
I Wasn’t Prepared to Work - reikonomusha
http://symbo1ics.com/blog/?p=1803
======
georgemcbay
This is a big part of the reason I support the idea of a "basic income"
system.

I believe there are lots of people out there not wired for dealing with the
politics or immediate-results stress of the VC system but who are self-
directed, interested and motivated enough to work on big problems, but whose
energy is destroyed by having to deal with the immense bullshit inherent in
modern office-style software development to make money to pay the bills. As a
society I believe we would be better off if these people were free to go live
in some cheap cost of living area while just doing their thing and
contributing to the commons in the form of open source or taking what they
eventually create and marketing it (if it is marketable when complete) in
order to generate wealth on top of their basic income.

I believe the same would hold for non-software creative jobs as well.

But, of course, I'm not holding my breath for this to happen.

~~~
charlieflowers
Question (and this is motivated out of my ignorance, not any political
leaning) --

If everyone gets a Basic Income, wouldn't prices merely rise to compensate for
it, leaving us in the same state we're in now? In other words, when it comes
to prices, isn't everything "relative," since prices are determined by supply
and demand?

~~~
chipsy
For prices to rise, the nominal amount of money flowing through the economy
must increase somewhere along the line.

However, what occurs in basic income is a straight-up "redistribution of
wealth" from richer to poorer, which means that the nominal amount of money in
the system should be no different from the laissez-faire situation.

This in turn means that prices aren't going to change as a direct result, as
in inflation(where there is an overt increase in money supply). But they are
likely to change when consumer demand changes, which could happen if, for
example, people receiving basic income start to upgrade their lifestyle away
from abject poverty.

Some prices may actually drop as a result; for example, if more people can
afford health insurance and get preventative care, the economies of scale for
health insurance coverage improve. On the other hand, luxury goods with
limited supply are likely to be pushed upwards to remain out of reach of the
masses.

~~~
ams6110
You're assuming that the basic income dollars would actually be transferred
and not just printed.

~~~
chipsy
Indeed. That's consistent with most proposals(including negative income tax)
and the few real world implementations such as the Alaskan benefit.

The government can always opt to print for its expenditures - there is nothing
stopping them from doing so, and it's a typical last resort of desperate
leaders, but economic prescriptions avoid it since it lowers confidence, which
has destabilizing effects beyond inflation.

~~~
scotty79
Why government printing money for its expenditures is considered bad?

I know that it's tempting for government to print money uncontrollably. But
what if printing money was proprly offset by increasing reserve requirement so
that banks would create less money with credit at the same time?

~~~
chipsy
This is a good question, and it's one of the more challenging aspects of
neoclassical macroeconomics(as taught in most U.S. schools). It's also heavily
contested, and one of the reasons why I started to dislike my study of
economics, because the theory has to make some big assumptions to get any
result.

The rationale given to not do this is that any policy change from the
government is going to affect expectations of the future - if (on balance)
most economic actors are rational and know that there will be inflation in the
future, they will take steps _now_ to protect themselves from the side
effects. If you change policy on both ends, expectations about the economy
become uncertain - more so than if there's no change - which means that the
market will start to move its investment towards other countries with more
predictable economies.

Here's a Wikipedia article describing the original proposition that this
theory was built on:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Policy_Ineffectiveness_Proposit...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Policy_Ineffectiveness_Proposition)

~~~
scotty79
I think that any potential incentive for the investments to leave could be
properly offset by lowering or abolishing taxes.

------
aprescott
If the start of this post put you off because it sounds arrogant, please keep
reading. It is an intentional setup to highlight the core point, which I think
is in this paragraph:

 _But the environment matters a lot less than the fact that when I get home
from work—which is a two hour commute each way (sorry, I can’t afford to live
in downtown San Francisco)—I just feel like being mentally incapacitated.
Occasionally I have a little spark of brilliance (relative, not absolute) that
motivates me to write a short bit of code, but the code is never more than one
or two hundred lines. It usually consists of some little trick._

That is: you cannot fight your day-to-day work — long-term — by working on
your own stuff, when you get home after already spending 6-7 hours working and
thinking in a particular way. The author tagged it "sad" for a reason.

~~~
doktrin
> _you cannot fight your day-to-day work — long-term — by working on your own
> stuff, when you get home after already spending 6-7 hours working and
> thinking in a particular way. The author tagged it "sad" for a reason._

That's precisely why this post resonated with me. Even short of literally
switching mind sets, I find it tricky to get motivated to code after spending
~8 hours at work (coding). As it stands, I even find myself stressing out over
weekends due to not being "productive" enough on side projects.

Of slightly more relevance to the author, having done the 2-hour commute in SV
(granted, _from_ SF to Menlo because socially I couldn't stand the latter), I
strongly recommend against it. Housing accommodations can be found in SF for a
developer's wage, and I would strongly urge anyone and everyone to avoid
spending 4 hours of their life each day in transit. It makes a difference.

~~~
textminer
About to start a daily commute from Berkeley to Menlo Park. Am optimistic
about 880-South in the morning, and driving seems far faster and more peaceful
than the BART -> Shuttle method. But I do mourn the loss of productive time on
a daily basis, but can't imagine a better place to live. Even on a wonderful
developer salary, I cannot possibly afford a nice apartment for me and my
partner in San Francisco or on the peninsula. Especially compared to East
Bay's prices...

