Post: #51

(04-19-2015 03:24 PM)Goodtimez Wrote:  

(04-19-2015 08:21 AM)Gunner Wrote:  [quote='Ice' pid='1003157' dateline='1429446324']

I work at one of MBB. Feel free to shoot me a note with specific questions.

Hey thanks - will do!

Post: #52

.......

Post: #53

Yep 150+ base -> high tech geek herding.

Post: #54

If you want to do "high tech geek herding", then a Stanford or UCLA MBA is the way to go.

Post: #55

Or you could work your way up the ranks. Specifically in the type of work I do (DevOps) you need to have ass before you can chew ass.

Very few techies become successful leaders, the ones that do are worth their weight in gold.

(04-22-2015 02:06 PM)Easy_C Wrote:  If you want to do "high tech geek herding", then a Stanford or UCLA MBA is the way to go.

Post: #56

(04-22-2015 02:20 PM)ThrustMaster Wrote:  Or you could work your way up the ranks. Specifically in the type of work I do (DevOps) you need to have ass before you can chew ass.

Very few techies become successful leaders, the ones that do are worth their weight in gold.

(04-22-2015 02:06 PM)Easy_C Wrote:  If you want to do "high tech geek herding", then a Stanford or UCLA MBA is the way to go.

Is your background in the realm of programming or system admin skills?

What type of tech leadership roles do you recommend pursuing?

Post: #57

(04-22-2015 02:54 PM)Player_1337 Wrote:  Is your background in the realm of programming or system admin skills?
What type of tech leadership roles do you recommend pursuing?

I'm strictly from the IT/Ops world. Start as a tech lead, go to team lead, to manager, to sr. manager (manager of managers or tech leads) then director (manages managers) an so on. That should get you into your 40's unless you're an utter rockstar (or blew the right person) you might hit Veep.

Post: #58

Engineers 5-10 years in

Post: #59

I feel so poor reading this thread. My little country of Holland looks like a third world country when seeing these numbers.

150k $ is about 138k Euro. I don't know anyone making this. No guy working with his hands will ever make this kind of money in Holland unless you count a dentist or a doctor. Engineers will not make this and so won't anyone generally working at any company unless you're leading it. A senior buyer at a multinational will make about 60 to 80k euro gross. His boss perhaps a 100k if he's a senior too.

To make 150k $ here in Holland you need a serious job in finance or at the government.

Edit: a member of Dutch Parliament makes 100k euro. The president 144k euro (2012)

No wonder you guys are always balling when traveling abroad.

Post: #60

Didn't you just sell a movie? What's the scoop on that?

Post: #61

(04-23-2015 12:49 PM)Spike Wrote:  I feel so poor reading this thread. My little country of Holland looks like a third world country when seeing these numbers.

Don't feel so bad. I believe only around 5% of US individuals make $150k or more. So about 1 in 20 are earning that much or more. Most everyone knows many more than 20 people so everyone will have a few examples of high earning people even if the average person makes quite a bit less.

The US has the benefit/problem of having a high income inequity. I wouldn't want that for your country. It normally doesn't end so well.

Post: #62

The guy who owns the garage I take my MB to drives a V12 S class and a Bentley. His son is getting a used SL 500 bought brand new as his first car. The way to make real money is not with a job like a lawyer, it's by owning a garage, a flower shop, real estate, some easily understandable cash business, or selling such a business.

Post: #63

(04-23-2015 12:49 PM)Spike Wrote:  I feel so poor reading this thread. My little country of Holland looks like a third world country when seeing these numbers.

Ironically (or not), the US feels like a third world country after you visit Europe. The airports, infrastructure, public transport, is all at a much higher level there. But you don't make as much money. So, I don't know. It's a toss up.

Post: #64

(04-23-2015 01:11 PM)Menace Wrote:  The guy who owns the garage I take my MB to drives a V12 S class and a Bentley. His son is getting a used SL 500 bought brand new as his first car. The way to make real money is not with a job like a lawyer, it's by owning a garage, a flower shop, real estate, some easily understandable cash business, or selling such a business.

