Why do some of you people work so darn hard?

[sailor-bob]

Hey everyone,

reading MMM's blog I understood that the secret is all about frugality and managing one's desires, but yet in the forum I see a lot of people talking about their second job, often even very low-paying one's like driving for Uber, distributing Newspaper or Pizza. This strikes me as very odd. Can anyone explain?

Does maybe this forum attract many super-hard-workers because there is a competition going on about who can FI/RE first? So MMM attracts hard-working people, because the laid-back folks just don't care and have a natural inclination not to overspend?

My motto, by the way, is the old Vulcan greeting – Live long and labour little!

(IIRC Mr. Spock himself was, next to Zeno of Citium and H. D. Thoreau, one of the early Mustachians.)

[Freedomin5]

Not sure why others on this forum take a side hustle, but I did/do it for the following reasons:

1. Pay off high interest debt faster.
2. Get to FI faster.
3. Diversify my income streams so that it doesn’t matter as much if I lose my job.
4. Make money from my hobby/passion. If I would’ve done this for free in my free time anyway, I might as well make some money from it.
5. Acquire a new, useful, and interesting skill, while getting paid to do so.

Granted, I don’t take low paying side hustles, except my latest one, which is something I would’ve done for free anyway.

[inline five]

It's a good point in that instead of working a trivial job, one should put the same effort into advancing their skillsket to command higher wages.

MMM turned high income into early retirement, the people you refer to don't understand that concept and missed the "high income" part of the equation.

[wordnerd]

Probably two forms of selection bias going on here:
1) People who are interested enough in FIRE to join a forum about it are probably more likely to be overachiever types.
2) Of those on the forum already, those who have side hustles are more likely to talk about them. I sometimes see people journal about more laid-back lifestyles, but that kind of life probably inspires fewer stand-alone threads.

If you wanted to get at #2, you could start a poll of how many here have a side hustle (though there would still be bias, since those with a side hustle would be more likely to open the thread).

I also think there is a dynamic that once you really get into FIRE the wait can seem interminable (like waiting for the next chapter of your life to begin), and the urge to speed up progress can be palpable. Personally, I did a side hustle for a while to test something I am planning to do when I quit working full-time in May. Knowing that I liked it and I could pretty easily make enough to cover our living expenses made me a lot more comfortable with the idea of quitting our jobs while we have two young kids.

[BTDretire]

 Oh, you met my wife!
She easily works 70 hrs a week. Work is small single item retail, it can be slow at times.
Rather than, watch TV, listen to radio, surf the internet, (like I do) or just converse with people,
she will often cook supper, or make a large batch of egg rolls (250) or prepare and steam
banh bao.
When out of work, she works her large garden, mows the lawn, gathers pecans, picks the fruit trees,
yesterday she was digging up tubers, something like taro. She will gather skin and remove the seeds
from Luffa for sponges.
 Also she is up at 4:05am and goes for jogging for just over an hour, everyday! The when she gets home
she often puts a tape in the VCR and does 1/2 hour of exercise.
 Why do some of you people work so darn hard? For my wife, I think its just hardwired into her psyche,
she can't not think of things to do and then do them. For me, manana !
 I forgot to mention, our nestegg is way bigger than we need, absolutely no need for her to work 70 hours a week.

[Retire-Canada]

If you are frugal-ish, debt-free and making $100K-$200K+/yr it's easy to FIRE without extra help. If you are making $50K/yr or less and starting with debt it a much longer/harder process and a side-gig can significantly speed things up.

Personally I was cruising along nicely towards FIRE with a decent professional income when I got offered a contract gig I could do at the same time as my main job. The work was easy and I increased my income by 50% and increased my savings by over 200%. It was a short term thing I didn't go looking for, but when it came my way it seemed like a good use of my time.

In the end a few hundred hours of work will probably get me to FIRE a year or two earlier. I'm not out looking for side-gigs all the time, but if something that's easy to do and high paying comes my way I won't say no if I can make it happen.

OTOH if I was offered a second full-time contract and would have to work a tough 80-100hrs/wk for a few years I wouldn't agree to that. The damage it would do to me would not outweigh the progress towards FIRE.

[MrUpwardlyMobile]

Hey everyone,

reading MMM's blog I understood that the secret is all about frugality and managing one's desires, but yet in the forum I see a lot of people talking about their second job, often even very low-paying one's like driving for Uber, distributing Newspaper or Pizza. This strikes me as very odd. Can anyone explain?

