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Comment by blowski | Hacker News Reader

When I was at school we had to interview our headmaster, and somebody asked him if he thought his job was difficult. His answer has always stayed with me:

  "Compared to lying on a beach drinking cocktails, it's difficult. But compared to a coal miner, it's ridiculously easy."

Would I rather be a software developer - even one who is building boring CRUD apps - or a coal miner?

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I've never mined coal, but I did fly-in/fly-out work at coal mines surveying, and compared to coding it had the following benefits:

  - way better pay (not everywhere pays developers like the US)
  - kept me in shape
  - I slept a lot better during that job
  - satisfaction of jobs completed (no maintenance for topo data)
  - no micromanagment, open plan offices, daily stand-ups
  - predictable, stable working hours
  - etc. etc.

I don't do it now - 10 days out of every 14 is too long for me to stay away from my family - so I guess in the end the bad outweighed the good. But I just want to make the point that it's easy to assume that building boring CRUD apps is the best road to go down if you too quickly dismiss the other paths that can be taken.

You bring up a really interesting point. My partner does both project management and sound tech work. "I love it when the gigs go well, but good or bad, at the end of the night I get paid for the gig, I come home, and I don't ever have to think about it again if I don't want to."

I've never been a coal miner, but I have worked a number of extremely physically demanding jobs, one especially where people died from poor safety conditions and most of everyone called in sick several days a month ( I was complimented sincerely on what a good worker I was because I only called in sick once per month).

any day of that job was much worse than programming when programming on a good day, but programming on a bad day is much worse than any day of that job ever was.

What kind of days were those bad days?

those long bad days trying to fix a bug that you can't figure out and everything just seems bleak and full of despair, back aching from sitting badly at the desk all day trying without hope to fix the problem (because can't pull away just keep going), eyestrain, imposter syndrome - basically being in a bad and unrewarding relationship with your computer.

A bad day at the physical work was just cold, windy, hard work, muscle aches. Luckily I never got injured and I didn't know anyone that died there otherwise I suppose my opinion of the two works might be different. But I've worked other hard physical labor; for example - ditch digging - cold, muddy, and a real workout, less strenuous - washing dishes in a restaurant, bussing tables.

Again - all preferable to programming on a bad day of programming, maybe it's because when programming goes bad I keep thinking about it afterwards, the other work I forget it right away - hell, I don't even really think about it when I'm doing it.

Coal miners learning to code - https://backchannel.com/canary-in-the-code-mine-903884eca853...

I've never been a coal miner, but there is some sort of satisfaction in working with your hands that you don't quite get being a corporate coder.

There's also the black lung that you don't quite get being a corporate coder.

I think it's very easy for people who aren't working with their hands every day to sit back and talk about the 'satisfaction' you get. You may get that if you go and do it for a day. When you're doing it every day you're destroying your back, knees, your hands end up cut and calloused, and you're exhausted. And the 'satisfaction' probably doesn't make up for the lower pay manual labour jobs typical come with.

> destroying your back, knees, your hands end up cut and calloused

+ your hearing, it can be very noisy in a mine.

I'm from a coal mining region and some of the miners hate the job with passion and curse it every day as they get on the comutter's bus. Others are more indifferent about it and even enjoy some aspects of it (mostly camraderie). I'm pretty sure the majority of them would switch for ANY office job that pays the same.

My general thoughts on the "I'm unhappy doing CRUD" sentiments is that people generally tend to get bored with what they're doing and the dream of one day doing something else, something more fulfilling, relieves the pain somewhat. Funnily, for pretty much all the alternative careers that devs talk about, there are internet threads where people working those jobs are discussing how to retrain as a software developer.

Plus if you've made $150-250k for the past 8-10 years, it's easy to have that retirement buffer and that money in the bank and think that working in a mine might be "satisfying" for six months even if you did it for $15k.

It's totally different when you can barely afford your mortgage, you're in debt, and you have no chance of getting a better job.

Sure, I was thinking more along the lines of other, less life threatening "working with hands" type work. I knew an IT admin who used to be a lumberjack and the guy missed being in the wilderness for months at a time.

Don't forget about the threats of cave ins and poisonous gas...

I worked a manual labor job (installing industrial epoxy flooring). I distinctly remember being too tired to go to a friend's barbecue on a Friday after working a job 9 days straight, and dust boogers can surely not be a healthy indicator. I'm not sure it's something I'd want to do for years on end (I worked it as a summer job during college), but there's something to be said about the satisfaction. There's less stress involved on a day to day basis. Nearly every day you go home tired, but satisfied you did something tangible. Only very rarely did things go wrong to the point where little or negative progress was made on a project- which I don't find to be the case in software. Seeing a 60,000sqft floor I'd help complete turn out perfect after sweating for a week is comparable to solving a particularly vexing bug, only more tangible. And I made about the same amount as a union laborer as I did in my first developer job.

