[Closed] Wages vs Job satisfaction - Midlife Crisis etc

I've been thinking about doing the same myself. I earn good money, but have fallen into that 'middle class' trap of a couple of PCP cars, big mortgage, plus some credit card debt and a home improvement loan. There's nothing like a Pandemic and recession to make you wonder if you've made the right decision.

We've got 2 conflicting 'plans' in action at home at the moment. The Wife who is younger than me wants to stay on the wheel so-to-speak. Once we've cleared off the commitments we've got now she wants to extend the house or move, bigger, better, more etc. She's only been working 'properly' for 6 years or so, is pretty much at the start of her career and she's progressing quickly so I think She's in that mindset I was in at her age (she's only 8 years younger than me) when you just assume your income is always going to go up.

I'm frankly I feel a bit worn out, a combination of stress / anxiety disorder and a challenging job means I'm looking to take a step back. In a few years when the eldest should be out of our hair I'm planning to take a job in Patient Transfer for the NHS, I don't know why, but I fancy it. I also fancy a near recession proof, 'easy' job that I won't take home with me... The 'problem' is that it's an NHS band 2 or 3 job which would mean a £1500 a month reduction in take-home pay, which is huge. It would mean not moving, giving up my car (wouldn't bother me) and we'd have to be all but debt free (not including) mortgage. On and my Wife will likely be an NHS Band 7 by then, so she could boss me around if we ever happened to be working in the same place - could my fragile male ego take it!

Have a good think about what you do spend your money on. Being mortgage free will be great, but the cost of everything else is the same in the rest of the UK.

So say you moved to the middle of Wales, got a nice mortgage free house and surrounded by great riding spots. There will be little to no work there. Perhaps shelf stackking at the local supermarket, but thats going to not only pay you F'all, its will provide you with F'all satisfaction.

If you move somewhere else you still have the same family, skills, prospects and costs (apart from the mortgage). So you could go from a mortgage to no mortgage but also no chance of a fufilling job. Also in cheap places what will your wife do for work ?

Why not start your own carbon business, Id look at that if I were you.

Also, nothing is bigger / better. Bit like Strave KOM chasing, as soon as you get bigger/better/faster you discover there is another bigger/better/faster thing to chase for.

I live on a cheap estate and ride with fat mates, make my whole life feel great 🙂

I quit my well paid job 4 years ago, I’d had enough of sitting behind a desk.
We didn’t move, we just changed our lifestyle so we don’t spend as much.

I work part time now as does my wife and our life is honestly infinitely better that when I was working full time. Not one regret here.

has anyone jacked in their ‘well payed’ job, moved somewhere else cheaper and started a new/different life?

I am in the process of doing precisely this. I walked off the job at the beginning of March and went straight to the doctor, having given fifteen years of my life only to have my 'superior' sit in front of me and say that he had no idea what I actually did. I have been off sick since, but my union rep is now negotiating a settlement so I can draw a line under it.

I was drawing a very good salary by the end of my time there, but I really couldn't care less. We still have a mortgage - which worries me a little bit - but I was able to re-negotiate it in February to half the initial payments, and unless the interest rate were to rocket, we should be able to manage in the long run.

Most importantly, I AM SO, SO, SO MUCH BETTER OFF now. I am happier; I am back to being a voracious reader; I am writing again; I am beginning to actually sleep through the night...

I can only say that, yes, if you can afford to... GO FOR IT. Heck, even if you can't afford it, you might ask if you can't afford not to. Life is so much more than shit careers.

For me - 20 years ago I quit my job ( I had spent 20 years building the skills to do what I wanted but discovered I was crap at it and hated it - being a senior manager) I spent ten years working part time on a zero hours contract and refound my enthusiasm partly thru doing a degree. MOney was tight but I had loads of time to ride bikes and also I ran the house 90%. I enjoyed it. after 10 years i was ready to go back to fulltime work and did. Suddenly loads of money ( by my standards) Now back to part time on a permanent contract and loving it.

To me time is more important than money. Those choices have cost me a lot over the years financially including reducing my pension significantly (? 1/4 million in earnings and 5000+pa in lost pension). However my mental health is better and I have some great memories of things I have done.

