
I quit the tech industry - jaimebuelta
http://eev.ee/blog/2015/06/09/i-quit-the-tech-industry/
======
probablyfiction
This is what burnout looks like. Unless Yelp has a toxic work culture, it's
likely the author brought it on themselves by pushing too hard. After several
months, the author will probably start thinking about work again, and begin
the job search once more.

Not to say that the author's points are invalid; it's a terrible feeling to
have to spend your most productive hours working on someone else's problems.
He or she may find themselves drawn toward entrepreneurship. There's nothing
quite like working on your own idea...especially if that idea is going to make
you cash.

Office culture is draining. Some people aren't cut out for it. Additionally,
programmers tend to push themselves too hard for too long out of a misplaced
sense of loyalty to the company. They're being paid huge sums and sometimes
feel that they need to work extremely hard to deserve what they're being paid.
They don't see that the work they do is extremely valuable in and of itself.
Employment is a business arrangement; a coder doesn't owe the company anything
more than their agreed-upon hours of work.

If/when the author does return to work, it's likely they will be much more
likely to put themselves first and the company second. They'll likely have a
plan to escape working for someone else ever again.

~~~
johan_larson
Generally speaking, if you have to pay people to do it, there is something
nasty about the work. It's strenuous or dangerous or dirty or degrading or
stressful or boring. If it were actually fun, people would be doing it for
free.

(Exceptions, anyone?)

We programmers are quite lucky. At its worst our work is only frustrating. And
we are well compensated, usually.

Don't get me wrong; programming itself can be lots of fun. But what you get
paid for isn't the fun stuff. I doubt there is anyone who gets excited about
upgrading and debugging aging Java applications.

~~~
borplk
> if you have to pay people to do it, there is something nasty about the work

Even if someone loves doing something they can still ask to be paid to do it
for other people

~~~
dragonwriter
Sometimes, doing it for other people is the nasty bit.

------
cstross
> The only things they have in common are that their main products are
> websites with tertiary features that let you buy things. Yet both of them
> ended up scrambling to write their own payment platforms from scratch. What
> the fuck is going on?

* Raises hand *

I was the first dev hire at Datacash and wrote their back-end servers.
Datacash only came into existence because an earlier (circa 1995-96) startup
trying to sell stuff via the web couldn't handle payments without a card
reader and a dialup connection. Handling payments properly is _hard_ ,
especially as if you do it right (and your business grows) you turn into a
juicy big target for black hats everywhere.

I also resemble the OC's burnout, except fifteen years down the line and
mostly recovered ... by not working in tech any more. I'm a novelist and I set
up and do my own projects more or less in my own time and (as a much earlier
tech burnout case said, in Tracy Kidder's "The Soul of a New Machine") I try
not to deal with any time frame shorter than a season.

Yes, there is life after you quit your last high pressure tech sector job. And
yes, you can find things to invest your personal interest in that don't chew
you up and spit you out and which earn you a living. The problem is with the
way corporations are internally constituted -- especially with hierarchies of
control and command where the people at the top don't have any deep
understanding of the problems the people at the bottom are engaged with.

~~~
bwanab
Sorry to say, I'm glad you burned out - otherwise no "Halting State",....

------
yc1010
I have been working for myself for last 8 years after completing my masters,
in hindsight financially I did not do too badly (tho there was some great and
ups and incredible downs!) and it is NICE working from home and watching your
kid grow (tho there are quite a lot of distractions!!! says he who is
procrastinating reading HN :D )

BUT if I was offered a job with guaranteed employment and steady wages and
(gaaasp pension!) like being a teacher I would go for it. Having kids changes
your perspective.

I would have been financially much better of if it wasn't for punitive taxes
in Ireland, here you reach ~53% high tax rate with only about ~$35K in income.
And then there are new property/water taxes they brought in now as well as 23%
VAT :( All of these taxes really make you ask yourself "why bother work harder
and longer" and really kill any incentive to work. And no we do not get free
healthcare here still need to pay for medical insurance out of aftertax
earnings. And as a business owner I do not qualify for the full welfare if
things go to shit, despite paying high rate of social taxes.

edit: Now that I read my rant in second half of my past, no wonder no good
startups come from here, the atmosphere is toxic to entrepreneurship.

~~~
simonebrunozzi
It is (was) great for Ireland, though. That's how they attracted tons of
(large) tech companies to Ireland. It's the perfect match: low corporate tax,
no incentive for people to go away and do their own startups, which means you
can get paid less as there as less alternatives for you. Very smart play by
Ireland.

Then, the EU went back to them and told them they couldn't keep doing this,
and very soon (is it 2016?) they will rack up corporate tax and make a
fortune. And if you're Google, you built a large office and hired thousands of
people, you're not going to leave anytime soon.

~~~
pjc50
_And if you 're Google, you built a large office and hired thousands of
people, you're not going to leave anytime soon_

Plenty of people have said that about other employers in the past and come
into work one day to find the doors locked.

------
sbisker
>I net enough to pay off the mortgage, so I’m doing that, which will leave the
entire household debt-free and cut our expenses drastically

The lead seems buried here. This isn't someone quitting, this is someone in a
position of incredible privilege, essentially retiring (or at least going on
"funemployment" for a little while).

There are far darker ways to make far less money, that are far more worthy of
dramatic storm cloud drawings. Maybe once they see past their burnout they'll
realize how incredibly privileged they were to even accomplish what they were
able to (working remotely no less!) in the first place. Burnout really is a
sad and scary thing.

~~~
eevee
I'm fully aware how lucky I am to be able to pull this off. (I don't have
nearly enough saved to actually _retire_ on, though.)

Knowing that other people have it worse — or even that I used to have it worse
— doesn't make it any better.

------
zxcvvcxz
An interesting comment I saw in this thread is the suggestion to take
medication [presumably to make working a job easier / more manageable].

To this I say -- are you fucking kidding?

Working like we do is already fairly unnatural. Taking medication to allow
yourself to continue doing something unnatural, which you don't even like, has
to be the one of the most dehumanizing things I can think of. That's modern
day, self-induced slavery if you ask me.

And yes, I have experience with this. In college, I met with a psychiatrist
about depression-related symptoms. I described my life circumstances (school,
work, relationship, etc), and after just one 45-minute session he prescribed
me SSRIs. They did nothing, except creates horrific withdrawals as I started
coming off them. Then I made the real changes: I ended my toxic relationship,
quit my cubicle job, and used my savings to have an enjoyable life for about a
year. Then I finished school.

The OP seems to have had a pretty sweet set-up (remote, high-paying job, etc)
but misery is still misery. Another comment mentioned burn-out. In my
experience burn-out rarely has to do with the volume of work, but rather the
mental anguish experienced. I've been burned out working 9 to 5; and energized
beyond belief working 12 hour days on my own business.

Here's some advice worth considering for those in similar situations. Quit
your job, or figure out how to go part time. Your company won't mind, you're
quite replaceable most likely. Really cut down on your expenses; get roommates
if you have to (this can be more than a financial improvement -- socializing
and having good friends improves your quality of life).

And my god, quit consumer culture. That thing you think you need to buy with
your next paycheck? You probably don't. What you need is: a roof over your
head, food, laptop/phone, and a gym membership. What's the grand total of all
this, maybe $1K/mo? (Depends where you live I suppose.) I'm assuming you're a
single mid-late 20s male if you're reading this. What else would do you
_really_ need to be happy and spend your time working on your own tech
projects?

Best of luck to the OP and anyone else doing something similar.

~~~
moskie
I'm sorry you had a bad experience with the prescriptions you tried, and that
they didn't work for you. But don't take that to mean you should lash out at
others suggesting it might help this person, or someone else. I think it's a
mistake to assume you know exactly what the OP's problem is, what solutions
would work, and what solutions won't. There's a good chance he himself doesn't
even fully understand why his mental state is what it is, and it could involve
things besides his shitty work life. It is very possible that medication could
help. I understand prescription drugs can be abused, or over-prescribed. But
don't denigrate the notion entirely. Responding to the idea with "are you
fucking kidding?" is out of line.

~~~
zxcvvcxz
The notion that one should consider pharmaceuticals as a solution to not
deriving happiness from a desk job really is outrageous. And that's just from
a statistical standpoint. It's very unlikely to be the "right" solution for
that person.

Same goes for ADHD medication for boys (yes, predominantly boys) in grade
school because they can't sit still and concentrate as they're expected at
such a young age. I find it absurd how commonplace this is becoming. Humans
have not fundamentally changed their genetic makeup in the last few hundred
years. It's much more likely the case that the environment has become
unreasonable, rather than that the kids are failing their roles as humans.

But wait, if you want mindless drones who do as they're told, contribute to
bottom lines, buy shit they don't need to satisfy misery they don't
understand, then by all means, humans are failing. Let's fix that. Let's over-
medicate. Let's teach people how to cope with a life devoid of meaning and
passion.

These are the trends I see when I tune into mainstream narratives and general
societal expectations. And it pisses me off. Can the right medication help a
small subset of the population who are a few standard deviations off in terms
of brain chemistry? Of course it can, that goes without saying. Doesn't mean
we're not facing some disturbing trends in the developed world.

And I'll express myself however I please within HN's guidelines, thank you
very much.

