4 ms·

Early 30s, nothing at all and I plan to live the next 4 years off <strike>basic</strike> student assistance. The whole notion of retirement has never made sens

Early 30s, nothing at all and I plan to live the next 4 years off <strike>basic</strike> student assistance. The whole notion of retirement has never made sense to me. I remember when I was 15-ish people said I would understand once I grew up, but nope, it still doesn’t make any sense. I have spent maybe 48 months working so far. I can bill about 20k a month when I do work. But it’s such a waste of lifetime to do it, I never work more than absolutely necessary.

giantg2 5y ago
$20k per month? What do you do?
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- admissionsguy 5y ago
  Run-of-the-mill full-stack + mobile web development + a tiny bit of DevOps. I am decent at understanding and solving business problems, and very efficient (and all around brilliant, let's be honest), but otherwise I don't feel like I'm doing anything special, technically. For the most part. Note 20k is $125/hour at 100% utilization, which I find rather easy to achieve. I had spent years at $40/h, then upped to $60-70 after joining Toptal, but clients were paying $100+. Knowing who the clients willing to pay that much were, I found it possible to reach similar clients directly, and here I am. I rather frequently take over really abysmally done work from previous developers. I don't think those developers are generally paid less than myself. So the takeaway appears to be that technical prowess is a minor factor in the whole picture.
  - giantg2 5y ago
    I guess I'm just in the wrong part of the industry then. It seems $250k per year work is rare, at least outside of a few specific markets.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
VirusNewbie 5y ago
You could work for like, one year, bank it all and then in about five years you'd be rich... seems weird to not do that.
- aureli 5y ago
  That's what I did. Billed similar numbers for a few years, saved 80% - 90%, and am now financially independent in my late 20s.
  - admissionsguy 5y ago
    It does seem appealing to compress it into a few years, doesn't it. But I don't think it works for me at this point. First, the math. I believe 20k gross is ~10k after tax where I live. My absolute minimum acceptable lifestyle costs 30k/year. Which leaves the possibility of saving 90k/year. So I get three free years for every year worked. Brings to mind the Ciolkowski equation. Three years for every year worked, neglecting investments, but also opportunity cost, and the fact that I absolutely detest working for others and even a year of working full-time is a dreadful prospect to me. Assuming life expectancy of 85 and no state pension, I would need to work full-time for about 13 years, no time-off, optimistically assuming no mental breakdown from all that work. So I end up at 45, possibly bald, with no savings except to fund what I considered the minimum acceptable lifestyle at 32. That is not good. The opportunity cost. I now work for about 2-3 months / year (and benefit from lower tax at lower income), building a quite possibly successful business venture on the side, and devoting lots and lots of time to my hobbies. Aging. I would not want to sacrfice a year of my 30s for three years of my 50s.
    - throw_this_one 5y ago
      Yeah seriously, who wants to "travel the world" in your 60s lol.
      - VirusNewbie 5y ago
        Dude if you sacrifice two years in your twenties to bank ~300k you can have plenty of time to travel the world while you're young and single or dating someone and live it up. There's a huge difference between 'sacrificing' a few years if you can milk a decent gig when you're young and throwing way decades of your life being miserable.

giantg2 5y ago

$20k per month? What do you do?

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
admissionsguy 5y ago
Run-of-the-mill full-stack + mobile web development + a tiny bit of DevOps. I am decent at understanding and solving business problems, and very efficient (and all around brilliant, let's be honest), but otherwise I don't feel like I'm doing anything special, technically. For the most part. Note 20k is $125/hour at 100% utilization, which I find rather easy to achieve. I had spent years at $40/h, then upped to $60-70 after joining Toptal, but clients were paying $100+. Knowing who the clients willing to pay that much were, I found it possible to reach similar clients directly, and here I am. I rather frequently take over really abysmally done work from previous developers. I don't think those developers are generally paid less than myself. So the takeaway appears to be that technical prowess is a minor factor in the whole picture.
- giantg2 5y ago
  I guess I'm just in the wrong part of the industry then. It seems $250k per year work is rare, at least outside of a few specific markets.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]

VirusNewbie 5y ago

You could work for like, one year, bank it all and then in about five years you'd be rich... seems weird to not do that.

aureli 5y ago
That's what I did. Billed similar numbers for a few years, saved 80% - 90%, and am now financially independent in my late 20s.
- admissionsguy 5y ago
  It does seem appealing to compress it into a few years, doesn't it. But I don't think it works for me at this point. First, the math. I believe 20k gross is ~10k after tax where I live. My absolute minimum acceptable lifestyle costs 30k/year. Which leaves the possibility of saving 90k/year. So I get three free years for every year worked. Brings to mind the Ciolkowski equation. Three years for every year worked, neglecting investments, but also opportunity cost, and the fact that I absolutely detest working for others and even a year of working full-time is a dreadful prospect to me. Assuming life expectancy of 85 and no state pension, I would need to work full-time for about 13 years, no time-off, optimistically assuming no mental breakdown from all that work. So I end up at 45, possibly bald, with no savings except to fund what I considered the minimum acceptable lifestyle at 32. That is not good. The opportunity cost. I now work for about 2-3 months / year (and benefit from lower tax at lower income), building a quite possibly successful business venture on the side, and devoting lots and lots of time to my hobbies. Aging. I would not want to sacrfice a year of my 30s for three years of my 50s.
  - throw_this_one 5y ago
    Yeah seriously, who wants to "travel the world" in your 60s lol.
    - VirusNewbie 5y ago
      Dude if you sacrifice two years in your twenties to bank ~300k you can have plenty of time to travel the world while you're young and single or dating someone and live it up. There's a huge difference between 'sacrificing' a few years if you can milk a decent gig when you're young and throwing way decades of your life being miserable.