The tricky part is that a lot of this advice is situation-dependent. Should you switch to a riskier company that offers a higher compensation? Sometimes yes, sometimes no. Should you work late to accomplish goals hoping to get a promotion? It depends.
So how are we supposed to know what to do?
The answer, in my opinion, is people. You have to trust people who are trustworthy and avoid people who are not. As an employee, your success depends on the people who hired you--they are the ones who can promote you or cheat you. The best leaders are the ones who realize that helping you advance is going to help them advance. Help your boss accomplish their corporate goals and they will promote you--not as a reward, but as a bet that you will help them on the next goal.
Bad leaders are either too selfish (fail to promote you) or too incompetent (unable to rise, even with your help). You need to learn to avoid them.
Therefore, my advice is this: Look at the leaders in your company--people who could plausibly hire you. Which ones are the best bets? Which ones have both the talent and the integrity to succeed? If you're lucky there's more than one and you can work to get on their team. If you're unlucky, there are none and you need to find a different company.
Warren Buffet also made the point that investing in a company (this applies whether its your capital or your time as an employer) that it was the calibre of the people that determined whether the investment was worthwhile, or not.
And that's why interviews, as a potential employee are so important, you want to know who you will be working for/ with, so you should be asking questions that determine what sort of people you are getting involved with.
Maybe you can get to 50 million with a reasonable management career.
But let's say you're on this path and you have 3 million or so, at 35/40 years ... then what? Management at all costs? No reasonable job at a FANG will get you to even just double what you have at that point.
If you cannot have a happy life on that, well...
But I get it--if your goal is to accumulate more wealth (no judgement--that's a legit goal) then it gets harder. When I was at Microsoft, partner-level engineers were making $1 million per year; now it's probably $2 million. Staff-engineer at FAANG is probably similar, I bet, to say nothing of the AI labs. I bet you could reach $25 million after 10 years with the right investment strategy. And $25 million throws off at least $1.25 million per year if you invest right.
Beyond that, you probably do need a startup or some other significant ownership stake.
Obviously this means one has to be earning that much for 15+ years.
Still, if you reach staff-level at 40 years old, you could have $25M at 55. That's pretty amazing. But that requires lots of luck. Most people never make it to staff-level. I never did.
Another thing: People at FAANGs usually ride the stock up and get way more than 7% per year. I'm embarrassed to say that I sold a lot of MSFT stock at $30 in 2011. Today (~15 years later) it is trading at $530.
That would be what I'm trying to avoid.
This seems...high. The levels.fyi data for 68/69 shows them maybe crossing 1M, and the highest available data point at a bit under 1.5 mil. Staff engineers at FAANG are not making 1M a year except in cases of significant stock growth. 700-800K is more reasonable. The AI labs pay a significant premium, yes (2-3x!).
My math on it was basically "I can work for 10-15 more years and retire meeting my financial goals, or work until my 4 year grant at an AI lab finishes and meet all the same goals, with more interesting work".
I know, I know, everyone on HN says entry level FAANG makes $600K/year and drives a brand new Porsche, but it's not reality.
It was much much easier ten years ago, too.
That's one of the clearest examples of the difference between income-vs-wealth and the difference between "high cost of living" and "every expense is higher." If your higher salary offsets your higher cost of essentials of SV plus goes beyond that, a Porsche is much more relatively affordable to you than someome making the "inflation adjusted" amount in Ohio. (Or if you're looking to retire earlier, you can put more away for that too.)
In the last few decades the part you're missing in your math is that the trick is NOT to take 5% gains. Instead, keep it in the company. The wealth people have gotten from working BigTech hasn't been higher base comp or even TC, it's been specifically stock in BigTech.
In the last 15 years there have been several significant Big Tech valuation-jumps that have helped people save $$$$ too, but won't necessarily help the next round of folks. Amazon, Google, Meta are both up 10x since 2014. Apple is 20x+. So if you started then with an equity package worth 500k... 2022 was also a great time to start at Meta, and a decent (2x+) one at Amazon. 2020 even was a great time to start at Apple, up 6x since then. And before then, 2002-2014 was also a wildly good time to be at Amazon or Meta or Apple or Google. Better, even, for some of them!
So that's a good 25-years of wild gains. The "regular" employees who benefited from that timing are somewhat-understandably now saying just everyone can do that and have great results. I'm not sure if I'd make that bet myself in 2026 with the changes to things from AI. Though none of them are pure-SAAS that's easy to duplicate, so... maybe still go for it!
I think I'd be way too bored, though. Last time I considered a job offer from one of them, I just decided to throw a bunch into stock in the company instead and took a startup offer. It worked out ok as a hedge, if not AS good as taking the offer would've been.
See also IBM
Also different tax rates for investment vs income: 200k taxed at 30% is easily L6 level compensation. And if you're comparing to L6 anywhere outside of US it's easily L7.
Also: these amounts are declining. Except perhaps in AI.
In my experience, those numbers are low for the US. This is about accurate: https://www.levels.fyi/companies/google/salaries/software-en...
