Choosing careers with very limited potential

Zascar · 16-04-2021 9:24am #1

I was discussing this with a friend recently - about how many people choose to go into careers where no matter how good you are, your promotion and earnings potential is severely limited. Take the standard "Nurse and a Guard" - very solid professions but you are never exactly going to hit the bigtime, even the bosses don't exactly make huge money. Going into a career in areas like finance, banking, tech, sales or engineering etc - even at the very bottom has virtually unlimited possibilities of where you can go and ways you can make serious money - and you don't need 600 points to get in. I still don't understand why so many young people are steered into avenues where no matter how well they do, there is always a ceiling on your success. I get not everyone is money motivated or is even ambitious, but if you are going to have a career does it not make sense to give yourself as much runway as possible?

basill · 16-04-2021 9:37am

I think you highlight the fundamental problem in the education system. Presently its aimed at getting children to complete secondary school at all costs and then feed them into higher education even though most are unsuited to this type of learning environment. They end up doing a course that is in reality a vocation and something would be better placed in a polytechnic/technical training college or centre or via work experience. Many of these courses have little chance of a job at the end of it. In fact many simply exploit kids via unpaid internships which has to be stamped out.

The bright children at school miss out on learning opportunities as the teacher has to direct more of their time in dealing with the kids that shouldn't be at school in the first place nor quite possibly want to be. Instead they should be in apprenticeships. So its then a nasty spiral race to the bottom where class sizes get bigger, teacher resources get strained and inevitably the curriculum has to be "dumbed down" to facilitate educating the children that shouldn't be there in the first place in order to try to wrestle them up to higher education entry levels.

The moral of the story is stop rewriting history and go back to pulling kids out of school at 15 and into apprenticeships or work. Or send them into technical colleges at 15 and take them out of the normal school system.

3DataModem · 16-04-2021 10:16am

The one thing about jobs with a ceiling, is that they also generally have a floor, and fixed hours. That is attractive to a lot of people.

The one thing about jobs with big potential, is that they also have a shorter expected lifespan. Knowing that you could be out a job in 6 months is something some people don't have to deal with.

It's a trade off between security and potential, and always has been.

OMM 0000 · 16-04-2021 1:37pm

I remember reading a psychology book and they were talking about different types of people. In a nutshell it said 80% of people are boring and want to be part of the establishment and not shake the boat. Only about 5% of people are entrepreneurial. Another 5% are creative. Mavericks take up another 5%, and then there was some other 5%, probably crazy people, I don't remember.

My point is most people are boring and not very ambitious, so a civil service job or the like (stable, secure) appeals to them.

This is a good thing, because if everyone was entrepreneurial or mavericks, we'd have no one to do the boring stuff.

So I think it'd take a lot more than "hey go into finance you'll make a fortune" to prevent them becoming nurses.

Obviously I have nothing against nurses.

16-04-2021 1:50pm

OP - the jobs you mentioned (nurses, guards) have incredible job security, pensions etc. Same with teachers. Its a trade off.

huskerdu · 16-04-2021 1:58pm

"I still don't understand why so many young people are steered into avenues where no matter how well they do, there is always a ceiling on your success. "

I disagree fundamentally. You seem to be talking about a very narrow definition of success.

I don't understand why anyone would steer a young person into a career on the basis that 10% of people who go into that area make a lot of money.

Doing something that you might enjoy is a much better reason
(of course, choosing a career path at 17/18 is fundamentally flawed and many people move from the path they went on initially anyway but no time to go into that today).

Homelander · 16-04-2021 2:04pm

I also wouldn't say they have "very limited" potential in the overall scheme of things. Not only is there scope for advancement if you've determined, motivated and ambitious enough, but they have excellent security, benefits and a respectable salary scale that allows you to easily plan for the future.

I'm not sure I agree with "even the bosses don't make big money". It's big money when compared to the median industrial wage in Ireland and hence it's "big enough" for most normal people. Like in the civil service, any-one with the vaguest touch of intelligence or motivation could easily make Grade V or VI level and earn 60-65k, and still have a relatively simple, stress-free job.

In fact most careers aren't all that limiting, they're mostly limited by lack of ambition, motivation, etc on behalf of the individual. What you are really asking is "why isn't everyone extremely ambitious?"

