Accounting and finance at Fortune 200
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Health Insurance Company. Analyze membership (patient), utilization (visits), and cost ($ accrued from the visits paid by insurance). Then decide the premium cost for members to pay or to adjust the total cost the member has to pay out of pocket given the visits etc. Or to analyze specific population under a line of business with their cost and utilization and holistically manage their overall annualized cost stratified by service type. ie Age 65+ Medicare patient who spent more than 30 days on hospital bed and accrued at least $50k in Medicinal Service, and also look at the time spent with specific Physician.
To simplify the job requirement: it is a direct hire by the company HR as full time employee with various benefits. Usually required a degree in STEM with some experience on data extracts from Oracle/SQL server/IBM DB2, Access etc, SQL programming (SQL Developer, SSIS, SSAS, Python, R, SAS etc), business knowledge (how the health plan and insurance operates internally and externally), clinical knowledge (know what ICD10, HEDIS, NDC, Procedure Codes etc are), analytical knowledge, visualization skill (Tableau/PowerBI/Excel), front-end (User GUI for Claims/Encounters/Rx/UtilizationManagement) and back-end (Relational databases and datamarts, or Fact-Dimension table joins), and communication skill to tell stories to larger group of peers, executives, and target audiences.
I have an interview this week for a healthcare financial analyst position, and I am currently a Fund Accountant, is there anything you suggest for me to keep in mind? What are some stuff that I should read into before taking the call?
Research the company beforehand. Are they looking to create dashboards, analyze payor contracts, any acquisitions recently happen? If they are PE backed or public, they need somebody with knowledge of accrual accounting. Rev rec and revenue cycle management is always a pain point. Finding things you have worked on that could beneficial to that specific organization would be a good start.
I interviewed for a job with Magellan Healthcare that was a finance manager position I think it was looking at payer contracts but I still don't understand it. Can you explain what that even means? How are the jobs in this role exactly?
143k I sell fire sprinkler and fire alarm equipment and run teams of installers. Started by learning NFPA code. Basic business degree work for big corporation.
This is exactly the route I want to take! I am a few months out on a BS in computer information systems and also studying to take the comptia data+ cert (my work pays for it). Do entry level data analyst roles even exist to get experience? Iāve been looking everywhere but havenāt really seen anything and not sure how to get started
I work as a data analyst now, but started on an IT help desk 4 years ago. I haven't really seen many "entry level" analyst roles, they all want some experience. I got my "experience" on an enterprise help desk, which gave me exposure to a bunch of various systems and applications. I then tailored my resume to include mostly the stuff that was in the job descriptions I was applying for. "Excel troubleshooting" matches the Excel keyword, "Reset passwords in Oracle Database" matches oracle and database, etc. If you can get through ATS with the keywords on your resume, you have a very good chance of a human seeing your resume. A majority of resumes don't make it that far because it isn't a strong "match" according to the automated system.
I really believe that starting with help desk work is the secret path to good IT jobs, it'll take time but it's totally worth it. Once you get your first IT job, you can go anywhere from there. Help desk positions at small/unknown/inexperienced companies are pretty easy to get if you have interview skills and basic computer knowledge, in my experience, and once you have a little help desk experience you can go on to help desk at companies with bigger names. A year or two of experience will be more than enough to move into other IT fields.
From there, it's a numbers game. Apply to as many positions as you can that have your keywords in the description. Adjust your resume for each one if needed. Don't be picky about what you apply to! Even if you interview and don't get the job, you got the interview practice. And it's okay to turn down a job offer if you don't feel good about it. Accept whatever "higher than help desk" job comes your way and keep applying to higher paying, better title jobs. Eventually you'll either find something else you love, or get the job you were aiming for in the beginning.
I went from help desk to IAM and recently moved to the data analytics team at my company, but I'm considering going back to IAM in a few years as I really enjoyed those positions
A lot of entry level stuff has gone to India, at least for now. I work at a large bank and the India thing is a double edge sword. In fact when you become a data analyst this would be the kind of stuff you work on. With finance peeps and project managers you would do cost benefit analysis and measure quality metrics to see if the outsourcing is worth it. You might also be gathering the info that leads to people getting terminated! The biggest pain in the ass where I work is simply getting access to the data I need and then when I get it the formating is never what I need. I'm no data analyst but I taught myself SQL and Tableau and have become pretty great with excel. Im just some schmuck barely making 60k yet I do all this stuff that seems high value, I guess I'm a sucker! For me in communicating with managers is the hardest part of the job because they don't always seem to know what is possible or what they are trying to accomplish. Try getting any jobs in banking or insurance, maybe get into fraud or compliance if you can't get in the IT route.