~~~
moskie
The issue is that this post screams clinical depression to me. Yes, he's also
describing a shitty job, one that he will probably benefit from quitting. But
it is also common for the feelings he's having to be the result of more than
just a shitty job. Also, people in healthy mental states prevent these
situations before they get to the breaking point. There's so many factors to
consider, and none of us have all the information. For that reason, it should
not be off the table to suggest he at least consider seeing a trusted and
reputable doctor, and it is irresponsible for you to dismiss that idea
entirely.

> But wait, if you want mindless drones who do as they're told, contribute to
> bottom lines, buy shit they don't need to satisfy misery they don't
> understand

Jesus, what a straw man that is. My approach here is to suggest ways for this
man to find contentedness, maybe even happiness. That can validly include
medication. Yours is to push an agenda against a type of work life you don't
like.

~~~
kelnos
I don't see it that way at all, and I'd like to suggest that attempting to
diagnose clinical depression from a blog post seems a bit ridiculous. She
doesn't sound depressed; she sounds like someone happy to be mostly
financially independent and able to pursue whatever projects she wants, not
something someone else is telling her to do.

I've felt very similarly over the past few years, and I'm working to build
enough of a war chest to make it a reality. I'm not depressed, I'm not burned
out (at least not in a general sense; I do occasionally burn out on specific
aspects and feel the need to pull back)... I just don't derive too much
pleasure building the same things over and over for other people who don't
actually understand technology work and have different priorities than I do.
I've been much luckier at my current job, but I still feel that way
occasionally.

~~~
moskie
I pretty much agree with what you're saying, I just take issue with zxcvvcxz
using the mere suggestion that it could be something more, and something that
might be helped by medication, as an excuse to deride the entire concept of
(responsibly) using medication to treat depression when appropriate.

~~~
zxcvvcxz
I believe you're missing the point of my comments entirely, probably because
you got offended at my tone. That's alright, I realize that I write
provocatively.

To quote what I wrote above,

>Can the right medication help a small subset of the population who are a few
standard deviations off in terms of brain chemistry? Of course it can, that
goes without saying. Doesn't mean we're not facing some disturbing trends in
the developed world.

I am _not_ deriding "the entire concept of (responsibly) using medication to
treat depression when appropriate."

Rather what I'm suggesting is that the vast majority of people in the OP's
situation, or something analogous, are not these brain-chemistry outliers who
require medication. Instead, I suggest that the unnatural environment created
by office cubicle/computer wage slavery runs counter to human nature,
particularly with respect to one's happiness.

I hope it is very clear at this point what I am saying, and that I am not
deriding the use of all medication, but rather, speaking with respect to a
particular environmental example.

------
jahnu
"I had stock options, and I cashed them all in last week. I net enough to pay
off the mortgage, so I’m doing that, which will leave the entire household
debt-free and cut our expenses drastically."

I'm happy for you. Even a tiny bit jealous. But it does in the end make the
whole post sound like a humblebrag to me.

~~~
Mahn
But that's how all posts like these go, HN loves to upvote them for some
reason but they all boil down to "I'm quitting because I have enough money to
do it".

~~~
serve_yay
Boy oh boy, that really puts a different spin on this post, doesn't it. I wish
I had the cash to throw this kind of tantrum.

~~~
sosuke
That's what it looks like from the outside doesn't it? His pain is real
certainly, and like all experience relative to his situation. When you look at
it from a perspective of responsibility without an option to stop working, or
the fear of not finding work with which you can fulfill your responsibilities
his position is a lot tougher to identify with.

I hope I can work hard enough to someday be able to have the luxury of that
choice and that I'll remember my current perspective at that time.

~~~
cafebeen
Reminds of the idea of the hedonic treadmill:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hedonic_treadmill](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hedonic_treadmill)

------
JDiculous
The author's rant is not specific to the tech industry at all, it's the case
for practically all full-time jobs.

Full-time jobs generally suck. Spending the bulk of every weekday in an office
doing what you're told is not fun. If it was, then people would do it for
free. Day to day work is generally unglamorous and boring.

I think part of the blame is that tech employers permeate this notion that one
must "love" their work. So we feel guilty for not enjoying cleaning up
somebody else's legacy code, fixing that tracking bug, or god forbid solving
an IE8 bug.

I totally agree with the author that the tickets we're assigned are all
puzzles that I _could_ lose myself in and inevitably get some feeling of
satisfaction when I figure it out. But in the grand scheme of things, most of
us aren't working on problems of real significance (eg. curing cancer,
creating a more efficient battery). Most of us are just reinventing some form
of wheel. And most of the problems we solve as implementors don't pertain to
us. Rarely do we capture any of the fruits of our labor aside from a "great
job!" and a 10% pay bump at the end of the year if we're lucky.

We as employees need to change the culture of employment. Nobody should have
to pretend to enjoy grunt work. Work should be about the output you produce,
not face time or tracking hours. Being in an office 8 hrs/day and never seeing
the sun is depressing, and it's time we acknowledge that and fight to improve
the situation.

We can start by demanding that remote work be accepted by our employers. That
immediately gives us back our entire commutes (even just one hour a day is
huge when you spend the majority of your waking hours in an office and thus
only have 6 hours of real free time). And we can demand the freedom to work on
our own schedules rather than being confined to 9-5, which we all know for
most people is bullshit because we're not on an assembly line and our most
productive work doesn't necessarily follow a 9-5 schedule.

~~~
chrismarlow9
This. I waste 2 hours a day commuting. 10 hours a week I'm sitting in the car
doing nothing, for no real reason other than some company culture nonsense.

~~~
artmageddon
I've been there before; I have a 2 hour commute door to door from central NJ
to NYC, and back, each day. I don't know how viable it is for you, but do
whatever it takes to make the change, assuming you're not tied to a mortgage
and there just aren't any jobs nearby. After doing it for 6.5 years I was
finally able to get it down from 120mins each way to 20mins each way, and it
made such a huge difference in quality of life.

~~~
chrismarlow9
This isn't the first time I've been in this position. Yeah my last few gigs
were within 20 minutes, I thought that it wouldn't be so bad but realize now
anything further than 20 mins isn't for me.

------
nine_k
> _I’m not going anywhere. I’m going to sit at this desk and I’m going to work
> on whatever the hell I feel like working on._

> _I don’t know how to turn this into dollars yet. Hopefully I’ll figure that
> out._

Well, good luck. I'm just afraid the reality will kick in soon. Tech industry
is by far not the worst way to get some food for fifty picnics; many others
are much more soul-crushing, with less chance to retire early.

~~~
harkyns_castle
Very much agreed. It sounds like OP is a bit burnt out, and I had much the
same thing - I said to myself I'll do my own thing, I've done the hard yards,
I'll just sit down to think of something, got a few good ideas... time keeps
ticking though, and unless you have endless cash, the bills will keep rolling
in. Discipline and focus I guess is pretty important to doing the solo thing.

It's easy to forget the plethora of shit jobs out there once you've been doing
software development/ops/IT for a while. Sure, its painful, and some companies
more than others, but I agree with another poster that often it's more what
you put on yourself versus what's forced on you (at least in my case I think
that was often true). I guess it's vital to look for that work/life balance
and a company that will offer that (not just lip service); or do your own
thing, but that can be pretty hard work too - it's not just coding then, it's
all the roles, even the ones you hate.

If there were an easy answer, we'd all be doing it.

[edit] added bit.

------
mavdi
I couldn't believe what I was reading. I have the exact same feeling about
current state of the tech industry.

No one pushes barriers anymore. Rarely anyone makes anyones life better by
doing things radically different. We keep reinventing the same wheel again and
again. I've been paid handsomely in the last 5 years by doing pretty much the
exact same things, using different frameworks for different (and at times the
same) companies.

~~~
neverartful
This may sound harsh and insensitive, but it's not meant that way.

"No one pushes barriers anymore". No one that you may have seen. Look around,
folks do it all the time. Examples abound.

"Rarely anyone makes anyones life better...". Become a teacher, a nurse, a
social worker, a friend, a good neighbor, volunteer to work with the poor,
etc. etc.

"...by doing things radically different". This is one of my biggest beefs with
our tech culture. We're arrogant. We need to step back and realize that a
great deal was invented and accomplished before we were born. Many billions of
people have passed through life on Earth before us. Some did "radically
different" things, but more likely, most did not. What makes you or I so
special to think that it's something we're entitled to. Of course we should
strive to do our very best and have high goals, but our expectations really
should be tempered by reality (not our ego).

"I've been paid handsomely in the last 5 years by doing pretty much the exact
same things...". How do you think these roles think about doing the exact same
things? Painters, plumbers, carpenters, electricians, bus driver, accountant,
sales executive, restaurant owner, sales clerk, etc.

2 parting thoughts: (1) count your blessings, not your problems, and (2) if
you're as smart and talented as you think you are, you should be able to
improve the situation for yourself and others.

------
Jimmy
Having a traditional job is such a terrible experience. At the very least,
it's terrible if you're not 100% in love with whatever company project you're
working on.