Most just want a half decent job they don't hate that'll allow them a reasonable quality of life. A fraction of people want to endlessly climb the career ladder or hit the top of their field.

jrosen · 16-04-2021 2:21pm

Some young people have little guidance from home and then Career guidance in school certainly in my school was terrible. Its equally as bad in my sons secondary school. Not every young person is thinking long term, or has a focus. Plenty of students sitting the LC have no real idea what they want to do.

We also need people to do a whole range of jobs. We cant all be ambitious finance people or engineers. We need someone to serve the coffee, cut hair, sweep the street, stock the shelves. If we want to pay people more for these jobs then we need to charge more for the service.

billyhead · 16-04-2021 4:56pm

Some jobs are a vocation or a family member such as a parent worked the same job and they followed suit i.e Gardai for example.

PhoenixParker · 16-04-2021 5:04pm

I wouldn't say nursing has low scope for advancement.

There's a lot of scope for promotional posts which carry solid salaries and you can move from nursing management to hospital management and keep going further. The proportion of promotional posts is fairly high too.

Engineering on the otherhand doesn't have great scope if you stay in engineering.

Teaching is one that has fairly limited prospects for promotion. There are very few principals vs the number of teachers.

Pogue eile · 16-04-2021 5:11pm

Do people really choose a career based on potential earnings? Seems a recipe for disaster to me, job satisfaction and work life balance should be so far ahead of any starting or notional salary.

OMM 0000 · 16-04-2021 5:16pm

Pogue eile wrote: »

Do people really choose a career based on potential earnings? Seems a recipe for disaster to me, job satisfaction and work life balance should be so far ahead of any starting or notional salary.

I know a lot of people in finance and banking and they all hate their jobs. Their salaries are high though, all on a good bit more than 100k a year.

The thing with programming (sort of my area) is you can also make good money and if you like it you really like it.

Tell me how · 16-04-2021 5:30pm

Zascar wrote: »

I was discussing this with a friend recently - about how many people choose to go into careers where no matter how good you are, your promotion and earnings potential is severely limited. Take the standard "Nurse and a Guard" - very solid professions but you are never exactly going to hit the bigtime, even the bosses don't exactly make huge money. Going into a career in areas like finance, banking, tech, sales or engineering etc - even at the very bottom has virtually unlimited possibilities of where you can go and ways you can make serious money - and you don't need 600 points to get in. I still don't understand why so many young people are steered into avenues where no matter how well they do, there is always a ceiling on your success. I get not everyone is money motivated or is even ambitious, but if you are going to have a career does it not make sense to give yourself as much runway as possible?

Bizarrely maybe, many people are motivated by things more than just career success and even in the context of their career, they don't always consider the amount of money they make as an element of their success.

There are some who achieve a high level of 'success' (wealth) as a consequence of their career, but in doing so in finance, engineering, tech, sales they will most likely have devoted a huge amount of time of their lives in doing so with a 40Hr week being seen as a short week.

We know how necessary money is, but the idea (not that you have said it) that it is the answer to all or most of lifes problems is absurd.

floorpie · 16-04-2021 9:51pm

I know many people who were big earners/senior in their respective fields, who were out of work for extended periods of time during bad economic years. Now look at an employment chart for the last 40 years and, at least at a high level, how many years of the 40 were bad?

You're asking this question at a local peak of employment, but for almost a decade until recently, it didn't seem like there were "virtually unlimited possibilities" if you worked in several of the areas you mention. Jobbridge had what, 100k people working for free in the 2010s, including laywers, salespeople, tech staff. Even government departments hired laywers via Jobbridge just 5 years ago. Nearly half a million were on Jobpath since. There are near half a million on PUP right now!

I'm personally quite money motivated, but I'm getting out of tech and into the public sector for this very reason. I think job security in many industries is very questionable right now, and imo you can't earn enough in Ireland to make up for the risk of your industry falling on its ass when you're >50. Especially when the age for state pension will soon be 68. Thinking about another 2008 hitting when I'm 10-15 years off of a high retirement age just makes me shudder

mariaalice · 16-04-2021 10:17pm

PhoenixParker wrote: »

I wouldn't say nursing has low scope for advancement.

There's a lot of scope for promotional posts which carry solid salaries and you can move from nursing management to hospital management and keep going further. The proportion of promotional posts is fairly high too.

Engineering on the otherhand doesn't have great scope if you stay in engineering.

Teaching is one that has fairly limited prospects for promotion. There are very few principals vs the number of teachers.

