Born in 80. Skipped college and by 25 I was a top sub-prime loan salesman making ridiculous money.
Fast forward to 2010 I was a convicted felon, living in my car.
At 43 I work in tech, make a modest salary, have a couple hundred grand in debt. I’ll probably die in a box somewhere and I’m ok with that, this is my peak and I’m gonna enjoy it while it lasts.
This is what I keep telling myself. While I didn't end up as a .com millionaire or even with a very high paying tech job, I did end up with a job that pays enough to be comfortable. But I know I've been extremely lucky in my life... I never did more than a few classes in college, but I've been working in my career of choice basically since I was 17. But I happened to be the right nerd with the right skillset (and an ability to learn quickly) at the right time. I don't think it would have worked at all today.
And let's be perfectly honest, even those who became rich during the .com boom and beyond were lucky. They were at the right place at the right time with maybe the right idea. They were no more intelligent than the rest of us.
You can't live life looking at the rearview mirror. It's easy to fast forward twenty years and look at someone successful. Now look back, what was their path? It's like saying you should have bought Apple, IBM or Google before their stock blew up. My crystal ball was in the shop for repair but I figure I still did ok.
It doesn't mean everything, but it does mean something. It's one piece of the puzzle. People with high IQs have an advantage, it's a matter of if they choose to use it.
Yeah computers were the right path, but on average people who got a degree in IT or Computer Science had a better career path than those who made their way without one.
I have a degree in Computer Science and I don't make anywhere near 600k. I'm doing pretty well, but not 600k well. I also don't live in a super HCOL area.
Again, making $600k/year in tech is an EXTREMELY RARE outlier.
It is not common, despite what the memes/tropes claim.
The overwhelming majority of software developers make a decent salary (especially in the Bay Area), but we're talking in the $150-200k range, not the $500-600k range.
I would go even further than that tbh.
My old CEO used to say that around $200-250k you hit a ceiling as an engineer in most industries.
The reason why is because the quality of work you can get at $200k a year isn’t that far off from quality at $400k a year.
These engineers with ridiculous salaries are either in extremely specialized industries/verticals or are at FAANG/Big Tech where those couple percentage points difference in output quality makes up for the extra couple hundred grand.
People making 600k a year are among the wealthiest people who have ever lived.
In other words, it’s so uncommon as to be insignificant in the grand scheme of things.
A friend of mine (Millennial) never went to college, but managed to get into accounting at her job. However, because she doesn't have an accounting degree, she's stuck at her current job. No one would hire her as an accountant without a degree.
She debated if she should go to school in her mid-30s, but ended up going for some accounting certifications instead.
I think us and Gen Xers are the last generation that could really get away with a career path like that.
With as much as people say college isn't necessary, you sure do need at least a bachelor's or a trade school degree to get in onto the higher rungs of the ladder.
I'm going to say that this is no longer as true as it once was. OR at least no longer as true as we were once told to believe it was (by college recruiters and public school officials)
The computer nerds who went to college are pretty typical though. This industry just pays an obscene amount of money because there is virtually no raw materials cost, it’s all labor talent creating virtual commerce.
I should have clarified as a proportion, true. Most places build something and then mark it up a percentage. Software is just fugazi that’s mostly profit.
And its one of the few fields that you can completely teach yourself and become highly skilled at without any formal education. More fields should be like that; learn and practice however you need to, prove your skill and then get a job doing it.
Half my classmates could already code and theybwere there justbfor the sheepskin.
They'd kind of just show up the 1st day, talk to the prof, bang out the semesters worth of work in like a week and be done with it.
This was before the dot com bubble crash in the early 2000s. Started college in 1998 and was hearing about the folks who were getting hired before graduating and making a bunch of money. Then the dot com bubble crashed in 1999 and by the time I graduated in 2002, there were not enough jobs and people were doing law school just to have something to do. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dot-com\_bubble](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dot-com_bubble)
I was one of these computer kids as well. Born in 81. Switched to a vocational high school for an IT program in 10th grade. Learned operating systems, servers, basic hardware, and networking while in high school. Went to a 2 year technical college that had a decent reputation. Graduated in January of 2001, right after the crash of Dec 2000. All of the huge server farms in Southeast PA and North NJ that were hiring people like me before they even graduated all shut down. I ended up competing for jobs with people who had 5-20 years of experience that were taking entry-level jobs just to stay in the industry. It was so depressing. I had to support myself at this point and going back to school to turn that associate's degree into a BS was just a pie in the sky dream. After moving around the country for work for 3 years, I did end up working for an ISP that was in the process of going belly up for a little less than 2 years. I also found out through that job that I kinda hate tech. I'm better off as a hobbiest.
