What Do You Do For Living

[jimfriedrice]

I work in IT for a liberal religious denomination.  I'm probably the least liberal person there, but the people I work with are amazing, and awesome to serve.  They're so grateful for what I do, and express it so often, I swear I'm getting more liberal as I age because of this!  (usually the opposite of what happens as people get older).  

 

[Itchy]

I'm a control systems engineer. I tell people it's a hybrid in between an electrical and software engineer. I do industrial automation in various industries. Paper, rubber (tires), plastics, glass, chemicals, water/waste water. Spend most of my time writing code for machines and traveling all over. Came from food and refrigeration automation. All together 13 years doing this. Can't imagine doing anything else.

 

[SaintAlien]

I'm an artist that isn't alway starving lol. Set and costume designer for a fashion house as well as a model.  I'm aging out of the latter so the former (my passion) is now more of my profession.  I am a licensed nurse practitioner, I quit 1 year ago when I began to note addictive behavior with meds - I worked in a addiction / psych facility for MMT no less! I am still licensed, but I'm in MMT now and could never get hired with methadone in my system.  It hurts because I love helping people and harm reduction.  I had worked at an upscale (sounds silly in context) clinic / for profit only / no insurance allowed just cash but DEA regulated, place in the windy city. I don't receive treatment there now, it's against regulations and my judgement / secrecy - so I go to a sister clinic with the same set-up.

Heroin sheik has made it's way back and most are popping pills, as it's easier to travel with, (models) and I got caught up.

however, I'm content but seeking to stabilize my health and addiction so that I can go back clean and do both

 

[Hammerblow]

Considering where I post most of the time this might come as a shock to most. But I'm a self employed session musician & veeeery small business owner.

I own a  music studio in the big smoke, I live in the suburbs. We primarily deal with trying to promote, record and when we have the money sign new Scottish talent. I'm a session musician by trade so I try to negotiate contracts with larger ad firms, clothing, television companies and a lot of producers to record music for them. We can compose, transpose and record everything in house which keeps costs down. Then we try to invest that back into the Scottish music scene by offering what I've mentioned above. There's been so many great Scottish bands not make it due to either studio prices being too high or labels not willing to take a chance. We are trying to stop that rut. We make enough money doing it that we can do it for a living with a reasonable amount of comfort. And we love what we do! And by 'we'  by the way I have a team of three...including my dog! 

 

[runnerlk]

I'm a self employed business analyst. I help businesses streamline their archaic processes to be more competitive in a lean economy. I travel the world for this and while traveling I compete in triathlons when I'm completely healthy, which thankfully right now I am. Will be cutting back my hours as I enter retirement over the next few years

 

[Meltheangel]

Pimping ain't easy. 

 

[girlgerms]

Pimping ain't easy. 

Word.

 

[Adkam19]

As the old saying goes ....money makes money . I am sort of a venture capitalist ...which means I invest in other people's ideas...,in return for part of their business of course . Pretty much every day something interesting comes along. 

 

[Hammerblow]

@Adkam19 what you've almost literally just described is the TV show Drangons Den! How does one become a venture capitalist? I'm genuinely quite intersted, most people (including myself) would apply through the bank for a start up loan or in my country the council where you can occasionally be awarded an enterprise grant but they are few and far between.

Your portfolio must be extremely impressive because I know very few business owners (zero) who would be willing to give up a % of their business to a third party unless you could show expertise in that field. What percentage,future earnings and any interest rate do you ask for as there's obviously risk management? Sorry for all the questions I'm just quite intrigued It sounds very much like a back alley loan shark/bank. Sometimes I watch that show and think would I he'll give them anything and they're multimillionaire gym, hotel owners. Former .com and airline jammy so and so's!    

Peace

 

[Adkam19]

It's actually not that complicated. Let's say a person wants to start a business. He or she has an idea but no means to finance it. If that idea makes sense and I determine that it actually has a chance to make money, I make them an offer. Usually it's a loan, plus a few percentage points of the ownership. Of course I am not talking here about some multimillion startups but some small ventures like auto body shop, a restaurant or a cleaning service. Keep in mind that I don't use my own money. Thanks to my perfect credit history , I have an access to an unlimited funds through the investment company I work with. Long story short, I love what I do cause every day brings something new.....,even though some of the ideas are beyond bizarre.