It's a certain type that goes for promotion someone would need at least a master's and probably an MBA and other specialised qualification if they were a nurse who wanted to go into health care management.

There is no way today anyone goes for promotion or specialised role in the vast majority of careers without further qualification after their degree, they're on the treadmill from their leaving cert on.

17-04-2021 12:04am

The level of insulting projection in that OP, the narrow ignorance evidenced and the easy confidence in same, tbh it staggers me it's not a new minted troll account but a longstanding poster

Id safely say what you know about any of the varied and interesting careers you name and write off as being for people that are boring and unambitious could be written in large print on the back of a stamp.

Chaos Black · 17-04-2021 12:10pm

OMM 0000 wrote: »

My point is most people are boring and not very ambitious, so a civil service job or the like (stable, secure) appeals to them.

This is a good thing, because if everyone was entrepreneurial or mavericks, we'd have no one to do the boring stuff.

Just a small note, I get the meaning of what you are saying and that a lot of CS are likely more risk adverse then someone who works in a startup and that can be an organisation culture thing as well. I.e. if you are in the CS, regardless of personality the prevailing wind is to be risk adverse. Although I recently read the private sector despite the narrative is similar in reality!

However, I just wanted to say that if someone is ambitious, the CS job can entail influencing and having a direct hand in national policy. I would bet that your average AP for example in some Departments have much more influence then someone making similar money in a tech giant like Google as they will be advising Government and implementing policy.

vriesmays · 17-04-2021 2:06pm

Someone full-time staying in the civil service at clerical grade from say aged 20 to 60 would earn over €1 million.

17-04-2021 2:41pm

vriesmays wrote: »

Someone full-time staying in the civil service at clerical grade from say aged 20 to 60 would earn over €1 million.

What would someone working in tesco earn over forty years?

I mean this is absolutely inane stuff.

floorpie · 17-04-2021 5:12pm

Chaos Black wrote: »

However, I just wanted to say that if someone is ambitious, the CS job can entail influencing and having a direct hand in national policy. I would bet that your average AP for example in some Departments have much more influence then someone making similar money in a tech giant like Google as they will be advising Government and implementing policy.

I think the average PO, AP, or even HEO has responsibilities that FAR exceed what their (imo) low pay would suggest. I had no clue about the nature or extent of CS work before I looked into joining it. I reckon by a certain level you must have extreme ambition to take on such responsibilities for the given salary. OMM 0000 suggests that they're the boring risk-averse 80% but possibly they're the 5% of crazy people

OMM 0000 wrote: »

In a nutshell it said 80% of people are boring and want to be part of the establishment and not shake the boat. Only about 5% of people are entrepreneurial. Another 5% are creative. Mavericks take up another 5%, and then there was some other 5%, probably crazy people, I don't remember.

BonsaiKitten · 17-04-2021 5:15pm

Not everyone wants to work solely to earn big bucks. Speaking of teaching, I know a lot of classroom teachers who wouldn't touch being a principal with a barge pole - it's a completely different role to their own, much more admin and paperwork, can be quite lonely at times. It's not directly comparable to promotion in other careers where you might be doing something similar while being bumped up the food chain.

con___manx1 · 17-04-2021 5:21pm

At the end of the day money isn't everything. Some people get those kind of jobs where there is real career progression but the higher they go up the ladder the more responsibility pressure and stress thses people will have.
Any job that puts you under stress is not worth the money in my opinion. That will take years off your life.

17-04-2021 5:23pm

How many part time positions are available in the high-earning sectors?
Plenty of teachers are happy to split their job for a while when their kids are before school age. Nursing has plenty of opportunities for part time work later on or shift work which can average at 3 shifts per week.
On top of that is it worth zero security and flexibility to make an extra 20k which will be instantly halve by tax?
A couple both on 2-3x minimum wage (which apparently isn't high-paying now) will have a combined income of 100k, perfect job security and a couple of decent pensions.

Yourmama · 17-04-2021 6:07pm

It's not all about money. Some people prefer to have a job they enjoy and go to work to have fun. I consider myself lucky that I do what I love and I get decent money for it. If money was crap, I'd still do it. Life's to short for suffering, even for great money.

Cluedo Monopoly · 17-04-2021 6:36pm

con___manx1 wrote: »

At the end of the day money isn't everything. Some people get those kind of jobs where there is real career progression but the higher they go up the ladder the more responsibility pressure and stress thses people will have.
Any job that puts you under stress is not worth the money in my opinion. That will take years off your life.