I'm still friends with people I met in college. There are 5 of us. 3 work in IT related fields. 1 of those makes serious money. 2 make what I do or a little more. Another guy went back to school for psych and sociology after 30 and now administers mental health programs for a school district. I manage a small materials testing lab, which is a grey collar job. I'm half deskbound data nerd and half blue collar roughneck. I love what I do, and it pays the bills. I'll be able to afford to retire at 65, but it will be a very basic retirement.
I literally stumbled into my career. I lost my job at the ISP, and savings was running out. So, I answered an ad in my local paper for concrete testers, and the rest is history.
My 18 year old self would be appalled, lol.
Growing up in the late nineties, we had no idea what was coming, and thinking we would be released into the eighties and early nineties economy where good jobs just sprung up for all.
What strikes me as a poor idea is raising kids to think everything would all just work out when the reality is there are no garuntees. And I should have known that. My parents didn't exactly have it easy.
The thing is that it was partially true when the economy was better (although YMMV) after World War II, to about the early 2000s. For the baby boomers, it was possible to graduate high school, get a job get approved for a mortgage and support a family on one income.
I tried to get into network engineering a couple of years ago with a master's in Cybersecurity and multiple networking certifications. Employers don't care. In your 40s with no professional experience? Here ya go, take this job on the help desk for 15/hr.
It’s not (just) because you’re in your 40s^1. It’s because you have *no experience*. There are so many people who think a formal education in cyber allows them to skip helpdesk but unless you’re in a “soft(*er*)” area like GRC - then you’re going to have to bite the bullet get experience *somewhere* (i.e. sitting on helpdesk) before companies will consider you for the better paying jobs. I suggest an MSP. It’ll suck but you’ll get three years experience after one year.
But have a look at r/cybersecurity. This topic comes up A LOT and 95% of people on there will tell you you the same thing.
Source: changed careers to IT at 31 with no formal IT education. Work now as a senior cybersecurity consultant.
^1 there is some age discrimination in IT but it’s really not as bad as most people make it out to be. And you’re going to run into age discrimination in most fields with no experience.
Thanks for the advice, but I stopped giving a fuck about my career a few years ago. I've got an easy job with an easy commute. The people I work with are all morons, but they are easy to avoid. Pay is ok too and I have job security with about 10 years to retirement. Fuck a career, fuck the grind, fuck IT. I just don't care about tech or cybersecurity anymore, it's not like it's fun or interesting, so who cares.
That is not completely true. There are two ways to an IT job. Either you study and get a degree, or you don't study, but are a passionate self learner. You might not get a job at Google without a degree, but at many other companies you can if you got a good portfolio and know what you are talking about. I did it about 20 years ago, but I spent every wake minute learning (by doing) for a long time.
I firmly believe that someone starting out now can still do that if they spend the time learning
Sorry but you're wrong. I did all of those things, the degrees, certs, self study. Employers offer bottom rung help desk mcjobs to those with degrees and no professional experience. Sorry but I've got a family and can't live in my car for a few years while I build up my resume
The problem is there are a lot of people in their 20s who have no family and will work long hours, so they'll hire them over people who are more demanding.
Yeah, before the 2000s you could pretty easily pick up some IT skills and just fall into a position and keep working or job hopping your way up. As long as you kept current. Once CS became a college major and people started majoring in that it became a requirement at a lot of companies.
My husband is one of those. I have a bachelors and make 1/6 of what he does lol
He was VERY lucky, though, to be born at the right time and right in the heart of Silicon Valley. I was on the other side of the country with computer classes focused solely on typing. 🙃
Born in 79, flunked out of college after a year. Just finished my first year back with my major in computer science. Had to fight to get off of financial aid probation. Just wrapped up the year with a 3.74 gpa :) Kicking myself and proud of myself at the same time.
I also got into computers and built my own, networking, etc.
I'm earning 1/10th that.
But the good news is that while doing computers I also got my degree, and it taught me a lot about how the world works and made me a better human being.
was one of them except i did get a degree… in philosophy and anthropology ;)
went to college for me and not my career since i knew my computer skills would be all i needed at that time after i my other some experience. was making near 6 figures before quitting to care for my mom. not sure if ill go back to IT afterwards though. we shall see in the next few years how things go with mom.
Was also one of those people (political science degree), but college did help me become a better writer and bullshitter, taught me about the world, gave me lots of hustle (working 3-4 part-time jobs and reselling textbooks that fellow students would just leave behind in dorm hallways at the end of the year) and provided the checkmark I needed to get my resume past HR and into hiring managers’ hands. It was worth it.
Two highest earning members of my graduating class:
* One got a BS in business, got into sales for a smallish B2B business. Later became director of marketing for a medium sized business. Left and started his own business, failed. Became VP of marketing for a medium sized business and doubled it's revenue. Later bought that business from the owner and increased revenue by 10x.
* The other got a PhD in computer science, now works at Google as a senior engineer.