~~~
microtherion
I don’t quite follow the logic of driving being “faster”. In my experience,
public transportation can be highly productive time for certain activities
like reading, while driving is very limited in the activities you can safely
do (though I used to have a tape in my car to help me practice singing scales,
so there are some safe options).

~~~
textminer
I've just timed it out for about 45 minutes in the car, and an hour and
fifteen for the BART/shuttle combo. I also quite like podcasts, so am all
right with having just my ears free while driving.

~~~
rdl
Berkeley to Menlo Park is only 45 minutes if you leave at the correct time
(before 6-7 and after 10am, and 1-3pm or >9pm), and there are no accidents or
other delays.

To get there with 95% odds, you often need to allow 70-80 minutes. I guess it
depends on how bad being late is.

Timing it to arrive at 0930 is actually really hard; I end up leaving around
0730 to be 99% certain of arriving on time. Sometimes it's an hour early, but
sometimes only 15 minutes early.

~~~
textminer
You've just broken my heart. My timing's basically based on two 9 AM drives
that hit traffic/construction, but took no more than 45 minutes.

I start tomorrow.

~~~
rdl
80 (i.e. along the shore in Berkeley) is _really_ bad quite often, but you
could possibly skip most of that. If you can avoid that, it's not too bad,
although the 880 parts in Oakland (due to port/construction traffic) can be
bad.

~~~
textminer
Actually live in Oakland near Emeryville. Not sure why I wrote Berkeley,
except for misguided attempt at identity obfuscation. But used to live up in
Contra Costa county, and the mornings I'd drive into SF-- boy howdy, 580/80
along the coast near University was an absolute disaster.

I wonder if, as "Oakland becomes the new Mission", if we'll see more of the
tech giants sending shuttles up to East Bay. I know Google has at least one
going to West Oakland, but Facebook does not yet.

~~~
rdl
Yeah, I have a friend who worked at google who lives at the cannery lofts, and
used the west Oakland Bart google shuttle a lot. I still would want my car in
case I wanted to work late, or go somewhere other tha directly home.

Another annoying thing about 880 is the trucks and general narrowness. It is
technically 45mph but people do 70-80. I hadn't had an accident there, but it
kind of sucks vs the rest of 880.

You are aware that a lot of the Oakland/emeryville areas near 30th and such
are pretty gangster, right? My friend had a loft there and I kept showing up
at her buyer while the cops had the block shut down to serve a high risk
warrant.

~~~
textminer
Yes, a friend's motorcycle was severely damaged last week from someone trying
to steal it. He was upstairs in our apartment eating dinner. Nine more months
on the lease!

------
mindcrime
Well said. It is damn tough (if not impossible) to keep the same sort of
intellectual stimulation going when you have to "work" at a dull, boring job
(or maybe _any_ job, other than doing pure research).

I definitely miss having time just explore, play and do interesting stuff, now
that I have both a $DAYJOB and a startup. However, the goal is to get the
startup to a point where I can either:

A. IPO or sell the company, and walk way with enough cash to be financially
independent for life, giving me all time I want to do "fun" stuff.

B. Get the startup to a point where it makes sense to hire somebody else to be
CEO, appoint myself some nonsense title like "Chief Scientist", collect a
reasonable salary, and spend all my time researching and playing with neat
stuff.

It makes me sad though, every time I look around my apartment and see all
these math books, or philosophy books, or history books or whatever, that
reflect some interest I've been wanting to explore forever, but don't have
time for. :-(

~~~
mattchamb
I know exactly how you feel about seeing the books you never have time to
read... <http://sdrv.ms/10HTsYs>

~~~
notimetorelax
If you have difficulty reading AI book, I highly recommend taking this course:

[https://www.edx.org/course/uc-
berkeley/cs188-1x/artificial-i...](https://www.edx.org/course/uc-
berkeley/cs188-1x/artificial-intelligence/579)

Just read the chapters that are being covered in the course and you will have
read one third of it! Second part will start early next year with further
chapters covered.

~~~
mattchamb
I have actually read the majority the AI book, it was the course textbook for
the AI paper I did at university. The reason it is there is because I want to
re-read parts for a project that I have never started.

------
skyraider
I empathize with this a ton. Reminds me of a David Foster Wallace commencement
speech in which the takeaway point was something to the effect of 'you
graduates don't yet know what day in, day out really means.'
(<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SFt7EzpsZQo>)

Come on folks, let's think up a better primary waking activity for the average
person than "attach yourself to someone else's dreams, and help build their
wealth, at the expense of your own intellectual freedom and sanity." It's a
first world problem, but I think privileged first world people should put some
effort into thinking up something better for everyone. Effort meaning an
intentional foray into some creative economics.

The economic world is something that can be shaped. The problems, of course,
are where to start, and how to do it :-)

~~~
unimpressive
>Come on folks, let's think up a better primary waking activity for the
average person than "attach yourself to someone else's dreams, and help build
their wealth, at the expense of your own intellectual freedom and sanity."

Part of the reason that efforts to do this have cooled down some is that the
previous attempts didn't go so well.

<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Internationale>

~~~
skyraider
Socialism is about attaching yourself to the community (or usually the
Politburo's) 5-year dream for production. Doesn't have anything to do with
individual freedom.

