, and deserves to get paid twice as much. I suppose the same issue exists for pharmacists. Out of school, you're expected to make $110k; pretty much the same exact salary as RPh with 20 years of experience.
- Matachines 11y ago
  Most programmers are happy enough to make their current salary and many work for less. Don't think it's gonna increase any time soon.
- greggman 11y ago
  Money does not make the job and more fun or less boring. I'm not sayin it don't want money I just don't agree that more money would make programming a great job. It might help them tolerate a boring job longer
- FLUX-YOU 11y ago
  Lower end pay can stay right where it is. Upper end pay could probably go up to better reflect actual skill and specialty knowledge. I really doubt a union would succeed unless you suddenly get a lot of programmers on board very quickly. Tech giants are big and if they chose to fight, they have a ton of cash to do it with.
williamle8300 11y ago
He's essentially admitting two things: 1) I hate my job... but! 2) I do it because I need it Ok. That's fine. Just shut-up if you need the job. No one needs to hear about your woes and whinings if you're conscionable about the contract you're entering in to. It's downright childish if you don't reject/quit a job if you don't want it.
- pcurve 11y ago
  3) make up your own interesting side projects that will benefit your manager, company,and customers, short term and long term. If you don't, you risk remaining as a permanent cog. You want to transform from a cog into planetary gear set.
- tomreece 11y ago
  Did you read the post? I LOVE programming. I HATE programming for someone else as a career. For fucks sake.
pyrrhotech 11y ago
Work is called work because it isn't supposed to be fun. If your's is remotely tolerable, only requires your time from 9 to 5 and pays you enough to cover all your necessities and even some luxuries you are better off than 95% of the world. Life's a bitch, then you die. At least you make enough money to not have to do it past your 40s if you don't want to.
- YeGoblynQueenne 11y ago
  Eh, no. Work is called work because it's supposed to produce something. If all it does is drive you nuts, waste your life and fill the world with garbage, then what's the point of it? You might as well give it all up and go tour the world with nothing but the clothes you wear. And what's that I hear, about getting a pension in your 40s'? Wasn't that what the Greeks did wrong, that they wanted to get a pension in their 40s, and that's why their economy died?
  - jacalata 11y ago
    Nobody mentioned pensions, the comment was saying you should save up your own money.
kwalazulu 11y ago
Googled your name and found your Linkedin page. Rspace is getting pummeled by AWS and Azure offerings, never work for a company that is going down and has little or no innovation.
xupybd 11y ago
Work is work. But you can learn to self motivate, and even learn to enjoy the boring bits. However if you think that it's out of your control, what you enjoy and what bores you, it can be hard to improve your enjoyment.
nstart 11y ago
I almost cried while reading this. <virtual hug to tomreece). I'm 27 too and hitting my 5th year in software. Last year I worked in a company that had 20 employees; 10 people were related to dev. Everyday in there was a slog. Shipping code was a convoluted affair that happened once every 45 days or so. Testing was all over the place, and in a bid to do "excellent design" there were classes connected to 5 levels of interfaces and abstractions and multiple circular references. During that job, I made and shared two side projects for the first time in my life. But the 9 to 5 hell was impossible to deal with. Fast forward to now, I'm remotely working with a company that pays me a great salary. I live in South East Asia and that means my savings are fantastic. Bonus is that the company is amazing. Dreamt of joining it since 2012. But I digress. Here's where I get to the point. Try and find this kind of remote work, and come live around here for a short while (Sri Lanka). Heck. I'd be happy to talk to you about it. Put it in perspective, with a salary of say 80k USD, you'll pay off your student loan in one year guaranteed if you live a little frugally. Hope this helps
- meric 11y ago
  Which company is this?! I'd love to talk to you about it!
  - nstart 11y ago
    would be happy to message on a private channel. Still not comfortable talking about it openly till I'm confirmed employee :)
    - meric 11y ago
      Ok. I put my email in my profile. Pop me an email! :)
- tomreece 11y ago
  Awesome story friend. I wish you the best of luck in your future endeavors!
  - 11y ago
scrabble 11y ago
I actually quite enjoy my job. I still have side projects that I also enjoy, but my job is wonderful along with the company I work for. Also, this stuff: "I didn't care how my code read, or if it was maintainable, or if it was DRY, or if it was tested, or how long it'd take me to write, or if features were separated into logical chunks" Right at the beginning is where you lost me, because even when I was in grade school, I still made my code maintainable and separated into logical chunks because I had to read and maintain it whenever I got a chance to get back to it. My side projects are all built with these things in mind. It is good that you have decided that coding isn't the right career for you, but I wonder what is? I would also be careful of making harsh public criticisms of your employer. It's easy to figure out where you work, and these are the types of concerns that your employer should be able to work with you to address. Best of luck.