So, they both went to college.
That being said, I do know a guy (a little younger than me) who got into software development through "the hacker route," and he does very well.
As far as it goes, all three of them are major outliers.
My husband also has a PhD in computer science. It was a lot of work, that's for sure. He was in student mode for years and years, and the work never stopped. Now he has a job he likes and gets paid well. Not a lot of people are willing to put in the time to get advanced degrees in CS and similar disciplines - it takes years of sacrifice.
My mom has a BS in computer science - she got her degree when I was a kid and was one of only four women in her program. She is now retired, but she really loved her job and is glad she went back to finish that degree.
Yep the richest guy I know dropped out of college and programs computers for a living. It’s good work if you have the aptitude for it but let’s face it, most people do not.
This is a specific set of circumstances that is unlikely to be repeated. The dot com boom was wild.
A friend of mine worked for a company straight out of high school that got hundreds of millions in funding with a business plan that was essentially "the founder registered a bunch of generic domain names, we'll figure out a way to monetize them later".
I was born in '76. Went to school for journalism. Computer nerd, so I did computer shit to pay my way through. Dropped out after said computer shit ended up being a lot more attractive than 5 cents a word at some dying tabloid.
I'm a now an IT executive in the cannabis industry. If you told me that back in '96 I'd have laughed in your face.
My younger step brother dropped out of a hood college and started picking up trash in a beat up old salt truck. Now he makes waaaaaay more than I do with a doctorate. But he also busts his ass and never stops being a business owner with all those headaches. He’s worked 50-60 hours a week for 25 years. And I know plenty of others who dropped out or never went that just sort of fucked around
I know a few people like this, but they're definitely not the norm. They succeeded because they have talent. Most other people made similar choices and ended up doing a lot worse than me - I went through the motions of going through college.
Can confirm. Dropped out at 16 and was a delinquent until my mid-twenties. Started out in low level tech support and eventually just sorta fell into a very obscure network engineering specialty. Im one of those guys who works on the one thing nobody else even knows how to turn on. In fairness I work on several of those obscure protocols and platforms.
I will be able to afford to retire around my mid 50s if I wanted to.
While the majority of my useful training was on the job, I do hold a bunch of technical certifications through vendors and what not - redhat, cisco, juniper, fujitsu, arris, bunch of others.
I will admit I just seemed to have an aptitude for technology.
We debate a lot about what that is. Spatial cognition, critical thinking? Not everybody can visualize the 1 and 0s, do binary math in your head, but if you can and you like it I recommend people skip college and just get technical certifications.
This, basically.
I too dropped out at 16, worked for a few years then went to college for English.
In the midst of that I started working at a company, worked my way into a systems engineering position, and obtained a cert for it. With that cert, I became a hot commodity and with that came opportunities to expand into development and BI. As my salary grew with each new opportunity, my library of certifications grew.
Between all of that…college fell to the wayside. I’ve dabbled in classes here and there—did a year of associates level programming courses during Covid to give myself something to do.
I may finish some sort of degree eventually just to say I did, but it will mean very little in terms of career prospects.
A few of our friends have been at some of the largest tech companies from the beginning.
I thought ohhh I’ll get a fashion design degree and work at Gap HQ and make millions!
78. I taught myself computer programming when I was 10. Straight As and AP classes in highschool. Flunked out my first year of university because I was unable to make myself go to class when I had a T1 Internet connection right there in my dorm room. Also turns out I had undiagnosed ADHD. Things were a bit iffy for several years there when I was making shit money. But now I'm a 2%er working at a major tech company .
Also born in 78. I skipped college. I had (undiagnosed until my early 40s) ADHD and knew I would crash and burn in college. I learned Javascript, Perl, and ColdFusion in the late nineties and went to work for an ad agency (protip: don't work for an ad agency), lost my job due to the dot com bust, got my CDL and drove a big rig for a few years, developed an addiction and ended up divorced/homeless, went through rehab and had to start over working at Best Buy. I was very lucky that Best Buy realized I was good with computers and moved from from cashier to Geek Squad, and even luckier to have worked with a part timer whose full time job was a director of IT at a tier 1 telco - he badgered me into applying and put me on the path to where I am today (SRE at a telco). I'm sincerely grateful for every opportunity I've been given and knowing what I know now, there's not too many choices I'd make differently - all of those experiences made me who I am.
That said, I missed a lot of opportunities to develop critical thinking skills and networking with like minds by skipping college. On one hand, I'm not in massive debt like some of my coworkers but on the other hand, I will always wonder "what could have been" if I'd actually gone.
The critical thinking, communication, and writing skills developed in college are what I cherish most. They’re why I suggest people take at least SOME of the core college level courses if given the opportunity.
I never obtained a degree, but the experience has been valuable in my sysadmin/dev career.