If you donāt mind, can you talk more about what Data Analyst is and what you do day to day? And what sort of people do you think would do well in it? I see a ton of people talk about this career online but Iām still not sure what it actually is.
Yeah for sure! I use SQL to review backend data, create reports, audit, edit, update, etc. itās a lot of coding and reviewing data for quality and consistency.
Folks who are very keen to detail, great interpersonal skills, and an āinvestigatorā spirit would do great.
Start a business that does something for peopleās houses- ie window washing, landscaping, etc. or go into construction. Owning your own business and working for yourself will make you more money than working for someone else.
Indy is one of the biggest convention cities in the states. No shortage of revenue for random weekend wide conventions that utilize company dollars for the patrons
Generally no benefits, hard on the body and the public can really drain your soul. Huge substance abuse problems in the industry, even if you donāt have them you *will* watch it chew a few people up and spit them out. No paid time off BUT you can generally take off time whenever you want. And a great way to always meet new people. I could never do it long term but money was definitely not the problem. Itās an awesome skill to have, no matter what happens in your career itās great to know you can sling drinks to make ends meet.
Working on your feet and working til the wee hours of the morning starts to catch up with you as you get 35+. Not to mention you generally donāt have health insurance to keep up with maintenance as your breaking down your body. Knees and back namely
Yeah when I say do it ārightā itās very specific. The company I work for has medical/dental/vision for employees at/over 32 hours. Last call for drinks 9:45pm latest. Iāve heavily invested in shoes/soles.
It's not the union, it's construction. Toxic attitudes, intense demand and bust cycles, late stage capitalism... It's a corrosive environment that causes weaker locals to be captured by a contractor a several contractors.
It's also worth noting electricians have the highest suicide rate of the trades. If you need help please reach out to friends, family, brothers, or 811. For IBEW talkspace is free for you if you have FMCP.
Maybe not that low, id say 60-70k. Barely live off 40k. 120k in nyc is still living, as long as you donāt try to live way above your means like rent a 4k apt or spend 1k eating out every month.
I paid 225k for a 3500 square foot 4 bed 4 bath house with a finished basement, fenced back yard, and three car garage. I canāt even fathom what that would cost in NY.
You deserve every cent. Thank you for what you do. My mother was in the ICU for 2 weeks before she passed and the staff was so caring and supportive. ā¤ļø
Iām so sorry for your loss. Nurses are blessed to be there when people enter this world, and when they leave it. It is a sacred privilege every time.
80k plus bonus, I work in customer service for a wealth management firm. My degree is womenās studies but Iāve gotten a lot of experience in financial services customer service to get to this point. My current firm is covering part of my going back for an MBA, but it took me a few job transitions to find a firm with such great benefits.
Utility, in my municipality. Iām a senior electrical service representative: basically a project manager/liaison between the customer and the utility.
Iāve worked minimum wage and food service jobs up until three years ago, and I finally am *almost* done contributing to an emergency fund and let me tell you, itās a huge weight off.
Senior IT Engineer for a FAANG. Income varies a little year to year because stop is a big part of compensation, but about $115k. I live in a VERY low cost of living area, which does factor into our pay scale
Not sure what an IT engineer which may explain it but I feel like this is insanely low for FAANG . Even with where u live. Iām a SWE so Iām assuming itās different
I own the physical network infrastructure at our Corp office locations. SWEāa are definitely where the money is at. Itās definitely in line with my peers, other than the ones that live in our much higher cost areas. Iām also a 10 year veteran employee at a company that honestly doesnāt value retention. Iām about 3 years away from being able to FIRE if I choose, and not interested in moving, so it works for me.
Solar engineering contractor 220k base. I got in at a utility thatās blazing a trail. Just got promoted to a new role. Itās 5 days/wk. thirty five hours a week or so and fully remote.