I think there are some personality types that are suited to traditional jobs
though, since most people don't share my concerns when I tell them how
terrible it is to have a job. Because of this, I think more people like the
author of this post should pursue non-traditional lines of work without
feeling guilty. Perhaps our current economic set-up doesn't allow everyone to
be happy, but more people could be happy than they currently are.

~~~
kayoone
While i feel similar in that i don't think i could go back to a "normal" job,
i also realize how incredibly lucky i am to have this choice. So many people
have to do much more grueling work that is not even remotely their passion and
earn much less doing so. It's not even a question of education really, imo it
comes down to luck in where you were born and some choices that made you end
up in an industry that allows all of this.

I also know that there are always people that aren't as lucky and privileged
and that it shouldn't be the argument to end all arguments because otherwise
no progress will ever be possible.

~~~
72deluxe
This is very true - we are fortunate and should not forget that. It could be
worse (like it is for others).

------
lohengramm
This post expresses exactly how I feel. I am currently under a 30 days
vacation and it has been incredibly good. In only three weeks I have studied
lots of things that were postponed for months or years, worked on a personal
project, exercised my body, slept well, read books, disassembled every old
electronic device that was lurking for years to clean and fix it, went to a
medical doctor to fix health issues that were also postponed and now I still
have an infinite list of things to learn, books to read and projects to do.

Now I am really thinking on leaving my full-time job, because the vacation is
coming to an end. But how to make money? If I could have a stable but low
income without wasting too much time, it would be great. Mainly if that income
came from a source with which I care about.

It sucks. Life, I mean.

~~~
saiya-jin
Posts like these make me a bit sad, how far some people get detached from
reality of this world as a whole.

I would hate it since i am part of this industry, byt maybe we really need
some dev crysis, meaning 50% of software engineers unemployed, salaries plunge
say to construction engineers level. Those fortunate to keep the job would be
glad to be creative with what they have and maybe, but just MAYBE these
pathetic rants won't surface as much.

As for you, simple advice - sort out your life, you know better than anybody
else what you want, and you're the only one who can do it. it's quite easy,
just that some decisions require sturdy balls, not moaning on internet forums
:)

~~~
lohengramm
I respect your point of view, but I don't want to believe that people should
feel "awarded" to have a job. This might be how it always worked and how it
still works for the majority, but it is, for me, a defect of the economic
system, not a virtue. Maybe we (as humanity) actually never get to that utopic
society where mundane tasks are all automated and people are completely
educated and free from the burden of wage labor (instead of bow down and thank
for the "opportunity to waste your life"), but we must set some goals in order
to progress, and the "perfect" economic system seems like a praiseworthy one.

As for my salary, unfortunately, software workers here in Brazil are actually
earning way less than some construction engineers. In fact, if I had had a
degree in Civil Engineering I would be way better off than with my current
Computer Science major.

Again, I see you have a point, but internet forums are here for that exactly:
discussing -- with moanings included.

------
fecak
I fail to see how this is quitting the tech industry. This is quitting Yelp,
but the listing of the Patreon account is all "tech industry" work, just
without having a boss or company to be accountable to. The post doesn't seem
to insinuate that the author will quit writing software - "Eventually it would
be nice to make a thing that actually makes money on its own." Someone who
codes and makes money off that product is still in the industry, no?

The author isn't quitting the industry. He is basically going independent,
with an undetermined business model.

~~~
eevee
Is it really "the industry" if I'm not running a business?

~~~
fecak
That is the question I guess. If you are trying to make money from what you
do, are you not "running a business"? It might not be a traditional business,
but seeking individuals to support you financially for the work you do would
qualify as a business to me anyway.

Even if you created multiple revenue streams - write a book, produce a game,
Patreon, etc. - which appears to be your intent, you essentially are the
business at that point, no? At least that's how I'd view it.

------
shalmanese
It's sad to me that the industry is pushing out so many great people because
they feel so disenfranchised by it. I believe technology is one of the most
potent forces of good in the world but for that to sustain, a culture has to
develop around it with a deep desire to solve serious, large problems.

I attended my first (and last) Hackathon a couple of weeks ago because it was
immigration themed and so I thought I could meet some smart, thoughtful
people. The pitches were mostly terrible with a few more decent ones sprinkled
through as you would expect from a Hackathon.

One of the pitches that was made though, was "Greendir", a Tinder for Green
Card marriages. Now, I fully support the guy's desire to pitch whatever idea
he chooses but it was depressing to me that Greendir turned out to be the most
popular app on the pitch board and the one the most people indicated they
wanted to work on. It just seemed to me to be the epitome of the "we're in it
for ourselves", move fast and break things, easy X-meets-Y description, get
rich quick schemes attitude that is increasingly gaining mindshare in the tech
industry.

It really made me wonder, what did these people come to this weekend to do?
Why were they giving up their precious time? Because they wanted to be
entertained and have a laugh? Or because they believed their powers could be
meaningfully leveraged to solve hard problems that have the potential to
fundamentally alter people's lives? Furthermore, what impression does it give
to the newly entering workers in the tech field who use events like hackathons
to get connected into a community of peers and who subconsciously absorb the
value of those peers?

Fortunately, I'm seeing the other side of the picture too. I'm in the process
of building a startup right now with a serious social mission (we want to get
people excited about donating to charity by doing for charity what Whole Foods
did for organic foods). I reach out to my network and I see my friends who
came up 5 - 20 years ago in tech having the same frustrations by the
triviality that's morphed the industry over the last couple of years. The
outpouring of support has exceeded, by an order of magnitude, that of any
previous startup I've worked on and I think it's precisely because there's a
real yearning to see entrepreneurs solving hard problems with large impacts.

~~~
Delmania
> I believe technology is one of the most potent forces of good in the world
> but for that to sustain, a culture has to develop around it with a deep
> desire to solve serious, large problems.

Idealism

> It just seemed to me to be the epitome of the "we're in it for ourselves",
> move fast and break things, easy X-meets-Y description, get rich quick
> schemes attitude that is increasingly gaining mindshare in the tech
> industry.

Reality.

While I can definitely understand the belief that given incredible evolution
of technology in the past few decades will be a force for good and change,
always remember technology is just a tool. People have not fundamentally
changed in a very long time.

~~~
shalmanese
I think you absolutely have to temper idealism with meeting people where they
are but I don't believe that's an excuse for cynicism. At the end of the day,
people everywhere want the same fundamental things: A life of connection,
respect and joy and a world that is better for their children than for
themselves.

Technology & economic development has eradicated illnesses, brought billions
out of hunger, enabled new political systems and unlocked creativity as a
career option for a large middle class. But it's technology in the broad,
expansive sense, not the narrowly focused, web & mobile app economy that is
what's meant by "tech" in the Bay Area.

------
mrgriscom
I don't understand the desire to pay off the mortgage after a big windfall,
especially with interest rates so low. I suppose you get a vague sense of
security, as in "the bank can never take my house away now", but you just took
a big chunk of liquid money that could have been used to pay any kind of
expense, and you put it into very illiquid home equity that was being loaned
to you at a long-term locked-in rate barely above the historical rate of
inflation.

~~~
eevee
I understand the math, but I _feel_ like debt is a huge weight on my
shoulders.

I grew up with parents who were constantly in more debt than they could handle
and constantly reminding me of it. I would rather not be anywhere near that
situation again, even if keeping moderate debt would've worked out a little
better in the long run.

~~~
OneOneOneOne
Thumbs up.

Too many people take on unnecessary debt (big house, new cars, toys, ...) It
seems like many are at peace with their debt.

Going into debt for anything more than a modest house (rather than paying
rent) doesn't make sense to me.

~~~
eclipxe
Nothing wrong with debt and being at peace with it. Why doesn't it make sense
to you? (I genuinely want to know your opinion)

~~~
OneOneOneOne
Being in debt limits your freedom. We all need to provide for our well being
but why take on more than is necessary?

~~~
eclipxe
Who determines what is "necessary"? Why does it limit freedom?

------
jrochkind1
Of course a full-time job sucks. Most people need one anyway in order to pay
the rent. If you have the luxury of getting away without it, of course why
wouldn't you?

I have the luxury of working a 4/5ths time (four days a week job). I'm still a
programmer. At a university. That also allows me to work reasonable hours on
that 4/5th time job, take personal days for personal business, etc. And most
of what I write is open source, which is very nice. It's definitely still a
trade-off, it's a very frustrating place to work sometimes, I don't always get
to work on interesting problems (but sometimes do, in some periods often), I
don't have enough colleagues to work on the _really_ cool stuff that would
take more IT resources than my employer is willing to devote to what I think
would be the really cool stuff. Etc.

My impression is that trying to start your own business will end up taking
_more_ of your time than a 'full time job', not less. But if you end up
finding that time more rewarding to spend, then, great.