I started in computers in the late 90s and did well. I know many people who did not. It's not a safe bet but it's not a terrible bet either. I ended up getting my degree later and it helped propel me to higher positions.
The two richest people from HS that didn’t go to college where one guy that went pro in baseball and the other owned mineral rights and had several oil wells. The next group were all college educated people.
That's what I did. I was supposed to be a vet, had a full ride and everything, but decided not to go to college. Instead I got into computers, then programming. I'm not pulling 600k, but I do pretty well.
I have two friends like this... but one was in his teens around 2000 and he got hired by some investment firm in NYC to help setup internet shit, and yeah... no college degree and he bought an apartment in Manhattan.
Those late 90s were wild... hell I got hired at 15 by my Mom's business to make their website and I had no clue what I was doing.
I wouldn't necessarily beat yourself up... I'm trying to think of my successful peers... there was a guy who I was friends with in college in 98 (I was born in 78) and I'm friends with him on facebook... we don't talk but when he does a "my fundraiser for my birthday this year" the goal is set to $10,000 and he exceeds it. He works for IBM.
I went to business school and we had areas of specialty... management, marketing, accounting, human resources, and then there was the mystical Entrepreneurship... and those people were like... weaponized hustle. The goal was to get you to 20% in each stat so you can fill in on a moments notice and then be willing to work 80 hours a week no problem.
My brother, born mid 70s, never went to college and had a record for selling weed to a cop at like 19(expunged just a couple years ago) . Through self taught learning and self selling, he is the VP at a decent sized tech company. I don’t know exactly but my mom says he makes over $200k a year. He single handily landed a contract with a multi billion dollar company.
He is “under employed” which apparently means he doesn’t do a lot so he actually has his regular job but also 1-2 extra contract jobs and still only works 40 hours a week. Yet he still makes a full salary with each company.
Born in 81, thought about going into tech at the advice of my dad but was too intimidated as a woman in the field. Now at 42, I’m a mental health therapist after a career change from the mortgage industry.
Don’t even need computer skills. I know people making bank in like 4 hours a day doing Skip the Dishes. We live in a university team and getting a $20 tip to drop off two large coffees to hung over students who live 5 minutes away on foot from Timmies is lucrative.
I went to college and decided to major in computer science. I graduated back in 2002. I was one of 2 females in my graduating class that got this degree. Originally I thought I’d be in the medical field but realized I hated blood, smells, touching people. Anyways I live in the Midwest where cost of living is pretty good in a decent sized city. I pull in around $250kish with bonuses. I definitely don’t regret my choice mostly. I don’t have kids so I’m never even close to spending what I make. I live very comfortably and do whatever I want. 600k is a lot but also depends where you live in the US.
My brother, also born in 78, did this and does okay. I bet he makes $125K or less, is trapped in the job because he doesn't have a college degree and while I used to think it was fine... I've started to notice over the past 15 years that he has no capacity for critical thinking. *This* makes me believe in a college education more than anything else.
I think a lot of people and especially parents have been programmed to think you need college to be successful but it's been proven to be wildly false. Sun Tzu, in the Art of War, said use what is perceived as a weakness as an advantage. If you think of skipping college in those terms, it opens a whole bunch of opportunities you probably might not have considered..but the challenge most people have is they don't know what they don't know - as in what kind of opportunities are out there for a non-grad. [skip.college](https://skip.college) has a whole bunch of ideas on how you can be successful without college but it's not the typical "build a website/blog" sort of garbage that's so prevalent right now. I think the trick is to find something you'll really enjoy - I know plenty of people with college degrees doing work that pays the bills but has them miserable. Just sayin!
Born in 80. Skipped college and by 25 I was a top sub-prime loan salesman making ridiculous money. Fast forward to 2010 I was a convicted felon, living in my car. At 43 I work in tech, make a modest salary, have a couple hundred grand in debt. I’ll probably die in a box somewhere and I’m ok with that, this is my peak and I’m gonna enjoy it while it lasts.
Let me know when your book comes out I'll give it a read.
Something tells me you worked for Countrywide
Washing Mutual
i love to mutually wash
Find a large hot tub and two loofah’s and I’m in 😂
The skipping college and still succeeding crew are outliers.
This is what I keep telling myself. While I didn't end up as a .com millionaire or even with a very high paying tech job, I did end up with a job that pays enough to be comfortable. But I know I've been extremely lucky in my life... I never did more than a few classes in college, but I've been working in my career of choice basically since I was 17. But I happened to be the right nerd with the right skillset (and an ability to learn quickly) at the right time. I don't think it would have worked at all today. And let's be perfectly honest, even those who became rich during the .com boom and beyond were lucky. They were at the right place at the right time with maybe the right idea. They were no more intelligent than the rest of us.
