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Here I am, a 40 something very mediocre webdev with 2 kids and a mortgage, taking home 30K / year struggling to learn the framework-du-jour my boss thinks I sho
by stef25 7y ago
Here I am, a 40 something very mediocre webdev with 2 kids and a mortgage, taking home 30K / year struggling to learn the framework-du-jour my boss thinks I should be using, unable to find another job cause I'm too expensive, wondering what the hell to do with my life.
And then there's a kid in Malaysia of all places selling frigging vapers, taking home every month what I take home per year.
- sleepychu 7y agoWhere are you based?
- stef25 7y agoBelgium
- fnigi 7y agoHow can you earn 30k gross there ? Is not under the minimum wage ?
- stef25 7y agoThat's net, gross is around 50K.
- chosenbreed37 7y ago> That's net, gross is around 50K. The taxes are a bit high but have a lot of benefits of living in Belgium. But it is true that you have to make some compromises/sacrifices if you want to make your disposable income stretch.
- stef25 7y agoTaxes are brutal, thankfully it gets better once you have kids.
- vbsteven 7y agoAre you self-employed? That can be a way to bump your income significantly in the belgian IT world. My email is in my profile if you want to talk about it. (self-employed for 5 years, 1 kid, early thirties, also in Belgium)
- Insanity 7y agoWhat he did is nontheless impressive. You sound a bit negative in your last sentence, but getting a good business going is about finding the 'gap in the market' and knowing how to fill it. He did this, so where he is from does not really matter, does it?
- stef25 7y agoNot meaning to be negative or disparaging at all, I admire him and he deserves it all. Vaping seems like a totally over saturated market, was just a little surprised.
- stronglikedan 7y ago> Vaping seems like a totally over saturated market It is, but I think that's where the "gap" presented itself. It's crazy how many ejuice brands, varieties, and flavors there are. I'm just surprised no one has been successful with a "flavor of the week" style "club" until now. It's almost impossible to navigate the ejuice landscape on your own.
- stef25 7y agoCigarette smokers tend to always stay with one brand, same with Swedish snuss. Seems weird that vapers would want tons of different flavors?
- Insanity 7y agoI don't know about smoking / snuss, but does one brand == one flavour? Or is it like a "Doritos" situation where you have x different flavours of the same brand?
- nineumbrellas 7y agoIf you use the same juice frequently, over time that flavor will diminish. This is known as "vape tongue" in some communities. When I vaped after kicking cigarettes I had 2-3 different flavors I would rotate to mitigate this.
- switchstance 7y agoWhat's the saying? "Where you are in life is a result of choices you made in the past." Something like that. While not 100% accurate, I've found it to be mostly true with people in my life.
- profalseidol 7y agoTell that to the millions who choose to be born in the slums. Then there is also the fact that we are not equally the same upon birth. Everyone has different traits. I suspect that when you really weigh in the factors, a lot of the result we get is caused by a lot simply being at the right time in the right place.
- switchstance 7y agoPlease see "not 100% accurate." I get that uncontrolled circumstances are inevitable, but hearing others bitch and complain about how good others have it while riding their pity pony drives me mad. The original author (clearly not living in slums) didn't have to get married, have two kids, and take out a mortgage on a home. Also, being a mediocre developer is in his control too. Get your big boy panties on, change your mindset, and make change in your life, not excuses.
- switchstance 7y agoSorry for being a hardass, but the original author sounds like me 11 years ago. I thought life happened to me, and I had no control over it. I've since changed my way of thinking, and just this week my bootstrapped company reached 10 million in ARR.
- frogpelt 7y agoOne simple change to the statement accounts for your observation: "Where you are in life is a result of choices you AND YOUR PARENTS have made in the past." If by some remote chance there's a young person reading these comments and you are living in the slums, you have to start making better choices than your parents did (and their parents did) TODAY if you want your kids to have it better than you do. Start with Walter Williams (Economics Professor at George Mason) advice on how to not be poor: 1. Graduate from High School. 2. Don't have children until you're married and stay married once you get married. 3. Take any kind of job (except illegal ones). 4. Stay out of jail. Start there and move up as opportunities arise and it is almost guaranteed that your kids will do better than you (if you are currently in the slums.)
- havetocharge 7y agoI am presuming that you're from a "better" country, so it should be easier for you to repeat what this guy did, now that he told you how.
- elorant 7y agoYou're comparing apples to oranges. He's not a developer, he's an entrepreneur.
- chosenbreed37 7y ago> You're comparing apples to oranges. He's not a developer, he's an entrepreneur. True. But still depressing...
- elorant 7y agoBear in mind that the 60k/month figure is turnover. Not profit. He employes 8 people, has to pay for inventory and packaging, postal, logistics, accounting and whatnot. Also, judging from the archive.org records it's a 4 year old business. It's not an overnight success.
- jbbos 7y ago> Also, judging from the archive.org records it's a 4 year old business. It's not an overnight success. This is key, obviously. A lot of people will read something like this and assume it’s some kind of overnight success. For that, I give kudos to this guy for what is a business built most likely around long nights and days and determination.
- Stanish 7y agoAnd a product that will help give Malaysians lung disease
- thaumasiotes 7y ago> Bear in mind that the 60k/month figure is turnover. Not profit. He's not shy about the details -- he gives the profit figure in the article. It's still $25k / month.
- stef25 7y ago> entrepreneur Tried that many times, albeit without any relevant education.
- vcoelho 7y agoI make U$7.5K/year as a Vue developer in Brazil. There will be always someone in worse situation than yours, if you go down that road.
- hogu 7y agoSorry to approach here, but don't know how else to reach you. I'm looking for remote Vue devs, maybe we can work together? If you'd like to talk, please reach out to hugo@saturncloud.io
- zerr 7y agoI assume that's because you're working for a Brazilian company - why are you doing this? There's the whole world at your hands - target North American and western European clients and you'll be making six figures (in USD) easily.
- gadders 7y agoYou got two kids. That's the best thing anyone could ever do. Work is just stuff you do to fund the rest.
- jhabdas 7y agoThe American Dream. If you want to stick it to your boss join CodementorX (now arc) and start building static websites on the side. You'll make more money if you apply yourself and then you can quit your job and move your family to Malaysia to avoid paying taxes.
- jvagner 7y agoIf you can wake up an hour earlier every day [which may mean killing a TV habit, or something] and work on something for yourself, you may have a different story to tell in a year, or three.
- stef25 7y agoMade plenty of such time, have several projects that aren't quite finished, lost confidence, etc. Working on another one as we speak :)
- superasn 7y agoHaving been in a similar situation once, my advice to you is stick to one project and focus 80% on marketing and 20% on dev. Learn to sell and learn to SEO. Your traffic and leads make you money not the tech stack (but it's easy to always fall into that trap)
- maximente 7y agomatter of perspective. here's another: you're getting paid to learn web development on company time, which you could easily use to double, triple or more your salary if you take advantage of it.