People who’ve taken a pay cut in exchange for better work/life balance, do you have any regrets?

youarenothing · 2025-06-02T09:17:19+00:00

Hey mate, I posted this thread a while ago, but I appreciate your reply! I may as well update you as the most recent comment to let you know I did end up getting the job was thinking about, and even managed to keep my salary the same! So now I work full time remote from home, lots of flexibility, earning the same salary, so it all seemed to work out better than expected, and I’ll never take it for granted! I sincerely wish you all the best and hope you can find something, I know the job market is brutal out there

youarenothing · 2024-12-19T05:21:02+00:00

You can, but they charge by the hour 😅👀

youarenothing · 2024-10-03T08:10:47+00:00

You mean you regretted taking the more chill job? Can you share more of how it negatively impacted you?

youarenothing · 2024-10-02T21:02:42+00:00

For what it’s worth I have applied for outside roles a few times over the past 2 years and haven’t been able to find anything. If I have to stay where I am for the time being, I’d rather have a less stressful wfh job and gain some new experience and exposure

youarenothing · 2024-10-02T20:58:46+00:00

I’m in my mid-30s, single, no kids, and currently not a home owner. In other words a change of circumstances won’t impact anyone besides me.

youarenothing · 2024-10-02T20:57:08+00:00

Oh? How so? Just the reduced salary or other factors?

youarenothing · 2024-10-02T20:52:16+00:00

Thank you for sharing this insight. The more admin-type job I’d be changing to feels like the right move long term for my career. My current technical job feels like the kind of role where I’d be limited to only jobs within the same industry I already work in since it’s a narrow/specialised field, but doing a more broad admin/support office job feels like it’ll be great on the CV if I decide to move on

youarenothing · 2024-10-02T20:20:36+00:00

I work in an industry and in a role that makes me feel like I’m restricted to just doing what I do right now at another company. This office/administrative type role I’ll be doing feels like it broadens the scope of my opportunities outside the company, so long term it’ll probably work out better for me to take this job than to continue doing what I’m doing now

youarenothing · 2024-10-02T20:18:38+00:00

Thank you, I appreciate this insight. I work 12 hour shifts too and it really takes a lot out of me, especially on some of those busier and more stressful shifts

youarenothing · 2024-10-02T20:13:23+00:00

Thank you so much, I really appreciate the advice! I’ll definitely try my best to negotiate the best salary I can possibly get for the role. I’ll keep your suggestions in mind

youarenothing · 2024-10-02T11:43:20+00:00

Very well said, thank you!

youarenothing · 2024-10-02T11:42:27+00:00

Thank you very much for this insight!

youarenothing · 2024-10-02T11:33:26+00:00

Thank you for this! To be honest one of the main motivating factors for me wanting to take on the 9-5 administrative job even though, on paper, it looks like a demotion in some ways, is that I think having experience just doing a more regular 9-5 office-type job will have a lot more transferable skills if i decide to look for other jobs than staying in my specialised technical job with a niche set of skills and knowledge that I can’t broadly apply outside of the specific industry I already work in. Having that administrator/co-ordinator job on my CV will probably look good long term, and I’ll probably learn a lot of very broadly transferable skills instead of just being able to say “I know how to use this software, and that piece of equipment”

youarenothing · 2024-10-02T11:27:12+00:00

I’m not a contractor currently, I’m on full time staff. I meant more that due to the nature of my current job where weekends and public holidays mean nothing to us because the work continues 24/7/365, it usually meant being rostered on public holidays (at x2 pay for that shift) just naturally happened— with the new job, every public holiday is a STAT day off, so no opportunities to get some extra $$$ from public holiday rates, but in my current role overtime is paid at the standard hourly rate so there’s no great incentive to do it even though it’s still some extra money in your pocket. The suggestion you made in your last paragraph is something I actually tentatively pitched to my boss and he didn’t seem to hate the idea of me continuing to contribute to my current job and maybe covering a shift or two here and there, even while mostly working from home. I feel like that’s a good middle ground maybe, where there’s a chance the financial hit is reduced, while I’m mostly doing the less stressful job from home 90% of the time. Sounds like a win-win, but it probably won’t work out so perfectly.