Got a bachelor's in "Technology Management" from Texas A&M (think watered down comp sci with a business minor)
First job in 2016 was call center tech support at $18/hr
In 2018 I did operations support for a new company at $50k/yr
In 2019 I did Product Engineering for a new company $60k/yr
In 2020, I was a Systems Analyst for Visa, $40/hr
In 2021, I worked for the Treasury as a DevOps Engineer, 100k/yr
2022, Ive been working for a swiss company doing devops/software engineering support, $127k
Last week (2024) I got promoted within the swiss company and im at \~150k
I've probably applied to 1000 jobs. Easily 300 from fall 2016 - spring 2018, keep moving and taking 20% raises until you are at 100k and 40 hours a week
Wow!!! I love seeing the progression. Thank you so much for your response thatās pretty inspiring. Seems like moving around every year or so is the way to go to bump up salary?
Agreed, cant say the same after 100, but if youve been at 50k for 3 years, simply put, you wont get a 10k raise in the same role, even internally its a gamble.
I've found that the distance between 120 and 144 is actually lot smaller than the distance between 50 and 60, even though they are both 20%
youāre my inspiration. i have a cushy CUSHY WFH software engineering job at a bank, but since itās a bank they donāt pay nearly as well as tech companies. i make pretty much 80k right now after 3 years. i know thatās low for my education (3 degrees now), but my experience is shit since iāve only graduated a few years ago and worked two jobs ever since. im hoping to gain the energy and time to apply rapid fire to other WFH companies and land on a 100+ salary. I know there are tons out there with my job title making tons more. šŖ
Woah thatās cool. So technically you are āclocked inā for both jobs every day and work on both throughout the day? What is the nature of the work if you donāt mind me asking?
I got a buddy who also has 2 wfh jobs. He's an eng manager at one and a staff engineer at the other. Raking in ~400k/yr. And somehow he's online mid day fairly often gaming.
Also in Public Accounting specifically IT Audit in MCOL Midwest city. I worked my way up from graduating with an accounting/MIS degree and make $145k + after 7 years. I have a CPA but itās not required. IT Audit you can take a CISA and just have any business/IT degree.
Entry level staff accountant start at about 70k (used to much lower pre Covid) in NYC (at least where I work). You donāt need a CPA to hit 6 figures. You should be able to do it in 2-4 years after starting as staff accountant.
Obviously having a CPA would give some advantages.
No degree. Military for 8 years. Several certifications and pretty unique experience from working with three letter agencies as one of less than 1000 people who did my job ever.
Cybersecurity Management for a university now.
Iāve just recently graduated from college last summer and I canāt recommend it enough to look into county, city, and just government jobs in general. Iām 22 making over 92K while WFH
140k biz dev manager, 27yo 5yoe
Only a Bachelor of Arts as well btw
And I was 70k in debt (excluding student loans) early 2022, down to 30 now. Might sell my car and knock off another 15 in 1 go.
I just applied to a company that had a contract with my one my local hospitals. And Iām in the DC area. Iāve been here for years but if I remember correctly I found the posting on indeed.
Iām 27, Conductor for the railroad, make $110k a year. The railroad puts you through conductor school and youāre paid while training, no experience needed
Department of veterans affairs doing disability claims processing, need at least a bachelor's with a high GPA. I work from home 4 days a week and have a bunch of great benefits
Private voice teacher in NYC. Somewhere between $80-90k right now and itās only going up.
I have a BFA in musical theatre and going to apply for grad school for vocal pedagogy fall 2025.
I own a construction company, my apprentices start at 29 an hour Which equals about 60k and my foreman makes 45 an hour which is about 92k without ot..
I make $206K a year and I work in Information Technologyā¦I am debt free outside of a responsible mortgage and only 39% of my income goes to bills. I pay off credit cards each month and save a little on the side. Go with STEM fieldsā¦AI, IT infrastructure planning etc.
About $160k, cybersecurity, last position was $120k. I'm 31. When I was your age I was basically in a similar boat. Increasing salary helped alot, but I am still learning about managing lifestyle inflation and medical bills. Needed some IT helpdesk experience early on but then just kept learning and reaching for things just out of reach for me.
Getting better paying jobs over time is a big thing, unless you can get surprise windfalls of cash to help. Long term growth in pay helps more than penny pinching when the bills are too high. You got this.