Does maybe this forum attract many super-hard-workers because there is a competition going on about who can FI/RE first? So MMM attracts hard-working people, because the laid-back folks just don't care and have a natural inclination not to overspend?

My motto, by the way, is the old Vulcan greeting – Live long and labour little!

(IIRC Mr. Spock himself was, next to Zeno of Citium and H. D. Thoreau, one of the early Mustachians.)

many posters here have huge debt loads from student loans.  They’re working hard just to get to $0 net worth or $0 student loan debt.  Once you pass those thresholds, you want to get caught up with where you mentally envision where you ought to be.

[SC93]

VCR? You could sell that thing and be set for life!!! :)

I'm with the OP.... no idea why people work these low paying jobs and think they are doing something. Plenty of things to do for yourself that pay much more and would probably way more fun.

[undercover]

Does maybe this forum attract many super-hard-workers because there is a competition going on about who can FI/RE first? So MMM attracts hard-working people, because the laid-back folks just don't care and have a natural inclination not to overspend?

I think it's the opposite. I would describe most here as extremely laid back, non-extroverted types. I don't think we're really over achievers here, we just are introspective and work hard at the things that make the most sense in life. I don't think many here are gunning for prestige or recognition either. It's basically a race to reach independence and it mostly stops at that. Everything else is optional. But no, it's not a competition at all. So yeah...I don't know where you're reading that everyone has all these low-paying side hustles. Most people here have chosen to work hard at the smart thing and stop at that, IE: building a highly valuable set of skills like software engineering.

I'm definitely now in the "work hard at the smart thing" camp because "work smarter, not harder" doesn't really encapsulate the fact that you still need to give everything you've got on the smarter thing. I used to be tied up hard into about three different "jobs" along with going to school full time. Very stupid thing to do. Ail it did was burn me out and I would've been way more successful just focusing on one thing.

[Morning Glory]

My side gig (teaching) actually pays slightly more per hour than my main job, and also uses my Master's degree. I call it my side gig because it is fewer hours (about 12 hours/ week during the school year only) and doesn't offer health insurance. Main job is 36hours/ week year round and offers healthcare, pension, etc but doesn't use my Master's degree (other than I get paid a couple dollars more per hour for having it), in fact some colleagues in the same role don't even have a Bachelor's.

[Hula Hoop]

Oh, you met my wife!
She easily works 70 hrs a week. Work is small single item retail, it can be slow at times.
Rather than, watch TV, listen to radio, surf the internet, (like I do) or just converse with people,
she will often cook supper, or make a large batch of egg rolls (250) or prepare and steam
banh bao.
When out of work, she works her large garden, mows the lawn, gathers pecans, picks the fruit trees,
yesterday she was digging up tubers, something like taro. She will gather skin and remove the seeds
from Luffa for sponges.
 Also she is up at 4:05am and goes for jogging for just over an hour, everyday! The when she gets home
she often puts a tape in the VCR and does 1/2 hour of exercise.
 Why do some of you people work so darn hard? For my wife, I think its just hardwired into her psyche,
she can't not think of things to do and then do them. For me, manana !
 I forgot to mention, our nestegg is way bigger than we need, absolutely no need for her to work 70 hours a week.

It doesn't sound like FIREing is your wife's thing.  Maybe you can FIRE and she can continue working 70 hours a week!

[Luck12]

Yeah I don't get it either.  There is only so much time in a day.

Friends, family, exercise, volunteering in the community, enough sleep, eating healthily, hobbies, and working.  If you work more than 50 hours a week, pretty difficult if not impossible to get all of the first 7. 

[Retire-Canada]

Yeah I don't get it either.  There is only so much time in a day.

Friends, family, exercise, volunteering in the community, enough sleep, eating healthily, hobbies, and working.  If you work more than 50 hours a week, pretty difficult if not impossible to get all of the first 7.

You are not making adequate time for ^^ all that working 40hrs a week.

[use2betrix]

I’m hourly, and right now I’m make about $3150/WK just in overtime pay. That’s on top of my weekly per diem and 40 hr pay.

To me - it’s worth it right now. I’ll work every single hour I can. I do work some jobs with less hrs, or take breaks between jobs. I’m going to try and keep this pace up for 5-6 months though.