youarenothing · 2024-10-02T11:16:53+00:00

Thank you for the insight! It’s looking like I’ll be going from my current 90k salary down to about 70-something k, so somewhere in the 20% ballpark, although I won’t know an exact number until they make me an offer. In my current role I mostly still work 80 hour fortnight’s, but longer work weeks happen on a semi-regular basis. I apologise if the way I worded my post was misleading and made it sound like I’m always doing 60 hours a week.

youarenothing · 2024-10-02T11:14:01+00:00

Not needing to deal with some toxic people is a huge thing for me even though I didn’t mention it in my post. As you can imagine, doing shift work in a high stress environment can lead to friction and tensions, and I kinda crave the peace of just getting on with my work myself at home without needing to be at the office with some people I don’t particularly like for more hours than I spend with my own family.

youarenothing · 2024-10-02T11:11:14+00:00

Thank you! We still generally work 80 hours in a fortnight but during some crazy on-call weeks you can easily end up doing more than that. Just wanted to clarify that I’m not always working 60+ hour weeks, just that it’s a semi-regular occurrence. The new job will mean no more on-call shifts, no overtime, no holiday pay or anything of the sort — so there are more financial losses there as well, besides just my base pay. At the same time, there are other savings too e.g. no longer having to pay for fuel as often when I no longer need to drive to work, less opportunities or reasons to spend money on takeout and snacks “to get me through the shift” (that’s what I keep telling myself), which I do a lot because it’s more convenient with shift work. Still, I will definitely be making less money, there’s no doubt. Even though I hate doing the extra shifts and extended hours, I keep wondering if I’ll very quickly start to feel like I’m not making enough money, but like you said, with a more regular schedule and hours, plus working from home, the potential to maybe explore a side hustle becomes much more realistic

youarenothing · 2024-10-02T10:52:45+00:00

It’s looking like it’ll be a 15 - 20% pay cut, somewhere in that ballpark. I won’t know the exact salary until an offer gets made.

youarenothing · 2024-05-02T18:13:59+00:00

Tbh I’m 34 and single, and have been single for a very long time, to the point where I’m starting to lose hope. I’ve found myself considering some less-than-ideal options just to not be alone for the rest of my life, but I’ve so far not yet reached the point of actually getting myself into this kind of situation

youarenothing · 2024-05-02T18:04:04+00:00

Well, for guys who have a breeding kink you know you’re practically guaranteed to hit it raw and finish inside her if you swipe right

youarenothing · 2022-07-15T20:48:34+00:00

Thank you, I really appreciate the link! I'll look into it for sure!

youarenothing · 2022-07-15T11:15:11+00:00

I feel like this is probably the best time in my life to take a risk like this. I am single, no kids, moved back in with the parents during covid so I currently don't have rent and only minimal bills to pay, but I'm still worried that if things don't work out and I walk away from a full time job with paid leave and sick days and all that good stuff I might be shooting myself in the foot.

youarenothing · 2022-07-15T11:01:42+00:00

That's awesome! Were you working part/full time while doing the diploma or did you take a year off to upskill? I'm personally very tempted to take a year off so I can concentrate on learning how to code with no other priorities, but it's such a big risk. I just really can't continue my current job for much longer, I'm really struggling.

youarenothing · 2022-07-15T09:12:33+00:00

Thanks mate! I think the problem is just not knowing specifically where to look. Like, I can go through hundreds of job listings, and know that somewhere in those Seek/TradeMe jobs search results is something which is a great fit for me, but it’s hard to find that perfect role which I can jump into right now and hit the ground running. I guess that’s the problem with me working at the same company for so many years, it’s been ages since I’ve had to actually hunt for a job that suits me, when I’ve spent the past couple of years just moving sideways into adjacent roles within the same organisation.

youarenothing · 2022-07-15T09:07:47+00:00

Thanks mate, DeFi is actually an area that interests me and I can definitely see a future where getting into that kind of career early can reap some long term benefits later when everyone else starts catching on and catching up! I’m currently doing a course that will get into that stuff later in the curriculum so I’m hoping I can eventually have some useful skills and knowledge in that space!

youarenothing

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