Agree with this. If your job is stressing unnecessarily then get out. Stress will mess up your health in many ways.

peasant · 17-04-2021 9:09pm

Zascar wrote: »

... there is always a ceiling on your success.

It really depends on how you define success.

If your definition for example includes regular hours to devote to your family, the ability to have life outside of work, being yourself instead of a corporate wheel and advancing on merit rather than office politics...then yes, that success comes with a ceiling to your potential earnings.

But money aint everything and quite brutally put ...not everybody wants to be the corporate whore, no matter how well it pays, some people have standards to live up to

LimeFruitGum · 18-04-2021 7:36am

Jobs aren’t for life anyway.
I remember bumping into a science teacher from my school in Limerick city a few years later at a job in Blanchardstown. She was working in HR. I did a double-take at first! She had never taught me and we didn’t interact that much at work, but I had to really try to stop myself calling her Miss

Another friend who originally trained as a teacher, had enough of unstable contracts, and she eventually went into financial services.

maxsmum · 18-04-2021 7:41am

I totally get why people go into nursing, Garda etc, safe and pensionable and when you're off the clock, you're off the clock. Paid maternity leave and all that is very attractive to most.
I never got why people go to art college (to be artists). There were two in my class at school. They are still living off their parents, nearly 40. I know we need art and artists, but as a sideline to a 'real' job, I would have thought.

18-04-2021 7:46am

Zascar wrote: »

I was discussing this with a friend recently - about how many people choose to go into careers where no matter how good you are, your promotion and earnings potential is severely limited. Take the standard "Nurse and a Guard" - very solid professions but you are never exactly going to hit the bigtime, even the bosses don't exactly make huge money. Going into a career in areas like finance, banking, tech, sales or engineering etc - even at the very bottom has virtually unlimited possibilities of where you can go and ways you can make serious money - and you don't need 600 points to get in. I still don't understand why so many young people are steered into avenues where no matter how well they do, there is always a ceiling on your success. I get not everyone is money motivated or is even ambitious, but if you are going to have a career does it not make sense to give yourself as much runway as possible?

Garda commissioner makes 263,000 euro a year!
Not everyone will make that money obvs, but management level is not a bad salary figure, plus expenses.

Tbf, I think most people want to do a job that they enjoy, as well as being able to live off the wages. If I was paid 3 times as much as I am now, but it was a job I didn't like, I wouldn't do it.
Ambition is not always about going higher/making more money.

listermint · 18-04-2021 8:03am

I'd have to agree with alot of others here, OP has an extremely juvenile and naive definition of success.

It reads like the type of 'potential released' picked up from a bottom shelf self help book or podcast.

People should not shape themselves or their world on such frivolities. But they do.

ThumbTaxed · 18-04-2021 8:46am

People would really want to stop saying how good a civil service pension is.

Those who joined post 1995 and post 2013 would not agree with that.

It is more of a small benefit than a real head turner especially now that 40 year careers in CS will be less likely with older new joiners.

18-04-2021 9:17am

ThumbTaxed wrote: »

People would really want to stop saying how good a civil service pension is.

Those who joined post 1995 and post 2013 would not agree with that.

It is more of a small benefit than a real head turner especially now that 40 year careers in CS will be less likely with older new joiners.

It still puts anything in the private sector to shame. There's no excuse for DB pensions in this day and age - should be DC like everyone else instead of the tax payer picking up the risk.

18-04-2021 12:38pm

ThumbTaxed wrote: »

People would really want to stop saying how good a civil service pension is.

Those who joined post 1995 and post 2013 would not agree with that.

It is more of a small benefit than a real head turner especially now that 40 year careers in CS will be less likely with older new joiners.

Course they wouldn't, people love complaining.
Friend of mine (teacher) went on about how "not great" it was. I told her to go and see how much she'd have to put away privately to get something in the same league. She's happy to pay the couple of percent for it now.

18-04-2021 12:40pm

Student_111 wrote: »

It still puts anything in the private sector to shame..

Theres only five threads bumped this month with actual information on this exact topic.

If you were interested in informing yourself and not two-line drivebys youd do well to read them

Edit for short answer- anyone joining today because of a pension far in advance of a very typical private package is misinformed

None of my mates are turning down their salaries, employer contributions, bonuses or stock offers for the civil service

Likewise, im not trading the conditions of my gig for theirs

And yet we all still get on, isnt it amazing

Mr. teddywinkles · 18-04-2021 12:45pm

Maybe cause a lot of people aren't ass kissers.
That and people have families. Would prioritize that over massive career that would take up more time.