MY partner worked full time thu all this but I was able to run the house nd to arrange trips away - so for a weekend away I could pick her up from work with the hire car packed with everything I need and everything organised.

I do not regret it at all. I chose to be time rich but money poor. We don't have all the toys folk seem to think necessary but I do not care. I have thousands of photos of stuff we have done instead

Edit - and all tht working as a nurse - a job that indeed does give great satisfaction

I've not had a proper job for about 10 years, je ne regrette rien!

Everybody has a different situation, but for me - 2 yrs ago I owned (having founded) a small agency in London. Left to be more available to the family and now earn a tiny fraction of what I did. I'm much happier, relaxed, enjoy life more. I think(!) the family would agree. It's definitely worth considering. For us, moving to much less money was much less painful than I'd anticipated. Upsides definitely.

has anyone jacked in their ‘well payed’ job, moved somewhere else cheaper and started a new/different life?

Yes, ditched a job with lots of money, it involved flying all over the place and I wanted to be with the other human that I had fallen in love with.
Second time , ditched the job, took a salary drop and moved back to Scotland .We now had two small humans and liked the idea of them growing up with a bit more space and being closer to family.
I have always followed my heart, not the money.
Never had a job I didn't like,life's too short.
So far so good

Thinking exactly the same thoughts, I've been 'failing upwards' for a while now and am effectively in a roll trying to delegate too many tasks to too few staff when half the time I don't even know how to do the tasks myself, or for that matter, which tasks are most important.

Every time I've brought it up with management they've just thrown money/promotion at me and hoped I'd go away and shut up, which I mostly have done.

They're effectively paying me for my stress, late nights, resentful wife (time not spent with family) and sore back!

Buuuuut it gets harder and harder to give up the perks. I could give up most of my bikes so that ultimately I'm just paying to maintain one bike, and I guess in time I could wean myself off all the pointless 'upgrades' I keep paying for.

Could I eat cheaper? Probably, we eat really well but that's because I don't hesitate to fill trolley with nice raw ingredients etc.

Could I give up holidays? That's tough, I've only just started scratching the surface of riding in Europe whereas I feel I've seen everything I want to see in Scotland, or at least, I'm not going to see anything new or different if I keep doing long weekends in the highlands. European breaks are a luxury at the end of the day, just the one I would most regret giving up.

Could you travel on the cheap if you had more time off? Maybe...

First world problems though, I actually asked to be furloughed and they wouldn't let me, so I'm feeling pretty secure in work at least, hope everyone else feels similarly safe!

I've never had a well paid job, does that count?!!? 😂

I was made redundant just before Xmas and spent 5 months trying to find a new job. However at the time I was massively fed up with the whole thing and probably would have left anyway. I now work in a job much closer to home, don't have to travel anymore and at 5pm I switch off and forget about it all until 9am the next day. I'm earning 50% less than I did but I'm happier and more relaxed than I ever was. My new job is a far more junior version of what I was doing before and whilst sometimes it's hard not to be the one making the decisions or watching people doing my old job thinking I could do it better (big head much!) I'm quite happy to let them deal with the nonsense and politics.

My new job is a far more junior version of what I was doing before and whilst sometimes it’s hard not to be the one making the decisions or watching people doing my old job thinking I could do it better (big head much!) I’m quite happy to let them deal with the nonsense and politics.

This is what I want, voluntary demotion! I'm a senior acting as a principal but basically only qualified to be a technician...

anagallis_arvensis
Member
I’ve never had a well paid job, does that count?!!? 😂

I thought you were head of dept as a teacher - thats a well paid job in my eyes

Had a pretty well paid job in my 20's.
It nearly killed me.

Jacked it in to become a care worker and quickly found that being hungry and skint is no fun. It destroyed my self worth too - people tell you that your worthless for long enough and you start to believe it.

Now in the NHS and could not be happier.
Not well paid but I have simple tastes and no debt.

You're a long time dead.
Move North, do something that makes you happy.

