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Also a more interesting question would be, are people working in startup, especially single software vendors more susceptible to depression? Look at Aaron Schwa

Also a more interesting question would be, are people working in startup, especially single software vendors more susceptible to depression? Look at Aaron Schwartz guy, all those times he was depressed, look at his increasingly erratic and tendency towards martyrdom. The pressure from idiot zealots finally tipped him.

scottcha 14y ago
I'm the author of the article and I asked myself this question before I wrote it. I posted some data here which came out of that research: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5272763 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5272763 but it didn't get much traction. When I compared across disciplines in the original dataset (using software programmer as the discipline) there wasn't a strong indication that they were more prone to suicide than other professional jobs. I don't remember exactly but doctors, lawyers, dentists were toward the top of that list. One challenge is that the dataset I reference doesn't have data post 1998. Since our discipline has grown and changed since then a more recent dataset might show something more interesting.
- umphetico 14y ago
  I think the actual software programmer job working for a company is different than someone working alone erratic hours, building apps, marketing, selling, and breaking even. It's quite challenging in itself to produce good software product let alone selling it and breaking even so it'd be interesting to see some statistics for single founder startups or micro software vendors. I would say the stress is the biggest for SaaS type of software products, as someone posted a video here about "Constant Contact", it's described as the slow ramp of death because it takes so long and hard to reach that magic upward slope. These are all just my magical assumptions based on my own situation and experience. I'm sure there's ton of positive, empathetic, emotionally intelligent coder/hacker/entrepreneurs although there's lot of Aspies, who studies have shown to be greater risk of depression.
  - Evbn 14y ago
    Stress (and financial instability) has its own set of health problems, but that's not depression. Depression has more mundane physical and neurological causes, whereas stress disorders are caused by the pressures of difficult lifestyles like running a business on your last nickel or being ultraompetitive in your career or being a soldier at war.

scottcha 14y ago

I'm the author of the article and I asked myself this question before I wrote it. I posted some data here which came out of that research: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5272763 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5272763 but it didn't get much traction. When I compared across disciplines in the original dataset (using software programmer as the discipline) there wasn't a strong indication that they were more prone to suicide than other professional jobs. I don't remember exactly but doctors, lawyers, dentists were toward the top of that list. One challenge is that the dataset I reference doesn't have data post 1998. Since our discipline has grown and changed since then a more recent dataset might show something more interesting.

umphetico 14y ago
I think the actual software programmer job working for a company is different than someone working alone erratic hours, building apps, marketing, selling, and breaking even. It's quite challenging in itself to produce good software product let alone selling it and breaking even so it'd be interesting to see some statistics for single founder startups or micro software vendors. I would say the stress is the biggest for SaaS type of software products, as someone posted a video here about "Constant Contact", it's described as the slow ramp of death because it takes so long and hard to reach that magic upward slope. These are all just my magical assumptions based on my own situation and experience. I'm sure there's ton of positive, empathetic, emotionally intelligent coder/hacker/entrepreneurs although there's lot of Aspies, who studies have shown to be greater risk of depression.
- Evbn 14y ago
  Stress (and financial instability) has its own set of health problems, but that's not depression. Depression has more mundane physical and neurological causes, whereas stress disorders are caused by the pressures of difficult lifestyles like running a business on your last nickel or being ultraompetitive in your career or being a soldier at war.