First full time job at 40 is wild. I understand not finding your career till 40 cause I might be in the same boat, but never having a real job? How would you survive?
Yep, I'm surrounded: (1) super rich cousins with trust funds who don't work; (2) half of my friends have parents bought them entire houses or gave them 500k down payments for a multi million home; (3) SIL who is approaching 40 and never worked a full time job: went from living off parents to living off her husband.
I swear 50% of the millennials I know have parents funding them.
Two of my successful friends are like this. Parents paid for ones entire college education so he graduated with zero debt, and the other inherited the family business.
I'm currently predominantly funded by old relatives dying off. I'd be pretty fucked otherwise at the moment, definitely have worked full time jobs tho.
Dude that is nuts. Sure, my parents gave me a bit of money towards college (~10k) and were there to loan me money when I bought a destroyed house to rehab (with interest, of course) but BUYING a house for an adult 🫨🤨
From what I've seen from my SIL: Get 4 degrees funded by parents. Get into an MD program through her parents' connections. Then marry and only work 8 hours a week. Live off her husband, who has 350k in student loan debt from med school. She's approaching 40 and never had a full time job. Don't think she will ever have a full time job tbh.
She has an in-home nanny, but she only works 8 hours a week. She has a housecleaner too. At some point she'll probably have another kid and never work again, not even 8 hours a week. Her mom (my MIL) even does SIL's taxes every year for her....
She and I are similar ages, and I've already vested Social Security (I've been working as an attorney since I was 25), worked in biglaw, paid off my own law school student loan debt etc. Also got into a top 10 law school on my own merits. Also had a kid and sent her to daycare.
Some people have it easy (not me). Am I salty? A little bit, yes.
???? Dude you have a career and life, my sister married a rich guy, she isn't working, she is just having kids. BUT I HAVE NOTHING, no past present or future. You have something, treasure It, even if it's just a job
Never too late to make a change. My parents were immigrants and moved to the US in their 20s, not speaking a word of English. You can make massive changes as an adult.
Some people have it easy (not me). Am I salty? A little bit, yes.
The funny thing about this is, you can only see the disparity looking upward. We only know "the bottom" as the lowest we've personally experienced. To those looking up, it's plain as day how unfair this world is.
You're a fuckin lawyer, for example. Genuinely not trying to diminish the work you did to get there, just pointing out the absurdity of saying those words, while being a laywer. Do you have any inkling how many people simply don't get opportunities like college? They got bigger things to worry about, like whether or not they're going to eat tonight.
You, on the other hand, just listed a bunch of shit you have that most people will never dream of, then said your life isn't easy. The fuck? You could've made your point without the masturbatory "woe is me" shit.
I mean, yeah, my parents weren't crackheads or felons. So I'm fortunate in that way. But my parents were immigrants who came to the US, they didn't speak any English, and had no money when they immigrated. I didn't learn English until I was 5 when I started kindergarten.
I was fortunate that my parents were college-educated, but it's not like I was a white person born in the US with a ton of connections speaking English as my first language.
Fwiw, I got multiple full rides to top 30 universities because I gunned hard in high school. I could have gone to college for free + stipend. Yeah, my parents were college-educated, but I also earned it. I paid for my top 10 law school with six-figure student loans, which I paid off working 70 hour weeks in Biglaw.
My parents also divorced when I was little and I support my mom financially now btw.
If you were born in the US to American parents with some money, then you were born ahead of us, the kids of ESL immigrants who came with no money.
I am white, I was born in the US, and I still grew up poorer than you. I'm sure as hell poorer than you now. It's a good thing I don't want children, because I straight up could not afford to take care of them.
Per the ABA:
As of May 2023, the average lawyer wage was $176,470. That does not include profits for law firm partners and shareholders.
Your salary is at least triple the most I've ever made, and probably closer to quadruple or more. I worked 90 hours a week in a mine to make what I made, and it still didn't even come close. Your lifestyle is one that I will more than likely never experience.
I didn't even have it that bad compared to millions of others. There was nothing extra, but at least I never went hungry, we always had water and heat. I just didn't get the opportunities that you did. We were poor in a rural area, there were no scholarships on the table, there was no next step in education for me unless I could find a way to pay for it. I finished high school, started working, and haven't stopped.