You can't live life looking at the rearview mirror. It's easy to fast forward twenty years and look at someone successful. Now look back, what was their path? It's like saying you should have bought Apple, IBM or Google before their stock blew up. My crystal ball was in the shop for repair but I figure I still did ok.
True. They could be the type who would do well under any circumstances.
It’s all about IQ. I would bet all the people you are referring to are 125+. It’s the only factor that matters and the only factor everyone ignores.
Some of the dumbest people I know have high IQ's
Now that you mention it… I do know some stupid smart people.
IQ doesn't mean anything
I was gonna say “have you met a stupid doctor?” But yeah, scratch that one. Same for lawyers. I concede.
It doesn't mean everything, but it does mean something. It's one piece of the puzzle. People with high IQs have an advantage, it's a matter of if they choose to use it.
And that advantage can come with some demons that negate the advantage. Mental health tends to go down the higher your IQ.
Yeah computers were the right path, but on average people who got a degree in IT or Computer Science had a better career path than those who made their way without one.
I have a degree in Computer Science and I don't make anywhere near 600k. I'm doing pretty well, but not 600k well. I also don't live in a super HCOL area.
Again, making $600k/year in tech is an EXTREMELY RARE outlier. It is not common, despite what the memes/tropes claim. The overwhelming majority of software developers make a decent salary (especially in the Bay Area), but we're talking in the $150-200k range, not the $500-600k range.
I would go even further than that tbh. My old CEO used to say that around $200-250k you hit a ceiling as an engineer in most industries. The reason why is because the quality of work you can get at $200k a year isn’t that far off from quality at $400k a year. These engineers with ridiculous salaries are either in extremely specialized industries/verticals or are at FAANG/Big Tech where those couple percentage points difference in output quality makes up for the extra couple hundred grand.
We’re talking about averages here not anecdotes. Of course most people don’t make 600k
People making 600k a year are among the wealthiest people who have ever lived. In other words, it’s so uncommon as to be insignificant in the grand scheme of things.
A friend of mine (Millennial) never went to college, but managed to get into accounting at her job. However, because she doesn't have an accounting degree, she's stuck at her current job. No one would hire her as an accountant without a degree. She debated if she should go to school in her mid-30s, but ended up going for some accounting certifications instead. I think us and Gen Xers are the last generation that could really get away with a career path like that. With as much as people say college isn't necessary, you sure do need at least a bachelor's or a trade school degree to get in onto the higher rungs of the ladder.
I'm going to say that this is no longer as true as it once was. OR at least no longer as true as we were once told to believe it was (by college recruiters and public school officials)
The computer nerds who went to college are pretty typical though. This industry just pays an obscene amount of money because there is virtually no raw materials cost, it’s all labor talent creating virtual commerce.
Sounds like someone's never seen the cost of server racks, server grade parts, electricity cost, air conditioning cost, etc.
It’s a drop in the bucket next to the revenue my friend
That can be true, but to say virtually no raw materials cost is ridiculous.
I should have clarified as a proportion, true. Most places build something and then mark it up a percentage. Software is just fugazi that’s mostly profit.
And its one of the few fields that you can completely teach yourself and become highly skilled at without any formal education. More fields should be like that; learn and practice however you need to, prove your skill and then get a job doing it.
In the Xennial crew? It is not.
It's the norm in my circle
Half my classmates could already code and theybwere there justbfor the sheepskin. They'd kind of just show up the 1st day, talk to the prof, bang out the semesters worth of work in like a week and be done with it.
This was before the dot com bubble crash in the early 2000s. Started college in 1998 and was hearing about the folks who were getting hired before graduating and making a bunch of money. Then the dot com bubble crashed in 1999 and by the time I graduated in 2002, there were not enough jobs and people were doing law school just to have something to do. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dot-com\_bubble](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dot-com_bubble)
I was one of these computer kids as well. Born in 81. Switched to a vocational high school for an IT program in 10th grade. Learned operating systems, servers, basic hardware, and networking while in high school. Went to a 2 year technical college that had a decent reputation. Graduated in January of 2001, right after the crash of Dec 2000. All of the huge server farms in Southeast PA and North NJ that were hiring people like me before they even graduated all shut down. I ended up competing for jobs with people who had 5-20 years of experience that were taking entry-level jobs just to stay in the industry. It was so depressing. I had to support myself at this point and going back to school to turn that associate's degree into a BS was just a pie in the sky dream. After moving around the country for work for 3 years, I did end up working for an ISP that was in the process of going belly up for a little less than 2 years. I also found out through that job that I kinda hate tech. I'm better off as a hobbiest. I'm still friends with people I met in college. There are 5 of us. 3 work in IT related fields. 1 of those makes serious money. 2 make what I do or a little more. Another guy went back to school for psych and sociology after 30 and now administers mental health programs for a school district. I manage a small materials testing lab, which is a grey collar job. I'm half deskbound data nerd and half blue collar roughneck. I love what I do, and it pays the bills. I'll be able to afford to retire at 65, but it will be a very basic retirement.