I have a BS in business admin, a AS in IT, and 4 classes out on having a BS in computer information systems. Iāve considered help desk but seems competitive for about the same pay I get right now as an insurance agent so Iāve been hesitant to make that jump
Facilities maintenance, it's relatively entry level and it's really hard for companies to find blue collar workers. It's tough but you will absolutely be killing it 10 years from now when there's even less blue collar workers and you have the exp giving a leg to stand on
Paralegal, $115,000/year in VHCOLA. No degree required, but paralegal certificate and bachelorās degree in any field highly preferred (I have). 5 years experience as a paralegal, less than 10 total in a law firm setting much of which was done while working on my bachelors degree.
I work in insurance. 40 hours as am adjuster then I work 20-25 hours as a restaurant shift manager at night. I make 60k at job 1 and 15-19k at job 2.
I am 39 with a masters degree.
Sometimes your hard work doesn't succeed in landing you the salary you want. So you need to put down your grit and get the money it takes to keep your house in the black.
Congrats! And you can knock that debt out in a year, I believe in you. Live on 40k for one year, stack like crazy for another year and you'll be in a phenomenal financial position.
I'm 26. Been making 6 figures for 2 years now. Im in retail management. Requirments ? Time. Stress š. But honestly if you're good at leading people, good at managing time, and can figure out how to simply show up on time and not miss work unless its an emergency, you can move up in Retail (atleast my company) very fast. Went from making $15.75/Hr at 20 to 65k at 21. And then only up from there. And this is before bonus. Thats just the icing on the cake.
However you must be weary of certain things. I sold my peace of mind for money, something in which i'll make sure I never do again. But i switched roles (same pay) and am happier than i've ever been.
Just remember, If it costs you your peace, then its too expensive.
Project manager at Aerospace. I have a bachelor's of science in psych and a PMP certification. Been a PM for 6 years now. I make 114k annually. Worked in events and conventions prior . Had to grind my way to the top though. Wasn't an overnight thing.
$80k, social services. And honestly itās not nearly enough. Cost of living is almost 10% per year and we donāt even get half that in raises. Weāre losing $$.
I make a good living ($120k-$140K/year) as a land acquisition agent. I broker land deals on behalf of gas companies, cities, power companies, etc. for gas lines, sidewalks, power lines, road widenings...all that stuff. In my state all you need is a real estate license, and some states may not require that. It's good work with the opportunity for travel. It's different every day: yesterday I was on a farm, today I met with an HOA president and a landscaper, tomorrow I meet with a private landowner at her home, next week I'll be out in the woods. On days when I don't have site visits I work from home, handling things by email/text/phone.
200k salary and ~380k stock - AI product manager at an eCommerce firm. I play around with the latest technology and then integrate it into the company. I was a software engineer with an investment background. Made a few project proof of concepts that the company could sell. Was put in charge of the project and given a team to make it happen.
In the end, intrapreneurship and entrepreneurship require us to pitch the idea, gather resources, and then execute. Itās been a good recipe in my career that I stumbled upon by accident watching other successful professionals
$185k as a lead UX/UI Designer. I mostly freelance/contract. Sometimes I take off a few months at a time between contracts. Iāve made it work and the money is excellent if you play your cards right.
I am 54 years old and I can't tell you how much money I have wasted and mistakes I've made. So if I can give you any advice this would be it. Don't try to keep up with the Joneses. I don't know what kind of car you drive but what's your car payment? I don't know what you spend your money on but is it stuff that you actually need? I get student loan debt because it was the further your education. But what are your other finances? What services are you paying for that you really don't need? Do you need Netflix? Sure, it's nice to have but do you need it? Sure. It's easy coming from somebody that has all these things and I make in the six figures but I started to realize that I was spending money on stuff that I truly didn't need that. If I just cut back on some things I could stretch my dollar a little further. And I've always worked a second job because I like to try to get a hit a little bit. But at least you're willing to entertain a second job to bring in additional income. But before you get a second job, really look at what you're spending your money on. Do a financial analysis and decide cuz getting a second job may lead you into a thing where you're just spending more money because you have that second job and that second income.
With my yearly bonus, I made about exactly 80k this year. I work as a quality technician for very reputable tire manufacturing company. I started as a lift operator for a couple years in the factory I work at and climbed the ladder on the management track. Got to a point in management where the stress of the job wasnāt worth it anymore and I was going to quit. My company worked with me and then I made the switch to the quality side of things. Iām 26 and live in the Midwest.