~~~
bottled_poe
Your last sentence is certainly true, but the difference is being able to
choose what is worth doing and being fully invested in the outcome.

~~~
mcdougle
Also control over your time. There's a huge difference between "9 to 5 every
day" and "40ish hours a week, pick the times that are most convenient, and
have some flexibility in that number based on how much actually gets done"

------
muraiki
"Do you have any internal libraries or systems or platforms at your company?
Do you think no one else has ever had the same idea and built the same thing?"

Isn't this one of the reasons behind the FOSS movement? That we as programmers
are often repeating the same uninteresting tasks, so perhaps we should just
freely share what we've done so that we can all work on something more
interesting.

And in the Libre sense of Free -- in the GNU sense (and perhaps I've
interpreted it wrongly here) -- this is why GNU is not just "something to make
our lives better". It is rather a moral responsibility towards your fellow
users, which includes programmers who use your code, not just end users.
Because if people don't share, you end up with people like the author of this
article: burnt out on writing something that's been written before.

Of course how this meshes with the real world of capitalism is a whole other
story. I'm not saying it's not viable: Stallman of course mentions selling
support in the GNU Manifesto, and the article also mentions Patreon.

Note that I'm not saying GNU is the One True Way, but rather trying to
stimulate a discussion about something I don't fully understand but have been
thinking about lately and which I believe touches upon one of the core issues
that prompted the author's action.

------
meritt
The guy cashed out enough to pay off his entire mortgage and is acting like
that's a tough decision. Millions of Americans would love to have that
"problem". Millions of people hate their jobs. They don't have the opportunity
to just walk away from it, as they often have a family to support.

And then he has the gall to ask for donations? Seriously? Can this post be
laden with slightly more privilege?

~~~
thomas943
> Can this post be laden with slightly more privilege?

Sadly, it probably was laden with even more obnoxious privilege and what we
are reading is the edited version. I'm in my late twenties and I am constantly
amazed by how pathetic, obnoxious, and truly useless the younger generations
have made themselves. This person wants donations to play with pokemons after
letting us know they paid off their mortgage.

My only hope is that this blog post prevents this person from ever being hired
again.

~~~
dang
> My only hope is that this blog post prevents this person from ever being
> hired again.

Please don't use HN this way. You're more than welcome to make substantive
comments, but pouring vitriol in response to something annoying harms the
discourse here. We all have the temptation, but it's important to resist it.
Otherwise—long experience shows—the community becomes toxic.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html)

~~~
thomas943
Labeling my comment as vitriol is a pretty insubstantial exaggeration. For all
either one of us knows, the author has not given any thought to how their
knee-jerk blog post will affect them years from now, when they've tired of
playing with their pokemons and need to figure out how to pay their bills
again. With any luck, my comment will induce a moment of self-reflection and
allow them to consider whether their short lived catharsis from publicly
humblebragging about quitting a high-paying, 100% remote job with stock
options will negatively affect them in the future.

------
ChuckMcM
I think it is great for the author that their career has allowed them to pay
off their mortgage and sit back and examine what it is they are really
passionate about. But this was a challenging comment for me from the article:

 _" I’ve only worked for two tech companies, in radically different fields.
The only things they have in common are that their main products are websites
with tertiary features that let you buy things. Yet both of them ended up
scrambling to write their own payment platforms from scratch. What the fuck is
going on?"_

I'm currently working at a tech company that is trying to increase the
survival rate for cancer patients. Others are working at companies that are
providing medicine or support for folks who have no access to medical
facilities. The point being that the experience of two tech companies is
insufficient to evaluate the entire industry.

And the bigger point is that how you spend your time is your choice. Take the
fact that you are getting burned out in your current job to inform your
decision on your next one. That is the key to not getting completely burned
out.

------
mark_l_watson
I think he did the right thing paying off his mortgage. He does not have to
create a successful startup as money runs out: he could switch to part time
consulting, which is what I did about 18 years ago. Back then we became debt
free and except for short jobs at Google and Webmind Corporation, I consulted
for probably an average of 15 to 20 hours a week, remotely. The trick is
reducing living costs (we live in the mountains in Central Arizona).

------
flipped_bit
Understand the author's (Clintonesque) pain, as I am going through a similar
problem, but don't have it all figured neatly to disengage from the industry
yet.

My own views are that the software industry has reduced its 'professional
quotient' a lot, to probably near zero, and hence all this chaos. I used to
work in 'well-run and large companies' prior to the internet days, and in some
sense we are a victim of the post-internet (mid-90s' post-Netscape) runaway
success.

There is no professionalism in the industry anymore, and paradoxically it
could be due to the 'open source model'. Don't get me wrong, I like open-
source with all that emphasis to openness, freedom etc.. but it has led to the
ruin of the small developer. It is forcing a lot of us to jump into the
'entrepreneur/solopreneur' bandwagon.

The openness part described above also includes anyone to jump into the
industry (unlike say the medical, or civil-engineering profession; after all
do you want a 'hacker heart surgeon' or a 'hacker bridge builder?'). The
professionalism is completely mocked at, and all this hero-worshiping of
start-up culture etc.. has ruined it.

OTOH, I am not arguing in favor of high-barriers of entry etc... Honestly I
don't the answer on how to fix it....

------
kadavy
A huge congratulations to OP! 7 years ago, I got fired (I should have quit,
but didn't have the guts). I had enough money to not have to worry for at
least a couple of years, and I couldn't find it in my being to work for anyone
– not even freelance.

For me, the first couple of weeks was just reminding myself that I still
existed – that my "flesh sack" was still there, and would still be there
despite the fact that I didn't have a job. Of course, all of the questions
about "what will [I] do next?" didn't help this existential crisis.

I gradually got over it. My main metric for my days was reconnecting with the
sense of "flow." For enjoying what I was doing in the moment. Thankfully, for
me, I could still find that in something that resembled work.

I knew there was something in my brain that I had to discover, so after the
first year, I fled SV, away from all of the noise. Two more years of
experimentation later (finally supported by some freelance income), I scored a
book deal on a topic that was a perfect amalgamation of my curiosities and
interest.

I hope you find a similar sense of satisfaction! Just find the joy in what
you're doing, and don't let others' expectations create worry for you.

------
renegadedev
I feel his pain but it's easy to quit when you can cash in your stock options
and pay off your mortgage

~~~
a3n
Yes, that's how you do it. If he was burned out and asking how to do it, the
answers would be variations on this.

He did it.

------
kzhahou
I resent the fact that so many people here are calling this BURNOUT.

Can you not fathom the idea that Eevee simply saw and accepted the truth: that
the job at Yelp was not personally meaningful?

------
jnsaff2
This sounds very much like the article I read yesterday:
[http://mashable.com/2015/06/09/post-hipster-
yuccie/](http://mashable.com/2015/06/09/post-hipster-yuccie/)

------
ZanyProgrammer
"I don’t know how to turn this into dollars yet. Hopefully I’ll figure that
out." This just oozes privilege and naivete. If only most people scraping
along had this kind of safety net.

~~~
eevee
I am definitely hecka privileged. What would you have me do? Keep working a
job I don't enjoy, out of guilt that other people have to do the same?

~~~
peu4000
You should definitely do what makes you happy.

However, the blog post seems a bit braggy. A lot of us experience the same
things, but we don't have a safety net(other than the gubmit I guess), it
breeds jealousy. If I were in the same situation I would have left off the
part about cashing out and paying the mortgage and not created a patreon
without something to back it up immediately.

It would have been better if it just listed the reasons you're leaving and
maybe some insight into how you might fix some problems.

~~~
eevee
I wrote it because it was what I wanted to write, not as a formal teardown of
the tech industry. You may notice that I didn't submit it to HN.

------
kohanz
_I’m just thoroughly exhausted. I have so much I want to do, yet I’m selling
half of my waking hours every weekday to someone else, for the sake of
cleaning up their legacy messes. By the end of the day I’m already worn out,
and now I have to squeeze in whatever I wanted to do alongside relaxing and
doing chores and maintaining this fleshsack. Weekends are nice, but become a
mad dash to get fifty things done, meaning none of them get done._

And then add kids to the equation! I left my full-time job for part-time
contracting ( _ahem_ consulting!) just over a year ago. I work about 60% of
the hours that I previously did, make about 80% of what I did, and spend the
rest of the time with the family and catching up on "life". Not sure if it's a
longterm solution, but I'm enjoying watching my family grow.

------
thebouv
Some days I dream about this and going out on my own, or pursuing that startup
idea that's been itching the back of my head for so long. I couldn't leave the
tech industry per se, but at least changing what I'm doing in it.

But then I realize I've been doing the day-to-day for so long that I have
accumulated the trappings thereof: mortgage on a house, two cars, a
"comfortable" lifestyle.

To leave puts it at risk. I fear not being able to make it solo. The startup
idea will take too long or fail if I bootstrap it. We'll have to move.
Downsize. Change our lifestyle. Affect the kids. And a downward spiral of
thoughts like that.

So I'm back at my cubicle today. Wishing I was working from home to watch the
new baby grow while I code.

------
jimwalsh
Work-Life-Balance, such a great lesson many 20 somethings should make an
effort to learn before they destroy the passion they have for whatever it is
they are passionate about.

I'd never tell someone to not work hard or to strive for things they want to
accomplish. But be able to step back and look at the big picture. Life is too
short. Don't forget to enjoy it while you can.

~~~
neverartful
Well stated. It applies to all age groups. I recently forced myself to 'stop
and smell the flowers' (or however that phrase goes). I discovered something
that had been around me my whole life that I had never noticed. I noticed the
beautiful singing of the cardinal (the little red bird). Since then I listen
for them and hear them often. It's a beautiful sound and it's a reminder to
not take work life so seriously and enjoy the beauty of nature.

------
cianchette
After reading on HN about the miners in England yesterday, it's difficult to
generate too much sympathy for your situation.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9677863](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9677863)

I hope that you translate your passion into using technology to truly help
make the world a better place.