BrianD3 · 18-04-2021 1:37pm

This thread should be read in conjunction with my "science is a poor career choice" thread. Why do people go into nursing, teaching or the Gardai, many reasons. Some are risk averse and drawn toward steady careers. Upbringing and experience (e.g. entrepreneur parents having money difficulties) in formative years influence people greatly. Some might say they are unambitious, maybe they are lacking confidence in their ability. Maybe they recognise that they are not cut out for the corporate world or being entrepreneurs

I was in school with a few girls who went on to be nurses, some are at senior levels now (i.e. Director of Nursing grade) they all had mediocre leaving certs and struggled even with ordinary level maths. They never gave any impression that they could do well as engineers, computer programmes or working in finance.

Even today after many years of grade inflation, you can study nursing in Ireland with CAO points in the high 300s, Obviously this is related to supply and demand but in general, you won't get many high achievers going into nursing. Maybe they should.

I do know some high achievers, especially those who went into software engineering and electronic engineering who have done very well for themselves. But plenty of others have not done so well. They'd have been better off becoming nurses, teachers or guards. One of the best scientists I ever met did just that, did the teaching HDip immediately after his degree, got a job shortly afterwards and has never been out of work. Would be on over 60k now I think with more increments to go. I'm not sure how much he enjoys the job but he definitely enjoys June, July and August and being able to afford a house and a family. At the time that he started on this path in his early 20s, some other equally brilliant people sneered - what is he at, why is he so boring and unambitious, why does he not do a PhD. Twenty years later, those other people are in a much worse financial position and have admitted that he made a good decision.

18-04-2021 1:45pm

The only thing id jump at there brian is the shorthand of "high achievers" when i think it would me much more fair to say "high academic achievers"

the measure of a person is made at any number of points throughout their life and the snapshot taken at leaving cert is already overemphasised- i was pretty handy at school for the effort i put in and in the decades since any idea i might have had about that mattering more than effort, character and resilience has been well and truly put to bed

AndrewJRenko · 18-04-2021 1:51pm

Deleted User wrote: »

Course they wouldn't, people love complaining.
Friend of mine (teacher) went on about how "not great" it was. I told her to go and see how much she'd have to put away privately to get something in the same league. She's happy to pay the couple of percent for it now.

She pays an awful lot more than 'a couple of percent' for it. If she joined from 2013 onwards, she won't get a whole lot for what she pays.

Student_111 wrote: »

It still puts anything in the private sector to shame. There's no excuse for DB pensions in this day and age - should be DC like everyone else instead of the tax payer picking up the risk.

The problem is that to fund a switch from DB to DC, the Govt would have to fund both DB pensions for older staff and DC pension contributions new staff for 40-60 years, resulting in a considerable increase in public expenditure.

Cyrus · 18-04-2021 2:02pm

Zascar wrote: »

I was discussing this with a friend recently - about how many people choose to go into careers where no matter how good you are, your promotion and earnings potential is severely limited. Take the standard "Nurse and a Guard" - very solid professions but you are never exactly going to hit the bigtime, even the bosses don't exactly make huge money. Going into a career in areas like finance, banking, tech, sales or engineering etc - even at the very bottom has virtually unlimited possibilities of where you can go and ways you can make serious money - and you don't need 600 points to get in. I still don't understand why so many young people are steered into avenues where no matter how well they do, there is always a ceiling on your success. I get not everyone is money motivated or is even ambitious, but if you are going to have a career does it not make sense to give yourself as much runway as possible?

I get what you are saying but other posters make some excellent posts in arguing against it. Obviously if you start out as a teacher your ability to live in certain desirable parts of the country are gone but as long as you are ok with that starting out who cares.

Life is about contentment more than anything , so whatever gives you that contentment is the most important thing . Once you earn over a certain amount of money all you get is more stuff, that stuff can bring some happiness but it’s fleeting generally. If you are relatively comfortable financially the stuff that really matters after that doesn’t tend to be anything that costs money.

I saw this as someone who is about as capitalist and economically right wing as you will meet

mariaalice · 18-04-2021 5:23pm

The amount of anger and cynicism when every anythingthing about careers comes up. It must be something to do with their personality.