derekp7 11y ago
My biggest problem with coding for an employer, is that they then own exclusive rights to the code. Essentially, you are solving a problem. If that problem is unique to the employer, then that is fine for them to own the code. But if the project involves writing a bunch of potentially reusable routines, such as what you might find in a third party library, it just seems awful that you can never solve those same problems again in the future (as more likely than not, you will end up typing in about the same code). So it really seems like you are giving up a piece of your mind whenever you program for someone else. For an example of what I'm talking about, see XKCD 664.
- dudul 11y ago
  Well, it's not like they pay you to write code for them right? It is only fair that your are, in theory, not allowed to reuse the code who wrote for them at your next gig. And to be clear, we all do it. If you've implemented it once you can redo it in no time.
  - derekp7 11y ago
    I agree that it is fair, it just kind of hurts a bit is all. Especially if you did something you are real proud of. I wish there were more programming jobs that were similar to photography -- you get hired to do a shoot, the customer gets a copy, but you keep the copyrights.
softwaredev__ 11y ago
I agree that programming at work isn't as fun as it is when you're just hacking away on side projects. But there's also that satisfaction of learning your craft well.
tomreece 11y ago
How Software Companies Die - Orson Scott Card https://www.cs.cmu.edu/~chuck/jokepg/joke_19970213_01.txt https://www.cs.cmu.edu/~chuck/jokepg/joke_19970213_01.txt
davekiss 11y ago
Thanks for writing this, Tom. Coding as an employee isn't right for me, either. By and large, programmers generally make great employees. Many brilliant people are able to knock out their assigned and existential objectives by solving complex problems and are handsomely rewarded with hefty checks. But, if you ask them questions outside their comfort zone about, for example, running a business, designing for the user, or marketing, most would be quick to point out that those aren't responsibilities that fall on their plate. To me, it sounds like you have a fervor for being more than just an employee. You want to take ownership of your work. You want to use your brain for your own benefit, not for some other corporation to rent out. You want the grittiness of taking on multiple roles and welcome being side by side with your users. There are many of us out here, coding as self-starters, founders, freelancers, remote workers, and small business owners. It isn't for everyone, and if you are happy or content with your full time job, then it's probably not for you. That's ok. But for those of us who have found ways to make it work outside of what can feel like the soul-crushing environment of a typical full-time workplace, the devs building on their own, grinding out client work, doing remote year, making products - ask any of them, and you'll find that coding as a employee wasn't right for them, either. I'd encourage you to read my post on the way I fell into this line of thought, but for me, I was coming from a job that I actually really liked: http://davekiss.com/getting-started-with-passive-income/ http://davekiss.com/getting-started-with-passive-income/ You don't need to code as an employee to code as a career. Be honest with yourself; are you an employee, or a founder?
YeGoblynQueenne 11y ago
I have NOT internalized the disciplinarian culture. I think you have: I'm fortunate to have had jobs since I graduated college. Edit: I mean that it shouldn't be down to luck whether you have a job or not and how productive you can be in the limited time when you can be productive, in your life. It's rotten that not everyone can. We're doing human civilisation wrong, if it's down to luck whether you live a satisfying life doing fullfilling work, or spend your life in slavery.
puppetmaster3 11y ago
He is not a programmer. He is a tester. I'd love to see his CV.
aaronchall 11y ago
I had a graduate degree and could barely make rent for more than a year before I finally got a job as a programmer. At my lowest point, I used to pick up a large $5 dollar cheese pizza to go, a tomato and onion from a street vendor (for toppings on my pizza), and stretch 4 meals out of it. You should be grateful you have the opportunities you have, and that you're able to work a job that would allow you to pay off your student loans so quickly. As a programmer, you have one of the best jobs that exists. You have a low stress job and you make a lot of money. (The median programmer makes more than twice the median wage - 37 versus 17/hr - http://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes_nat.htm http://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes_nat.htm ) - your financial freedom will come much more quickly to you than it will for most others. You ought to do your best to learn to find meaning in your work and be grateful you have so much self-direction in your work when so many others don't.

