Ask HN: I want to leave tech: what do I do?

First thing to do is get used to a much lower salary. Mostly kidding but channeling how often I see sentiments online of people saying they want to leave tech and then balk at the salaries normal people have.

that's the hard part for me, I'd have to change every aspect of my life because any other job would probably start me at 25% of what I make now

sell my house, put my kids in a different school district, be terrified about health insurance

if I fail I'd have to go back into tech and would have uprooted everything in a way that's probably irreversible

I’ve heard this argument many times; some of those times it came out of my own mouth.

the thing is… if you and your spouse get a 25% bump in salary right now, a year or so from now it is likely you’d write the exact same comment as this one above even though a year ago you were in the same boat and obviously managed beautifully without the extra 25%… :)

It's easier to move in one direction than the other :). People have goals, getting a bump in salary lets them achieve those goals faster; getting a 75% cut on the salary means undoing all that and then some.

Not to mention, costs of everything also go up, and our bodies are not getting younger and healthier either. If you're to give up your current salary for the one you had 5 years ago, you wouldn't afford the kind of life you had 5 years ago.

Not to discount your overall point, but you're comparing a 25% increase with a 75% decrease here. Not quite the same thing

Paraphrasing to bring clarity to the point:

> I want to significant change, but not to my income!

I realize that life is expensive, but if you feel stuck, not needing a high salary gives you more options. It's often easier to control spending than income.

When I left big tech for doing tech at a nonprofit, I had to keep reminding myself that even though I took a 66% pay cut I was still making ~double the median wage. By all accounts the job I had with a pay cut was still seen as a “good, high-paying job” in the community

In a past life I worked at a nonprofit. In an attempt to woo higher quality engineers we bumped our salaries as high as we possibly could. It worked to an extent, more mission driven people would come from Big Tech to join us. But despite them taking a huge paycut they were still getting paid a lot more than engineers in other areas of our company. And that, as you point out, was still a fantastic wage in the grand scheme of things relative to the rest of the country.

unfortunately a bunch of it are healthcare expenses

Well a lot of those folks got themselves trapped in a mortgage possibly with a family. I see it all the time here in the Bay. People think they’re on top of the world, buy a house, then start to have second thoughts. Then they’re trapped and will lose out by selling and downsizing. They don’t want to do that, so complain and stick with their job fearing layoffs and hating life.

> I want significant change, but not to my income!

That's not it. The issue is (as the GGP mentions) irreversibility (and, I'd add, unpredictability). When you go for a less-paying job, two things are sure: (1) it'll be nearly impossible to return to the previous (better paying) job, if shit hits the fan, (2) the new job will pay a lot less than you are used to (and what your entire current way of living is based upon) from day 1. Whereas, what you desire in return for this, is totally unpredictable: the new job might or might not give you the meaning and inspiration you are seeking; and you'll only learn the outcome months later.

Thus, the negatives are immediate and certain, while the positives are delayed and uncertain. It's a totally irrational and fiscally irresponsible choice.

Of course, sometimes you do have to make that choice; for example when you get psychosomatic symptoms from the stress and the violation of your core identity at work. But then -- let's be clear about it -- the decision does not come from "carefully weighing the pros and cons"; you do it (literally) to survive.

See the author's story <https://write.as/conjure-utopia/the-verbose-story-of-how-i-l...>:

> I almost died [...] to this day I still suffer from chronic issues. This whole experience forced me to slow down, accept my limits, and reframe my plans for the future. It was very liberating: I was forced to quit the rat race [...] I started to appreciate the freedom that comes from restrictions.

You don't implement such life-uprooting changes, you don't take such risks until/unless you have no other way to survive. These changes are inaccessible through reasoning.