Yes, walked out of normal office-based life about 5 years ago, most based on accrued savings but also a bit of working from home which has its plusses and minuses. No regrets. It's not a perfect life but any bad bits are entirely my fault rather than being imposed by others 🙂

Did it 2 weeks ago - I'm 55, mortgage free and hopefully have enough money in the bank to not really have the need to work again - ever. I was made redundant just over 2 years ago from a corporate job - reasonable pay-out that meant there was enough to pay for the last 2 years and work out what I wanted to do. Mrs Dovebiker was part-time carer and keen to pass that on to other family. I had a stress-related, mental health issue about 16 years ago, so gave up on the career progression thing. I have set-up my own 'lifestyle' business but it'll never deliver a full income- it's online so can be done anywhere. I was also working a couple of days per week in my local bike shop. Sat down with a financial advisor in January who gave the best piece of advise and that was to buy the smallest house you need, not the one you can afford. Pension health check was OK - provided we live within our means. Sold our house in Hampshire for £100k more than we thought too. We're currently renting a small cottage on Speyside and hope to get over to the Western Isles to talk to a builder about a new development of eco-houses. Weather permitting, I'm out running up hills with the dog or out cycling. At 5:30am this morning, letting the dogs out there was a brown hare just sitting outside the front door and we had a 3 juvenile curlews running down the road when getting the car out. I can't think of anywhere better to be right now.

I thought you were head of dept as a teacher – thats a well paid job in my eyes

Good god no!! Got close once, then I had a moment of clarity! Much like yours really.

Edited to add, when I say I've never had a well paid job I mean by STW standards, obviously in actual real world teachers are doing ok.

Went straight through school / Uni and didn't take a year out afterwards 'cos a dream job came up (or so I thought!). Dream job was perhaps not quite as advertised, but still had some great points, the main downside was the commitment required for it, didn't really leave much time for family life once the kids arrived. In the background, mrsredrocktrails and I had a dream of doing something completely different, which to be honest is what kept us going during the harder times.
After 16 years in the job, we realised we'd bored so many people for so long about our dream that we had to do it, otherwise we'd look bad, so chucked in the jobs and started a new life in Spain.

Positives - spending loads more time with the family, live in the sunny mountains, and responsible for our own mistakes.
Negatives - carry the can for the results of our own mistakes, financial insecurity, and, ironically, sometimes so little time for riding bikes.

But so glad we did it - we're having an adventure as a family, we've met some great friends (both locals and guests), and, despite working harder and with potentially much higher jeopardy than before, we're not ground down by work, but we enjoy it.

On the flipside - I'd make sure you have something to do once you step out of the rat race. For me, anyway, it would be easy to start to drift a bit. While that may be good for a while, I don't think it would be a good long-term prospect for me.

Have an adventure!

Never had a job I didn’t like,life’s too short.

I’m in the opposite situation to this. Always worked out of necessity and taken whatever job paid the bills. I think I earn a decent living now for someone who has no formal qualifications or skills. Don’t think I’d find a job that pays me anywhere near what I earn now and the owners of the company have been great to me. I really don’t like my job though and the stress it brings. Mortgage, a wife and two young kids to support leaves me with zero options to change things.

If you have the means and opportunity to make a positive change I’d say go for it and wish you the best of luck.

I worked in sport & the bike industry after uni for 5 years. Some job satisfaction but not much in the way of wages.

Got a ‘proper’ job in 2018 and some days I’m begging to be drinking coffee and talking bikes and shiny upgrades. I’m paid more now but often wonder if it’s the right balance with the associated stress about the things my (mostly useless and unempathetic) line manager leaves me to deal with.

I love the idea of keeping things like houses and mortgages scaled as far back as possible for more flexibility- the idea of being tied to a job and lifestyle fills me with dread. But it’s easy for monthly costs to rise!

Edited to add, when I say I’ve never had a well paid job I mean by STW standards, obviously in actual real world teachers are doing ok.

To be fair, some heads of academies are on 6 figure salaries, so half decent 😉

I've not done it but can see the attraction. An issue for me is I have 0 other skills than what I do now so a career change would probably mean minimum wage and that's too far a drop in income for me. I could drop to a more junior role but I don't think I'd enjoy that anymore and it would only be a bit less stress and similar hours.

Once I'm mortgage free I'll probably start by dipping my toe in the water and move to a 4 then 3 days a week contract. Maybe after being on 3 days a week for a while I'll be better prepared for switching to minimum wage doing something less stressful. It would also mess up my pension a fair bit, I'm not planning on a long retirement but knowing my luck I'll live to 100 and end up destitute in a care home somewhere...