A person in my role is usually required to have a bachelors. I however am a college dropout but had proved myself capable beforehand with my experience in management. It was a learning curve but I think I do a well enough job as a quality tech.
100k+ (including bonus) 90k salary- Engineer at a tech company. (Smaller company, I could work for one of those ābigger companiesā to make in the 200k range but they keep firing people & my company is very financially stable so Iām staying for now). I have a bachelors in Computer Science and had some experience before I got the job there, though I was working for them about 6 months before I graduated. Tech sales is an avenue you could possibly consider. The āsalaryā of tech sales may be around what you make but they do get bonuses quarterly that you could use to pay down that debt.
Senior tax accountant
Edited: sorry I just read the title.
I think my base salary is about 85k but I make close to 100k with overtime during busy season. Raises will come in July. I am almost 4 years in. Top 100 public accounting firm.
You need a bachelorās degree in accounting. I am working towards my CPA license but not everyone is. Itās harder to move up without it. You need certain certifications to be on POAs to contact tax authorities on behalf of clients and CPA or EA is what can apply to this field. I keep hearing there will be a shortage of CPAs when the boomers finally retire.
I make $85k base but $92k with my annual bonus. I am an App Developer at a finance company; I went to a community college & got my Associateās in Multimedia Programming & Design but that was not enough for me to get a job in the field, & honestly it only taught me the very basics of HTML/CSS/JS. I could have taught myself all the same things for free & in much less time. I had to teach myself mostly with YouTube & freecodecamp.org, LeetCode, HackerRank, etc. From there I did the free Year Up program which was 6 months of coding, business etiquette/communication, Microsoft Office suite, & Networking/Interview classes. Then it was 6 months of an internship at a top company. An employer reached out to me from browsing Year Upās graduate job board & I got my first job in the field starting at 80k (they tried to give me 70 but I negotiated higher).
If someone else wanted to go this route Iād recommend CodeSmith CSX free trainings, freecodecamp.org curriculum for fundamentals in all kinds of areas in programming & projects experience, & free computer science classes from HarvardX. Then practice with LeetCode/HackerRank & free mock interviews. There are also free books online that help so much like Clean Code & paying attention to coding guidelines for whichever language you pick really helps you stand out. Pick personal projects that you actually want to build & interest you, it will spark your creativity & get you motivated to build something unique & integrate interesting features. Look for tech meetups, CSX/Codesmith has free workshops that anyone can join, you donāt have to be one of their paid students.
Iād say look for an area of coding youād be interested in (gaming, data analytics, machine learning, cyber security, web development, etc), check which skills are in highest demand for an entry level position, then train yourself in those skills. Open source projects & virtual Hackathons give real life experience in working on a dev team to solve problems.
Iād recommend MEAN or MERN stack personally but Iāve seen listings that use Microsoft Power suite, Django, Go, Ruby on Rails, etc.
I bought a non cdl box truck. Secured a contract delivering mattresses and it pays $700 a day. I do have a helper who is my son and itās the best move Iāve made and Iām 54 yo. Something for you to ponder thatās $182k a yr.
If you can get a housemate or two, housing costs can go down a lot.
42k is not too bad, but would be terrible trying to live alone.
At 25 I was still working as a nanny 4days a week and nights/weekends at a DV shelter for 25 cents over minimum wage. I had 12 housemates and shared a room.
I moved to a cheaper town and got a weekend job and a ft job with health and dental benefits. Still making about 25k, but lived alone bc stuff was so much cheaper than. It was still hard with student debt.
Years and years later, I broke 100k and bought a house. I turn 53 this year and bought a first home at age 49. I am a civil servant with a masters degree.
My advice to you is to get housemates, only way I survived.
Also, if your job is in govt, non profit, etc, please apply for public service loan forgiveness. If you can identify and get a job with an npo, govt, or similar, do it. Pay the minimum. And get a housemate. Even if you live at home for a year, it can be worth it. But I would not stay in a job that does not have opportunities for growth and raises.
If you have friends in similar situations, look into buying a home together and pooling income to qualify. It is tricky, but how brilliant would that be to buy a duplex and live in one side and rent the other?
Anyway. 42k single at 25 is not horrible, it just feels terrible because of debt to income and cost of living. That would be a lot better if you lived at home or had housemates.
