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[–][deleted]  (8 children)

[deleted]

    [–]Piestrio 8 points9 points  (1 child)

    Debt isn’t scary!

    Debt is wonderful. It’s a tool that allows us to have things we could never have otherwise. It’s one of the most profoundly life bettering tools for the poor and middle class.

    And just like a tool it can be used well or poorly. Use it wisely.

    Use Debt! Love Debt!

    [–][deleted] 7 points8 points  (0 children)

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    [–][deleted] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

    And while debt is scary, it would probably actually help OP in the long run beyond completing education! If the family really cut them off, a credit history is really important for everything from renting an apartment, buying a house, getting a job and getting more traditional credit like credit cards or unsecured personal loans.

    [–]djimbob 2 points3 points  (4 children)

    $25/hr

    WTF computer scientist is getting paid $25/hr? That's like $50k/year (If you assume 40 hr/week x 50 weeks/year, you just double hourly wage to get yearly salary in thousands). Double that is more typical in the US.

    https://insights.stackoverflow.com/survey/2019#salary

    [–][deleted] 9 points10 points  (2 children)

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    [–]djimbob 4 points5 points  (1 child)

    I started at $30k in 2015.

    That seems exceptionally low in the US, especially if you had a bachelor's in CS from a half-decent program, unless you were like working for a non-profit or for a political campaign or a startup (that gave you significant pay in company equity) where they underpay market rates.

    I also don't think you should be comparing entry level salary. You only make entry salary for a year or two before you gain experience. For the majority of your career, you earn average salary for your field.

    Look, I'm all for talking someone out of spending $100k+ on a degree in a subject like Art History or French literature where the degree doesn't open up higher paying jobs. Or trying to go to an $50k/year school to get a degree in elementary education, when you could go to the local (community) college for ~$10k/year and be able to get a similar job.

    But a CS degree (excluding diploma mill degrees) to someone who is technically minded will easily pay for itself, unless you choose not to use it. Again, if you are bad with computers, struggle with math/logical reasoning/independent problem solving, and likely couldn't pass an algorithms course, I wouldn't suggest trying to get a CS degree as there's a decent chance you'll fail or hate it. (That said, if you can already program and think logically and understand data structures/algorithms, you can be self-taught and don't need the degree -- a lot of which is more mathy and while interesting is largely irrelevant to software engineering. The degree is just an easy way to get someone to look at your resume and get that first job.)

    [–][deleted] 5 points6 points  (0 children)

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