 

[DippityDoo]

Am currently looking for work as a full-time Supermodel, part-time brain surgeon or tactical commander of Willie Nelson's bong-security team.  Have received a few call-backs, and by "a few" I mean [negative - nothing] + [zero2 ] x [infinityinfinity].

In the meantime, while I'm not Supermodelling or brain-surgeoning or tactically guarding Willie's weedly wares, I work as a medical transcriptionist, translating physician argle-bargle into English.  Physicians are required by law to audio-dictate certain status reports throughout the patient's hospital stay.  To accomplish this dictation, doctors first stuff their pie-holes with peanut butter and Lego bricks, then using GPS coordinates they carefully affix the recording microphone in the ONE place where audio can't be heard, i.e. buried deep within the dark and squishy confines of their crotchular area so, during dictation, their hands are free for more important things like sluuuuuurping coffee and flapping x-ray films so loud and so fast as to trigger an F5 tornado in the chart room.   So, these vortexes morph into whirligigs of death as pagers are beeping, beepers are paging, cell phones are ka-CHINGing the singularly most-loathed ringtone of all time, doors are slamming, papers are rattling, food is chewing and coffee is sluuuuuurping, the physician then speed-mumbles what should be a 3-minutes of clear-spoken English into 30 seconds of Charlie Brown's teacher going waah waaah waaaah.

So, if y'all hear of any openings for a full-time Supermodel with a home-school degree in brain surgery, lemme know, mkay?

 

[Back2Good]

I'm one of those unfortunates working on a second career - I spent 4 years as an enlisted man in the U.S. Army, bootstrapped to a military academy for 4 years, then spent 26 years as a commissioned officer, and retired after 30 years of active duty - (4 enlisted, 26 commissioned), but I retired as a Lieutenant Colonel at age 52, only to find that my pension wasn't nearly enough to support my family.  So now, at age 61, I find myself working for one of the world's biggest hardware / software / services firms, managing programs ("programs" are what DoD calls a handful of projects) for hardware or software implementations from Fort Benning to Camp Casey.  I've a few years left before I can draw 100% of my Social Security (I'll never need Medicare, thank goodness, as my wife and I are on TriCare for life), just trying to sock as much into the  401K as I can until then.  I draw a 40% VA disability check, which helps with the bills, but doesn't fix the disabilities - In short, I'm your average American veteran.

V/R

- b2g

 

[Hammerblow]

@Back2Good do you ever regret it? Joining and serving so long?  I'm neither pro or anti war/ military intervention. It's perhaps what you could call a necessary evil of the 21st century. There needs to be better aftercare for veterans all around the western world. The fact you served so long yet you found yourself having to learn a new trade and find a job is incomprehensible to me. Yet year after year major companies are given more tax breaks and so many blind eyes to the third party subsidiary companies set up to again pay less tax. 

I'd imagine it would've been an honour to serve your country so long and having that sense of pride but has it been diluted somewhat? 

 

[Back2Good]

That's a great question @Hammerblow, and one I haven't been asked before.  I can't say I regret staying on active duty for 30 years, for two reasons: 1) To my mind, the work I was doing was important, and I enjoyed the sense of purpose it entailed, and the camaraderie of the officer's corps, and 2) The way the U.S. Army's pension system works, one is eligible for retirement after 20 years service, at 50% of your base salary (averaged over your highest 3 years (36 months) average base pay plus 2.5% added on for every year of service over 20 years).  So the difference in pension if one serves 30 years rather than 20 years is significant - My pension check is 75% of my base pay while I was on active duty, while a pension check for someone who retired after 20 years would be 50% of their base pay.  Every year past 20 that one serves earns one an additional 2.5% of their base pay, so those extra 10 years make the difference between receiving 50% of one's pay or 75% of one's pay (and there is a guaranteed 2.5% cost of living adjustment added to the gross pension amount as a cost of living adjustment every year).

So once I decided to make a career of the army (and I didn't make that decision until earned my commission as an officer), I knew I was signing up for 30 years of service - 20 years wouldn't have provided enough of a pension to actually retire on, I'd have to start a second career.

Ironically enough, with the economy going down the tubes in the years before I retired, and two daughters just starting college, I had to do so anyhow - We were never able to save much money while I was on active duty, as my wife's parents both had severe health issues, and of course we had three kids of our own, with all of the associated expenses that come with them.