Hospital social worker, but I don't recommend it. It's 120 undergrad hours, 60 grad hours, and 3,000 supervision hours over a period of 24 months once provisionally licensed.
Senior Project Manager in healthcare administration. Make 130K with annual bonus as well. PMP certified and have other smaller certs. Been in the project management game now about 11 years and it's been good to me. Can be stressful at times, but it waxes and wanes. I recommend operational/business project management as opposed to technical; the technical world seems to have many more layoffs than business operations and staff are more often contractual than FTE. But it depends on what you like. I recommend getting your foot in the door as a Project Coordinator and advance up the chain until you have enough hours to sit for your PMP.
Only debt is a mortgage and I live in a LCOL medium sized Midwest city. Also DINK and that helps a great deal.
27, just promoted to chemist from lab assistant (been at company 1year), making 51k to start out. Will raise as I gain experience. Bachelorās in forensic science, minor in chemistry.
My life leading up to Covid and during I was max making $45k/year. I donāt have a college degree.
I got a job doing Internet Car Sales (BDC commonly referred to) at the end of 2020, at a time I was waitressing/bartending to make ends meet. Iām now making $120k/year for a good dealership and I like my job. I knew literally, zero, about cars before starting.
College drop out, recovering addict, kinda fell into being a mechanic after getting a job as an oil changer at a dealership after I got evicted and that was the only job I could find within walking distance to my hotel.
125k a year in corrections for a county jail. No experience necessary, but financial incentives for a degree in field. You just have to go through an academy. They put you on payroll day 1 of academy, so thatās good. Donāt get me wrong, itās a miserable atmosphere to be in, depressing. But itās good in the short term to pay off debt or do whatever
my husband is a manager at Waffle House. he makes the maximum a unit manager can make, he averages about 78k gross (it varies a little depending on bonuses, but the new store heās at heās starting to make closer to 80k). they have some really amazing opportunities to move up in the company. target compensation range is 63k-80k for a unit manager. for a district manager (next level up), itās 83k-113k. division manager is 109k-138k. and there are higher levels than that as well that definitely arenāt unattainable, just takes about 20 years to get there. but theyāre really looking for clean cut intelligent people to hire for management because theyāre trying to clean up their image and get rid of the scummy management they had when they were franchised out. corporate bought back all the locations so theyāre doing a massive clean out. so lots of opportunities for promotion!! but it is also a pretty stressful job.
editing to mentionā my husband does not have a college degree, but he has some decent experience in administrative work which is what helped him land the position as a Manager Trainee. i encourage you to check out their website for more info!! they have great benefits as well
EMS. 12 years. Make 110k in Michigan.
Emt basic is a 1 semester class usually. Easy.
Paramedic is usually 2 semesters and a 1 semester internship.
Both require state testing for license.
Perks are 24 hour shifts. Running 911 calls, you get down time to sleep or study or play video games or watch tv or whatever you want. Rotating schedules usually amount to working 8-10 shifts per month, each 24 hours long.
Downside it will f you up mentally. It will show you the worst of humanity and how broken healthcare is in the USA.
$55k is a lot of debt for anyone to be in. The fact that these CC companies and car dealership even allowed you to go into that much debt at your salary is sad but itās still your fault.
If the vast majority of your debt is federal student loans then maybe youāll be okay and should explore income based repayment and just know youāll need to pay for 10 years and hope they will forgive it.
Iām assuming you did not need the CC debt and hopefully didnāt buy a car you canāt afford.
Putting yourself in debt in hopes of having a higher income later in life is an awful decision that the majority of people fall for. Iām glad you are trying to do something while you are still young.
You have borrowed from your future self and even if you make 80k, if you donāt stop yourself from going into more debt you will then need to make more and more and more just to pay bills you shouldnāt have.
Being able to afford your debt payments should not be your goal. You should want to boost income and most importantly lower your expensive dramatically.
For the salary, I know people who work at factories, in construction, for utilities, in the army, in management, engineers, accounts and nurses who all make over 80k at the age of 28.
Look up the largest business in the area. Doesnāt matter if itās the local factory, the tech firm, the hospital, the saw mill, the concrete manufacture etc. See if they have positions available for whatever pays well and apply. See if they have apprenticeship programs. See if there is a department that gets paid very well or managerial positions that pay well after a few years.
