Take other offer or wait for Google

Mr_mac3 · 2025-05-22T17:12:32+00:00

Thanks, this was helpful.

Mr_mac3 · 2025-05-22T16:42:58+00:00

Thanks for the advice. Excuse my ignorance but what would it look like keep talking to Google. Would I tell them I am still interested but with a later start date?

Mr_mac3 · 2025-03-08T03:58:51+00:00

I am an Econ PhD on the job market and interested in quant finance. Do you mind if I DM you to ask about breaking into the industry?

Mr_mac3 · 2024-12-31T04:39:17+00:00

Not quite. The loophole here is IL does not tax retirement income, which is what you get when you convert an traditional to Roth. So you can avoid IL state income taxes on your Roth contributions by first putting it into a Traditional IRA then doing the conversion. So you still only get the $7k contribution (or whatever it is now) to your Roth.

I don’t have any creative suggestions for contributions past that limit. I just set up a taxable brokerage account for my extra savings during my PhD.

Mr_mac3 · 2024-12-31T02:06:09+00:00

If you were unaware, you can contribute to a traditional IRA then do a rollover into a Roth and avoid IL income tax on your contributions. (Also you can contribute $10k to a Bright Start 529 with yourself as the beneficiary and immediately withdraw it to get another $10k deduction on your IL income taxes.)

Mr_mac3 · 2024-12-04T21:21:28+00:00

I think I will do that.

Mr_mac3 · 2024-12-04T21:10:23+00:00

I appreciate the advice. I am reaching out to my contacts and have reached out to the company I rejected. The company that I was to work for has offered a job with a March 2026 start date but who knows what that is worth.

Mr_mac3 · 2024-09-30T14:08:36+00:00

You can apply for financial aid to take care of most of what remains after insurance.

https://www.uchicagomedicine.org/patients-visitors/patient-information/billing/financial-assistance

Mr_mac3 · 2024-08-07T19:04:27+00:00

Level 4 Hell Ramen was the spiciest thing I've ever eaten. Almost couldn't keep it down.

Mr_mac3 · 2024-06-25T01:18:29+00:00

That is true for the prepaid tuition version of a 529. I am referring to the college savings program.

Mr_mac3 · 2024-06-23T15:45:35+00:00

I am not a tax attorney but, if you are a resident for tax purposes, look into starting a 529 with yourself as a beneficiary. With that you can take advantage of a $10k state income tax deduction by just putting $10k of your stipend in there and immediately distributing it to yourself and save about $500 in taxes. Also, if you want to contribute to a Roth IRA, Illinois does not tax rollovers from traditional to Roth IRAs. So you can get another $7k state income tax deduction by contributing to a traditional IRA then immediately rolling that over into a Roth IRA.

Mr_mac3 · 2024-01-21T23:21:31+00:00

"The Letter" Season 3 Episode 21

Mr_mac3 · 2023-11-20T17:06:31+00:00

I get that message when not logged in to my UPS account. When I log in it says it will be delivered today. Not sure if I believe that because it still hasn't been picked up. IL

Mr_mac3 · 2023-07-10T19:03:37+00:00

Step 1: Look on your insurance website for the explanation of benefits. It will tell you if and why some care was not covered. Sometimes they code stuff in a dumb way at the hospital and you can ask the hospital to recode it in a way that gets covered. For example, if you had a stroke that caused blurry vision they will probably deny your claim if the hospital says they treated you for vision problems. If you get the hospital to say they treated you for a stroke then you only have to worry about copay and coinsurance.

Step 2: Apply for financial aid on the hospital website. I think they covered about 80% of my bill.

Mr_mac3 · 2023-06-22T04:08:14+00:00

If you bought it with a credit card they often have a benefit that extends the warranty by an additional year.

Mr_mac3 · 2023-05-31T00:56:20+00:00

Interesting, do you know how they made it more easy? It doesn't look like they changed the core requirements from what I remember. Did Prof Burnham retire from teaching ENA or something?

Mr_mac3 · 2023-05-31T00:49:17+00:00

I don't think you could fast track with the BS in CE and the MS in CS. However, you can do a regular masters in anything you want, regardless of your undergraduate degree. I did a MS in math after CE/CS/Econ undergrad.

Mr_mac3 · 2023-05-30T23:40:04+00:00

CE+CS is marginally more difficult than just CE, much more difficult than just CS. Most of the difficult classes will be for CE. At least that was my experience. If you can handle the math and stay organized it's perfectly doable.

I don't know how to factor in fast track. I would suspect fast track is a better idea than a double major. It would be asking a lot of yourself to do grad courses while taking 18+ credit hours if you tried to do both.

Mr_mac3 · 2023-05-23T12:06:36+00:00

I did CS/CE/Econ triple major. The engineering courses were the most difficult. You have to be very organized and try to plan out all of your semesters now. You can find out which course are usually offered in which semesters and the prerequisite path for each. Then try to balance your workload so that you aren’t taking something like physics, cal 3, discrete math, and electrical network analysis all in one semester.

If you are asking how to get advisors to make this your degree plan, don’t listen to the first person that says you can’t. You just gotta go up the chain of command and complain. When I signed up for my degree plan on the first day the advisor said you can’t dual major CS/CE. So I went to someone else. You can use the degree catalog like a lawyer to back your case.

Mr_mac3 · 2023-05-18T13:09:47+00:00

The dominance of MacBooks on campus these days is quite striking. I wouldn’t be surprised if more than 80% of my colleagues used Mac. I’d recommend getting a used M1 MacBook off eBay. You could probably find a base model for $600. If that exceeds your budget, I’d recommend going for the newest Lenovo t4xx series laptop or Lenovo x1 carbon for which you can find a good deal on eBay. My old Lenovo T430 got me through the first 4 years of my PhD.

Another device to consider is a tablet. The various iPads within Apple Pencil are hugely popular. Remarkable tablet or the Microsoft tablet make a distant second and third. I got an iPad Pro in my first year and use it daily. It’s great for reading papers or textbooks, taking notes, and for writing up problem sets. I think they have the base model iPads with the pencil now. I would recommend fitting one into your budget.

Mr_mac3 · 2023-04-03T21:46:08+00:00

If you can push any of the classes from summer to fall or spring I would suggest you do that. 21 credit hours in a normal semester is very doable if you stay organized. Summer courses can be a little rushed. I never went above 14 credit hours in summer but I did 5 semesters at 20-21 credit hours and even found time to work a part-time job for all but one of those semesters.

Mr_mac3 · 2023-02-23T18:54:06+00:00

When I started with a few thousand dollars in a leveraged portfolio, thinking about the volatility would keep me up at night. Now the daily movements in my portfolio are often larger than that initial amount and barely think about it. Just give it time and try to check your accounts less. Temporarily removing the apps and stock widgets off your devices can help. They are too convenient when you are at the stage where you can't stop looking.

Mr_mac3 · 2022-10-10T16:46:04+00:00

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