In the 21st century, there is little valid reason to coordinate production
centrally - it's inefficient and causing industries to bumble along,
generally. The direction now is to automate production and have universal
minimum income that can be used for competitive purchasing of goods and
services. Sounds like a market economy to me.

~~~
unimpressive
>Doesn't have anything to do with individual freedom.

Generally 20th century enterprises employed millions of factory workers as
machines in a giant productive machine, with the benefits going to the
founders/owners/etc. Socialist movements were an attempt to capture this value
for the people creating it. Which would presumably mean you didn't have to
work as much.

As a casual reading of history will tell you, it didn't work.

>In the 21st century, you there is little valid reason to coordinate
production centrally

I wholly doubt that decentralized manufacturing solutions benefit from
economies of scale as well as their centralized kin. (Assuming you're talking
about 3D Printing/etc/all.)

>Sounds like a market economy to me.

I would hope so. Command economies are generally a bad idea.

~~~
skyraider
The economic concept of centrally-coordinated production has nothing to do
with 3D printing (?) or "centralized" / "decentralized" in the computing or
distributed systems sense.

It has everything to do with economic planning (the Argentinian government at
one point literally had a room where they president and staff would sit in
command chairs and plan out production across the economy, although I don't
think it was ever used).

Sure, socialism was designed to let the employees capture value. But
intellectual freedom is different from _who gets to capture the value._ Even
in America today, there are employee-owned companies. If capturing the value
is what you care most about, you don't need socialism - just work for an
employee-owned company.

~~~
rhizome
_just work for an employee-owned company._

How is this different than, "attaching yourself to a community," which you
denigrated above?

~~~
skyraider
Two ways: It's voluntary, and you might get some of the profits if the company
goes in the green.

In a state socialist economy, you have to go work on the pig farm or whatever.
In a market-ish economy, the attachment to a particular community is more
voluntary. You can, more often that not, choose which one you want to join.

------
AndyKelley
I recently quit my job due to having an eerily similar feeling. I saved enough
money to take a break for even a year or two if I want. It is difficult to
express how much more fulfilled I feel following my own academic pursuits
rather than someone else's business plan.

So far my plan for the future is:

    
    
      1. Enjoy as much time off as my heart desires, until I start feeling monetary pressure.
      2. Suck it up and get a job that is boring and pays an inordinate amount of money.
      3. Do that for 1-2 years, living frugally, fattening my savings.
      4. Repeat.
    

Better suggestions welcome.

~~~
enraged_camel
I'm going about it a different way: work hard while I'm young and save (i.e.
invest) as much as I can so that I can retire early. My current retirement age
goal is 45.

~~~
manmal
What if you die at age 44? And what if there is hyper-inflation?

~~~
corford
You bet the farm and lost. Shit happens sometimes...

------
mratzloff
> _I Wasn't Prepared for Work_

Some people just aren't cut out for the business world. Centuries ago they
might have become monks or clergy.

These days they exit academia with a master's degree or Ph.D., try
unsuccessfully to fit into the business world, then retreat back to academia
and eventually become associate professors or professors.

It's very easy to spot these types of people in interviews. I generally pass
on them because it's been my experience that in the business world they are
rudderless. They are very smart, but they often don't understand why companies
pass on them.

On the other hand, in this case, it may just be the four-hour commute. No job
is worth traveling four hours in a car each day, unless it's the only one you
can find and you're supporting a family. If that's not the case, find
something closer, or move. San Francisco isn't the only place that creates
software.

------
nick_urban
Among the HN crowd, and especially those who dislike working for others, I'm
surprised there isn't more of a focus on early retirement. If you make an
upper-middle class salary, it's not difficult to become financially
independent in a decade, even if you don't "strike it big".

Here's a great article by a programmer-turned-blogger about how savings rate
affects time-to-retirement:

[http://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2012/01/13/the-shockingly-
sim...](http://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2012/01/13/the-shockingly-simple-math-
behind-early-retirement/)

------
skyraider
Wait, ya'll, let me know what you think about this idea as a way to enable
more people to work on math, CS and other formalized things and get paid. More
generally, this is a potential way to solve the friction between what workers
_are_ doing and what they are _capable of_ doing.

I have this notion that there should be an online community that formalizes
the search for solutions to open problems. Each open problem has _directions_
and _attempts_. Proof software validates attempts, and senior community
members discard fruitless directions.

Let's say you want to tackle a hard unsolved math problem. Import all of the
research directions to date, and log the attempts. Recursively log directions
and attempts, and build up a tree of research into the problem.

Generous organizations and governments set up very large prizes for successful
solutions, and when a solution is discovered and verified, contributors are
rewarded according to merit. The person who provides the proof gets the
largest prize, and the folks higher up in the tree for that problem who
defined new directions get some money, too.

Research will accelerate, so it's worth the money. It doesn't solve the
problem of tedious work in general - it only solves it for the specific case
of workers who, due to friction and the incentive structure in the economy
today, are producing at less than their potential.

------
roguecoder
Productivity is antithetical to intellectual exploration. Software is a craft
pursuit, essentially blue-collar work. The OP does not wish to be a craftsman.
He wishes to be an intellectual, an explorer, an inventor, all of which are
pursuits of luxury, enabled by the efforts of those people who actually make
things and do the labor of the world. I find it unfortunate that in stating
his preferences he finds the need to dismiss the value and joy of crafting.

It used to be that those luxury pursuits were the realm of the upperclass or
the genius, though more recently they were subsidized by the labor union-
enabled middle class support of public universities. Such accessibility,
though, is a historical anomaly and has fallen apart with the fall in funding
for higher education.

I enjoy making things, even out of parts, because those choices are valuable.
The application of design patterns is joyful, even if it involves creating
nothing from whole cloth, because of the rapid creation of a product in which
I take pride. I recommend to the OP that if he genuinely does not enjoy what
he is doing, he seek out some other field, part time work or simply long-term
employment where his employer will appreciate algorithmic innovations (I find
computer vision to be an excellent field for this).

------
orangethirty
This is why I freelance remotely. I set my own hours, charge by day of work
(or by week), and don't really need to commute (drove less than 200 miles in 6
months(grocery shopping)). I know I'm lucky.

------
gt565k
Why not use that 2 hour commute to learn a new language? Pop in some audio of
sentences, grammar, and vocab words. I'm sure you can find plenty of audio
resources for new languages online, and start learning!

Everyone is so set on coding for their personal projects. Why not explore
other areas like learning a new language, and expand your skills.