I don't find that I ever regret my 30 years in the army...If my own health had held up better, I'd most likely have tried to serve another five years, and top out at 80% of my base pay, which might have made it possible to retire altogether, rather than embark on a second career.  The military retirement system is arguably the best retirement deal around these days, really - Unlike most retirement plans, the Armed Forces offer a pension, with benefits, that starts the day you retire, no matter how old you are. That means you could start collecting a regular retirement pension as early as 37 years old. What's more, that pension check will grow with a cost of living adjustment each year. The Bush / Obama mismanagement of the economy is something none of us saw coming...Everyone I'm still in touch with, all of my old army buddies, are in the exact same spot I am - Where our parents (who were, for the most part, also army officers) were able to retire comfortably after 30 years service, we find ourselves having to find a second job that has some sort of pension system of its own (in my case, a 401K savings plan, where the company matches every dollar I contribute, up to 10% of my salary), and wait until age 67, at which point we'll be eligible for 100% of our Social Security benefits.  It's not as bad as it sounds, really, because the army starts paying one's pension immediately upon retirement, so right now, it's like I'm getting two paychecks - My pension check, and my salary from my current job.  I also don't have to pay for healthcare, as part of the military retirement package is full health coverage for my wife and I, for as long as we live.

I am, of course, not very happy about having to wait until age 67 to retire, when I planned to retire at 52 for most of my life...And like most of the rest of the population, I'm furious about the corporate welfare that started with the great bailout of 2008, the scandalous mismanagement of the Veteran's Administration that was discovered in 2005 and still has not been addressed, and the rest of all the brain dead wastes of money the past two administrations have engaged in - I understand the Trump phenomenon perfectly, even if I don't entirely approve of it - It's anger.  People (including myself) are outraged at how the political class has thrown away our tax money on corporate welfare, foreign aid, partisan leverage, and corruption, and left us hanging out to dry. It is certainly going to be an interesting election cycle here in the U.S.

V/R

- b2g

 

[SheratonGibson]

I'm retired--early retirement from cancer (cured)--but took most of the need to succeed out of me.  I travel around full-time in a small RV, by myself, and have crossed the country three times in the last 6 years.  Was a network admin/web design, and lots of other stuff by retirement.  I created three websites years ago and I mainly manage them.  They offer niche items, so most of my free time is spent pulling my hair out in Photoshop or Dreamweaver.  I enjoy it.  No boss, just me to answer to.   

Sheraton Gibson  (howdy Back2-spank)

 

[Back2Good]

@SheratonGibson - Howdy old friend, good to see you here, and good to hear you are still tearing up the interstates in the RV!  Hope all's well with you - And thanks for the nightmares I'm going to have tonight about Dreamweaver...I've long since left that tool (and web development) behind me, but good grief, the late nights I spent with it trying to get things just so.  Now I just call in a development lead and tell him / her "Make it look like this."

Of course there are attendant duties to my current position that are equally as onerous as Dreamweaver, but I thought I'd left thoughts of that one behind me.  Now where's that L@r@zep@m...

V/R

- b2g

 

[nserc]

I work as a researcher (physics). I know lots of people who have the skills to make / acquire this stuff, but apparently they have ethics. Damn ethics.

 

[ElectroNymph]

I have recently been referred to a place where they help the disabled and mentally ill find work. They are recommending me to Apple to be a phone tech support person. The money is miles better than the pittance I get on ESA/welfare. 

Finally feeling optimistic.

 

[mannabanana]

I work in retail ,and i also hate it to be honest.electronics store. 8years

I used to think bottom level food service was the most miserable job until I worked retail. Even worse, I worked retail in a year round Christmas store. Hell is hearing "Redneck's 12 Days of Christmas" on repeat for half an hour because the store CD changer was faulty. I would seriously consider living out of my car before doing that again.

I'm currently going on six (? already) years of being unemployed after my immediate boss, my employees, and I were fired in retaliation for blowing the whistle on our company defrauding investors and state welfare programs. I've been job searching ever since, but can't even get an interview. Minimum wage doesn't want me because I have too much education and experience, entry level jobs in my field don't want me because I don't have enough experience. Went back to school and collected a couple more degrees while I search, but money is running tight. Worried about what I'm going to do next month.

I've been ghostwriting content, editing, and working as a lit researcher for people who don't want to write their own papers. The work is sporadic and I'm too much of an introvert to market myself more. My dream is to be a reference librarian. Two more years of school and I can do it, but what good is that if I can't get hired anywhere in the first place? Unemployment is depressing.

 

[TNotch347]

Truck driver?? traveling the states!