I personally don’t invest more in tech than I need to via broad index funds (and I certainly never keep my RSUs in the company stock, I always sell immediately). Otherwise, if there is a sector-wide downturn, I’d be triple exposed - my paycheck, my tech investments, and my company stock. That seems like a lot of risk to take on.
I’m open to other opinions here.
A. Guaranteed $1,000 each month
B. Every month, flip a coin. Heads gains $5,000, tails you lose $1,000.
To me, that's SPY vs. QQQ. Tech in general has higher expected return, but more volatility. If you can handle the volatility, then QQQ is better. If not, then not.
Ultimately, I'm taking a bet on tech because I believe tech has the greatest chance of improving the economy/world.
[I'm also not qualified, so do your own research]
But don't feel bad if you have not been able to do any of them, e.g. Most People with kids can often do very little than job and take care of kids and that's it. What is more important is to not beat yourself up about it, give yourself grace and do one or two things that make you and your near and dear people/pets happy.
The much more valuable and harder advice is what to do in a particular situation or when things go awry. For example, most career paths where you really end up at higher earnings require that you eventually manage large groups or many teams. The thing is, a lot of people hate managing people, and setting them up for a career path where they have to move into management is a recipe for misery. Much more valuable for these folks is to know what a good IC path looks like, and which careers can be particularly lucrative even if you don't need to manage people.
Most of these people cannot do most of these things, but it's not they can't or don't want to. The key IMHO is psychological/cognitive load to get past the day. A good example that OECD country readers can relate to is homeless people - an extreme but relatable example because you can see it. When you become homeless the first thing to go are dignity, self-confidence and in short order mind's ability to think beyond the short term(next 3 hours and today). And Living hand to mouth(just beyond the edge) is the same proverbial frog(the mind) in boiling water(circumstances), just slower and acceptable to one to not completely break one but deform the mind enough that it's not always possible to recover.
> When you become homeless the first thing to go are dignity, self-confidence and in short order
The data on American homelessness are actually exceptionally good and the support network means that the vast majority of people who avail themselves of help are back in a home in a year or so.
Kissing ass at work might help you but not nearly as much as this two ideas.
1. Alimony
2. Child support
If you _do_ break up, this also makes it harder for one person to keep the house, which might be bad if there's kids in a local school, etc. If you have 100k in equity it's easier to buy out your ex than if you have 1 million in equity.
Or to put it a different way, if my house was paid for, it would hurt, but I could make all ends meet just working fast food jobs. It wouldn't be an easy life, I'd end up walking a few miles to the nearest fast food place because I couldn't afford a car, but I could at least keep my house.
And when you get a windfall (stock grants, acquisitions, etc) unless it’s truly life changing money where you never have to work again, find a good investor (CFP) to manage so you’re not even thinking about it. Or invest it in some future liability like college expenses, home down payment, retirement, etc.
I'm sure if I was a multi-billionaire, I would have no clue what to spend a large portion of my money on. An Expensive cruise would be fun once, but I don't think I'd want to do that more than maybe once a year.
To your point, pay yourself first. Set up automatic investments. Find a fiduciary advisor if you must, but it's really not rocket science.
Not necessarily. If the savings deduction comes straight off the paycheque then it doesn't take all that much mental fortitude to pretend what you get is the salary.
No they don't. This may be true for some people but many people do not have this compulsion. I know many people who have zero issues saving money because they are largely satisfied with their lifestyle.
The lifestyle doesn't even have to be austere. You can eat out every night at nice restaurants and rent a very nice place on a budget of a couple hundred thousand per year. There is a natural limit on the amount of money you can spend unless you are blowing it on lots of expensive "stuff" that contributes relatively little to quality of life.
* Get a job at a successful listed tech company (not a startup) that issues RSUs.
* Get promoted to senior level but no higher (too much responsibility, poor work life balance, exposure to office politics)
* Move to a low tax jurisdiction like Dubai, Hong Kong or Singapore, at least long enough to build a serious nest egg (several million).
* Live significantly below your means: I aimed to save & invest half my income. You'll still live a good life because these countries have vast income inequality and services are cheap.
* Find a partner who shares your values.
Not saying this is easy or even possible for many, but it worked for me.
I think startup or smaller growth companies are better for this (but I'm biased since that was my path), as you can get more responsibility and rise through the ranks quickly to that critical senior or staff level where you start getting the real RSUs even if it means moving to a different company.
Much enablement, unblocking, capability-based, or risk reduction work is very difficult to interpret for the business decision-makers.
One earned C’s, but liked to set up token ring and Ethernet networks and code network games. Nice guy, kind of a shlub but not a genius.
Another got straight A’s while mostly drunk, long hair, liked sports but still a metalhead. Breezed through any new concept as if he was born with the knowledge of complex math and advanced physics.
First guy became a VP at Google. Has multiple houses and fancy cars. Doesn’t need to work anymore but loves it.
Second guy became fellow and major CPu/gpu company. Money falling out his ass.