~~~
SandB0x
Easier said than done - your advice sounds a bit like
[http://www.theonion.com/articles/find-the-thing-youre-
most-p...](http://www.theonion.com/articles/find-the-thing-youre-most-
passionate-about-then-do,31742/).

I can't imagine how exhausting four hours of commuting per day must be.

~~~
toomuchtodo
I do three hours a day (1.5 hours each way) from a Chicago suburb to downtown,
5 days a week. It's exhausting.

------
timothybone
Is academia an excuse to "hide out" for a while and continue being an
autodidact? Also, the 2 hour commute, as I'm sure you suspect, is no small
part of the intellectual killer.

~~~
tel
Only if you want to be slowly edged out. Academia actively kills off people
too interested in taking classes and insufficiently interested in doing work
for whatever preset research effort can pay their rent.

------
govindkabra31
Some tips I learned from my commute from south bay <\--> SF for two years.

\- Take caltrain for normal days. Drive for days with evening events. Trains
are far slower in off peak hours.

\- Use a bike for station to home/office. Bart or VTA are shit.

\- Get up early, use bullet train (last one leaves Mt View ~8am)

\- Use a data plan on train to catch up on emails, code reviews, etc. Or type
up some code that you can finish up compiling debugging when in office.

I probably would prefer this commute over 30minute drive within south bay.

------
mattchamb
This post resonates with me a lot. I have often considered writing something
similar called "How I became a 9-5 programmer." I got my current job straight
out of university, about 2.5 years ago. Since I started working, I have
noticed that I feel both more, and less capable. What I mean by this is that
while I am certainly more skilled at writing software than when I started
working, I feel much less optimistic and able to tackle hard problems.

~~~
rangibaby
This just sounds like a case of reality setting in. When people know a little
about something, they often think they are at a far higher level than they
really are. There is a word for this, but it's evading me ATM.

------
hypersoar
Oh man, this really hit me hard.

I'm halfway through an MA in mathematics and thinking about going on to a
Ph.D. I've done very well at my current institution and think I'll have a
decent chance of getting into a good program. But I'm not totally convinced
I'll make it in the long run. I've seen some friends of mine go through the
academic job search this year, and it's absolute hell. I don't imagine it'll
improve when I hit the market. If I go the academic track, I might not get a
job. Or worse, I get caught in postdoc limbo or am denied tenure. Then I'll
essentially be where I am now, minus 5-15 years of my life (I'm studying pure
mathematics. I'm not likely to pick up any directly-marketable skills in
further graduate studies).

Meanwhile, essentially my entire social infrastructure is moving to the Bay
Area. The appeal of going up there, getting a job (establishing financial
security next year instead of next decade), and being around people who I know
I want to have in my life, is becoming hard to ignore.

I'm frighted by my eventual prospects in the academic job market, but I
already knew that was scary. But down the other path might be something at
least as bad.

Fuck.

~~~
vlasev
I saw a statistic claiming there are about 5 graduate students for every
professor in the American graduate schools. Unless you want to really pursue
the academic path, maybe a phd is not worth it.

------
nilkn
> But the environment matters a lot less than the fact that when I get home
> from work—which is a two hour commute each way (sorry, I can’t afford to
> live in downtown San Francisco)—I just feel like being mentally
> incapacitated.

Although this seems like a minor point in the article, and to some extent it
is, I think this is still fairly significant. Four hours of commuting every
day is a hell of a lot. I'd eventually come to hate almost any job if I had to
commute that much.