[Bracken_Joy]

There seem to be a couple main ways to FIRE:
-take longer to get there, slower and more laid back. This works well for people who already earn decent wages, and/or enjoy their work.
-Hustle like hell to get there. This is for people who are either off or on, not on a fader. And/or hate their job. Often a "golden handcuffs" situation. Grind it out as fast as possible and get it over with.

Then of course there's another key category on this forum:
-starting way behind, and with no alternative BUT to grind it out. Low wages/high debt/high expenses like medical that can't be controlled.

I think it also depends on the degree of discrepancy between your wages and your preferred lifestyle you want during retirement.

Personally, I hustled way harder when I was deep in student debt and trying to save for a down payment. Then I backed off for a while to enjoy life more. Then medical costs have slapped me across the face, so it's back to more hustling.

[use2betrix]

Yeah I don't get it either.  There is only so much time in a day.

Friends, family, exercise, volunteering in the community, enough sleep, eating healthily, hobbies, and working.  If you work more than 50 hours a week, pretty difficult if not impossible to get all of the first 7.

Those aren’t all necessities for a happy life for many people. I eat healthier than probably 99% of the population even when working 80 hrs a week. In fact, the less I work, the unhealthier I eat. More time to cheat, more temptations, and more time to go out to eat. My working out doesn’t change much between 40 or 80 hrs either, and I stay in amazing shape. When you’re consistent and do it long enough, diet and exercise are super easy.

I get 7 hrs sleep regardless of hrs worked. Never less than 6 and rarely more than 8.

My family and friends consist of my wife lol. We move 1-2 times a year for work so never live by family and our friends are all over the country.

Most my hobbies can’t be done in places I live, so extensive travel is usually reserved for the most hrs I take off, so doesn’t impact 40 vs 80 hrs.

I don’t think 80+ hrs is attainable for many years for most to be happy, but in 2016 I had 900 hrs overtime and had a great enjoyable year. Right now I’m alternating 72/84 hr weeks and it’s been ok. Busy, but knowing the more I work the more I take off is worth it.

Happiness is different for everyone, and moreso dependent on ones philosophy of life as opposed to how much they work or have time for.

[aceyou]

I did extra tennis training because:

a) I liked it.
b) Pay was good
c) I'm a teacher, and have summer's off.
d) It got us a full free membership to a nice athletic club. 

I'm currently backing off on that because I'm valuing my time more we are over the hump financially...we can save 80k/year and still pay all our bills. 

But the side gigs in my 20's definitely helped set me up so I can scale back on the extras in my 30's/40's, an retire before 50.  It was work, but I'm glad I did it. 

[Laura33]

I think you missed a few other MMM tenets - like debt is a hair-on-fire emergency; and work your ass off and learn everything you can in your 20s so you can increase your income and thus your savings rate and so cut your time to FIRE; and then there is the intangible personal value of keeping busy with interesting, useful things that you enjoy and/or learn from that make you stronger and more competent (and then why not monetize that if you can, e.g., if you play soccer, be a ref and bring in some extra cash while you’re at it).

I don’t actually recall MMM ever posting about the value of sitting and doing nothing — he seems to spend his spare time running plumbing, installing insulation, constructing a shed, and all sorts of other projects that he thinks increase his bad-assery and/or that he just finds interesting.  The primary difference is that he doesn’t need to worry about monetizing all of that stuff any more — he can drive for Uber just to figure out the math of it all, not because he needs the side income.

[marty998]

I don't have any side hustles or anything, but my job does require a lot of extra hours which we do get rewarded for.

You can accuse me of not enjoying the ride to FIRE, but I'll sure as hell be unwinding myself when I get there :)

[brute]

Better low paying work than wasting my life in front of the tv with a bottle of bourbon.

I suppose part of it would be if you find something  you don't mind doing and net even $5k a year, that's almost $250k after 20 years of compounding. So, nothing to sneeze at.

Now that I'm in the $200k a year pay range, I can't talk myself into doing some of the side gigs I used to, but I'll still jump on hauling rock or cutting wood for $100 a day if I don't have anything else going on.

[ACyclist]

I hold a second job, so I can get bike parts at pro deal prices. Since, I don't work in the summer, this is an easy choice.  That side gig is only a few days a week.  It's fun as hell too.  I get to be around my tribe and I get to fondle high end bikes all day long.  The plan is to really quit for the summer in three years, because my husband and I will be at partial FIRE.  He is going to take a supplemental job and be able to leave for the summer as well.  Even if I way cut back, I still intend to work inventory or minimal hours to maintain my bike pricing, if possible.  They like me there and allow me to work when I choose.  What is not to love about that?