Agree with this. However, the key here is owning the real estate on which your cash business sits. I had a friend whose family owned a flower shop and they actually went bankrupt. You also see a lot of restaurants going bankrupt - very often people just cant afford to make the expensive lease payments when they don't own the real estate. Commercial landlords are jacking up prices all the time. They will juice you. Then, they find someone else to sign a 3-5 year lease, and then they juice them even more.

One of the reasons that McDonalds was so succesful at the beggining, apparently, was that they always owned their real estate. If you do own the real estate, then you can do whatever the hell you want with it - rent it out, start a flowershop, etc... whatever you find most profitable.

Keep in mind, however, that real estate requires some start-up capital. The more you have, the lower your risk, because the more equity you own from the start, the less leverage you have to utilize.

Traditional professions, such as lawyers and doctors, are a great way for someone without old-money family wealth to save-up some capital and work stability in order to get into real estate. Similarly, working in those professions allows you to build strong relationships with other people who have a lot of money. You can co-invest with these people. I know a former medical guy who is now a big commercial real estate owner - he pooled money with his doctor friends and bought an office building many years back, and has been moving forward.

Post: #65

(04-23-2015 03:23 PM)se7en Wrote:  

(04-23-2015 01:11 PM)Menace Wrote:  The guy who owns the garage I take my MB to drives a V12 S class and a Bentley. His son is getting a used SL 500 bought brand new as his first car. The way to make real money is not with a job like a lawyer, it's by owning a garage, a flower shop, real estate, some easily understandable cash business, or selling such a business.

Agree with this. However, the key here is owning the real estate on which your cash business sits. I had a friend whose family owned a flower shop and they actually went bankrupt. You also see a lot of restaurants going bankrupt - very often people just cant afford to make the expensive lease payments when they don't own the real estate. Commercial landlords are jacking up prices all the time. They will juice you. Then, they find someone else to sign a 3-5 year lease, and then they juice them even more.

One of the reasons that McDonalds was so succesful at the beggining, apparently, was that they always owned their real estate. If you do own the real estate, then you can do whatever the hell you want with it - rent it out, start a flowershop, etc... whatever you find most profitable.

Keep in mind, however, that real estate requires some start-up capital. The more you have, the lower your risk, because the more equity you own from the start, the less leverage you have to utilize.

Traditional professions, such as lawyers and doctors, are a great way for someone without old-money family wealth to save-up some capital and work stability in order to get into real estate. Similarly, working in those professions allows you to build strong relationships with other people who have a lot of money. You can co-invest with these people. I know a former medical guy who is now a big commercial real estate owner - he pooled money with his doctor friends and bought an office building many years back, and has been moving forward.

This is a solid strategy. If you're an engineer/doctor/lawyer, you often know other engineers, doctors & lawyers.

Otherwise look for family connections. If your family is jewish for example, there are often a lot of doctors/lawyers in your family you can try to talk to.

Post: #66

Most lawyers don't make 150k+ and the ones who do are basically putting in the hours of 2 full time jobs.

Quote:The left-hand peaks of the graph reflect salaries of $40,000 to $65,000, which collectively accounted for about 52% of reported salaries. The right-hand peak shows that salaries of $160,000 accounted for about 14% of reported salaries.

http://www.nalp.org/salarydistrib



A lot of lawyers start in the 40-60k a year range, which isn't much considering it requires 7 years of school after high school.

Post: #67

(04-23-2015 08:09 PM)Vitriol Wrote:  Most lawyers don't make 150k+ and the ones who do are basically putting in the hours of 2 full time jobs.

Quote:The left-hand peaks of the graph reflect salaries of $40,000 to $65,000, which collectively accounted for about 52% of reported salaries. The right-hand peak shows that salaries of $160,000 accounted for about 14% of reported salaries.

http://www.nalp.org/salarydistrib



A lot of lawyers start in the 40-60k a year range, which isn't much considering it requires 7 years of school after high school.