73 points by tomreece 11y ago

$65k in student loans to learn programming? The author is clearly an idiot. Programming can be learned from home for next to nothing, because you have all the tools you need there. It's not like you're a surgeon and you're working with expensive/complex equipment.

striking 11y ago
Yeah, but getting a degree (so that people know you're any good) is a tad more expensive than "next to nothing." Perhaps not $65k, but not too far off (depending on where you go). If you choose a cheaper school, there can be issues with getting a job or getting the salary you want (as I've heard it said, anyway).
- sly_foxx 11y ago
  Just look at programming jobs ads. When it comes to degree requirements, ads can be divided into 4 cases: 1) No degree required (not mentioned). 2) Stated that you need either a degree or show some code you've created. 3) Stated that a degree is required. Here you could contact them, show them samples of your work, list all of your experiences and offer to do additional tests if you don't have a degree. 4) Stated that a degree is required and they will only hire you if you got a degree.
hanniabu 11y ago
I graduated with a degree in mechanical engineering and decided to quit my job to learn programming at home. Took me a year to get to the point where I'm comfortable and know my way around. However, just because I taught myself doesn't mean that it was free. I had a year of lost wages which is about 65K, so all in all it costed about the same amount for me.
- sly_foxx 11y ago
  He had 4 years of lost wages + $65k in debt. When you're in college, you don't work. So, again, he's in much worse situation than someone who learns programming at home in 1 year.
  - hanniabu 11y ago
    I went to college for 4 years as well, so again, you can say we were in the same boat: 4 years of lost wages + $65k in debt for him, 4 years of lost wages + $65k in lost wages for me
    - YeGoblynQueenne 11y ago
      The difference is that you lost that money, but you don't owe it to anyone. Nobody can come over and take your stuff because you owe them that money. And then there's the matter of a debt being an amount agreed upon by all stakeholders, whereas your "lost wages" are just a number you calculate in an arbitrary manner, which may or may not reflect reality. Maybe you did lose $65k by not working. Maybe if you hadn't gone to college you'd have been hit by a car and you'd have lost far more than that. Maybe you'd be unemployed. Who's to say? Money is not money unless it's in your pocket (or bank account) or in an IOU.
  - Ao7bei3s 11y ago
    Except he didn't have an engineering degree, so its not clear he'd have had any job at all, much less a well-paying one.
tomreece 11y ago
> The author is clearly an idiot. Wow. I didn't realize Hacker News folks were like redditors. The 65k comes from the fact that I had to pay tuition and living expenses. My family is from a small town. The nearest college was 2 hours away (Indiana University). 15k a year adds up fast. I honestly didn't NEED the education, I think if I spent 4 years teaching myself I would have been just fine. I just felt that I needed the degree to get my foot in the door anywhere. Maybe I was wrong, but do you dispute that?
dang 11y ago
> The author is clearly an idiot. This and other of your comments break the HN guidelines. On this site, please comment civilly and substantively or not at all. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html

YuriNiyazov 11y ago

You call yourself "Old, Tired, and Bitter" but it actually sounds like this is your first, maybe second job out of college.

tomreece 11y ago
Third. I've only been at it for 6 years now. I'm 27. I'll correct the title for you to be "Older, Tired, and Bitter"
- YuriNiyazov 11y ago
  Did you pick these companies to work for, or did they approach you?
  - tomreece 11y ago
    I picked all three. The first was a medium sized startup (90 employees, mostly sales, only 5 devs). The second was a small startup (15 employees, 5 devs). My current job is a huge hosting company with like 3000+ employees in my location.
    - YuriNiyazov 11y ago
      There's something wrong with how you evaluate your potential employers, then. I understand how one can make the mistake that working at any startup would mean that it is going to be an exciting job. If you want to be excited about what you are working on, the fact that a company is a startup or a huge company isn't important; the question is always, what are they making, and are you excited about that?
      - tomreece 11y ago
        They're all making glorified crud apps, stuff that I could make solo. I'm not excited by it.
        11y ago

outericky 11y ago

Change your lifestyle temporarily, go heads down and pay off your debt in 12 months. Probably could. Alternatively, there are plenty of places to work that won't make you feel like a small cog in a giant machine. Self improvement comes from, improving your situation. No one will do it for you.

