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Comment by CM30 | Hacker News Reader

Two quick thoughts on this:

1. Working on tech is a pretty good way to kill whatever love of tech you might have. As the old adage goes, if you want to enjoy something, don't make it your day job.

2. Why does tech often end up being the field where people think everyone working there needs to be obssessed with? The vast majority of fields and industries are treated like a day job to pay the bills (even some incredibly prestigious/high paying ones like law and medicine), but there seems to be the assumption that this isn't true of the tech industry.

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> Why does tech often end up being the field where people think everyone working there needs to be obssessed with?

I think most people in tech have severe imposter syndrome. If they are constantly working in or on something they feel they are falling behind. Or lack the passion to constantly be committing to a Github[0] project. In other professions this simply doesn't happen. Once you have your license, degree, or certification you're validated. You're not on a treadmill to constantly prove your competence.

BTW, I love tech but even I'm starting to get exhausted from the constant need to stay ahead of the curve. Now I do 1-2 certifications a year and leave it at that. Which is about what a practicing CPA would do for work outside of their job.

[0] Github is probably thinking, "now why am I in this?" don't worry you were just an obvious, visible example.

> I think most people in tech have severe imposter syndrome. If they are constantly working in or on something they feel they are falling behind. Or lack the passion to constantly be committing to a Github[0] project. In other professions this simply doesn't happen. Once you have your license, degree, or certification you're validated. You're not on a treadmill to constantly prove your competence.

If you become a lawyer or consultant, two other high-paying fields, you're next worry is usually "how do I make partner," and everything that's not in service of that feels like work that's holding you back.

Tech is everywhere these days. This is a silly take from geohot. Do I really have to live, laugh, love tech to work at an insurance company on their internal tooling or something? Even most FAANG jobs are about working on some mind numbingly boring business problems

3. The history of Tech is people from other fields, usually career drop outs, deciding they could have a more comfortable life if they gave up their passion and did something easy with insufficient history to have its own academic standards.

Sounds like my friends in finance.

> 2. Why does tech often end up being the field where people think everyone working there needs to be obssessed with?

Hollywood? That’s how “nerds” are usually represented

Agree on 1.

Disagree on 2. I think with high pay comes higher requirement to be dedicated. I am sure they exist like all things but most of the well payed law and medical roles all work long hours and require continued education. The jobs that don’t have this, often do not have the same level of comp.

When doctors and lawyers work long hours, they bill for those hours.

I think for most doctors not exactly true.

Software engineering is generally extremely well compensated for the amount of work. I have found in my career that the more demanding the role, the better compensation. Often enough that it was easy to pick out the roles that did not have adequate comp.

I think it’s also just as easy to find a lower comp role that is not demanding. That’s all I meant.

>I think with high pay comes higher requirement to be dedicated.

My dedication is mostly weaponized autism not love, though I figure plenty of us can't tell the difference.

Why would you come to _Hacker_ News, of all places, and expect sympathy for the "[coding is just] a day job to pay the bills" mindset? Virtually none of the amazing hacks that get posted here on HN come from people who view computers like that.

I would guarantee that most of the people who come to Hacker News haven't ever posted an amazing hack here. It doesn't mean we can't appreciate one.

Never said I myself had no passion for tech, or wasn't working on interesting projects. Just that it feels weird that tech seems to get this far more than say, accountancy or architecture or brain surgery.

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