I work with someone on reduced days in the same role as me and he seems as stressed working 4 days as I am 5, he might get an extra day off but the shit that has to be dealt with doesn't disappear and often people don't really take into account he only works 4 days a week when planning projects anyway.

I'm absolutely torn on this too. We could sell our home and move back to Scotland and be mortgage free. Get part time low stress jobs and ride, hike, run to our hearts content. Live the pipe dream, but........

We're both fortunate that we love our slightly (80%) part time jobs. We live comfortably within our means, have a great group of friends in a Nice village in Hampshire and our daughter has just started school.

I'd love to fulfill the dream I had as a teenager but life got in the way. Fortunately its a good one.

BUT! As soon as I've booted her out the door at 18 all options will be on the table.😁

Was relatively successful in my 20s - earned more than most of peers from school at that stage, company car, various perks.

Made redundant at 30. The now MrsMC and I were looking to settle down and have kids, with her part time or stay at home mum. Only way to do it down south was for me to go for a city based job, commuting into London.

Chance visit to a former colleague of hers who had moved back home to Derby made us realise we could afford to do that up here, so we took the plunge. Initially with her job and me as just a call centre drone (having previously set up and managed call centres), then when Jnr came along I found a team leader civil service job and she did 2-3 days part time. Over time (17 years now) we've chopped and changed and now she is full time and I'm part time which gives us more money.

We both had way more time with the kids when they were young compared to other couples we know. Can't be replaced. Both had time to pursue other interests, even if not in the expensive way some friends do. Small mortgage meant we could pay it off early. Cheap camping holidays in the UK - kids have been abroad more with school and their sport/musical interests than as a family.

Personal regrets? I haven't missed the money as such, but I miss the challenge and responsibility that came with it. Seeing younger, less experienced people promoted over you and cock it up is frustrating. Being the one who has to do extra to sort it out is frustrating. But walking away and not having a work phone on at weekends is great.

I'm 51 now. Wife's new job means she's based at home for the youngest, so I'm actually looking at a more responsible, better paid job with more hours, but still only 4 days a week to help deal with kids, ageing parents etc. Hoping for more job satisfaction through that, and it will start to top up my pension pot after 5 years of lean part time earning. Can potentially start to claim my early private company pensions at 60, so thinking of putting in a few hard years now, then going semi retired at 60.

Bit of a ramble and maybe not much help, but those are my experiences.

Yup done it.

Despite having a pretty good job (plenty of freedom, not much stress, could wear flip flops), hated being part of the machine.

So I spent a couple of years getting rid of debt and downsizing, then quit. That was 4 years ago, but may as well been a lifetime ago, so much has happened since. Makes me shudder to think how much time I spent staring at a screen / in nonsense meetings / driving on motorways.

Self employed now, and absolutely love it. Worked one day this week, probably work 7 or 8 days this month and that is plenty* saying that, looked at a job yesterday that looks really interesting, so might work another couple of days

*i don’t feel the need to spend money to make me feel happier because I don’t spend time doing a job I don’t enjoy, so don’t really need much money.

My only regret is I didn’t do it years ago

2008.
Sheffield (edge of manor estate) to village in the Highlands.
Business Development Manager in construction back to my true calling of outdoor instructor.
£36k ote to a third of that.
30k miles a year for work to driving from city to city, to a cycle commute up Loch Tay and driving kids in minibuses to climb hills.
Weekends spent showing my kids round hills and rivers, holidays at the other outdoor centres my employers owned.

Downsides: naff all money, no job for mrs_oab, didn't own a house any more, silly miles in the car to go anywhere or see family, Highland villages can sway between lovely communities and viscous rodents you wouldn't wish on your enemy, stupid amount of hours in the season (I would often collapse for the October half term week ill), hard to break out of the low pay and small world that is outdoors, same sh*t that is yourself and family still carries on.

I'm now on another job, back at bit more out of the wilds and earning ok.

Would I change a thing? No.
Am I still skint - yes, it put a hole in our finances.
I'm not sure mrs_oab and I would have survived me staying in a city, I'm not sure my health and wellbeing would have survived either.

However. Life is too short.