~~~
adenot
I thought the same thing... first world problems in its essence.

~~~
ZenoArrow
So just because someone has it worse you have to enjoy your job? Doesn't work
like that.

What the OP realised is that money is no good if chasing it wrecks your time.
Is he lucky to be able to choose another way? Yes, but that doesn't make his
decision any less valid.

~~~
adenot
Sure he has his reasons but it's most because he is making a decision that he
believes is the right to do, not because his employer did something wrong.

I am in the exact same situation as him (without the equity large enough to
cover my mortgage), but I recognize my last employer was actually good to me,
my unhappiness was not their fault.

------
desireco42
This is not burnout, this is professional dead-end our industry became
because... well he kind of explained it in his post. It is amazing that you
have all this knowledge and you have to set it aside, because of all the same
problems that are present everywhere. And I mean exactly the same legacy
mistakes that are made in good faith supposedly and now you have to show
professionalism and reason and as senior guy accept it and deal with it.

The only thing I am sad, is that I can't do what he did.

~~~
chrismarlow9
Heh. I've thought about this a bunch and come to the conclusion that it's why
a startup based purely on ability to execute succeeds so often. It takes the
right group of people in every facet of the company (sales, technical, etc)
that have seen these mistakes over and over and refuse to let the company
repeat them.

It's not often you get that group of guys together in the same room with a
good idea and a VC, but when you do it's a fun thing to watch.

------
anotheryou
I feel like this before even starting my career...

I'm passionate about structuring knowledge, perception, society, art, sound.
I'm good at creating concepts.

As a programmer I'm mediocre (I can learn what I need quickly and on demand,
but I'd not open-source a library anytime soon). Yet I still feel like this
still is the easiest way to earn a living.

My aim is to have the freedom of a digital nomad. Making money and tech (also
as the execution of ideas and concepts) is just a necessity...

------
mikecmpbll
You got burnt out, no need to turn it into a sob story or a bitter industry
rant. You couldn't manage your time effectively.

By all means if you're unhappy change your lifestyle -- and pronto -- if you
can eek out an existence in a more fulfilling way then get to it, but don't
try telling everyone they work in a "stupid, backwards, fledgling industry"
because you didn't like your job.

Just another "woe betide me"-disaffected-techie rant.

------
omouse
A separate comment I want to make is that the cute puzzles talked about in the
article are pretty much the same everywhere: deal with politics, deal with
poor performing code, deal with random idiotic UI decisions. The more
interesting thing is to work on your own code or company where you have users
and customers and they can guide you toward a good design or to work on harder
research-y things, things that fall under computer science or software
engineering.

I was re-reading one of Paul Graham's earlier essays, the ones I read while at
the tail end of high school and beginning college and it basically says give
the hackers direct access to user feedback and they'll do the right thing. I
don't know what happens but along the way all these companies that started out
like that have just introduced layers and layers of people between the user
and the hacker so much so that the hackers opinions about what's the right
thing to work on right now are ignored.

Maybe it's just time to get back to that and take that exit strategy; just
work on a small cool product that _you_ own where you get user feedback
immediately where _you_ decide the priority.

------
mikemarsh
"I hate dread. What a completely useless emotion."

Funny you should say that, since the sense of dread seemed to motivate this
decision pretty heavily. Seems like the emotion was pretty useful as a sort of
"burnout immune system".

~~~
eevee
Ah, interesting! Useless in the same way pain is useless, then — not very
helpful in the moment, but it sure teaches you what to avoid in the long run.

------
CrLf
"I’ve worked remotely my whole career"

I wonder how much of a role does this play in (not) caring about your
employer's problems...

As much as I can understand the benefits of working remotely on occasion,
doing it all the time will cause a kind of disconnect all by itself. You see
the problems as your employer's problems, instead of your team's problems.
Your are fixing your employer instead of helping your teammates.

~~~
mgkimsal
Even if you're f2f, at some point, especially if you've worked a few places,
you'll still see the same patterns of problems cropping up, and the same ennui
will likely set it. Perhaps not as soon as for remote workers, but it will
happen.

If you really bond with your teammates, but still see the same recurring
problems, you'll almost certainly develop an 'us v them' mentality against
'management', justified or not (though, it likely will be justified if you're
seeing jr-level mistakes constantly promoted as the next magic bullet).

~~~
CrLf
But it'ss much easier to avoid burnout. Even if your objective is based on an
"us vs. them" mentality, you still have a purpose. If you feel like you're
working alone (and sometimes this happens even with other people around) it's
much easier to find out that your work means nothing in the grand scheme of
things.

~~~
mgkimsal
"easier to avoid burnout" feels to me more like a function of time vs actually
being f2f with folks, assuming the work doesn't change dramatically. But... my
data points are primarily my own and some colleagues, not a comprehensive view
of techfolk.

------
mcgrootz
A lot of the work we do as programmers is for a meaningless product. If we
worked on things that we believed in, maybe something that helped people live
better lives, especially those who really need the help like the poor and
disenfranchised, I believe programmers would be happier people. There just
isn't a lot of opportunity out there right now to do meaningful work with
code. It's a shame.

~~~
mcgrootz
Additionally, I don't think the answer is to work less and have more leisure
time. I don't think that really solves the issue. I think you can spend an
enormous amount of energy and time on something you love, and be very
fulfilled by it.

Coders have a lot of power in this day and age. Let's start using it to help
people and do good work in the world. I'm so tired of meaningless tech
achievements, one after another. Elon Musk may get us to Mars, he may help us
reduce our energy usage, but we'll still be the same depressed people if we
don't work on improving the system.

------
rvdm
I've been a tech consultant since my late teens but got out and passed all my
clients on to a close friend so that I could focus on my own work about a year
ago. It was a leap of faith for sure, but where there's a will there's a way.
During my decade of consulting I set up some automatic income through a few
different routes ( never put all your eggs in one basket! ).

I entertain the thought of selling what I'm working on some day for a big
payout, but that's a completely optional scenario for me. Because of the
simple fact that I've never been happier in my life.

I feel like my work I do now actually matters. And even if it never makes me a
dollar, it brings me joy. And that's what life's all about in the end ( to me
at least ).

I wish you all the best and in my opinion you certainly made the right choice.

One note: getting the combination of automatic income right was a learning
curve, if you ever want to know what works for me, feel free to reach out.

~~~
eevee
Thank you! I'm glad you found something simultaneously worthwhile and
profitable. Here's hoping I can do it too.

~~~
rvdm
I'm sure you will! This is something that has always inspired me: in the US
small businesses are heroes, going out on a limb and doing your own thing is
the definition of the american spirit. Becoming a job creator in the process
is an incredibly rewarding feeling.

------
smhg
There are quite a few different topics in this post. I just take one: the fact
that people keep reinventing the wheel (libraries/systems/platforms) and the
frustration that triggers.

Humans aren't really "built" to cooperate, right? I think almost all could
accomplish far more if it would be easier/more obvious to work together. We
call competition healthy, and it might be, but it also takes the focus away
from cooperation.

It takes a lot of effort to make others (peers, customers, managers,...) work
together. And if some don't (which is often the case), the amount of effort
required grows exponentially. Although the satisfaction is huge, it's easy to
think the cost is greater than the benefit.

Just a guess of course, but maybe this is what the author lacks in his/her
career? Too little cooperative efforts on the tasks he/she performed?

------
stkni
This is interesting mostly because it echoes my feelings of dissonance with
the employers I've worked for.

My conclusion was that I needed to be more in tune with the/a business that
I'm ultimately trying to serve, and therefore to be closer too it. Because
until then it all seems like pointless bit shifting.

------
jkot
Perhaps it is just working environment? Since I quit cubicle my productivity
skyrocketed and I actually enjoy it.