I'm also quite confused on why this person didn't go to graduate school. By
his own admission, he's not making enough to even live inside San Francisco
(you can certainly share an apartment downtown on a modest income if you're
frugal), so he's not really getting the main advantage that a career offers
over graduate school: money. If he's not going to make much money doing
something he dislikes, why not instead make little money doing something he
loves?

~~~
brotchie
Exactly my thoughts. He comes across as the ideal candidate for further study.
No doubt, if he's as capable as he makes out, he'd be able to get a PhD
scholarship, and spend all day doing what he wants do to. Granted, there is
still a lot of "politicking" in grad school, but you can avoid most of it.

re: commuting. I spent 10 years commuting 1 hour each way (2 hour daily
commute) to and from first high school, then university. The biggest quality
of life improvement I've ever experienced was moving closer to wherever I had
to be day-in-day-out. Every single relocation decision has been chosen
explicitly to lower my commute time.

------
mattdeboard
Thanks for making me feel fortunate for working where I work, doing what I'm
doing, with the team I'm a part of, HN.

------
papaver
"I find myself abstaining from studying advanced topics in programming and
computer science, and instead sticking to this comfort zone of what I know."

that pretty much sums up why you may not enjoy work anymore. i've been doing
the exact same thing for the last 8 years, research on google, find an example
that gets me close, manipulate it to my desire to get the results im looking
for. this is not a bad thing, and is also an art.

i find one can get a rush through learning, it seems you get the same when you
delve into certain subjects. i usually get bored with working at a company
after a couple of years. mostly due to the repetition that ensues when one is
comfortable with their environment. i've worked in 5 different industries
using 13 different languages in the last 8 years.

you always have a choice on how to solve the problem. implement it the easy
way you know how, or do extra research and find a more optimal solution. i
code in a manner that excites me. this usually leads to better code as well as
learning new techniques in the process. i do a lot of language research and
slowly work my way to the most advanced techniques a language has to offer. i
learned about pythons named tuples the other day, iterator tool's groupby and
chain. i use these new constructs when i can.

if you make learning part of the job, it stays enjoyable longer. i also make
an effort to learn other things outside of tech at home. learn to skate, play
the guitar, learn a new language.

don't get burned out on coding.

------
strlen
I'll say this: it sounds like the author went through a great deal of stress
(interviewing, moving to another state, taking a new job, taking on a huge
commute, living in an unfamiliar area) and stress _does_ make one feel like
they're less intellectually capable.

I found best way to deal with this is to connect with like-minded folks: look
for people who do interesting things (whether at work or elsewhere) and who
live or work next to you; at the least grab dinner or drinks with them
occasionally, attend meetups/conferences that they attend, etc.. To your
surprise, you may find that many people with what you see as enviable careers
went through same challenges as you have (everyone had to face self-doubt,
stress, and exhaustion at some point or another).

Others talked about commute, but I'll suggest some actionable choices:
commuting from Oakland/Berkeley/Emeryville is 20-25 minutes door-to-door
(granted these places are no longer inexpensive, but still much better than
downtown SF -- if by downtown SF you mean somewhere close to a Bart Station).
If you're willing to commute for 30-60 minutes (still less than two hours),
Pleasanton/Dublin (a 40-45 minute Bart ride) is an option, as is Daly
City/Colma (30-40 minutes), or Sunset (40-45 minute commute by Muni Metro).

Education is also a great alternatives: if your high school grades are too
poor to be admitted to a university, California has a great community college
system (e.g., Foothill or De Anza). While the days of "guaranteed transfer to
UC Berkeley or UCLA" are over due to budget cuts, you still have a high chance
of getting into a good school (including Berkeley MA CS program, even if
perhaps not EECS).

What you've probably realized right now is that you've got the rest of your
life to work: it's one thing to drop out if your side projects becomes a wild
success, it's another thing to forego college altogether in favour of work.
Furthermore (and I am not defending this as necessarily just or right, it's
more of "the way things are" right now) coming in as an intern can generally
be a gateway into more rewarding jobs as opposed to trying to find a full time
job without any experience in areas that compose the set intersection of
"interesting" and "in-demand". I've known folks who went back to academia
after 10 years in the industry (most in order to attend graduate school, but a
few returned for undergrad) and it is really never too late.

~~~
michaelochurch
_To your surprise, you may find that many went through same challenges as you
have._

That's why I post things I "should never say" under my real name. Ten years
from now when I succeed in spite of it, I want people to realize that this
painful shit is part of the path, rather than suffering in silence and being
ashamed of their (actually very common) setbacks. We live in a phenomenally
stupid world where a lot of horrendous, incapable people have power, and if
there is anything good about you, you will suffer for it; but people overcome
that anyway. It's not as common as it should be, but it happens.

I can't stand this world where people pretend to be happier than they are in
order to project status, and thus create a world of full-out dishonesty that
almost no one has the courage to challenge. I'd much rather bring out the
truth so we can start fixing things and solving problems. I'm young, but I
won't always be; so let's get this shit over with, be completely honest with
ourselves as a society, tear down whatever powers deserve it, and build
something better.

~~~
strlen
Erm, I understand you have some strong opinions on this, but I actually meant
something slightly different: people go through tough periods but generally
bounce back and are _actually_ happy (even during their tough periods).

It isn't evidence that you need to "tear down whatever powers ": how confident
are you that whatever you'll build will actually be better?

I'll say one last thing: if your system design goal is having a high uptime
guarantee, it's easier to do so by building systems that have a low mean time
to recovery (MTTR) as opposed to infinitely high mean time between failure
(MTBF). Applying this analogy to other topics is left as exercise to reader.

~~~
michaelochurch
_people go through tough periods but generally bounce back and are actually
happy (even during their tough periods)._

I believe that, too.

I'm not an unhappy person. I'm angry often, but if you recognize anger and put
it in its proper place, it need not be overwhelming. There's nothing wrong
with having anger. The problem is letting it control you; that's when you're
losing.

Happiness and anger are not mutually exclusive. In fact, it's hard to be happy
if you don't experience negative emotions (anger, fear, disgust) in proper,
limited, and appropriate ways.

 _It isn't evidence that you need to "tear down whatever powers ": how
confident are you that whatever you'll build will actually be better?_

Extremely so. The world (at least, the business world; I don't think public-
sector "politicians" are that bad, the worst are rarely worse than the
constituents who elect them) is run by some of the worst people imaginable.

~~~
theorique
_The world (at least, the business world; I don't think public-sector
"politicians" are that bad, the worst are rarely worse than the constituents
who elect them) is run by some of the worst people imaginable._

Most of your comments don't seem particularly anti-business, but this seems
fairly out there. What's your basis for this particular claim?