tomreece 11y ago
This is my third try at improving my situation, each time the money has increased and is helping me pay that debt off. So I'm getting closer on that front, but I don't want the money. I want to be excited to wake up every morning and go build something amazing.
- moron4hire 11y ago
  Try part-time freelancing. That's how I've been able to survive these last 5 years. I spend about 20 hours a week working for clients and the rest of my time (usually another 40 hours a week) I spend on my own projects. I don't make a lot of money, but I make enough to live on. And I get to spend most of my time doing what I love. Freelancing is hard. It's especially difficult to get into a part time situation. Most clients don't want a consultant, they want an employee they don't have to file HR paperwork for. But if you network enough, you'll get there and it will be fine. I think, if you can get out of the soul-crushing chasm of despair that is wage employment, you'll find that software development is indeed your calling. You just don't like being treated like a child in that calling.
- nostrademons 11y ago
  Money buys freedom. Save up a couple years of living expenses and you can go do what you want for a couple years. If you're prudent, this could also develop the skills that'll make sure your next job is both more fun and more lucrative than your past ones. Actually, you don't even have to quit. Just knowing that you can quit, if you're not happy, changes how you interact with your employer. Don't like what you're doing? Do something else, either there or at a different company.
  - 11y ago

grillvogel 11y ago

the entitlement is strong with this one

tomreece 11y ago
Indeed it is. Haven't I accrued debt, worked hard, and earned the right to be in a job I should be happy at? I deserve that. So do you and so does every body else.
- grillvogel 11y ago
  no one deserves anything
  - moron4hire 11y ago
    Everyone deserves everything. We live in a society that is capable of creating a post-scarcity economy (and in many cases, such as media and software, has) yet is putting itself through ever more convoluted contortions to make sure poor people don't get to have anything. Eff. That. Noise. Work is not a moral imperative.
    - solipsism 11y ago
      If one of our descendants happens to be born into a society that grants him/her the _entitlement_ to happiness, that person will be very lucky indeed. We haven't been born into such a society, however.
      - Apocryphon 11y ago
        We're on the threshold of one. We should start living and working that way.
        leshow 11y ago
        no we aren't, happiness is to nebulous to just be 'solved'

ocfx 11y ago

This resonates a lot with my current situation. I'm hoping a job change will fix that since I'm still with my first big programming gig (3 years now), but I'm so burned out. Tired of working with people who give inconsistent directions and don't have their shit together. Tired of people being able to act like idiots and never deliver on time, yet if I make the smallest mistake I go under a microscope. It's just so mentally exhausting day in and day out and it's making me extremely depressed. I don't want to go out anymore or do anything and all my passion for hobbies is gone. I'm moving within a year, so until then I guess I'm stuck.

Mithaldu 11y ago

> I want to get away from coding for you and code for me. > I don't like coding for you. I don't think any of us do. I'm sorry you haven't found anything to like and be excited by, but i assure you it is out there. I personally have never worked in a company with much process, so i haven't experienced that kind of hell. But do keep in mind, there's also another kind of hell: Where everybody is a cowboy coder and walks all over anybody's changes; where everybody codes 9-5 and then doesn't think about code ever, never improves, coding the same as when they started, 15 years after they start. I've found my enjoyment in taking such companies and teaching them how to produce quality code without compromising on speed. I've found my enjoyment in encouraging such companies to take on young coders who i can then teach, and see flower into excellence they could otherwise only reach with years of investment. And occasionally there is the one or two projects that are just for fun, or really touch many many customers. Don't give up and blame the world. Look harder. Maybe even change your language. I mainly do Perl, which gets a bit of a bad rap by people who don't use it. But compared to companies doing e.g. Java or PHP i find a marked difference in culture. Maybe you're just stuck with the wrong focus in your skill set? Or, if you feel brave: Maybe your problem is that you keep getting into the kind of company that wants an employee. Maybe you can change your situation by becoming a freelancer. Keep in mind that as a freelancer, you eventually, if you're good enough, end up in the position where you may fire clients. You also tend to see a lot more projects of much more variety.