This is why. This is what my kids have had for 12 years in Scotland.
The eldest choose to celebrate his 18th on the summit of Meall nam Tarmachan, at dawn. Job done.

https://flic.kr/p/6Evc7k

https://flic.kr/p/7Kp7Eu

https://flic.kr/p/a3nN9h

https://flic.kr/p/9yMrop

https://flic.kr/p/PE8cDs

https://flic.kr/p/TKRBEV

18th birthday.

My take on it now is my job is a way to earn sufficient money to buy the lifestyle I want to lead. It’s a balance. Ideally I’d want to spend more time doing stuff I enjoy doing, but without the funds couldn’t afford to do them. Also with family you have responsibilities to others and I want my kids to have as good a start in life as possible and have experiences which ultimately cost money.

I’m luck on that my wife works and has a good job too and even her part time salary is better than my full time salary so that takes the pressure off me somewhat. I would hate to be the sole breadwinner! I’m a modern man me...get the wife out working.

My wife had a mini- mid life crisis a few years ago and wanted to jack it in and do something more ‘rewarding’. But I pointed out to her all the perks she gets in her job and if she hung on for another 5 years she could jack it in, start drawing down on her pension and wouldn’t have to work at all, vs jacking it all in and facing another 10 years or more working. That soon made her reconsider. And since she’s changed jobs within the company and she now enjoys her role.

I guess the difference is if you do a job you genuinely hate. I’m lucky in that I actually like my job, like the industry I work in. Sure some of the people and politics of the organisation I work in I could do without, but you have to take the rough with the smooth. If I hated my job I might be more motivated to do something else. Only you can make that assessment for your own circumstances. How much of a balance you’re prepared to make.

Are well paid jobs with job satisfaction that rare? I’ve been lucky to have had both (relatively) most of my working life.

I'll also add that in the process of selling our house / moving we deliberately got rid of about half our stuff - we'd lived there for 27 years and you can put an awful lot of "stuff" in a 4 bedroom house with attic and garage! Ultimately, job satisfaction just came down to having the ability to buy more stuff - I'm very conscious that a lot of those purchases weren't really necessary.

SAFRAN seats in south wales do a lot with carbon fibre for airplane seats, theres also united aerospace, a company in pembrokeshire that also specialises in carbon fibre parts for SAFRAN but also for motorsport and aerospace. Probably others, I wouldn't write south wales off as having nothing in your particular industry.

Great pics matt oab, I think you made the right decision

Move to where you fancy and become a part time postie, working three full days, or 4/5 part days?

Sadly I missed the well paid job in my youth after grammar school and starting a science degree at uni, replacing it with mental health issues mostly brought on by SAD. 😆

many many thanks to all that replied, a real insight into what others have done and some genuine food for thought.

I really appreciate everyone's replies. A spot of soul searching and maybe jotting down some plans and idea's with both pro's and con's is something I need to do.

The caveat I would give is to make sure you are running towards something not away from something. ie make it a positive move like Matt in the post above

I spent many years climbing the corporate greasy pole, including quite a few years working overseas, and then eventually moving to London for 5 years because that's where all the senior management jobs were. I enjoyed my time down there but a couple of years back I had options to move to a really senior role but it'd have included a lot of global travelling (i.e. travelling pretty much every week) and I realised that while it would have been an interesting (and very well paid) job I just couldn't face that sort of life any more.

At the time I was 50 so I decided we'd move back to Edinburgh and we'd both retire (and apart from a bit of supply teaching at her old school my wife has stayed retired), including heading off on a extended motorhome trip (planned at maybe a year or so). I ended up getting headhunted just after we set-off on our trip and decided to take the role as it was Edinburgh based , paid about the same as I'd been getting in London and - most importantly - was a lot less stress as I didn't have a team and wouldn't be in a senior management position. That meant cutting short our trip but we did manage a couple of months away and it was great.

I'm certainly a lot less stressed although have found I've ended up taking on some management responsibility and leadership responsibilities - but I don't own a number this time, which is nice. If it gets too stressful though I'll just retire again, or at least take a year out to complete that motorhome tour we had planned. I find that's perhaps the thing that's contributed most to a less stressful life - that while I like my current job I could ditch it if I felt the need. We've also consider buying a small business to run as until our pensions kick in, so I do keep an eye out for candidate businesses up in the North West of Scotland.