I agree with the existence of the data in that chart, and also that 40-60k is minuscule taking into account the schooling and $$ you put into going to law school. However, granted we are talking about the US, if you do a reasonable amount of planning, and have actively been interested in becoming a lawyer for a long time, its not that bad.

You would get good grades in undergrad (no reason why you shouldn't, if you plan on pursuing masters or higher after), and then study for your LSAT to get into law school. That should secure your entrance into a top 30 law program, and provide you with significant grants and possibly full ride at some of those programs. After that, about 40-50% of the graduating class from those programs can secure a 150k+ position within 2-3 years after graduation. The rest go into government / small firms / business. The jobs at the 160k jobs have long hours, but significantly less than investment banks, and with much better pay. If you have a STEM undergrad, you are pretty much guaranteed a 150k job as a patent attorney, because you need to have a STEM background to sit for the patent bar, and thats like 5% all law students. Still, you have the risk of falling through the cracks and not being able to secure a 160k and then you either look for i) government, ii) small firms, iii) business, or iv) other non-law fields. Some fall through the cracks so hard I guess they don't do s*** period - especially those from bad schools or those unwilling to take non-legal work. Some just end up hating the career and the life - others grow to love it.

I guess my takeaway is you go into the fields of medicine or law if you are truly interested in building a career there, you don't do this for the money. Thus, you do a fair amount of planning to make sure you have all your basis covered. Just like, if you want to get an MBA, you either goto the best school, or you goto a shitty school but with a full ride. Otherwise, your chances of making 40-60k are significantly higher.

Then, as time goes on, you invest in real estate.

I wanted to come back here and say this: The main issue with the fields of law, medicine, and possibly finance in the USA is the high barrier of entry - and its not a regular barrier to entry, but a weird subsequent barrier to entry - the f***ing debt! that will hit you upon graduation if you aren't smart and don't plan ahead. Plan ahead! Only ten years ago, a law program cost a student, without scholarships like $15k (don't quote me). Nowadays, law is 150k and Med is 300k+. Sometimes more when factoring costs of living and delayed income. The further issue is that most people who get scammed into taking out these debt loads are in no way prepared to do so. Still, schools are expanding weak useless programs, , marketing scam education, and encouraging students to take on debt ; meanwhile they also jack up tuition, because they know the US gov will foot the bill by issuing unlimited debt to students to cover the rising costs of tuition. Its a business model - don't let the system play you.

I am very debt averse. The issue is that the older generations, before today
s young americans, had no idea what it means to take out debt for school, and then be stuck with that debt when you work. Most garden-variety Americans do not take responsibility for guiding their children in the young direction: work hard early on and don't take on debt. I don't know wtf else it could be - those expensive loans usually require co-signers, so its not just the kids being stupid.

Post: #68

60k in teaching. Nursing gf makes 100k. Tons of friends in sales make 70k+ in SF

Post: #69

(04-23-2015 09:32 PM)Sonoma Wrote:  60k in teaching. Nursing gf makes 100k. Tons of friends in sales make 70k+ in SF

I'm assuming the salaries are matched at least a bit with the high costs of living in NorCal. Probably would make, on average, 5-10k less living outside the coasts. Right?

Post: #70

(04-23-2015 09:24 PM)se7en Wrote:  You would get good grades in undergrad (no reason why you shouldn't, if you plan on pursuing masters or higher after), and then study for your LSAT to get into law school. That should secure your entrance into a top 30 law program, and provide you with significant grants and possibly full ride at some of those programs. After that, about 40-50% of the graduating class from those programs can secure a 150k+ position within 2-3 years after graduation. The rest go into government / small firms / business. The jobs at the 160k jobs have long hours, but significantly less than investment banks, and with much better pay. If you have a STEM undergrad, you are pretty much guaranteed a 150k job as a patent attorney, because you need to have a STEM background to sit for the patent bar, and thats like 5% all law students. Still, you have the risk of falling through the cracks and not being able to secure a 160k and then you either look for i) government, ii) small firms, iii) business, or iv) other non-law fields. Some fall through the cracks so hard I guess they don't do s*** period - especially those from bad schools or those unwilling to take non-legal work. Some just end up hating the career and the life - others grow to love it.