I have a relative a bit like that they eventually got a job in the public services on a good salary as its a technical role and are still not happy.

The White Wolf · 18-04-2021 5:32pm

basill wrote: »

I think you highlight the fundamental problem in the education system. Presently its aimed at getting children to complete secondary school at all costs and then feed them into higher education even though most are unsuited to this type of learning environment. They end up doing a course that is in reality a vocation and something would be better placed in a polytechnic/technical training college or centre or via work experience. Many of these courses have little chance of a job at the end of it. In fact many simply exploit kids via unpaid internships which has to be stamped out.

The bright children at school miss out on learning opportunities as the teacher has to direct more of their time in dealing with the kids that shouldn't be at school in the first place nor quite possibly want to be. Instead they should be in apprenticeships. So its then a nasty spiral race to the bottom where class sizes get bigger, teacher resources get strained and inevitably the curriculum has to be "dumbed down" to facilitate educating the children that shouldn't be there in the first place in order to try to wrestle them up to higher education entry levels.

The moral of the story is stop rewriting history and go back to pulling kids out of school at 15 and into apprenticeships or work. Or send them into technical colleges at 15 and take them out of the normal school system.

Sounds like you want to reduce the potential avenues for a number of children and force them into work chosen for them. Ask many of the oul lads around now who were forced into such an avenue when they were 15 and see how many who are angry that they didn't get a chance to be a teacher, academic, health worker, work in science etc.....

Now if you said rip up the system completely and create more tailor made avenues for these kids to pursue their interests, I'd agree with that.

But essentially you want gatekeeping and that is abhorrent to me.

ebayissues · 18-04-2021 5:32pm

Zascar wrote: »

I was discussing this with a friend recently - about how many people choose to go into careers where no matter how good you are, your promotion and earnings potential is severely limited. Take the standard "Nurse and a Guard" - very solid professions but you are never exactly going to hit the bigtime, even the bosses don't exactly make huge money. Going into a career in areas like finance, banking, tech, sales or engineering etc - even at the very bottom has virtually unlimited possibilities of where you can go and ways you can make serious money - and you don't need 600 points to get in. I still don't understand why so many young people are steered into avenues where no matter how well they do, there is always a ceiling on your success. I get not everyone is money motivated or is even ambitious, but if you are going to have a career does it not make sense to give yourself as much runway as possible?

Anyone going into a profession should think about earnings potential. You'd be silly not to especially in today's market. You need good wages for houses, holidays, expenses, avocado and toast.

I've friends working as a teacher, pharmacist in hospitals, and can't buy a house. Some will be in their mid thirties stuck renting.

On another note, I really can't fathom working in a job that gives the odd 1/2% payrise every here and then or working as a teacher who can rise as far as a principal - could be wrong here.

floorpie · 18-04-2021 5:37pm

mariaalice wrote: »

The amount of anger and cynicism when every anythingthing about careers comes up. It must be something to do with their personality.

Whose personality? People that post on threads about careers?

floorpie · 18-04-2021 6:43pm

ebayissues wrote: »

Anyone going into a profession should think about earnings potential.

That's why I think OP is naïve: the earnings potential for your career spans 50 years. Furthermore, your earnings potential is affected by a lot more than just your personal motivation.

E.g. you can earn decent money in tech. Will Facebook/Google etc exist in 50 years? Historically speaking probably not. If they still exist will they still have a big presence in Ireland? Probably not. If tech companies were to move en masse to India will you be able to follow when you're 60? Probably not. Can you remain competitive in tech until the retirement age of 68? Probably not. Will the state pension exist in 50 years? Probably not, etc.

It doesn't matter if you're able to earn 150k per annum in your role, it doesn't take much disturbance to your earnings to make a more stable, lower salary, competitive. Ending up on jobseekers for a few years, and having to shift to a lower salary from age 60-68 will mess up any good "earnings potential" for a given career, and I think this is a common occurrence.

I'll also add that people here shouldn't be blinded by - what they perceive to be - people's "high earning" careers. OP mentions finance, sales as high earning careers, I mentioned law: many people in finance, sales, law had great fluctuation in their career after 2008. People in construction earned a ton before 2008, and then look. I personally know lawyers that took very little salary for many years up to the mid 2010s. You wouldn't think it based on their house and car and so on, but if you could see a graph of their earnings - which is essentially the same shape as the graph for employment rate - you likely wouldn't be impressed. If you could see a graph of their stress levels you'd be even less impressed.