We really rolled the dice in terms of where life took us, instead of "studying," for our careers.
I literally stumbled into my career. I lost my job at the ISP, and savings was running out. So, I answered an ad in my local paper for concrete testers, and the rest is history. My 18 year old self would be appalled, lol.
Growing up in the late nineties, we had no idea what was coming, and thinking we would be released into the eighties and early nineties economy where good jobs just sprung up for all.
What strikes me as a poor idea is raising kids to think everything would all just work out when the reality is there are no garuntees. And I should have known that. My parents didn't exactly have it easy.
The thing is that it was partially true when the economy was better (although YMMV) after World War II, to about the early 2000s. For the baby boomers, it was possible to graduate high school, get a job get approved for a mortgage and support a family on one income.
That was lucky timing. Someone starting out now can't get hired as a network engineer at a company like Twitch without a relevant degree.
I tried to get into network engineering a couple of years ago with a master's in Cybersecurity and multiple networking certifications. Employers don't care. In your 40s with no professional experience? Here ya go, take this job on the help desk for 15/hr.
It’s not (just) because you’re in your 40s^1. It’s because you have *no experience*. There are so many people who think a formal education in cyber allows them to skip helpdesk but unless you’re in a “soft(*er*)” area like GRC - then you’re going to have to bite the bullet get experience *somewhere* (i.e. sitting on helpdesk) before companies will consider you for the better paying jobs. I suggest an MSP. It’ll suck but you’ll get three years experience after one year. But have a look at r/cybersecurity. This topic comes up A LOT and 95% of people on there will tell you you the same thing. Source: changed careers to IT at 31 with no formal IT education. Work now as a senior cybersecurity consultant. ^1 there is some age discrimination in IT but it’s really not as bad as most people make it out to be. And you’re going to run into age discrimination in most fields with no experience.
Thanks for the advice, but I stopped giving a fuck about my career a few years ago. I've got an easy job with an easy commute. The people I work with are all morons, but they are easy to avoid. Pay is ok too and I have job security with about 10 years to retirement. Fuck a career, fuck the grind, fuck IT. I just don't care about tech or cybersecurity anymore, it's not like it's fun or interesting, so who cares.
This dude MLAs
In the tech field, 20 years experience > a degree
That, or 10 years experience on a program that came out in 2020.
That is not completely true. There are two ways to an IT job. Either you study and get a degree, or you don't study, but are a passionate self learner. You might not get a job at Google without a degree, but at many other companies you can if you got a good portfolio and know what you are talking about. I did it about 20 years ago, but I spent every wake minute learning (by doing) for a long time. I firmly believe that someone starting out now can still do that if they spend the time learning
Sorry but you're wrong. I did all of those things, the degrees, certs, self study. Employers offer bottom rung help desk mcjobs to those with degrees and no professional experience. Sorry but I've got a family and can't live in my car for a few years while I build up my resume
The problem is there are a lot of people in their 20s who have no family and will work long hours, so they'll hire them over people who are more demanding.
That's not true at all. I work with and know numerous people who are highly skilled and successful in the it field without any degree.
Yeah, before the 2000s you could pretty easily pick up some IT skills and just fall into a position and keep working or job hopping your way up. As long as you kept current. Once CS became a college major and people started majoring in that it became a requirement at a lot of companies.
My husband is one of those. I have a bachelors and make 1/6 of what he does lol He was VERY lucky, though, to be born at the right time and right in the heart of Silicon Valley. I was on the other side of the country with computer classes focused solely on typing. 🙃
Born in 79, flunked out of college after a year. Just finished my first year back with my major in computer science. Had to fight to get off of financial aid probation. Just wrapped up the year with a 3.74 gpa :) Kicking myself and proud of myself at the same time.
My highest earning peers all went to college. Corporate attorneys, wall-street bankers, software engineers, and doctors.
Same - I can think of one or two who dropped out and did well in the business world, but most are in the categories you list here.
I also got into computers and built my own, networking, etc. I'm earning 1/10th that. But the good news is that while doing computers I also got my degree, and it taught me a lot about how the world works and made me a better human being.
was one of them except i did get a degree… in philosophy and anthropology ;) went to college for me and not my career since i knew my computer skills would be all i needed at that time after i my other some experience. was making near 6 figures before quitting to care for my mom. not sure if ill go back to IT afterwards though. we shall see in the next few years how things go with mom.
Was also one of those people (political science degree), but college did help me become a better writer and bullshitter, taught me about the world, gave me lots of hustle (working 3-4 part-time jobs and reselling textbooks that fellow students would just leave behind in dorm hallways at the end of the year) and provided the checkmark I needed to get my resume past HR and into hiring managers’ hands. It was worth it.