~~~
jacalata
He had a manager he didn't like once at google and has built his worldview
around it.

~~~
yuhong
It is not just that. I think going through bad startups too.

------
grey-area
Not all jobs require producing a solution in a short time to a trivial
problem, some jobs involve a lot of abstract thought (academia, some software
companies) which the OP seems to enjoy, though very few combine high salary,
thinking freely on topics which interest you, no workplace politics, and
convenient location, however if you are not in a job and environment which
satisfies you, you clearly have the abilities and resources to change that
situation.

To the OP I'd say:

    
    
        Ditch the commute - either move closer to work or find other work - I don't know how you can stand a 4 hour commute, that alone would knock me out.
        Long term, ditch the job - it's clearly not a good fit for you, there are plenty of jobs out there suited to  your particular interests. They won't all be well paid but they won't require a 2 hour commute and work you find tedious either. 
        Accept compromise on some areas (i.e. lower pay or living with others) in order to gain on others (short commute).
        Don't succumb to bitterness or blame others for your predicament, it doesn't help.

------
e3pi
RE: "When I was 16 or 17, I was exploring the relation x ....After all of
that, I came up with, through experimental ways, methods for approximating x
to1/x using rational functions, very reminiscent of Padé approximations."

At 16 or 17 your brain filled with a hot-rush golden glowing light as you knew
you moved the whole ball of wax.

You want that.

We also. Therefore please:

Show HN: (Padé) Rational Approximations of y = x to 1/x?

------
calinet6
Just a bit of a shock at the end here -- "my decision to rush off to stuff my
bank account."

Not everyone gets to _decide_ and not everyone _stuffs their bank account._
Far from it. It seems that the OP is very self-aware and aware of his own
benefits, but the luxury for work to be a decision is one you should never
take for granted.

------
kmm
Fascinating. I have the same symptoms as described by the author, but they're
due to a major depression. I stay in my comfort zone, and am lacking the
brilliance I had earlier, if I may be so unhumble. I can't write code anymore.

I'm sad for the author, but it's interesting to recognize myself in a
completely different setting.

------
vinceguidry
Is a two-hour commute really necessary? I found rooms on Craigslist for $650 a
month in South SF. Personally though, I'd shoot for one of the $850/month pads
I saw in downtown. As long as you're making at least $60K that should be
doable. Shaving 20 mins off a daily commute is worth 200 bucks at least.

------
test001only
An amazing article which resonates well with what is happening to me. I find
myself just copy pasting lot of code from stackoverflow(website), leaning to
google for every answer and not able to come up with good solution for even
moderate tough problems. Earlier I used to be able to convey my thoughts well
in writing at least - now even that has degenerated I think. Thinking about
something deeply is now a chore for me. I get distracted, irritated very
easily and this increases mental tension...this is a vicious circle. I stopped
TV for the fear of it dumbing me down. Now I am abusing stackoverflow, google
and getting into the same situation. Fear of job security and having to learn
just enough to get the job done is not helping either.

------
mwfunk
I feel for the author, but it seems like (whether he realizes it or not) he's
not complaining about the modern working world so much as he's just
complaining about fundamental facts of life- at some point you've got to move
away from home and start supporting yourself, and it may take a while to find
a way to do that in a way that doesn't drive you crazy.

At the end he says this:

"Had I known the burden that an average (or above average) job would put
forth, I might have re-evaluated my decision to rush off to stuff my bank
account."

The phrasing, "to stuff my bank account" makes it sound like he feels like he
made some Faustian bargain to give up his soul for the filthy lucre. But
that's not why he rushed off. He rushed off because of this:

"I was approaching my 20s and I had to get a job. Living at home off of my
parents was not sustainable, and wasn’t conducive to a better future."

Is he saying, he wished he never left home, and continued living off of his
parents? Because I hope he realizes that that's not an option, or at least not
one that's going to be good for him or anyone else in the long term.

Or, is he saying that he had achieved some reasonable way of supporting
himself back at home, but he kept moving around and chasing higher-paying
jobs, until some financial version of the Peter Principle kicked in and he
attained some high-paying position that he hated? It doesn't sound like it,
since he still complains about not being able to afford a decent place near
work and spending 4 hours commuting every day.

I'm not sure he's saying anything other than verbalizing why he feels unhappy
right now, and for that I feel bad for him. This is the thing though- he's
clearly approaching a fork in the road where he's going to have to make some
tough decisions in order to get back to a reasonable level of happiness. The
fork is whether he blames the world for his problems, or uses it as an
opportunity to grow and find new ways to be happy and satisfied. If he blames
the world for his problems, then presumably he quits his job, moves back in
with his parents, and goes back to being addicted to his inner world all day
long for as long as that lasts. He doesn't change, nothing changes, he just
figures out some way to prolong his adolescence for a while longer.

The much better alternative is to just realize that a life well-lived
continually pushes you outside your comfort zone, and the best skill you can
acquire is to figure out how to roll with the punches and figure out new ways
to be happy when the old ones aren't practical anymore. People in your life
come and go, jobs come and go, where you live will change all the time, and
your amount of free time and what you can do with it will change continuously
over the years. More than anything else, YOU will change, the things you need
will change, and the things that make you happy will change. You'll miss the
people and things and places that are gone, but all of the pressure is on you
to adapt and find new ways to be happy. It completely and totally sucks balls,
but everybody has to go through it and it hits some people a lot harder than
others.

There's things you can change and things you can't change. You can't change
having to support yourself, or being responsible for your own health and
happiness. But you can change just about everything else. Is a 4 hour commute
making you miserable? Get a new job that's much closer to home. Or move closer
to work. If you can't stand the commute, then one of those two things has to
change, period. Also, it sounds like his passion for the more abstract,
academic side of things would make him a perfect fit for grad school or a PhD.
Maybe your parents have to help you with that for a while, or you can get a
scholarship and/or student loans. Every problem you can verbalize like this is
just a question that you need to come up with an answer for. Actually, based
on what he wrote, it kind of blows my mind that he didn't want to at least
stick around for an MS. Finally, he does sound like he may have some
depression issues, and he should at least meet with a therapist or
psychiatrist a few times to talk this stuff out. Nothing wrong with that, it
happens to people all the time. Good luck, you won't need it though.