Whilst nowhere near as bad as black lung, RSI and lower back pain caused by sitting all day are real things. Programming isn't without its own physical risks.

That's why I enjoy doing small-medium landscaping projects and yard work. You start with something in a substandard state (yard, grass, leaves, snow, etc) and you end with something looking much nicer, all within the span of a couple hours.

Compare that to releasing code 4 times a year. The stuff I'm working on now won't be in production until September.

That's too simplistic of a view. Physical work is hard on your body, but mind work is equally hard and you cannot brute force most of it. The mind needs to process complicated problems asynchronously, while you let it rest by taking a walk or doing house cleaning, but physical work needs no such thing, as long as your body condition is sufficient.

Have you ever tried a hard, manual labour job?

Yes, but not as a daily activity for long stretches (months), so my view may be incomplete.

EDIT: Not as a job, but working for weeks, daily on a personal project.

There is absolutely no comparison between the person who has to work a manual labor job breaking their body down because it's the only way they can earn a living and the guy doing 2-3 weeks of physical labor because they have a personal project they want to finish.

I mean I can't even put into words how ridiculous this comment is.

Have you worked an office job for years on end? They aren't exactly easy on your body, or soul, either. And trades have "executive" levels as well.

I'd rather be the Plumber for a skyscraper development than the accountant for it...

Yes I have. And easy is relative. Of course my back is a little sore some days, and I've worried about carpal tunnel/RSI in the past. But if you're looking at manual labor (it's called "back breaking" for a reason), there's really no comparison.

Life is hard no matter what. We don't need to look at people who have it objectively much harder than us and say "but these florescent lights give me a headache" to try and make our lives seem harder than they are, just like we don't need to look at people who have it objectively much easier than us and say "they have so much money and free time they couldn't possibly understand how hard I have it."

Maybe a coal miner is the wrong example, but I think you can think of plenty of jobs you would not want. I certainly would not want to go back to working in a call center like I did in my previous life, even if the pay were the same or slightly better.

If I could make the same money as a barista, I would do it, while continuing to program on my own as a hobby.

These days it's mind numbing Java CRUD services all day long, then I work on my own stuff (in any language but Java) at night.

Well, I can't argue with your opinion, but I certainly would not.

My job is definitely easier than a 1930s immigrant coal miner's. Is it easier than a 2016 coal miner's? Probably. Maybe. Is it easier than a furniture mover's? No, but it pays a lot more. Is it easier than a 1970s steelworker's? Certainly not, and it actually pays less.

Actually, you get payed far more. A steelworker in 1975 made on average $7.11.[1] This is about $31.47 in 2016 dollars. Not bad at all, but I'm still guessing you make more.

[1] http://articles.mcall.com/1985-07-19/news/2489404_1_steel-in...

I mean total compensation. My father made approximately $30,000 a year in wages in 1976. You have to remember that there was overtime pay. He also got high quality free health care, lots of vacation, 100% pension, and lots of other fringe benefits.

I estimate he made probably close to $200k, in 2016 dollars. And, he wasn't even a 'lead'. In total compensation, he made more than I do. And, IIRC, CPI inflation calculations don't account for home inflation, and we all know that housing costs as a portion of total household spending was much, much less than it is today.

Really? 31.47 * 52 (weeks) * 5 (days a week) * 24 (hours a day) = $196,372. In some place other than San Francisco (so pretty much guaranteed lower cost of living). Plus benefits, overtime, much lower likelihood of losing one's job, a pension...

24 hours a day 5 days a week is a pretty tough schedule.

Who works 24 hours a day? Also most work 40 weeks per year iirc.

What the fuck kind of job do you work for 24 hours a day? A third of that or $65457 is a much more realistic estimate, which is peanuts for a software developer.

Here are the real numbers to show you why your comment was (rightfully) downvoted:

31.47 * 50 wks (2wks vaca) * 5 * 8 (a work day) = $62,940

Whoops, yeah, I shouldn't post while zoning out on a teleconf.

TIL I make less than a steelwork in 1975.

Every time I've dealt with furniture movers I've noticed that they work incredibly hard and I'm glad I don't have to do that for a living (my back would disintegrate).

A few companies ago I interviewed an ex-coalminer for an Oracle DBA job. He was good too. My hiring recommendation was overridden by a senior manager who was a snob and an asshole, for the entirely irrelevant reason IIRC of no degree.

> Would I rather be a software developer - even one who is building boring CRUD apps - or a coal miner?

I've done manual labor. I feel when I did carpentry it was more rewarding than software development.

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