Cyrus · 18-04-2021 7:38pm

floorpie wrote: »

That's why I think OP is naïve: the earnings potential for your career spans 50 years. Furthermore, your earnings potential is affected by a lot more than just your personal motivation.

E.g. you can earn decent money in tech. Will Facebook/Google etc exist in 50 years? Historically speaking probably not. If they still exist will they still have a big presence in Ireland? Probably not. If tech companies were to move en masse to India will you be able to follow when you're 60? Probably not. Can you remain competitive in tech until the retirement age of 68? Probably not. Will the state pension exist in 50 years? Probably not, etc.

It doesn't matter if you're able to earn 150k per annum in your role, it doesn't take much disturbance to your earnings to make a more stable, lower salary, competitive. Ending up on jobseekers for a few years, and having to shift to a lower salary from age 60-68 will mess up any good "earnings potential" for a given career, and I think this is a common occurrence.

I'll also add that people here shouldn't be blinded by - what they perceive to be - people's "high earning" careers. OP mentions finance, sales as high earning careers, I mentioned law: many people in finance, sales, law had great fluctuation in their career after 2008. People in construction earned a ton before 2008, and then look. I personally know lawyers that took very little salary for many years up to the mid 2010s. You wouldn't think it based on their house and car and so on, but if you could see a graph of their earnings - which is essentially the same shape as the graph for employment rate - you likely wouldn't be impressed. If you could see a graph of their stress levels you'd be even less impressed.

You think people earning 150k today need to factor in a period on job seekers , no offence but that’s nonsense .

onrail · 18-04-2021 7:47pm

Some of the wealthiest people I know are public sector employees.

What makes them wealthy is that their role, while paying the bills and funding the pension, allows them to 'clock off' at a reasonable time every day (15:30 for primary teachers FFS) and not spend weekends worrying about project deadlines, lost tenders etc.

The wealthy ones use that time to pursue outside avenues of earning money or simply enjoying life. Those in the private sector have to live and breathe the job every waking hour in order to make it to a really lucrative position.

floorpie · 18-04-2021 7:51pm

Cyrus wrote: »

You think people earning 150k today need to factor in a period on job seekers , no offence but that’s nonsense .

Because they'll be able to save a lot to account for slack years, or because you assume they're so valuable that they'll never not have a job?

Cyrus · 18-04-2021 7:53pm

floorpie wrote: »

Because they'll be able to save a lot to account for slack years, or because you assume they're so valuable that they'll never not have a job?

Because they will find another job paying similar money, people generally do.

18-04-2021 8:00pm

Zascar wrote: »

I was discussing this with a friend recently - about how many people choose to go into careers where no matter how good you are, your promotion and earnings potential is severely limited. Take the standard "Nurse and a Guard" - very solid professions but you are never exactly going to hit the bigtime

I have no interest in promotion or making huge money. The job I have is a good job, I enjoy it.
I have had opportunities to travel, meet people I never would have met, done things and met interesting people. I think I have made a difference by doing my job.
Just because I'm not interested in promotion doesn't mean I'm not ambitious. There are many more things that I can do and aspire to do in my job.
Promotion means leaving my job to do a different job.

Its bit sad judging people by where they are on a career 'ladder' or by the size of their paypacket

floorpie · 18-04-2021 8:23pm

Cyrus wrote: »

Because they will find another job paying similar money, people generally do.

At any age? Not true in my experience.

In the short/medium term yeah, but over the long term economies change and industries with it. E.g. workers in the construction sector had good earnings before 2008 and by 2018, 50% had emigrated or changed industry.

Current example, banking sector right now. Will the 60 year olds that took redundancy last year waltz into similarly paying positions, when the industry itself is changing, and half a million people are on the live register/PUP? No.

Maybe I'm overly cautious but I've seen enough over the years to believe that you can't really gauge career earnings based on current salary, things change, sometimes drastically.

swimming in a sea · 18-04-2021 8:34pm

I can't remember if I knew what i wanted at the end of school, I think it was only that I was happy to finish. Looking back i got poor advice from the school but I probably wouldn't have listened to them anyways.
I left a job that I really liked 3 years ago as the boss kept refusing me a proper raise which I took more as sign of disrespect to me, since then I've done a job which pays well but is boring. I'm looking for that balance....

Choosing careers with very limited potential

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