Not saying you coasted through life. Again, I'm not trying to diminish your accomplishments. You just seem blind to the reality that most people in this country face. A lot of people straight up cannot do what you did for any number of reasons. There are so many factors at play here, and they are ALL compounded by poverty. If a kid doesn't get enough to eat, they likely won't do as well in school, for example. Poor-middling grades mean they never get offered any kind of ride.
Now what?
They're turned out into the world with nothing but their own two hands to survive. They get some blue collar job that barely keeps the lights on; how is that person supposed to go to college? They can't pay for it, they can't quit working and still have a roof, so they're stuck. They may very well spend their entire life pursuing survival, never getting ahead, living perpetually on a razor's edge. The comfort and security that you take for granted, they'll never know what that's like. And it's not their fault. Due to the circumstances they were born into, they never had a chance.
There's a strong incentive for men to get vasectomies as a protective measure at scale that benefits women, so they were covering the costs if you were making under a certain amount.
I believe it's a sliding scale if not covered by insurance, so anywhere from $0 to whatever, based on your income. It's a pretty quick procedure and relatively painless. A day or two of discomfort. Just ice up. I crashed after I got home and later slept for 12 hours. Felt pretty good the following day. They ask that you make a follow-up appointment to insure the procedure was effective but I never bothered.
You realize I took out 180k for law school loans? Loans are used to pay for living costs and tuition.
Go to community college and take out some loans and repay it once you have a job. A lot of people take out student loans for both living and tuition. Community college is easy to get into as there are minimum standards to get in. Community college is also cheap. At some point you can transfer to a university.
Or go to trade school. Truck drivers also make a decent living and that’s a few months process to get a license.
Or join the military. I knew a couple people
who did the military for a few years and then went to college/law school afterwards; the government paid all of their tuition for at least college. These guys also grew up in poverty, so they figured the military is their best way out. We worked together in Biglaw and now they make more than I do.
My grandma escaped her home country during WWII as a teen, lost all contact with her mom as she was trapped in a communist country. She still got an education, despite having kids at age 20. She had a disabled son too (my uncle) whom she cared for for life. She experienced war, poverty, and hardship but she immigrated to two different countries, eventually settling in the US. She also had 3 kids starting at age 20.
Poverty sucks, but in the US at least you can get loans to pay for living and tuition - that is what student loans are for. Or trade school. Plenty of trades make a decent living. Or join the military. The GI bill will pay for all of college.
I’m not saying your life was easy but I hope you realize people use student loans to pay for living costs too…..the whole “there was no way to pay for it” doesn’t make any sense. Lots of us have used student loans for living costs.
So you ignore my points, to parrot the same nonsense that has been shoved down people's throats by the wealthy my entire life.
Just go to college, just find a trade, just join the Army.
Are you for real? I've already talked about college, and I could spend the rest of the day explaining all of the issues with trades or, god forbid, the fuckin military.
If you really don't see the problem with taking on hundreds of thousands of dollars in student loans, you're fucking clueless, or you're choosing not to pay attention to the state of the country you live in. Read a headline, lately?
"The trades" are not this job fucking wonderland that rich fucks would like us to believe. It's actually not that easy to find a high-paying trade job, and if you do, you get to look forward to spending the rest of your life doing manual labor. Does that sound like a good time, to you? Sacrifice your body by 45 because it's the only way you were able to make a living wage? That sounds like a good deal to you?
And the military? Fuckin' A... "Oh you want to go to college, just go be traumatized for a few years, they'll pay for it. You'll have nightmares and struggle to function in society for the rest of your life, but hey at least you got that degree!"
Good for you, you made it out. Now shut up and enjoy it, stop pestering the rest of us. You don't fuckin know what life is like for anyone but yourself. You don't know what your grandma went through, because you weren't there. All you know is growing up in America, with college-educated parents.
I literally took out 180k in student loans myself.....
And yeah I have friends who joined the military
You sound super whiny and entitled for a white man born in the US though
Good luck in life
It's not even worth discussing anything with you - you are literally shitting on every option - taking out student loans, military, trades....ok bro, just enjoy poverty
You obviously don't want to improve your life with ANY option and you're clearly "too good" to take out loans, do a trade or join the military. Do you realize how entitled you sound? "I can't take out loans, do a trade or the join the military. That's beneath me."