We're fortunate in being a bit older and no longer having a mortgage or any other debt, which does give more flexibility plus we're not that many years away from pensions becoming available if we wanted (although at a reduced rate as we'd be taking them early). Overall though I'm comfortable with the decision to have less income (although moving back to Edinburgh and back to only having one house has mitigated the reduction in income from my wife no longer working) and a less stressful life.

I'm going to 'retire' June 21 🙂 at 56 The thing that helped the decision was the past year where I've written down everything I spent, allowed me to see exactly where the money went. Can see what ££ is required.
I don't want to buy stuff but I do like being able to look at something and think I can if I want to, but reached the stage where I don't want to.

Kind of back in the middle of all this now.   I did have a dream of a quiet retirement place in outside of London or in Menorca on a 2 phase plan a) I am lucky enough to have achieved enough savings to pay the mortgage now although am waiting for the fixed period to be over as thats cheaper than paying the penalty and b) we do need to wait for the kids to leave home - at least 12 years.  The former brings a little flexibility with choices as epicsteve says.

Option a) means that I could have stepped off the gas now but COVID meant redundancy for Mrs K and a much tougher Sales effort for me.   Looks like we'll need to stay as we are for a couple of years until this settles a little / she has another established job.   But also, a further cultural education meant that I realised my dream was moving her away from her cultural environment which isn't fair.   I'm having to really think about what that means, which probably means looking locally for a quieter detached location - that though has £££ attached to it here in N London.

Likely then I'll tick along on the same level of stress / location for the next 4.5 years perhaps putting some money into a new bathroom and small extension, with phase 1 meaning me lowering my working effort/responsibilities after the next 4 years and phase 2 semi/early retirement in 12 years.

Thats all off the cuff, I really need a sunny weekend afternoon in the garden with a beer to think on this...

What is job satisfaction? Never had that before.

We're thinking about moving in the next two years. Both don't enjoy our jobs and the thought of going back into work in a college where there will be no distancing measures or PPE means I might decide to not go back at all in 6 weeks. But, I need some income for the next year at least so not sure what to do as a temporary job.

Long term plan: We own a property each so the long term plan is to sell one and buy a new home elsewhere, then sell the other and buy a 2nd place to let out as an air bnb.

The caveat I would give is to make sure you are running towards something not away from something. ie make it a positive move like Matt in the post above

This is true. I properly hate my current job - used to be fantastic but legislation changes, incompetent managers, no prospect of advancement or development and austerity have taken away all the "feel good" elements. There are some proper downsides to the role I'm looking at and I'm conscious that they need to be resolved to make that jump worthwhile.

Would love to but difficult to find the balance. I could earn less but can't go down to low wages. Anything that pays enough will still be full time so may as well earn more. That being said I am taking a wage cut to stop traveling but still full time work.

A bit of both of MCTD and TheBrick for me also.   I'm trying really hard to see that COVID has caused me to be shut indoors and lose the customer interactions / mixed location nature of my role and increase Sales pressure and things may improve.   I don't want make rash decisions on the basis of something temporary, hence as I said in the Rishi thread, I'll probably be happy here with a beer and a pizza at the weekend in the meantime.

I worked in the city (not big money sales/trader, more modest back office manager) but soon tired of it and we moved to the Midlands and I retrained as a cabinet maker soon after getting married.

We got a lot of the expensive things done while earning more (travel, engagement ring, wedding, honeymoon, but not property ladder unfortunately).

Our lifestyle is modest but comfortable. Making things is much better for self esteem than endless cash reconciliations!

Sometimes I feel like a 'black sheep' among my higher earning friends, but I think they respect my decision. More importantly, we have kids now and I'm home by five each evening! I'm thinner, fitter, happier and poorer.

Midlife crisis - Buy a red bike with 170mm forks.

I've done this quite a few times.

The most pertinent was being paid a decent amount of money, but being very stressed all the time.

I took about a £60k pay cut, but am now doing what I would consider my dream job with the team I really enjoy spending time with.

You need to decide what's most important to you. I didn't want to look back at my life, realise I earned a lot of money but didn't enjoy myself along the way.

For me, job satisfaction first, people to be with second, money third. Location.... I'll take commuting over living somewhere I don't like.