It comes down to perspective tbh. For someone who's worked hard labor throughout their life, the cushy tech job you get is actually worth doing forever. But for people who have never experienced that, I can see why retiring early makes sense, but honestly most of us get to work from home and do our jobs on the computer, which doesn't require much. It's still an amazing career to be in IMO

I basically agree, just adding context.

As companies grow, it's the natural state of things, as any hope for goal alignment goes out the window. I am OK dealing with situations where the good for the company's long term might not be the same as my personal preferences. But we often see situations where what is decided isn't good for the company, or for most workers, but great for a decision maker, and we all know that at those layers, talking about the misalignment to the layer above is a great way to get canned. A decade or that, and the company is a zombie.

I've enjoyed tech in environments where there was alignment, and in a few cases it made me serious money, which is why I have said optionality myself. But nowadays AI has led to much higher capital costs to do innovative things, so the number of companies with the right size and potential has shrunk, and that makes fulfilling careers far less likely.

I feel the same way. I feel sad though that it's over and I never accomplished what I wanted to.

But for the last 20 years my priority has been my family. Pickups and Dropoffs to school, sports, activities, and doctor appointments.

At least I was able to give them a good life.

Living in the United States, my retirement plan is "MAID"

You know, I think the experiences you are describing are the norm for non-tech corporate jobs. Now with AI as an excuse, management is now subjecting the tech positions the same as the non-tech workers and it stings. Tech people were previously treated far better than the average corporate workers, and started after the tech hiring boom from Covid.

Some people need to touch fire to know the feeling of getting burned.

I was one of those people.

Excellent tech income; zero savings other than a 401(k) I barely contributed into.

After an amazing meal at a burger place several years ago, I asked my wife about upgrading to a Model S. She figuratively sat me down (after we literally sat into the seats of our Model 3) and was more straight-forward with me than she had ever been prior to that moment.

"How much do we have saved? Oh, _we_ have basically nothing? Yeah, so I'm not saying no, but you need to fix that before we discuss this again."

I took it defensively in the moment, but not for long because I knew she was right. Building that nest egg became priority #1 since that talk.

That was in 2023. I saved a lot since then. It felt VERY VERY GOOD to look at my savings and say "You know, I could fuck right off for six months if I wanted to. I won't, but I could!" It completely changed my priorities at work.

Now, I've had to drain my savings twice now: once to secure a down payment for our house, and again for a major repair of said home (b/c I am strongly against treating our home as a credit card). Regardless, I chip away a good amount into several savings accounts every two weeks and am expecting to regrow the account within the next year. I can't wait to feel that feeling again!

This has been me as well. While I don't think my time is quite up, I have heard the call of the sea. Grey ships are waiting.

There have been times in the last decade where I wished I had chosen a profession that lets me stay offline more. Ironically, AI has given me more enthusiasm for tech than I've had in years, which seems opposite to most people's experience.

I broadly agree, but expensive homes are an odd example because, like, you can just sell the house later. There might be some opportunity cost relative to investing in a broad market ETF or whatever, but that's not the sort of difference that makes or breaks your early retirement strategy.

It's a bit odd to get moralistic over saving/spending money in general, but that's especially true around expensive homes.

I'm coming up on 40 years with the last 17 at the same company. I'm so burnt out that I resemble a charcoal briquette.

I could and did live frugally before I had kids.

How can one continue living in a small apartment with lead and asbestos hazards is beyond me.

Very good advice. I was at it for 40 years, actually did some MUMPS (for those of you who watched The Audacity), as well as every tech from the old days, even some hardware, and kept current and on the very edge up until the end. I also loved it and thought I would do it forever, I felt so grateful that my hobby and passion as also my career, and very well paying (eventually, back then no one thought it would be a career).

I retired 10 years ago when I had enough (money) and had enough (of the industry). Always lived below my means. I cannot imagine what it was like to be in the industry for the past 10 years.

As far as the nonsense that is pushed top down, it is not so simple. I was at/near the top. I know what was happening, what I was doing, but everyone has a boss, even the boss. The industry is too important, too big, too critical for it not to be run by human nature. So glad I got out when I did.

I feel like I could still endure this AI hype cycle a bit, that things will eventually stabilize to some point I’m comfortable with, agents already seem kinda cool after the psychosis wears off.

But the next big disruptive thing like this, that will probably be my last straw. Not sure what it will be, but when it comes, I’ll just know. Maybe it will be developers installing neuralink type devices or something into their brains to have some kind of “organic interface” or something using their thoughts to build prompts or whatever. You will have to have it just to stay competitive in the industry.

I will check out.

such a wonderful advice, this resonates a lot with me. I know i would ignore it when i needed to hear it though

I bought a farm and ran away from tech. Euphoria! For a bit. Honeymoon period's well and fucking over. I did not enjoy chopping that cord of firewood, but I didn't hate it, either. I miss making impulsive, frivolous 4-figure purchases, and I miss not having to literally fucking conjure money out of soil. I don't miss the self-important corpo wankbags, "quick meetings," or the yearly cycle of having to pretend that someone who works for me is deserving of being compressed into the bad end of a bell curve because HR or some MD came back and said that we have too many high performers relative to another department. I've done more computing and written more code (and documentation!) for fun in the last few years than I did since about 2016, which is nice.

Don't run away from the desk job until you're really sure. If you're really sure, then don't let the door hit your ass.

I would take this advice a bit further even -- I don't think savings alone is the key, because inflation and de-dollarization are exponentially eroding purchasing power. The key is ownership of income-producing assets. In late-stage capitalism, the vast majority of people who work in exchange for wages will be members of the debt class; workers who manage to escape debt will still be living on a knife's edge where you can be laid off at any moment regardless of how well your company is doing. The only people living with stability will be those whose lives are paid for by the assets they own, rather than by the hours they sell.