You're grossly overestimating the salaries of people coming out of law school. I don't know who told you half of a graduating class is getting jobs that pay 150k plus, but I don't think that's ever been true. Those jobs are reserved for the people who are willing to turn themselves into machines and basically work non-stop while they're not sleeping or do cocaine to stay awake. In other words, the top 10% or so who make law review are willing to bend over, work as long as possible, and take orders...

Quote:A year of tuition can cost $44,000, even at schools that are ranked low on the U.S. News & World Report list. A diploma at a top-rated school, like Harvard, will cost an additional $10,000 or more annually.

That would seem a worthy investment if the job market awaiting new law school graduates looked more promising. But the bar association’s employment figures are dismal. In 2013, fewer than two-thirds of newly minted lawyers had found jobs that required passing the bar exam.

http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2014/12/17/l...1987/?_r=0

edit: Here's U.S News who is at the forefront of putting out law school rankings every year, basically coming and out saying "shit has gotten so bad that law schools now have to go out of their way to attract students." http://www.usnews.com/education/best-gra...aw-schools

Post: #71

(04-19-2015 08:16 AM)Deepdiver Wrote:  A friend of mine makes the most money of anyone I know - he developed his own highly disciplined trading methodology and shut down his hedge fund at $50M assets a few years ago because his investors were calling him every day to see how they were doing - he sent out monthly e-statements and they were driving him nuts anyway so returned all money and just trades now with his own account. Semi retired he will take off a week whenever he feels like it to go fishing.

Was talking to us recently about a tech investment that someone wanted him to invest $11M into so he has at least that much in his three offshore IBCs (keeps money out of the IRS's capricious clutches). Of course pays his taxes every year but wants total control over his capital. I have been learning his advanced trading algorithms and intraday trading trend confirmations that he works out by hand in his head and tracks via spreadsheets. My goal is to set up an automated trading engine and sell it as a SaaS service. On a high volatility day he does a three trades strategy; silver, gold and platinum trades he calls them but not in precious metals. He sets his trades up before market opens based upon his personal conservative risk management model and executes early morning buys, then sells his "silver" trade to recapture intraday risk capital, his gold trade to take a daily profit and his platinum trade a bonus on high volume high volatility days. A typical day is $20K plus and a high volume three trade bonus day can be $150K+ in one day. After this current cyber security contract I am working on finishes I plan on spending a week with him on automating the trading methodology.

Hey is there any chance you can elaborate on the silver, gold, and platinum trades? I personally have my own trading methodology however i only trade a few thousands. I've yet to meet or hear of anyone else with a successful day trade methodology so it strikes my curiosity

To add I have family in Cambodia who I remember as a kid , having a run in the dump flower shop. After my father sent them a bit of money over time and luck they some how became a whole seller of flowers for the city and I see pictures of them on fb now all eatting good, getting fat, traveling , buying condos near beaches, ect.

Post: #72

(04-23-2015 09:32 PM)Sonoma Wrote:  60k in teaching. Nursing gf makes 100k. Tons of friends in sales make 70k+ in SF

Seeing that a halfway nice house in a decent neighborhood in SF probably starts in the 800k range (Sunset/Richmond) these salaries are not particularly great. If you want to walk to work at UCSF's hospital you're coughing up 1m plus in Cow Hollow.