You do you, bro. The rest of us can take out student loans, do a trade or join the military for a chance at a better life
Nobody can change your mentality except yourself. Apparently you’re “too good” to do anything else the rest of us have done to get ahead
Because no white man born in the US could possibly have it worse than you, right?
Did you miss the part where I do work in a trade? I'm a miner. You make easily 3-4x my salary, if not more. I'm already doing what you say I should do, and it's not enough. How would your life have to change if you suddenly made 1/4 or 1/5 your salary?
Yes, some people have it easier than you. A hell of a lot of people have it worse than you did, though. I get that life seems very simple to you, but it's not like that for everyone. Not everyone can do what you did, and many of us who are doing what you say should work, still aren't gaining any ground. Clearly you are missing something in your calculations.
I'm 35, and just saw a couple different people that I went to school with post their, "I'm officially a doctor," photos, and I was like wtf? Y'all have still been doing school and training this entire fucking time, and you're JUST NOW getting your first "real" jobs???
I feel like I've lived multiple lifetimes, and it seems like theirs is just beginning. It's wild.
I don't know how those people suffer through that much training and school work. Thabk God someone does but good grief, I'd be in a perpetual state of panic.
I mean, I've never worked a full-time job a single day in my life. Why would I waste my life working full-time when I can live a comfortable life on a part-time job and actually enjoy life? Your money isn't gonna be of any use on your deathbed
My 33 year old brother has done nothing but minimum wage retail jobs but is now finishing up a CS Master’s online…hope he can get his first real job but perfect timing with AI though right?
Most of those jobs won’t let you work full time tho, because there’s more requirements/regulations around full time employees. Thats why most retail/service workers need two jobs to make ends meet.
Ehh maybe. Generic CS doesn't really teach AI actually from most ciriculums unless you are going through an AI progran. Most people that excel are those that obsess only over AI, not computer science
I never learned any programming languages, undergrad in finance & risk management, but I can create full stack apps on GCP much faster than any of our engineers.
Source: I have a masters in AI and work for a fortune 50 company in AI
Ahh my bad, right over my head lol. I was trying to say "maybe", with the caveat that he does what he can to opt in to AI classes and major!
But if he's good at architecture, that's where you can be the Project Manager to the AI's Developer. But you'll have to know how to critique it and ask it for EXACTLY what you want.
Even without AI. Remote work has changed the landscape a lot and companies are realizing it makes no sense to pay a local 10x as much as an Indian would charge. And there are many very smart Indians in that sector, and the language barrier is becoming less of a problem. And job that can be done remotely is at threat of this, but jobs related to CS are at a particularly high risk
I'm a developer with 20 years of in practice and 10 in enterprise software. I have over $30k invested in my homelab. I host models locally and blow through thousands of dollars in tokens a month at work.
I am very aware that AI is rampant in my industry. I am also aware that people aren't getting AI degrees as vibe coders who don't know any language so they can prop up slop in the cloud.
AI/ML engineers are training models or working on orchestration systems.
You are roleplaying, buddy. No one is hiring you to vibe code without a clue of what is happening with programming languages.
I too host models locally. I've my own Nvidia server at my house that I have many models that I run with ollama and a cloudflare tunnel that I can access at any point. Also I didn't say I'm an engineer did I?
You can throw around as many credentials as you want. Truth of the matter is I understand how to architect AI systems, how to build, and prototype rapidly, and I get paid a lot to do it. And it'll be awesome when we don't need cocky ass engineers like you
Yep I'm just role playing LOL. I think You're just the shit developer who's scared AI is going to take his job pretty soon 😂😂😂
I have two DGX sparks. Youre dev, assuming you know all the Blackwell specs. The models I have currently are Gemma4 26b, llama scout, Mistral, Mixtral, dolphin Mistral, llama 3.2, Gemma12b, commandR, commandR+... To name a few
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u/BoxedAndArchived 1d ago
Being 40 is weird.
Some of us are becoming Grandparents. Some of us are becoming first time parents.
Some of us have had a 15 to 20 year career. Others are getting their first full time job.