The degree question is interesting but in retrospect it really leads to all these false dichotomies and imagined careers. It really barely matters for a lot of people past their first job. Of course if you talk to people who love their own camp, they may want to argue.

Work-life balance will always be more about your personal ability to set boundaries with other people, and find the boundaries you need. The needed boundaries will usually differ somewhat per job, per team, per project, etc.

In general, you can have an amazing work-life balance with any degree and just about any career field, if you are planning to be intentional about this aspect, which you clearly are.

However this does mean being able to say "no" to people in various ways and in various situations. It may be downright awkward sometimes. Others may try to make you feel awkward about it, especially if they suck at setting boundaries.

If you are like me, you'll probably have to quit some jobs so you can preserve your boundaries. It's hard to say what can happen at work when you don't have all the info going into the job (you never do), or when there's a leadership change, and so on.

There are so many different approaches when it's time to act directly, too. The informational "I won't be doing that," the relational "I hear you but...," the logical "If X and Y are true, then it doesn't make sense for me to..." and the equity-seeking "since I did everything you asked of me..."

It all ends with you pushing back, ideally gently but definitely persistently. Some of it will not be received well even if worded perfectly.

I had a lot of friends move from CS to MIS back in the day, and they were mostly just sick of plodding linear progress and deep puzzles (I believe we had a unique department staffing situation in that way, psychologically) and ready to keep it breezy and cheesy. They wanted more of a survey that highlighted the parts they liked best. They wanted to be excited about computer stuff in general, wrap some fun team projects, learn a bunch of PM and accounting overlap skills which might come in handy, know the latest apps and dev tools for this or that, and so on. They all said they loved their new lives away from CS.

But other CS friends did just fine in their own ways.

To me the question also surfaces your willingness to trust in your future self to have the energy and strength to solve such problems as they arise. Strong contingency planners in these cases can end up trying to out-plan themselves sometimes.

Contingency planning can't bear the burden of developing your life into what you want or don't want, all by itself. So, please be sure to leave a note for future self: "Here's what I'm going for, based on limited information about what it means for you in the future. I trust you, and your problem-solving skills, with the rest." And boom, execute and move on.

This exercise may help you on the job as well, when faced with similar dichotomies. Planning and execution will mean vastly different things to some teams, but the latter is by far the most important in most jobs. For better or worse.

Good luck with whatever you decide.