If you're even vaguely mathematically inclined go CS or EE and learn to code. Mid-career smart devs in SillyCon Valley are making 150k. 10x devs are making 3 million in comp at places like Google and they're cheap.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/10/1...3R20131013

Post: #73

(04-23-2015 10:19 PM)Vitriol Wrote:  

(04-23-2015 09:24 PM)se7en Wrote:  You would get good grades in undergrad (no reason why you shouldn't, if you plan on pursuing masters or higher after), and then study for your LSAT to get into law school. That should secure your entrance into a top 30 law program, and provide you with significant grants and possibly full ride at some of those programs. After that, about 40-50% of the graduating class from those programs can secure a 150k+ position within 2-3 years after graduation. The rest go into government / small firms / business. The jobs at the 160k jobs have long hours, but significantly less than investment banks, and with much better pay. If you have a STEM undergrad, you are pretty much guaranteed a 150k job as a patent attorney, because you need to have a STEM background to sit for the patent bar, and thats like 5% all law students. Still, you have the risk of falling through the cracks and not being able to secure a 160k and then you either look for i) government, ii) small firms, iii) business, or iv) other non-law fields. Some fall through the cracks so hard I guess they don't do s*** period - especially those from bad schools or those unwilling to take non-legal work. Some just end up hating the career and the life - others grow to love it.

You're grossly overestimating the salaries of people coming out of law school. I don't know who told you half of a graduating class is getting jobs that pay 150k plus, but I don't think that's ever been true. Those jobs are reserved for the people who are willing to turn themselves into machines and basically work non-stop while they're not sleeping or do cocaine to stay awake. In other words, the top 10% or so who make law review are willing to bend over, work as long as possible, and take orders...

Quote:A year of tuition can cost $44,000, even at schools that are ranked low on the U.S. News & World Report list. A diploma at a top-rated school, like Harvard, will cost an additional $10,000 or more annually.

That would seem a worthy investment if the job market awaiting new law school graduates looked more promising. But the bar association’s employment figures are dismal. In 2013, fewer than two-thirds of newly minted lawyers had found jobs that required passing the bar exam.

http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2014/12/17/l...1987/?_r=0

edit: Here's U.S News who is at the forefront of putting out law school rankings every year, basically coming and out saying "shit has gotten so bad that law schools now have to go out of their way to attract students." http://www.usnews.com/education/best-gra...aw-schools

Im getting this info based on my graduating class - the stats were approx 40% represented at big law. This dropped after the crisis but is back at that level now. Average work hours of people I stay in touch with are aprox 60 hours usually, but hit 100 hours on very difficult weeks. Look, Im not saying its all gravy, but if this is what you want to do for a career its not bad. There are exit opportunities to comfy gov jobs paying 150k and higher for much better hours after about 4 years or so working in the hole. Also can exit to in-house @ a co and make at 60-100k, 9-5. The thing is, the work really is not for everybody. You can find it extremely interesting, extremely boring, or just whatever - it depends on your personality. Some people burn out after 6 months, some people work eighty hour weeks for ten years. Similarly, some people are just not cut out to be entrepreneurs, while some are. Its very important to match your work with your personality - thats the key to making 150k year in, year out in whatever you do.

Post: #74

(04-23-2015 10:54 PM)se7en Wrote:  Im getting this info based on my graduating class - the stats were approx 40% represented at big law. This dropped after the crisis but is back at that level now. Average work hours of people I stay in touch with are aprox 60 hours usually, but hit 100 hours on very difficult weeks.

I'm tempted to ask what law school you went to. A lot of those stats they publically publish are bullshit.

However, when you work in a profession where you can get disbarred for handing a business card to the wrong person I don't want you to post that info publically on an "evil misogynist" internet forum.

Post: #75

(04-23-2015 03:23 PM)se7en Wrote:  Traditional professions, such as lawyers and doctors, are a great way for someone without old-money family wealth to save-up some capital and work stability in order to get into real estate. Similarly, working in those professions allows you to build strong relationships with other people who have a lot of money. You can co-invest with these people. I know a former medical guy who is now a big commercial real estate owner - he pooled money with his doctor friends and bought an office building many years back, and has been moving forward.

This is exactly my plan.