Banging your head against a wall on unsolvable problem? Lets take kids for
lunch, some swimming on beach. I will resume head banging at evening, but
problem is usually cracked before that.

~~~
technomancy
I agree with the sentiment, but I don't think it would help in this case as he
says he was already working remotely.

------
rilita
Imagine that this article read as follows: "I used to have a great job working
at Yelp. I was paid highly for it and accomplished a lot. I even got stock
options. I've made it now though. Screw working hard, I'm through with that.
I'm paying off my mortgage and gonna live the easy life now. Good luck to all
you suckers still in the software industry. Bwwuahaha."

Somehow I don't feel much sympathy for this person. Many of us have been
working miserable software jobs for years, but we still give it our all and
don't throw in the towel.

Yeah it's great that this person made it through, but it's a crappy example
for the rest of us.

------
thrillgore
It sounds to me that the OP simply got tired of confronting an endless sea of
technical debt. It happens to the best of us.

------
jliptzin
You don't have to justify yourself for quitting your boring full-time job.
Most people don't have that option and you're in a fortunate position. I wish
I knew more people like you with the courage to actually quit once you're
able. I have too many friends who continue to slave away, complaining about
their jobs, yet have banked 7 digits+, all because they think that they'd feel
out of place and without things to do if they quit, or just want to continue
accumulating more money. I don't see a reason to accumulate money if you have
no time to spend it.

------
rasur
> I stay up hours later than I mean to, not even doing anything, just trying
> to put off sleeping — because the next thing I experience will be waking up
> and going back to work.

Shit, I get this and I'm not even in a particularly toxic work-place. Hell,
I'd even go as far as to say it's the best place I've ever worked at (and it
had some stiff competition, over the years).

That sentence resonated with me, i'm sad to say. Not a good sign.

EDIT: After having stewed on it for a few moments, I'm not sure me saying 'Not
a good sign' is actually correct.

------
TheGunner
Good for him, I'd be surprised if he didn't end up back in the tech industry
at some point in the future but the guy obviously needs a break/change of
scene. Hope it works out for him

------
dbg31415
Ok, so... I agree with the author on a lot of points, but from what I've seen
devs are the most pampered of all professions. Cut the most slack. Given the
most pay. Extended the most deadlines. And rightfully so. But if you can't
take it now... when things are "good" \-- wow, I'd hate to be you in a down
economy.

Lots of truth to this, but look we all have mortgages and what comes across as
"asshole" is the complaining. We all have a mortgage, why are you a special
special snowflake?

------
devonoel
I guess the real trick is to build your own business, but it keep it small
enough that you don't end up exactly in the same place, but with yourself at
the head of it.

Find yourself a tiny niche, fill a need for just enough people that you can
keep yourself gainfully employed doing something you care about, and not have
to worry about hiring other people to work under you and all the other shit
that comes with building a company. Stay small and lean. You won't get
Facebook rich, but maybe you'll be happy.

------
makeitsuckless
"I’ve worked remotely my whole career"

Regardless of all the perfectly valid reasons for being unhappy in what most
people consider a cushy job (the author seems perfectly aware of that), this
could possibly be an important factor here.

Working remotely means you only get a small slice of what most people get out
of their job. Again, this is perfectly fine if you're not "most people", but
if you've never known anything else than that may play a considerable role in
being dissatisfied with having a job.

~~~
eevee
I'm not exactly a social butterfly, so from my perspective I've been getting
much _more_ out of my job by not having to work in an office.

------
discardorama
I was wondering what this person's situation was. Then I read this in
her(his?) blog:

> I currently work for Yelp from the comfort of my home in Las Vegas. I live
> with my ridiculous cat, my partner, her three cats, her husband, his dog,
> and our boyfriend.

Now it makes more sense. In my limited experience, when you're working
remotely, you feel disconnected from the mothership. To this, add some work
stress, and it's easy to get disenchanted.

PS: I don't really know how to parse that sentence. No wonder NLP is so hard!
;-D

------
fotoblur
Unfortunately the world is a cruel place, and this guy wants freedom from it.
I know, I took the 3-4 months off after quitting a job to do my own thing. I
did earn a few dollars but nothing like what a business was willing to pay for
my skills.

We'd all like to be free to do what we want to do, but in all honesty only a
fraction of 1% ever get to. And even those people serve a master. Did I ever
find the answer, no. I think what its going to take is a huge leap in what we
call work.

~~~
mavdi
It's great that you at least tried it. Takes guts to do so.

It's something I've always wanted to do, but been waiting for that next level
of financial security before I do so. Problem is, every time I reach the
target, I'm not satisfied with it and want to make a bit more money before I
can back off. It's a vicious circle into an ever looming burn out.

~~~
fotoblur
You can do anything you want to do.

------
shabinesh
I am in a similar phase, just two more days left in my current job. After that
I shall start working on my own projects and freelance and build MVPs for
startups to keep me afloat, which I also enjoy for the fulfilling
responsibility. But I am only experimenting it for next few months and if it
doesn't work out I shall fall-back. Good luck for your next steps.

------
scolfax
Well said. I checked the article, and apparently I didn't write it.

------
nicholas73
Half your day gone? Try having a baby! Then you can choose between getting 1-2
hours of "me" time at 6am or 10pm, both of which cut into your sleep time.

Not trying to make comparisons here. I was exactly the same prior to
fatherhood. But now I wonder how I let all the time go to waste before. Half a
day available would be great!

------
bipin_nag
I empathize with the OP. I wanted to post a reply to probablyfiction
explaining to him. Instead I will list the reasons why burnout could have
happened to him.

Point 1 "unless X has a toxic work culture,it's likely the author brought it
on themselves by pushing too hard."

An overstatement unless you know what he faced. You were hired for your
problem-solving ability where pushing hard can be expected at times. In
reality this could be he's not pushing too hard so much as the existing
environment which leeches effort and adds burden to every step. Toxic culture
is somewhat unlikely but what if he inherited a huge technical debt, this
happens a lot.

Point 2 it's a terrible feeling to have to spend your most productive hours
working on someone else's problems. He or she may find themselves drawn toward
entrepreneurship

Wrong. IMO you can either work as a product engineer role building something
new (hopefully) or as support role integrating products/fixing glaring bugs
crappy code/migrating systems. The latter is not exciting. A developer MUST be
capable of both and SHOULD be given at least an opportunity for both. It does
not have to be in your own startup. I maybe a coder but I am not a horseshit
shoveler.

Point 3 Office culture is draining. Some people aren't cut out for it.

Why ? It doesn't have to be. Even then why assume work culture is the culprit
here and he is not cut for it.

Point 4 Additionally, programmers tend to push themselves too hard for too
long out of a misplaced sense of loyalty to the company. They don't see that
the work they do is extremely valuable in and of itself.

Translation the coder has to see the fine line of enthusiasm between "working
already" and overzealous. Seems like a hypothetical problem unless you tell
why is it relevant here. About the "work" you say, you should tell what "work"
is. It is not just the stationary lines of code lying on repository, but the
amount of effort that went to write it, debug it and will go to maintain it. A
badly written project demands higher effort to keep it running than what you
could imagine.

Point 5 a coder doesn't owe the company anything more than their agreed-upon
hours of work.

I know that is the agreement. But I don’t know if you have seen places where
boss wants work in a deadline and not hours a coder spends and wants it done.
You should remind him that then.

------
vuyani
I think OP really was burning out. I have a daily job but manage to get solid
side projects shipped. 8-5(Till 5 is the important part! no overtime). I get
home. rest or gym till about 7pm then get cracking. Usually sleep around 1am.
Im a heavy sleeper so i dont do it every day. but its enough to get things
done.

------
jcroll
Not everyone can work on passion projects, _someone_ has to be the employee,
the economy just doesn't work without it. Unless maybe if you run a company
like Valve where everyone is technically an "owner". Bottom line large value
projects require economies of scale and the mobilization of large labour
forces, it's just not realistic for every business in our industry to be a
company with two founders who are in love with their project. And work should
not be something we "love", work is something we do to bring value to our
society and wealth to our families. There's no easy answers here but stick to
providing _value_ to those you work with, or for, or for your customers, and I
hope in the long term it should work out for you.

------
pla3rhat3r
Finding a balance is the best way to manage stress. And just like anything
else, people have different levels in which they believe things are stressing
them out. What may be stressful to one person may not be a big deal to
another.

I feel this every day being in the tech industry and as a Navy Vet I almost
giggle when I hear what stresses people out. I'm sure the Navy prepared me
better for dealing with stressful situations but unless there's a gun pointed
in my direction I rarely find anything about the tech industry, my work load,
or stuff I'm working towards as stressful. Again, it's all about finding
balance and being able to put things into perspective. If you have no context
about what is really stressful, than everything becomes stressful.

------
ivan_ah
This post reminded me of another I-quit-the-industry blog post from a while
back: [http://mashable.com/2014/04/30/programming-
sucks/](http://mashable.com/2014/04/30/programming-sucks/)

~~~
georgefrick
The Mashable post was much better actually. It was a bit sarcastic, but more
interesting in that he tries to point out some of the day to day problems
instead of just throwing his hands in the air. Thanks for the link.

------
DanielBMarkham
In a way, this is a good argument for contracting, as long as you do it right.

If you know useful stuff, people will always offer you a bag of money to help
them out. It is extremely rare that you get the bag of money and you get to do
exactly what your passion is. Heck, most of us just have some vague idea of
what our passion is anyway. So it's always some sort of compromise.

But with contracting, you should be looking at a fixed amount of time working,
then a fixed amount of "downtime", then back to the market again. You should
ask for enough money in the bag (or adjust your expenses) so that both the
uptime and downtime is included in the payout. Otherwise you become a prisoner
of your own lifestyle -- which is a godawful place to be.

~~~
kedean
Working for a consulting company can also be a good middle ground. They
provide a corporate support network for you, but you aren't tied to one kind
of project for years. Most consulting projects are greenfield, too, because
the other party doesn't usually want to give you their own hard-earned code,
so maintenance hell isn't usually an issue.

------
mvanvoorden
We're not meant to do jobs, this is just some modern made up concept to keep
people busy so they don't see they are actually analogous to cattle.

So that you don't care about the virtual problems you solve for virtual
company X, is perfectly normal and healthy. They are not your problems, they
are not even remotely life-threatening, and so they are not relevant for
survival.

Jobs are just created to keep us busy, as I said before. If we imagine a world
without money (realistic or not), about 90% (educated guess) of jobs would not
even exist anymore, as those are just jobs that do some money-related thing:
Banking, insurance, financial advice, most lawyers, any administration
department at any organisation. Indirectly even more jobs would disappear,
because there is no need to compete financially, which means for example all
R&D in a specific field can be brought together, as no one has to invent their
(still unpatented) version of their wheel anymore.