tomreece 11y ago
Thanks for the advice. My first job was full stack Java backend (SpringMVC) and jQuery hell front end. Second was full stack, Python backend, AngularJS front end. My new job is writing Protractor tests for multiple AngularJS applications. I enjoy writing Python. Javascript isn't that thrilling to me. Not super excited by the countless FooJS libraries and Promises and async everything. In Protractor if I want to get the text of an element in the DOM, that's a promise. I mean come on? .getText() should not return a promise. I'm not a Javascript expert, so this will sound whiney-ish, but I think Promise hell is a thing just like Callback hell is.
- stonith 11y ago

faitswulff 11y ago

I reached the same conclusion recently. I'm about the same age, but instead of going through college to get there, I was one of the early "bootcamp" grads (though I took issue with my so-called bootcamp). Yes, we should be glad to have these high paying jobs doing knowledge work. But there is something thoroughly dissatisfying about writing another meaningless CRUD app that spins the cogs just a little faster. More efficiently? Who knows. Besides, it probably does one of three things: ecommerce, ads, or glorified coupons. What's the point? Coding isn't the right career for me, either. I do think it's a useful tool, but I think I've got to do something else with my life. I wish you luck figuring what that something else is, as well.

meric 11y ago

You remind me of me. I'm 26. I'd much rather work on my own stuff than my company stuff. I have this plan after my current job to burn up some of my savings and spend a couple of years to build something I'm excited by. I've been paying off student debt. I think I'm okay with working a 10.30-6.30 job. The pay-check is what will grant me my freedom. Every week I work, I save 3 weeks of expenses. I've already enough savings to pay off my student debt two times over. After another year I'll have enough savings to live as I do currently for 5 years. (Can double that if I don't take the train every day & eat out during office hours). The product is important. Does it help someone? Does it make their task easier? Are the bugs in it tolerable? At all three of my big boy jobs, I've been so far removed from the user that I have no clue if the product helped them or not. This hurts and it hurts a lot. You're writing test automation. Think of your users as your colleagues. You're not saving random people time. You're saving time of people you go out to lunch with. All you have to do is ask "Are my tests saving you time?" And that's something.

derekp7 11y ago
Don't forget that once you get enough saved up, you can live off the interest alone (i.e., retire). So at your rate, 5 years gives you 15 years of expenses. At 7% return on investment, that money will never run out.
stretchwithme 11y ago
Sometimes I think its test automation that should be automated :-)

russelluresti 11y ago

My suggestion would be to move away from the idea that there's only "code for you" and "code for me" - try to "code for us." If you're passionate about something, there's bound to be a couple of companies that are working in that field. Find one that shares your values and code for them. It can still be frustrating, but you move forward every day because you care about what you're doing.

sdenton4 11y ago

'One says to me, "I wonder that you do not lay up money; you love to travel; you might take the cars and go to Fitchburg today and see the country." But I am wiser than that. I have learned that the swiftest traveller is he that goes afoot. I say to my friend, Suppose we try who will get there first. The distance is thirty miles; the fare ninety cents. That is almost a day's wages. I remember when wages were sixty cents a day for laborers on this very road. Well, I start now on foot, and get there before night; I have travelled at that rate by the week together. You will in the meanwhile have earned your fare, and arrive there some time tomorrow, or possibly this evening, if you are lucky enough to get a job in season. Instead of going to Fitchburg, you will be working here the greater part of the day. And so, if the railroad reached round the world, I think that I should keep ahead of you; and as for seeing the country and getting experience of that kind, I should have to cut your acquaintance altogether. 'Such is the universal law, which no man can ever outwit, and with regard to the railroad even we may say it is as broad as it is long. To make a railroad round the world available to all mankind is equivalent to grading the whole surface of the planet. Men have an indistinct notion that if they keep up this activity of joint stocks and spades long enough all will at length ride somewhere, in next to no time, and for nothing; but though a crowd rushes to the depot, and the conductor shouts "All aboard!" when the smoke is blown away and the vapor condensed, it will be perceived that a few are riding, but the rest are run over- and it will be called, and will be, "A melancholy accident." No doubt they can ride at last who shall have earned their fare, that is, if they survive so long, but they will probably have lost their elasticity and desire to travel by that time. This spending of the best part of one's life earning money in order to enjoy a questionable liberty during the least valuable part of it reminds me of the Englishman who went to India to make a fortune first, in order that he might return to England and live the life of a poet. He should have gone up garret at once. "What!" exclaim a million Irishmen starting up from all the shanties in the land, "is not this railroad which we have built a good thing?" Yes, I answer, comparatively good, that is, you might have done worse; but I wish, as you are brothers of mine, that you could have spent your time better than digging in this dirt.' Probably my favorite passage from Walden...

tomreece 11y ago
Excellent.

