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Comment by scottndecker | Hacker News Reader

Just curious, how old were you when you hit the 6 figure salary and which city was that in?

In Los Angeles most positions are really dead end, by the time 6 figures became the norm the housing market here plus the additional taxes on california for singles has turned 6 figures into bare survival money. The attitude of most employers in Los Angeles is that you're essentially a slave and as a tech person you're about as important to them as a maggot, your talents are taken for granted and yeah I have a job but I have to work over 140 hours a week for 40 hours pay. My parents body blocked me from being a part of the Stanford class of 94 despite being a legacy, that was one of those cases where I needed to run away from home and walk from LA to Palo Alto against my parents' will lol.

140 / 7 = 20. You eat sleep and shit for a combined 4 hours a day?

Not sure why that is surprising to a lot of people. I have done near 18-20 hour work days(Sometimes going without sleep 2 days at a time), during many parts in my life(A few years at a time). In college, while at work, while building my own start up.

The last time I worked like that was when I was working on bootstrapping a start up while having a day job. I did close to a 20 hour schedule for around 4 years. This was only a year back, when I decided to take a break for an year or so.

Hardwork doesn't always give you results, But not working hard almost certainly doesn't. Well unless you have rich parents, or in-laws, or spouse or you inherit money someway- Or you are plain lucky to have god fathers in the industry bailing you out time to time, taking care of your career and financial growth.

For every body else its the plain old brutal torture.

Sure, most of us have experienced this kind of schedule short term, but I don't know anyone that is actually effective doing this long term.

There are some human anomalies that can thrive on that little amount of sleep but I would think for most people this would lead to poor productivity at best and be extremely detrimental to health at worst.

I'm on the East Coast, mainly Boston. And I was between 26 and 27 when I got the "achievement unlocked"... That is not to say it can't be achieved much younger, but then again, it's never too late.

That seems very young. I think I only know one person who had accomplished that, and she's a 4.0 student who skipped grades and actually finished her masters on time.

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