Me: worked hard, got B’s mostly, followed the path but never got promoted too far. Got a few mil in the 401k, but never got a big break.
I’m totally satisfied with where I’m at but these friends just hit the effing centimillionaire jackpot through stocks and weird luck.
Wish there was some consistency in my peer group. We (about 12 friends) all did well with EE degrees in the 80s. Some just did 10-100x better than others for no obvious reason.
Specifically pieces about how to be valuable in a pragmatic and honest way.
But then through the course of tedious and somewhat pompous paragraphs (I only read 5 before I started skimming so let me know if I missed something) the point seems to bend towards "work hard to get a foothold so you can own stuff and then you'll make real money" .
It did nothing to change my opinion of our system where labor earns a pittance and all real wealth comes from the lottery of birthright, corruption, picking the right stock, or getting lucky in entrepreneurship.
(What's all this stuff about grades??? Does somebody think grades matter??? Maybe I'm out of touch because I got my PhD before really starting the career grind.)
What is real wealth in this scenario? I had no birthright, involvement in government corruption, nor did I pick the right stock or start a company. Just boring old S&P 500 and not blowing money on really dumb stuff or making mistakes. Which is harder than it looks, but if your perception is real wealth = multi-digit millions then yes sure you have to get lucky. What is surprising or interesting about that? Rare thing is rare, else it wouldn’t be of value.
In short, careers used to be inherently profitable, but now we have a system where only gambling is truly profitable.
If you live anywhere in the developed world, and you are reasonably able bodied, you can certainly save sufficient money for your long term needs.
there is maybe 1% of the population who can't do it, for everyone else it's a choice.
Just setting aside 25% over time adds up to a sizable amount.
Everyone will die, despite great medical advances over the past century. Someone who lives past 5 and doesn't die in childbirth, or an accident - only got a couple years of life expectancy. You should be thinking of saving money as this is something we're going to spend in the future. The goal is not to get the most money on paper. The goal is to... Well, you figure out your own goals. I don't know the right answer for you, but to try and enjoy life with the money you make.
Otherwise you end up with what's called lifestyle creep, if you leave it into your bank account you will always find something to spend it on.
It does depend a bit on how much money you were making, but I'd guess it applies to most here.
The employer doesn't do it.
Doing the day job is priority #2. Many do not fully understand this late into their career.
By then it is too late and late stage health problems start due to stress.
Probably the single best take-away from the article is to never stop learning. I also like the tip about keep networking and building relationships.
Don’t you mean hecto-millionaires? Otherwise it’s not so impressive. ;)
> A centi-millionaire (or hundred millionaire) is an individual with a net worth or liquid investable assets of USD $100 million or greater.
I thought they might be a centillionaire, but that's a 1 followed by 303 or 600 zeroes (?!), depending on the numeric system used.
but I think there is a crowd that rejects too many of the basics at their own detriment. yes, getting work, highly valued work, still helps and helps waaay more reliably for a broader population than other methods, but its just a step. So you still need to do that, You also need to parlay earnings into wealth producing assets, assets that also have their own independent value that is intended to grow.
> There is a popular idea that substantial wealth belongs mainly to entrepreneurs.
This is probably because 24yo college dropouts are achieving billion dollar valuations after 12 months of work. Their secondary sales are worth more than following all the advice in this article will be for your entire life.
(To say nothing of NVDA, SpaceX, or other big tech acquiring them and making their billions liquid, despite no moat or profitability, just because they have so much money and need to spend it on something.)
No matter how much “grit” you have, you’re still at the mercy of such people, as e.g. the engineers at Windsurf were, who worked super hard but their founders sold to Google, walked away with hundreds of millions, and gave the employees nothing.
Of course, it depends on your meaning of “substantial”. Successful engineers have great wealth too, enough that they can be very happy and buy anything they want. But pretending the two levels are comparable is silly.
They are incorrect in that there is no strict separation of the two.
Anyone in tech can easily enter the ownership class. American assets are exceptionally cheap for what they are. It's very easy to purchase asset producing goods, whether that be businesses or real estate.
The ownership class matter because a worker exchanges time for money. Time is finite. Ownership is not.
A career is a quick and low volatility way towards ownership. You owe no loyalty to any company or any manager. Only owe loyalty to your friends, family, and the financial assets you own. These things reflect on you. Your job is just a distraction.
I agree with a lot of your post, but I don't think this is true anymore. Real-estate is pretty much at the maximum price the population can pay for it. We'll never see a rise like we did from the boomer generation until now in real-estate again. I also think most businesses don't make much money, at least small businesses.
It is extraordinarily easy to enter the ownership class in America which is why Marxism rarely takes root here.
..and this doesn't include hustlers in Dubai or some other tax haven earning six figures a month doing various schemes.
Why am I wasting my life?
Go after the achievable P75-P90 that's within your power.
It's really not even comparable to the life that normal people have. It's really sad.
If you don't have money it's very likely that you'll have a poor diet and have negative health consequences, be dumber, be able to do less, and just generally have a life filled with more suffering.