danso 11y ago

Hey, kudos for thinking this: > And then I want to get away from coding for you and code for me. I don't like coding for you. I don't think any of us do. Too many people think of coding as only a career...thus, we shouldn't teach coding to non-comsci-majors because not everyone should be a programmer as a job. Programming is an intellectual and productive pursuit in it of itself, and there is a huge difference between programming for someone else, and programming for your self and for what you care about. It's no different from writing prose. You could love to write for yourself, or for your own novels and projects...while having a writing job (technical writing, journalism) that you dislike. But it's not the writing itself that's the problem.

mabbo 11y ago
That said, I've met a few developers where it's just their job. They aren't passionate about code they way I am- their passions lie elsewhere, and that's fine. Being passionate about software development can help you be a better developer- but it's not a prerequisite by any means.
- danso 11y ago
  Definitely...actually I found after college that I didn't really like programming and didn't feel very good at it, at least not compared to my classmates who hacked all the time in school. But when I started programming for myself, and various side projects, it made me a much better and happier programmer. I'm happy to have become better, because it's helped me expand the scope of things that I want to accomplish...but time is ultimately a limited resource, so I'm mindful of what I've sacrificed by spending late nights tinkering with code.
- tomreece 11y ago
  I often feel like I'm surrounded by programmers who just come to work every day, write as much good enough code that they can, and then go home. They seem really happy. I want to be like them. But my care gets in the way. My desire to question why we do things the way we do only to be told "that's just how it is" is difficult to hear and only frustrates me further. The happy people around me don't seem to ask questions, they just do.

dudul 11y ago

Damn this is one bitter guy indeed. First of all, everything you do as a kid is more fun than doing it as a professional. I sure loved to play soccer as a kid, but guess what? Being a professional player is full of annoying things like training, lifting weight, being careful with your diet, traveling all the time, etc. And that could probably be said about any career. Being a professional at anything is tough compared to toying around as a child, that's how it is. "At all three of my big boy jobs, I've been so far removed from the user that I have no clue if the product helped them or not." Even during the second job at a "small startup with 15 employees, 5 developers, no testers." ? Hard to believe. "I don't like coding for you. I don't think any of us do. We only do it because you pay us way too much money and we have loans to pay off." Feel free to write whatever you want about your point of view, but leave the rest of us out of your vast generalization.

vladimir-y 11y ago
It looks like that kid becomes an adult, and eventually realizes that adult life is full of compromises.

FreedomToCreate 11y ago

Wonder what this guy would say to the countless millions who toil away in factories, big box retail, and accounting offices. None of these people do this for the love of the job. They do it because it needs to be done and they get paid for it. I wouldn't be so critical of your feelings but you whine about how society didn't let you do what you want to do on your terms. Change your circumstances. No one is just given everything. Its a combination of motivation and luck. And that luck comes from generating opportunities for yourself. So it all up to you. I hope you get your debt paid off. Move to the cabin, but if you ever want to come back, just remember that society has her dues.

sf_rob 11y ago
I like your post and think it's valid, but I would say that coding in high school/college doesn't prepare you for the real world at all. In high school I was hacking on silly personal projects. In college I was solving cool algorithms, puzzles, and games. But in the real world most programming roles are pretty menial / not a super exciting domain / consist largely of process, code reviews, QA, debugging.
- jacalata 11y ago
  My friend has a HR degree where she got to study psychology and organizational principles and how to motivate people and run a business, and now she does paperwork all day managing employee sick time and vacation time and making sure all their certifications are up to date. I'd be surprised if any degree fully prepares students for just how much menial work they'll be doing, partly because those bits don't require a university course to learn.
Apocryphon 11y ago
But that's the thing, though- the hypesters promises one thing, and the industry delivers another. "Everyone should code." "Software is eating the world." All of this is true, but despite the magic of engineering, which gives you the biggest lever in the world to move the most weight, actual coding jobs are swamped in mundanity. If people going in knew that it was more Office Space than The Social Network, it'd be less of a disillusionment.

staunch 11y ago

If programmers made twice as much money, it would be such a great job. And yet salaries have been relatively flat for over a decade (adjusted for inflation). Something is wrong that salaries never seem to rise with demand in Silicon Valley. We know there was a secret deal to help suppress wages at one point, but it's not obvious why it's been so successful. Is it new graduates, immigration abuse, internationalization, illegal price fixing? A programmers union could probably force tech companies to double salaries. They all could afford to pay it.

