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> As shown by the many posts on ‘FIRE’ or investing Reddit communities of salaried people making millions–it is indeed possible to get rich working for someone
by ValentineC 2y ago
> As shown by the many posts on ‘FIRE’ or investing Reddit communities of salaried people making millions–it is indeed possible to get rich working for someone else. These are young and middle-aged people on Reddit who have homes, nest eggs, a good work-life balance, and a high standard of living despite working for someone else, yet are somehow ‘doing it wrong’ or are struggling or miserable according to the Twitter or hustle-culture narrative. Hell, even Steve Balmer became richer than Bill Gates despite working for him.
The last sentence in this paragraph doesn't make sense.
Isn't Bill Gates less rich because he's actively giving it away through philanthropy?
- throwaway48540 2y agoNo, not really. Gates is less rich because he sold his MSFT, while Ballmer kept it. This had much more significant impact than all of his philanthropy.
- potato3732842 2y agoi.e. a classic case of forgoing potential returns in exchange for portfolio diversity and reduced risk.
- amadeuspagel 2y agoHe sold his MSFT to spend the money on philantrophy.
- throwaway48540 2y agoHe didn't, he donated much less than he had msft stock
- ein0p 2y agoFrom someone who currently has seven figure TC and is about to FIRE into the sunset by EOY in order to downshift (leaving millions in unvested stock grants on the table): such comp and work life balance are basically incompatible. When you’re young and poor, that’s fine, but I’m neither. Any claims to the contrary would need some serious evidence. This is so for rather fundamental reasons: comp like this requires serious results, and serious results are very difficult to achieve in large organizations. And only large companies are willing to pay this much.
- riku_iki 2y ago> such comp and work life balance are basically incompatible. > comp like this requires serious results there is diminishing return in results once you shift from good work/life balance schedule. Say you work 8h/d and deliver results with value of 500K/y. You won't be able to bump delivered value to 1M if work 12h/d, you will burn faster. At this level of compensation you are selling your skills and talent, and not overtime.
- ein0p 2y agoYou usually don’t have the option to modulate this. It’s my second such position and neither one had the option of anything other than high stress, and near-burnout work intensity on highly ambiguous, organizationally and technically complex problems. If they could hire someone for less to do what I do, they would. On the positive side I no longer want to climb the ladder. The higher up you go the worse this gets, and I don’t think it’s worth it, not even for a “life changing” amount of money.
- riku_iki 2y agostress is your internal state, and is optional. Work intensity is result of you not saying no. I still believe if your employer pays you 7 digits for 12h/d, he will pay you about the same for 8h/d which will bring total -20% delivered value reduction (reduced work time, but improved burnout damage).
- 2y ago