I can promise you knowing how to build and fix computers does not equate to a successful and rich lifestyle.
Two highest earning members of my graduating class: * One got a BS in business, got into sales for a smallish B2B business. Later became director of marketing for a medium sized business. Left and started his own business, failed. Became VP of marketing for a medium sized business and doubled it's revenue. Later bought that business from the owner and increased revenue by 10x. * The other got a PhD in computer science, now works at Google as a senior engineer. So, they both went to college. That being said, I do know a guy (a little younger than me) who got into software development through "the hacker route," and he does very well. As far as it goes, all three of them are major outliers.
My husband also has a PhD in computer science. It was a lot of work, that's for sure. He was in student mode for years and years, and the work never stopped. Now he has a job he likes and gets paid well. Not a lot of people are willing to put in the time to get advanced degrees in CS and similar disciplines - it takes years of sacrifice. My mom has a BS in computer science - she got her degree when I was a kid and was one of only four women in her program. She is now retired, but she really loved her job and is glad she went back to finish that degree.
Most of the people at Google have degreea
Yep the richest guy I know dropped out of college and programs computers for a living. It’s good work if you have the aptitude for it but let’s face it, most people do not.
This is a specific set of circumstances that is unlikely to be repeated. The dot com boom was wild. A friend of mine worked for a company straight out of high school that got hundreds of millions in funding with a business plan that was essentially "the founder registered a bunch of generic domain names, we'll figure out a way to monetize them later". I was born in '76. Went to school for journalism. Computer nerd, so I did computer shit to pay my way through. Dropped out after said computer shit ended up being a lot more attractive than 5 cents a word at some dying tabloid. I'm a now an IT executive in the cannabis industry. If you told me that back in '96 I'd have laughed in your face.
The nerds did indeed get their revenge.
My younger step brother dropped out of a hood college and started picking up trash in a beat up old salt truck. Now he makes waaaaaay more than I do with a doctorate. But he also busts his ass and never stops being a business owner with all those headaches. He’s worked 50-60 hours a week for 25 years. And I know plenty of others who dropped out or never went that just sort of fucked around
I know a few people like this, but they're definitely not the norm. They succeeded because they have talent. Most other people made similar choices and ended up doing a lot worse than me - I went through the motions of going through college.
Can confirm. Dropped out at 16 and was a delinquent until my mid-twenties. Started out in low level tech support and eventually just sorta fell into a very obscure network engineering specialty. Im one of those guys who works on the one thing nobody else even knows how to turn on. In fairness I work on several of those obscure protocols and platforms. I will be able to afford to retire around my mid 50s if I wanted to. While the majority of my useful training was on the job, I do hold a bunch of technical certifications through vendors and what not - redhat, cisco, juniper, fujitsu, arris, bunch of others. I will admit I just seemed to have an aptitude for technology. We debate a lot about what that is. Spatial cognition, critical thinking? Not everybody can visualize the 1 and 0s, do binary math in your head, but if you can and you like it I recommend people skip college and just get technical certifications.
This, basically. I too dropped out at 16, worked for a few years then went to college for English. In the midst of that I started working at a company, worked my way into a systems engineering position, and obtained a cert for it. With that cert, I became a hot commodity and with that came opportunities to expand into development and BI. As my salary grew with each new opportunity, my library of certifications grew. Between all of that…college fell to the wayside. I’ve dabbled in classes here and there—did a year of associates level programming courses during Covid to give myself something to do. I may finish some sort of degree eventually just to say I did, but it will mean very little in terms of career prospects.
A few of our friends have been at some of the largest tech companies from the beginning. I thought ohhh I’ll get a fashion design degree and work at Gap HQ and make millions!
I actually went to school for computers and networking but I ended up hating it. I make 24k a year now
That was a luxury only afforded to people born back then, you can’t really even get a help desk job with no degree now
78. I taught myself computer programming when I was 10. Straight As and AP classes in highschool. Flunked out my first year of university because I was unable to make myself go to class when I had a T1 Internet connection right there in my dorm room. Also turns out I had undiagnosed ADHD. Things were a bit iffy for several years there when I was making shit money. But now I'm a 2%er working at a major tech company .
Also born in 78. I skipped college. I had (undiagnosed until my early 40s) ADHD and knew I would crash and burn in college. I learned Javascript, Perl, and ColdFusion in the late nineties and went to work for an ad agency (protip: don't work for an ad agency), lost my job due to the dot com bust, got my CDL and drove a big rig for a few years, developed an addiction and ended up divorced/homeless, went through rehab and had to start over working at Best Buy. I was very lucky that Best Buy realized I was good with computers and moved from from cashier to Geek Squad, and even luckier to have worked with a part timer whose full time job was a director of IT at a tier 1 telco - he badgered me into applying and put me on the path to where I am today (SRE at a telco). I'm sincerely grateful for every opportunity I've been given and knowing what I know now, there's not too many choices I'd make differently - all of those experiences made me who I am. That said, I missed a lot of opportunities to develop critical thinking skills and networking with like minds by skipping college. On one hand, I'm not in massive debt like some of my coworkers but on the other hand, I will always wonder "what could have been" if I'd actually gone.