pcurve 11y ago
Programmers are generally very well paid in the U.S. The issue is, they hit pay-ceiling very quick, unless they go into management position. And really, who wants to be an IT manager? It's probably the second worst job in IT after IT project manager. chuckles A 30 year old sr. software engineer will be paid not much less than a 40 year old one, even if 40 year old is much more talented, and deserves to get paid twice as much. I suppose the same issue exists for pharmacists. Out of school, you're expected to make $110k; pretty much the same exact salary as RPh with 20 years of experience.
Matachines 11y ago
Most programmers are happy enough to make their current salary and many work for less. Don't think it's gonna increase any time soon.
greggman 11y ago
Money does not make the job and more fun or less boring. I'm not sayin it don't want money I just don't agree that more money would make programming a great job. It might help them tolerate a boring job longer
FLUX-YOU 11y ago
Lower end pay can stay right where it is. Upper end pay could probably go up to better reflect actual skill and specialty knowledge. I really doubt a union would succeed unless you suddenly get a lot of programmers on board very quickly. Tech giants are big and if they chose to fight, they have a ton of cash to do it with.

williamle8300 11y ago

He's essentially admitting two things: 1) I hate my job... but! 2) I do it because I need it Ok. That's fine. Just shut-up if you need the job. No one needs to hear about your woes and whinings if you're conscionable about the contract you're entering in to. It's downright childish if you don't reject/quit a job if you don't want it.

pcurve 11y ago
3) make up your own interesting side projects that will benefit your manager, company,and customers, short term and long term. If you don't, you risk remaining as a permanent cog. You want to transform from a cog into planetary gear set.
tomreece 11y ago
Did you read the post? I LOVE programming. I HATE programming for someone else as a career. For fucks sake.

pyrrhotech 11y ago

Work is called work because it isn't supposed to be fun. If your's is remotely tolerable, only requires your time from 9 to 5 and pays you enough to cover all your necessities and even some luxuries you are better off than 95% of the world. Life's a bitch, then you die. At least you make enough money to not have to do it past your 40s if you don't want to.

YeGoblynQueenne 11y ago
Eh, no. Work is called work because it's supposed to produce something. If all it does is drive you nuts, waste your life and fill the world with garbage, then what's the point of it? You might as well give it all up and go tour the world with nothing but the clothes you wear. And what's that I hear, about getting a pension in your 40s'? Wasn't that what the Greeks did wrong, that they wanted to get a pension in their 40s, and that's why their economy died?
- jacalata 11y ago
  Nobody mentioned pensions, the comment was saying you should save up your own money.

kwalazulu 11y ago

Googled your name and found your Linkedin page. Rspace is getting pummeled by AWS and Azure offerings, never work for a company that is going down and has little or no innovation.

xupybd 11y ago

Work is work. But you can learn to self motivate, and even learn to enjoy the boring bits. However if you think that it's out of your control, what you enjoy and what bores you, it can be hard to improve your enjoyment.

nstart 11y ago

I almost cried while reading this. <virtual hug to tomreece). I'm 27 too and hitting my 5th year in software. Last year I worked in a company that had 20 employees; 10 people were related to dev. Everyday in there was a slog. Shipping code was a convoluted affair that happened once every 45 days or so. Testing was all over the place, and in a bid to do "excellent design" there were classes connected to 5 levels of interfaces and abstractions and multiple circular references. During that job, I made and shared two side projects for the first time in my life. But the 9 to 5 hell was impossible to deal with. Fast forward to now, I'm remotely working with a company that pays me a great salary. I live in South East Asia and that means my savings are fantastic. Bonus is that the company is amazing. Dreamt of joining it since 2012. But I digress. Here's where I get to the point. Try and find this kind of remote work, and come live around here for a short while (Sri Lanka). Heck. I'd be happy to talk to you about it. Put it in perspective, with a salary of say 80k USD, you'll pay off your student loan in one year guaranteed if you live a little frugally. Hope this helps

meric 11y ago
Which company is this?! I'd love to talk to you about it!
- nstart 11y ago
  would be happy to message on a private channel. Still not comfortable talking about it openly till I'm confirmed employee :)
  - meric 11y ago
    Ok. I put my email in my profile. Pop me an email! :)
tomreece 11y ago
Awesome story friend. I wish you the best of luck in your future endeavors!
- 11y ago

scrabble 11y ago

I actually quite enjoy my job. I still have side projects that I also enjoy, but my job is wonderful along with the company I work for. Also, this stuff: "I didn't care how my code read, or if it was maintainable, or if it was DRY, or if it was tested, or how long it'd take me to write, or if features were separated into logical chunks" Right at the beginning is where you lost me, because even when I was in grade school, I still made my code maintainable and separated into logical chunks because I had to read and maintain it whenever I got a chance to get back to it. My side projects are all built with these things in mind. It is good that you have decided that coding isn't the right career for you, but I wonder what is? I would also be careful of making harsh public criticisms of your employer. It's easy to figure out where you work, and these are the types of concerns that your employer should be able to work with you to address. Best of luck.