We would be in a world where only work is done that is needed, that is
directly involved with our survival, curiosity or entertainment, and no 'need'
is created by some virtual dependencies. We would live in a world where
everybody has the time and freedom to pursue their own dreams, without having
to be afraid they will get in trouble later (because no pension built up etc).

We would also able to always pursue the most efficient and sustainable way to
do something, as money is out of the equation. No more fraud, no more oil
leaking in the oceans, no more rainforests cut down, and with all the empty
offices due to disappeared redundant jobs, the demand for resources will be
down and we wouldn't have to build any new houses or shelter for many years to
come.

So yes, wake up and stop working and go exploring. Travel the world, find a
skill that is directly useful to people, as helping out people will make you
happy and you will get food/shelter in return even without asking for that.
See also:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F7SVLaDdvDY](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F7SVLaDdvDY)
and
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fCFe2KnBuJ0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fCFe2KnBuJ0)

Anyway, don't worry about financials. I went travelling in 2013, through
Europe and Canary Islands, and spent about 5000 euro's in 18 months. With what
I've learned now, I could spend twice the amount of time travelling with the
same money.

At the moment I'm (unfortunately) working in IT again, because I haven't found
the way yet to earn bread on the road. When I started travelling I knew
nothing, now I know what to do and so this will be the last time I will spend
many hours a day in an office, as my salary will buy me all the gear I need to
make a(n easier) transition.

Anyway, whatever you do, don't lock yourself up in a stone prison for the rest
of your life. Become your own boss. Don't spend your life realizing other
people's dreams and wealth, because you WILL regret it when you are a
pensioner, as then you find out you forgot to live your own life and there's
no energy left for it now.

~~~
xienze
> We're not meant to do jobs, this is just some modern made up concept to keep
> people busy

And

> We would be in a world where only work is done that is needed

Contradict each other. Of course no one WANTS to work but there are things
that HAVE to be done. Like farming, hunting, building shelter. Chopping
firewood to keep warm in the winter. You know, modern, made up problems like
that.

> We would live in a world where everybody has the time and freedom to pursue
> their own dreams, without having to be afraid they will get in trouble later
> (because no pension built up etc).

There is very little time to pursue anything other than survival in a
subsistence existence. And you better hope you have children to take care of
you when you're physically unable to complete the work.

The fact that people have any time at all to dedicate to non-survival-related
pursuits should tell you how important all that work that we're not "meant" to
do is in the broader scheme of things.

~~~
mvanvoorden
>Contradict each other. Of course no one WANTS to work but there are things
that HAVE to be done. Like farming, hunting, building shelter. Chopping
firewood to keep warm in the winter. You know, modern, made up problems like
that.

But those are not made up problems, those are necessities and cost only a
minimal amount of time per day, especially if it can be distributed over many
more people.

Anyway, how does it contradict? With jobs I mean modern (office) jobs, and I'm
clearly saying in the other sentences that it's about _needed_ work.

How is there no time to pursue anything? When I was travelling and not working
at all for two years, my quest for survival meant that I had to get food and
water and had to keep my shelter clean and working. I 'worked' like 4 hours a
week on this.

There is a lot of time to pursue, like helping other people out, learning to
play an instrument, making art, building things. If there is any hard physical
work to do, we have machines for this, and otherwise always other people
around who can help.

All the work we are not meant to do is any work that doesn't produce anything
for our survival. That is everything money-related, everything entertainment-
related, and everything that is done redundantly because of patents/copyright.

So collectively we would have ALL the time, not less, and then surviving is
just peanuts in that case.

~~~
xienze
> But those are not made up problems, those are necessities and cost only a
> minimal amount of time per day

Minimal, LOL. What world do you live in? I suggest you pay a visit to Amish
country some day and see how people unencumbered with "made up problems" live.
Farming and other survival-related tasks are literally ALL they do. And it's
all you would ever do without people sitting in offices and factories tending
to "made up problems" in order to make your life simpler.

> How is there no time to pursue anything? When I was travelling and not
> working at all for two years, my quest for survival meant that I had to get
> food and water

Were you hunting and farming or scraping together a couple bucks so you could
head down to a store or restaurant to get food? You would not be able to do
that without an army of people in farms, factories, and offices making the
whole thing work.

> If there is any hard physical work to do, we have machines for this

Who builds the machines? A bunch of people tending to "made up problems" in
offices and factories.

It's very tempting to think you've unlocked the meaning of life after slumming
through Europe for a year and a half but you're totally ignoring the fact that
there are numerous people working on "made up problems" in tech, agriculture,
and manufacturing making it possible for you to do that. You absolutely do not
want to revert to an agrarian lifestyle. It's not fun. Realize that some of
these "made up problems" in the first world help you actually live a better
life than a life of subsistence would.

~~~
skidoo
No offense, but I disagree with pretty much all of this. We work more than our
ancestors do, not to make an easier life, but for the sake of incorporating
the ephemeral and inconsequential into our lives. And an agrarian lifestyle
can be loads of fun, actually. I got more of a sense of accomplishment helping
on my grandparents' farm than from any blue collar job I've ever held.

~~~
xienze
Yes the work can be rewarding but I'm really addressing the author's misguided
point that all our modern work is to solve non-existent problems. In reality,
it's to make our lives easier and more comfortable.

The flipside of a completely agrarian society is very little safety net. Crop
disease? Drought? Animal sickness? Broke your leg? Life just got a lot
tougher. Like, life or death tougher.

~~~
mvanvoorden
Again, because you don't seem to read what I'm typing:

Not all modern work, just all the work that has directly or indirectly to do
with money and jobs that come forth out of that (like the cleaning crew or
receptionist of an insurance company or bank).

We do a lot of redundant, unnecessary work, just for the sake of working,
without ever consciously asking ourselves what the use of this work is and who
is actually helped with this. Unconsciously this question comes by a lot, and
that makes people burn out in the long run.

Drop your assumptions and prejudice and read my posts again. We are actually
able to make our lives easier and more comfortable, but instead we let
ourselves be fooled and forced into doing robotic labor, never-ending jobs,
and repetetive tasks. Just because we are told it's necessary and makes our
lives more comfortable.

~~~
xienze
> Not all modern work, just all the work that has directly or indirectly to do
> with money

And then the point of doing this work would be...? There's a reason "money" is
a universal concept: it's compensation for time spent working on things that
aren't necessary for the survival of an individual person. Remove that and
you've removed motivation for people to do things that they don't want or need
to do. Your line of thinking does not scale to society at large.

> We do a lot of redundant, unnecessary work, just for the sake of working,
> without ever consciously asking ourselves what the use of this work is and
> who is actually helped with this.

I don't know about you, but I work so I can be paid and live a more
comfortable life. I'm pretty sure that's most people's motivation. And perhaps
working on nonsense is a Valley thing, but my coworkers and I certainly work
on software that improves the lives of others. Perhaps you should try to find
a company like that instead of declaring that everyone works on useless junk,
money is pointless, and we can all be farmers on 4 hours per week of work.

------
mrgriscom
I'd like to plug going part-time as a good way to temper burnout and provide a
soft landing for if/when you eventually decide to leave. You still get some
money coming in -- proportionally more due to progressive taxation. You still
have benefits, which the company may or may not still cover as if you were
full-time. You avoid abrupt life change while getting a four-day weekend every
week. If your company values you they will probably be more open to this
arrangement than you may think.

------
ianstallings
He sounds like an entrepreneur that wants to do his own thing, and he's using
his anger at the industry for motivation. We all find our power somewhere.

------
udev
This type of misery is common.

The author decided he needs a change in his life, there is no arguing there.

But what makes the author so confident that quitting the job is the solution?

------
omouse
This is precisely why Google had 20% time and why other companies have
hackathons; that ramp-up time to get anything done is definitely required.

It's also burnout; the dude is sick of working on something that he doesn't
particularly care about anymore. I bet if Yelp offered him a few days a week
or 1 week per month to work on whatever he wants he'd be happier and wouldn't
be burnt out.

~~~
thwarted
I worked at Yelp for five years and was there when Yelp engineering first
started doing "hackathons". People worked on some interesting stuff during
them, but very little of it was meant to be production ready and useful (vs
toy) projects saw little exposure outside of the company or the engineering
department itself. Lots of things were meant only to scratch our own developer
itches or impress co-workers, like internal engineering tools (which have
their own value). I attribute this to "yelp the public facing product/service"
having a master plan that is determined outside of engineering proper—nothing
wrong with that, it is what it is. So if you had some cool idea to, for
example, revamp the UI/UX of the business photos page, you could work on that
during the hackathon, but it was only a hackathon project. This encouraged
people to work on throwaway toy projects or experiment with deep backend stuff
during hackathons to blow off steam vs something that someone could point to
publicly. Not to say that no hackathon projects ever were exposed non-
internally, but it was a _very_ small percentage. Some people used hackathons
to catch up on regular work while many other people were working on hackathon
projects. Maybe it's changed since I left.

"Hackathons" are not a silver bullet solution to trying to get people to have
ownership over the solutions to problems they are solving for themselves,
their department, and the company.