~~~
tome
Great comment. At many stages of my life things suddenly just _got harder_.
Bit by bit I've learned to cope with them. I'm sure there are many more such
occasions on the horizon.

------
scotty79
Find a job you can do remotely, therefore no commute. Move to another country.
You'll be rich there so you'll have nice place to live in. At some point you
might want to ditch US citizenship to make IRS stop draining your income.
Accumulate enough money to retire for few years than do it. During this few
years have fun with your own stuff. You'll create some passive income
inevitably, just don't sweat about it. It might be even enough to live in his
country without ever taking a job again. find a wife, have an awesome kid. Die
happily.

If you are white I suggest moving to Poland. Locals won't be able to tell
whether you are foreigner unless you speak. And in Poland we don't speak much
with the other people, apart from friends.

------
grannyg00se
The lead-up describes somebody who definitely seems destined for research
work, PhD, think-tank analyst, that kind of thing. It's not surprising that a
run-of-the-mill code-slinging J.O.B is a terrible fit and I feel bad about it
- but it's never too late to change paths. Why not make an effort to steer out
of the situation into a career that is a better fit? You smashed a
multivariable calculus course in less than a week and here you are working
next to people who barely scraped through a general arts degree. It's painful
to even hear about.

~~~
vlasev
The problem is more complex than that I believe. I can say that my experience
with mathematics has been very similar up until a certain point during my
undergraduate years when money became really tough for me. All the stress and
uncertainty ate me up and I ended up feeling a lot like his later self much
earlier than at a run-of-the-mill job. There simply aren't enough spots in
academia and during graduate school a big portion of people like us don't get
paid enough to get by. I'd say most of us burn up before they get to the end.

------
genofon
I think the point is another: it seems that only if you do maths you are
smart. And whey all the formulas at the beginning, to make sure the reader
think you are smart? You might have lost some abilities in that field but you
gained others, to me more valuable than doing demonstrations.

If you like math do something with that, to me it seems that academia is more
suitable for what you want from your life.

------
carbocation
> _I have no room for a chalkboard or whiteboard, unless I wanted to cover up
> half of my mirrored closet._

You have a mirrored closet? Problem solved. You have a fancy dry-erase board,
no modifications necessary.

This is a random offshoot of the actual point, but I think it's useful to know
that you can use any window or mirror as a dry-erase board.

------
jsejwal
From the article - "shortest distance between a point and a line".

Distance between a point and a line is the length of the line segment that
joins the point and the line, and is perpendicular to it. It's nonsense to
speak of "shortest distance". It tends to imply that there are many distances
between...one of them is shortest.

------
Tycho
I found this blog entry interesting not so much for the point being made, but
as an insight into the intellectual pursuits of an extremely intelligent
teenager.

At that age, I was mostly playing Goldeneye 007.

------
jumpbug
blasted simple neural network behavior equations :P

------
phoenix5a
Maybe you're learning now that the skills you learned and valued so much
weren't really that valuable at all?

~~~
raymondh
The author's point is that "valuable" isn't the same as "valued by others who
are willing to pay you", and that the latter can interfere with the former.

------
calhoun137
I just read like all of this guys blog posts, they are great!

------
michaelochurch
OP deserves a lot of credit for having the courage to write this.

1\. Software was _supposed_ to be trans-industrial. If you knew how to write
code, you could work anywhere in the industrial economy. This meant it would
have all the same benefits (stability, industry-agnosticism) of management
without the negatives (subjectivity, politics). Unfortunately, that didn't
last. Managers took that from us and created a culture of
oblique/inappropriate specialization because it's easier to do that than to
admit that they don't understand what we do.

2\. Our industry has become _extremely_ anti-intellectual. There's a sharp
phase change between what your professors groom you for (out of a legacy
leftist hope, never realized, that if a leadership education is delivered down
into society's middle; then the scorned middle classes will revolt against the
elite) and the world of Work, which hasn't evolved in most places. Adam Smith
called Britain "a nation of shopkeepers". Corporate America is a nation of
social climbers. It's fucking revolting. The good news is that, after a few
years, you get used to it and develop the social skills necessary to survive
it.

