Some interesting followup questions arose from my recent post on the trap of the premature senior:

I found your blog (from Hacker News, I think) and your “Questionable Advice: The Trap of the Premature Senior” spoke to me, but I was wondering, do you have any followup advice on handling compensation in this situation? Should one be open to making less with this type of move, or is that not actually an issue?

You should ABSOLUTELY be open to making less. Consider it an investment in your long term career. Think of the extra money your company is paying you now as a hostage premium on top of your real market value. Staying isn’t what’s good for you, and that makes it hazard pay.

Your career is the single most valuable asset you have — it’s a multimillion dollar appreciating asset, and you should curate and guide it with an eye toward longevity. The first decade of your career is way, way too early to start optimizing for salary over experience.

This question was very relevant to me right now, as I recently spoke to a recruiter about a position that’s more in line with my career goals but pays less, and her immediate reaction was “don’t go backward on compensation.” But I can see the trade-off value in losing some comp to gain “better” experience.

Yeah, I think that’s terrible advice. 🙂 In general, if the compensation is fair and respectful, I think that is the absolute *worst* reason to make a job decision.

Salary is not a one-way escalator that you hop on after school, and gracefully exit at the peak upon retiring. It’s possible your recruiter’s advice was based on the assumption that your employers are likely to ask for your current salary and base their offers off of it. That used to be common practice, but is less and less so because of the fairness issues involved. Comp should be based on the value of your labor to the company, not your past comp, and in many states it is illegal to ask about your salary.

You may choose to take lower salaries at various times in your career — to work at a nonprofit or gov job, to learn new skills, in exchange for more flexibility or vacation time or titles or stock options, or as a result of moving to a different city or country.

I am not a financial advisor, but I am a big believer in retaining optionality. If the opportunity of your dreams came along with a starting salary of 150k, but every penny of your 170k salary is already committed, that’s a big loss of opportunity for you. This is a strong argument for trying to live well within your means, save religiously, and always have fuck you money in the bank. If you’re young and you get a salary bump, consider automatically diverting the raise into savings. Avoiding lifestyle inflation is the most painless way to save.

We have the unfathomable luxury of being incredibly well compensated for what we do. What is that luxury worth if we don’t use it to liberate ourselves, to facilitate happiness and fulfillment?