derekp7 11y ago

My biggest problem with coding for an employer, is that they then own exclusive rights to the code. Essentially, you are solving a problem. If that problem is unique to the employer, then that is fine for them to own the code. But if the project involves writing a bunch of potentially reusable routines, such as what you might find in a third party library, it just seems awful that you can never solve those same problems again in the future (as more likely than not, you will end up typing in about the same code). So it really seems like you are giving up a piece of your mind whenever you program for someone else. For an example of what I'm talking about, see XKCD 664.

dudul 11y ago
Well, it's not like they pay you to write code for them right? It is only fair that your are, in theory, not allowed to reuse the code who wrote for them at your next gig. And to be clear, we all do it. If you've implemented it once you can redo it in no time.
- derekp7 11y ago
  I agree that it is fair, it just kind of hurts a bit is all. Especially if you did something you are real proud of. I wish there were more programming jobs that were similar to photography -- you get hired to do a shoot, the customer gets a copy, but you keep the copyrights.

softwaredev__ 11y ago

I agree that programming at work isn't as fun as it is when you're just hacking away on side projects. But there's also that satisfaction of learning your craft well.

tomreece 11y ago

How Software Companies Die - Orson Scott Card https://www.cs.cmu.edu/~chuck/jokepg/joke_19970213_01.txt https://www.cs.cmu.edu/~chuck/jokepg/joke_19970213_01.txt

davekiss 11y ago

Thanks for writing this, Tom. Coding as an employee isn't right for me, either. By and large, programmers generally make great employees. Many brilliant people are able to knock out their assigned and existential objectives by solving complex problems and are handsomely rewarded with hefty checks. But, if you ask them questions outside their comfort zone about, for example, running a business, designing for the user, or marketing, most would be quick to point out that those aren't responsibilities that fall on their plate. To me, it sounds like you have a fervor for being more than just an employee. You want to take ownership of your work. You want to use your brain for your own benefit, not for some other corporation to rent out. You want the grittiness of taking on multiple roles and welcome being side by side with your users. There are many of us out here, coding as self-starters, founders, freelancers, remote workers, and small business owners. It isn't for everyone, and if you are happy or content with your full time job, then it's probably not for you. That's ok. But for those of us who have found ways to make it work outside of what can feel like the soul-crushing environment of a typical full-time workplace, the devs building on their own, grinding out client work, doing remote year, making products - ask any of them, and you'll find that coding as a employee wasn't right for them, either. I'd encourage you to read my post on the way I fell into this line of thought, but for me, I was coming from a job that I actually really liked: http://davekiss.com/getting-started-with-passive-income/ http://davekiss.com/getting-started-with-passive-income/ You don't need to code as an employee to code as a career. Be honest with yourself; are you an employee, or a founder?

YeGoblynQueenne 11y ago

I have NOT internalized the disciplinarian culture. I think you have: I'm fortunate to have had jobs since I graduated college. Edit: I mean that it shouldn't be down to luck whether you have a job or not and how productive you can be in the limited time when you can be productive, in your life. It's rotten that not everyone can. We're doing human civilisation wrong, if it's down to luck whether you live a satisfying life doing fullfilling work, or spend your life in slavery.

puppetmaster3 11y ago

He is not a programmer. He is a tester. I'd love to see his CV.

aaronchall 11y ago

I had a graduate degree and could barely make rent for more than a year before I finally got a job as a programmer. At my lowest point, I used to pick up a large $5 dollar cheese pizza to go, a tomato and onion from a street vendor (for toppings on my pizza), and stretch 4 meals out of it. You should be grateful you have the opportunities you have, and that you're able to work a job that would allow you to pay off your student loans so quickly. As a programmer, you have one of the best jobs that exists. You have a low stress job and you make a lot of money. (The median programmer makes more than twice the median wage - 37 versus 17/hr - http://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes_nat.htm http://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes_nat.htm ) - your financial freedom will come much more quickly to you than it will for most others. You ought to do your best to learn to find meaning in your work and be grateful you have so much self-direction in your work when so many others don't.