------
kev009
Find some group of people and cause bound by something other than simply being
coworkers working on bubble-ish webapps or boring corporate software. For me,
this is FreeBSD -- the problems are interesting personally from running my
laptop to scaling the Internet in my day job, the work and skills will
transcend any one job I ever have, and the people are the best I've ever met.

------
tbolse
If you build some tech product/service to earn money you are in fact not
quitting tech industry! You are tech industry - eventually. ;-)

------
johnthealy3
The article makes a number of points that resonate with me and were the
initial reason I felt obligated to start my own company:

* Corporate and management issues / misalignments * Uninteresting work content (e.g. fixing old bugs all the time) * Time and energy drain

I've been reading the two books about Google culture recently (Work Rules! and
How Google Works), both of which cover similar issues and (ostensibly) how
Google has responded to them. I understand there must be a huge pool of people
out there in similar situations, many of whom are the best of the best. It's
also clear that a few large companies are trying to figure out how to appeal
to this group, while most large companies continue to be consumed by egos and
the day to day grind and fail at this.

The most important benefit to having my own company has (by far) been the time
management. I feel like I could have the proper amount of time and energy to
devote to a child or two, which would have been unthinkable in previous jobs
(mine were in consulting, but the same seems to apply to tech).

However, I've also learned a lot about communication from my company,
especially when it comes to things that would cause unhappiness or conflict
(not agreeing with management, setting boundaries around time, etc). The
biggest leap was realizing that if people react negatively, 1) you don't want
to work with these people, and 2) there are a ton of people out there who want
to work with you because of this. I hope the OP is able to find people who
share his/her extremely positive traits to work with.

(Incidentally, I've learned a lot about communication from the poly community
as well, and I'm not at all surprised to read OP's about section after reading
this post.)

------
lectrick
Insist on reasonable work hours. Argue that it will maintain your performance
long-term. Say it like you mean it, and don't settle for less. Be ready to
leave if you must, in fact, and _do not_ let the glitz/glamour of a well-known
brand/company allow them to tread on you.

------
CyberpunkDad
Congrats to the author, if this refills the battery good for him. That being
said, be thankful you didn't have to get up at the crack of dawn and commute
like most of the world. Working at home only seems like a burden to those who
don't have to commute.

------
jclish
I wish you the best! At 52 I have cashed out the stock options and paid the
mortgage twice. In the end 3 weeks or so is the most I can go without either
wanting to help someone build a company or wanting to build a company. There
is work life after burnout!

------
TheCapn
Not to knock on the industry at large but the day I gave up wanting to program
"services" (for the lack of a better term -- things that work the data to
produce an outcome that although convenient, is not a necessity of our lives)
and apply my skills to tangible, real world problems I became immensely
happier in my day to day. I went from loathing the next day of work and
counting the clock hours until I ran out the door to happily thinking of the
problems, looking forward to the next project. I think a lot of people in
software could benefit from taking the time to take a hands-on hobby of sorts
where you create physical output, a useful craft with purpose. There's a chunk
of our lives that logic and algorithms cannot fulfill in the same way that a
craft can.

It seems like hokum re-reading that last paragraph. I wish I was better with
words to portray what I'm trying to get across but its just something that's
been on my mind in the last month or so. I feel into another slump similar to
what our article's author describes. You get caught in a cycle of "I'm tired
because tomorrow will suck" and don't use that time to regenerate and recover.
When my car hit the tipping point last week and I was forced to get my hands
dirty it broke that cycle. I came out from under with a true sense of
accomplishment; beaming with pride for what I had done and suddenly Monday's
problems were on the wayside.

To swing back to what I tried saying originally though; having a job where I
produce factories, networks, systems that clients look, touch, and interact
with just gives the same feeling of pride that I never achieved when building
services for IPTV products, billing software features or other data
applications. I'm certain there's a whole host of people that drool at some of
those domains but if that's not your "thing" then you'll never be happy. I
wasn't, the author likely wasn't but that's not to say she can't find
happiness anywhere in tech. And to believe that leaving it all behind for a
mystery won't solve those same problems that put her where she is now. "The
Grass is Always Greener" will wane and she'll miss being among peers and those
who she can share her problems with. A girlfriend in the medical industry just
can't converse on the same level as other tech's can, its where I reach out to
coworkers, peers, friends to blow off some steam. I wish her the best, I just
hope she figures out where the true problems lie or where her true calling is
before she regrets distancing herself from an industry that she has obvious
passion for.

------
dataker
Instead of quitting the tech industry, why not move to an existing smaller
company, whose size gives you more freedom?

Wait and sit for a profitable idea doesn't look like a very good idea.

I'd go to AngelList and join an existing startup, rather than going on my own.

------
xacaxulu
"Even if you win the rat race, you're still a rat." ~some smart person

------
hias
so he did not quit the tech industry at all but decided to create his own
business :-)

~~~
chris_wot
Worst. Plan. Evar.

------
Kiro
I definitely don't agree with everyone screaming "burnout" in this thread. I
feel exactly the same and I'm far from burnt out. Some people are just not fit
to be employed.

------
peter303
I've been in it 43 years! Still as fun as when I started.

------
CodeSheikh
First world problems.

~~~
bbcbasic
How are he rant on a full stomach with a roof over his head.

------
reagency
>I don’t intend to look for another tech job.

> Or another job at all.

To me, this is a love letter to tech. What other industry pays you near-FU
money for uncreative grunge work?

------
some_furry
Poor Eevee. :(

I hope he finds happiness from his new path in life. Goodness knows he wasn't
finding it in his previous one.

------
smcl
Anyone know what's with the black "x" characters which appear through the
article?

~~~
niels_bom
I saw some emoticons interspersed, I guess your setup can't show them.

------
snissn
.. hang on let me write a blog post about how i'm quiting the tech industry

------
mooogs
Either you work for the man, or you are the man. The choice is up to you.

------
billpaetzke
> I've worked remotely my entire career

Perhaps some of the angst stems from this bias. I wonder how well Yelp handles
remote workers.

~~~
spiritplumber
I either work remotely, or work in my home workshop (which is open to the
public, if anyone needs to borrow a laser cutter for an hour).

Most of "the basics" in my life are automated; bills are on autopay, I send my
stuff to the post office by drone truck, and so on.

It can be very alienating - there are days that I don't see a human being or
speak a word with anyone.

The solution is to make sure you actually try to be around people on
weekends.... and you MAKE yourself do it. It's way too easy to turtle up.

------
outsidetheparty
Yep, job burnout is the pits.

------
MyNameIsMK
This resonates with me.

------
jgwynn2901
boo friken hoo!

~~~
devonoel
Very constructive.

------
beachstartup
i find it impressive he resisted using the word 'fuck' until about 2/3rds of
the way through. he may have a future yet.

the irony of course, is that anger and humiliation and frustration drive you
to start your own company, but if you succeed, you will basically deal with
new instantiations of the same old problems, except this time it's all your
fault and they still need to be fixed. now 'that guy' is you. congratulations!
you've made it.

technical debt, constant stressful fire-drills, ludicrously overloaded
schedules, demands on your time and patience, inane re-inventions of
established technology, etc. plus a whole host of others ('unknown unknowns')
that you can't even begin to fathom as someone who was paid handsomely to care
only about the technical problems in an organization.

but, of course, you will be king shit sittin' pretty at the top of the whole
shit-heap by then, and see the entire heap of shit from a new, exciting,
gilded perspective. and this is, in and of itself, worth something. in fact,
it can be worth a shitload.

they don't call it an exit strategy for nothing!

------
imaginenore
I did that. I stopped working full time. I started working on my own projects,
which I have like 10 of, all very different. 3 of the ones I launched are
already making okay money, paying half of our rent.

The mental change is tremendous - I don't have a manager harassing me, I do
everything on my own schedule. I can switch between whatever projects I want,
whenever I want.

The only thing that I miss is working with the people who are smarter than me.

~~~
ExpiredLink
IOW, you switched your dependencies.

------
notNow
words of advice to the author of this piece: Just take a vacation and go
somewhere new and interesting and then unwind for some time and after you
clear up your mind, re-evaluate your decision and see what's good for you
going forward and I'm sure you will manage to sort all of this out.

Best wishes

------
michaelvkpdx
This wouldn't be happening if we had a true estate tax in this country, and if
we didn't allow corporations to sit on piles of money while laborers slave
away.

We in the USA are wealthy enough as a society that we all could thrive on 15
or so hours of work a week, if we didn't have to subsidize the fortunes of
billionaires.

~~~
hodwik
HN is turning into Slashdot. Great.

------
jorgeleo
[http://granitegrok.com/wp-
content/uploads/morpheus.jpg](http://granitegrok.com/wp-
content/uploads/morpheus.jpg)

------
tmaly
well written post!

------
davidgerard
Eevee's Patreon:
[https://www.patreon.com/eevee](https://www.patreon.com/eevee)

------
coleifer
Fuck this guy and his narcissistic post. So you retired early, the hell do I
care? Nothing interesting here beyond a guy with the financial means to leave,
and who left. Only a narcissist would think this was something profound.

~~~
roblfrieburg
Guy complains that working for massive company X isn't very motivational,
decides to leave. This isn't something unique it happens in every industry out
there, especially tech. I don't get why this post has the amount of votes it
has.