3\. I don't think the future is in the Bay Area or Manhattan. Those are great
places to build your career and gain some credibility/savings/experience while
society figures out where the future will be. However, if you want to build
the future, California's not the place for that anymore. Forty years ago,
Northern CA was where people went to escape the _Mad Men_ nonsense. Now,
houses in Palo Alto-- a _suburb_ ; we're not talking San Francisco-- are more
expensive than many places in Manhattan. The future's going to come out of a
location that's free from the high-rent nonsense that creates a work culture
of subordination. The years that made Silicon Valley cheap were those in which
few feared the boss because one could make living money doing odd jobs, the
cost of living being so low. That's over now. The Valley is Manhattan (again,
_Mad Men_ ) minus winter and with worse architecture.

4\. Through all this, you gotta play the long game. Sure, you're not going to
be able to do hard experimental mathematics. You may have to let that dream
go. Just keep current/sharp enough to be eligible for interesting work when it
comes up. _That_ is doable. Things are terrible right now for cognitive
1-percenters who want meaningful, interesting work (i.e. an upper middle class
salary isn't enough, and it's never "stable" for top-0.x-percent intellects
because of the job security risks that level of talent implies) but they won't
always be like this.

5\. Relatedly, if you watch the social climbers, they don't do a lot of real
work. If you get even passably good at their game, you can get by with a
couple hours of focused effort and that leaves 5-6 for self-directed learning.
(Don't write code that you'll use later on work time-- you don't own that--
but feel free to explore and just rewrite the code _from scratch_ at home.)
Don't feel wrong about doing this; it's a crooked game and that makes
criminals of everyone. Work is (for 95+ percent of people) just about
advancing your career; the other shit is stuff people say to distract the
naive and clueless. That idealistic shit is a luxury of the extremely
privileged, and you need to pretend it as a status signal, but don't believe
your own lie. Proles have to take what they can. Just be smart about it.
Stealing office supplies == stupid. It's illegal and wrong and dumb and you'll
get fired. Making decisions that help your career but aren't optimal for
others (who don't give a shit about you either) == smart, if you don't get
caught. If you steal, make sure to take intangibles.

6\. If you can, start getting up at 5:00 in the morning. Get some productive
hours banged out before you go to work. If you can't go to bed early, then
compensate by taking mid-afternoon naps in a place where your co-workers won't
find you (almost no one gets anything done during those hours anyway).
Relatedly, it's worth a lot of money to kill your commute. If you can't afford
to live near work, then consider a different city.

7\. There are jobs that aren't like the corporate hell being describe above.
They exist, but they're not common, and they're probably extremely selective
in the Bay Area. When you get one, hold on to it for as long as it's good and
learn as much as you can.

Also, on this: [http://michaelochurch.wordpress.com/2013/01/07/we-should-
pay...](http://michaelochurch.wordpress.com/2013/01/07/we-should-pay-people-
not-to-subordinate/)

~~~
hughes
_The future's going to come out of a location that's free from the high-rent
nonsense that creates a work culture of subordination._

I've been toying with the idea of a _rural technologist_. Sure, if the startup
I'm part of goes big, my equity might get me (most of) a house near the city.
Or, I can take my skills and my money to the country. How might society change
if rural areas had an influx of people who care about applying modern tech
outside of city life? I feel like I (and maybe OP) would flourish with lower
living costs, time to think and experiment, large tracts of land and
grassroots farming & manufacturing industry.

~~~
sliverstorm
It may not be as crazy as it sounds at first. Per documentaries, that was why
the Silicon Valley came to be. Land was cheap, so Shockley (specifically
avoiding the old centers of industry) set up shop there, and the rest is
history.

~~~
kkwok
That's skipping the substantial part where Terman establishes Stanford's
engineering department, brings in massive government funding, and encourages
students to commercialize the research.

~~~
sliverstorm
Yes, certainly not to say Shockley was all alone in establishing in the Bay
Area- but without him, would it be called the _Silicon_ Valley? :)

~~~
charle5
perhaps shockley would have actually preferred if it were called 'germanium
valley' :)

------
dschiptsov
The ability to google and copy-paste the answer is as common as the ability to
drive a car - it is absolutely nothing special and absolutely must have. And
of course it isn't enough to secure a job, let alone to make something people
will appreciate.

And, pardon me, but having a chalkboard in one's room is a sign of
narcissism.) Get a Ph.D from Princeton first.)

------
yoster
Welcome to the real world :)

~~~
staunch
Welcome to the world _most people_ live in, would be more accurate.

------
kmasters
Staring at traffic for 4 hours a day is no way to treat oneself.

~~~
foobarian
He should treat a 4 hour commute as a life-threatening emergency. That is
insane. Drop what you are doing and find somewhere closer to live or get a
closer job.

~~~
smtddr
Not even just "treat" it like that; it _IS_ a life-threatening emergency. I
was forced into that exact situation for 1 month. Even paying $4 bridge-toll.
It wasn't even a question if I was going to quit that job, the situation fell
apart on its own. I just couldn't sustain it. That daily 4hr commute eclipses
any other issue he has, IMHO. Whatever physical or mental energy you didn't
burn up in the office is destroyed in 4hrs of traffic. Nobody should live like
that.

------
jostmey
I suspect that part of the problem is that many people working on programming
projects no longer feel like they are making the world a better place. Many of
the world-changing ideas have been implemented. For many people, what is left
but to continually optimize what already exists?

~~~
Peaker
> Many of the world-changing ideas have been implemented. For many people,
> what is left but to continually optimize what already exists?

This sounds unimaginative to the point of absurdity.