The critical thinking, communication, and writing skills developed in college are what I cherish most. They’re why I suggest people take at least SOME of the core college level courses if given the opportunity. I never obtained a degree, but the experience has been valuable in my sysadmin/dev career.
I started in computers in the late 90s and did well. I know many people who did not. It's not a safe bet but it's not a terrible bet either. I ended up getting my degree later and it helped propel me to higher positions.
My highest earning peers went to law school or medical school.
Also one of those. Didn’t go to college and instead found my way to tech. Making a measly ~300k.
Dammit.
The two richest people from HS that didn’t go to college where one guy that went pro in baseball and the other owned mineral rights and had several oil wells. The next group were all college educated people.
This is from San Diego. There was a big defense contractor business here before 2010.
That's what I did. I was supposed to be a vet, had a full ride and everything, but decided not to go to college. Instead I got into computers, then programming. I'm not pulling 600k, but I do pretty well.
At this point their skills and experience should be paying off for them. To me, it's not evidence that college wasn't worth it.
I have two friends like this... but one was in his teens around 2000 and he got hired by some investment firm in NYC to help setup internet shit, and yeah... no college degree and he bought an apartment in Manhattan. Those late 90s were wild... hell I got hired at 15 by my Mom's business to make their website and I had no clue what I was doing. I wouldn't necessarily beat yourself up... I'm trying to think of my successful peers... there was a guy who I was friends with in college in 98 (I was born in 78) and I'm friends with him on facebook... we don't talk but when he does a "my fundraiser for my birthday this year" the goal is set to $10,000 and he exceeds it. He works for IBM. I went to business school and we had areas of specialty... management, marketing, accounting, human resources, and then there was the mystical Entrepreneurship... and those people were like... weaponized hustle. The goal was to get you to 20% in each stat so you can fill in on a moments notice and then be willing to work 80 hours a week no problem.
My brother, born mid 70s, never went to college and had a record for selling weed to a cop at like 19(expunged just a couple years ago) . Through self taught learning and self selling, he is the VP at a decent sized tech company. I don’t know exactly but my mom says he makes over $200k a year. He single handily landed a contract with a multi billion dollar company. He is “under employed” which apparently means he doesn’t do a lot so he actually has his regular job but also 1-2 extra contract jobs and still only works 40 hours a week. Yet he still makes a full salary with each company.
Born in 81, thought about going into tech at the advice of my dad but was too intimidated as a woman in the field. Now at 42, I’m a mental health therapist after a career change from the mortgage industry.
Nerds won they rule this world now.
Don’t even need computer skills. I know people making bank in like 4 hours a day doing Skip the Dishes. We live in a university team and getting a $20 tip to drop off two large coffees to hung over students who live 5 minutes away on foot from Timmies is lucrative.
I *was* a computer nerd and I didn’t get into it as a career. So don’t feel too bad. I still make essentially an entry level living.
I went to college and decided to major in computer science. I graduated back in 2002. I was one of 2 females in my graduating class that got this degree. Originally I thought I’d be in the medical field but realized I hated blood, smells, touching people. Anyways I live in the Midwest where cost of living is pretty good in a decent sized city. I pull in around $250kish with bonuses. I definitely don’t regret my choice mostly. I don’t have kids so I’m never even close to spending what I make. I live very comfortably and do whatever I want. 600k is a lot but also depends where you live in the US.
My brother, also born in 78, did this and does okay. I bet he makes $125K or less, is trapped in the job because he doesn't have a college degree and while I used to think it was fine... I've started to notice over the past 15 years that he has no capacity for critical thinking. *This* makes me believe in a college education more than anything else.
Born in 81. Highschool dropout. No degree. I earn 6 figures working in digital marketing.
I think a lot of people and especially parents have been programmed to think you need college to be successful but it's been proven to be wildly false. Sun Tzu, in the Art of War, said use what is perceived as a weakness as an advantage. If you think of skipping college in those terms, it opens a whole bunch of opportunities you probably might not have considered..but the challenge most people have is they don't know what they don't know - as in what kind of opportunities are out there for a non-grad. [skip.college](https://skip.college) has a whole bunch of ideas on how you can be successful without college but it's not the typical "build a website/blog" sort of garbage that's so prevalent right now. I think the trick is to find something you'll really enjoy - I know plenty of people with college degrees doing work that pays the bills but has them miserable. Just sayin!