[BTDretire]

Oh, you met my wife!
She easily works 70 hrs a week. Work is small single item retail, it can be slow at times.
Rather than, watch TV, listen to radio, surf the internet, (like I do) or just converse with people,
she will often cook supper, or make a large batch of egg rolls (250) or prepare and steam
banh bao.
When out of work, she works her large garden, mows the lawn, gathers pecans, picks the fruit trees,
yesterday she was digging up tubers, something like taro. She will gather skin and remove the seeds
from Luffa for sponges.
 Also she is up at 4:05am and goes for jogging for just over an hour, everyday! The when she gets home
she often puts a tape in the VCR and does 1/2 hour of exercise.
 Why do some of you people work so darn hard? For my wife, I think its just hardwired into her psyche,
she can't not think of things to do and then do them. For me, manana !
 I forgot to mention, our nestegg is way bigger than we need, absolutely no need for her to work 70 hours a week.

It doesn't sound like FIREing is your wife's thing.  Maybe you can FIRE and she can continue working 70 hours a week!

That's pretty much where we're at. I work 10 hrs one day a week and then Saturday, just to help her in the morning, but she usually ends up running errands. So I work 14 or 15 hrs a week. In truth, a good 1/2 of those hours are either surfing the net or watching TV. We're self employed.
 I only work that one day to give her a day off. In reality, the work is so easy that on her day off, she works harder, doing her other stuff she wants to get done.

[retireatbirth]

Because even if you make like $10/hr, the way a smart FI person looks at it is that that's $40/hr invested at 7% for 20 years. It's about the same as making $80k/year for the average person.

[Cassie]

When we were young my DH worked 2 jobs because even though we were very frugal we needed the $. Once we reached a place where we did not need the $ he went down to one f.t. job.

[mountain mustache]

I work full time (36-40 hours in the Winter, and 45-50 hours in the Summer) and I have a side gig. My full time job does not pay a lot, and while it's enough for my expenses and some saving, I like to have the side money for "extras" that I don't want to take out of my budget, or for extra savings. I dog sit and make at minimum $200 a month, and max $4-500/month. I have an expensive mountain biking and skiing hobby so it's nice to have extra for gear that I need. In the Summer I work a lot of over time, and I don't do the dog sitting thing so much because there's not enough time in the day...and I need to have time for adventures!

[Cwadda]

Because I don't have kids right now, so I'm working extra now so I don't have to work so much later when I have a family.

[bacchi]

I'm with the OP. I FIREd with a slacker's work ethic, at least as far hours were concerned.

[HomeSweetLab]

If you are frugal-ish, debt-free and making $100K-$200K+/yr it's easy to FIRE without extra help. If you are making $50K/yr or less and starting with debt it a much longer/harder process and a side-gig can significantly speed things up.

Personally I was cruising along nicely towards FIRE with a decent professional income when I got offered a contract gig I could do at the same time as my main job. The work was easy and I increased my income by 50% and increased my savings by over 200%. It was a short term thing I didn't go looking for, but when it came my way it seemed like a good use of my time.

In the end a few hundred hours of work will probably get me to FIRE a year or two earlier. I'm not out looking for side-gigs all the time, but if something that's easy to do and high paying comes my way I won't say no if I can make it happen.

OTOH if I was offered a second full-time contract and would have to work a tough 80-100hrs/wk for a few years I wouldn't agree to that. The damage it would do to me would not outweigh the progress towards FIRE.

This is sort of my approach to side-hustle work. I've developed a small side-hustle doing academic copy-editing, mainly for non-native English speakers in the various scientific fields I've worked in. I don't do any advertising, it's based purely on referrals from other people who've been satisfied with my work. I don't charge nearly what the "professional" copy-editing services charge, but I really enjoy doing it, as I get to read and understand a diverse range of research topics. Furthermore, I get the satisfaction of knowing that I helped someone improve the clarity of their ideas. :)

I also wouldn't do something where I had to commit a set number of hours/output each month at this point, as it would add too much stress and I would cease to see it as fun/a hobby. But there are plenty of people on this forum who are workaholics. I also don't think that these types of people will ever truly "FIRE." They'll just find something else to keep them busy. Some people just couldn't imaging life where they're not juggling 15 things at the same time.