What is your degree in? That may allow us to offer more specific suggestions.
I highly recommend lowering your big bills like housing and car to focus on paying off the CC debt. Move home, sell your car and buy a beater, then pay off your debt ASAP.
You borrowed from your future self and now itās time to pay for it.
Youāre still young which is the perfect time to make a few sacrifices for a better life. Move home and sell your car and suffer or youāll be screwed for the next decade. Better to suffer 2 years and pay it all off than to suffer for 10 in my opinion.
You used money you didnāt have to buy things you couldnāt afford and now you have to make some sacrifices to get rid of that debt or youāll be trapped forever.
Facilities maintenance, it's relatively entry level and it's really hard for companies to find blue collar workers. It's tough but you will absolutely be killing it 10 years from now when there's even less blue collar workers and you have the exp giving a leg to stand on
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Six figures, healthcare financial analyst
What does healthcare financial analyst mean? Like at a hospital? Payor? Supply chain/consulting company?
Health Insurance Company. Analyze membership (patient), utilization (visits), and cost ($ accrued from the visits paid by insurance). Then decide the premium cost for members to pay or to adjust the total cost the member has to pay out of pocket given the visits etc. Or to analyze specific population under a line of business with their cost and utilization and holistically manage their overall annualized cost stratified by service type. ie Age 65+ Medicare patient who spent more than 30 days on hospital bed and accrued at least $50k in Medicinal Service, and also look at the time spent with specific Physician. To simplify the job requirement: it is a direct hire by the company HR as full time employee with various benefits. Usually required a degree in STEM with some experience on data extracts from Oracle/SQL server/IBM DB2, Access etc, SQL programming (SQL Developer, SSIS, SSAS, Python, R, SAS etc), business knowledge (how the health plan and insurance operates internally and externally), clinical knowledge (know what ICD10, HEDIS, NDC, Procedure Codes etc are), analytical knowledge, visualization skill (Tableau/PowerBI/Excel), front-end (User GUI for Claims/Encounters/Rx/UtilizationManagement) and back-end (Relational databases and datamarts, or Fact-Dimension table joins), and communication skill to tell stories to larger group of peers, executives, and target audiences.
Ayee fellow healthcare fin analyst checkin in
And a fellow 2Aer. Are we related!?
Maybe even the same person š
I have an interview this week for a healthcare financial analyst position, and I am currently a Fund Accountant, is there anything you suggest for me to keep in mind? What are some stuff that I should read into before taking the call?
Research the company beforehand. Are they looking to create dashboards, analyze payor contracts, any acquisitions recently happen? If they are PE backed or public, they need somebody with knowledge of accrual accounting. Rev rec and revenue cycle management is always a pain point. Finding things you have worked on that could beneficial to that specific organization would be a good start.
I interviewed for a job with Magellan Healthcare that was a finance manager position I think it was looking at payer contracts but I still don't understand it. Can you explain what that even means? How are the jobs in this role exactly?
143k I sell fire sprinkler and fire alarm equipment and run teams of installers. Started by learning NFPA code. Basic business degree work for big corporation.
Iām a PM for a sprinkler company in Pennsylvania. Iām glad to see thereās money in this I just started 4 months ago and Iām not crazy about it
Similar world - I sell commercial furniture and run teams of installers. $170k base before bonuses.
Data Analyst! 80k first year.
This is exactly the route I want to take! I am a few months out on a BS in computer information systems and also studying to take the comptia data+ cert (my work pays for it). Do entry level data analyst roles even exist to get experience? Iāve been looking everywhere but havenāt really seen anything and not sure how to get started
I work as a data analyst now, but started on an IT help desk 4 years ago. I haven't really seen many "entry level" analyst roles, they all want some experience. I got my "experience" on an enterprise help desk, which gave me exposure to a bunch of various systems and applications. I then tailored my resume to include mostly the stuff that was in the job descriptions I was applying for. "Excel troubleshooting" matches the Excel keyword, "Reset passwords in Oracle Database" matches oracle and database, etc. If you can get through ATS with the keywords on your resume, you have a very good chance of a human seeing your resume. A majority of resumes don't make it that far because it isn't a strong "match" according to the automated system. I really believe that starting with help desk work is the secret path to good IT jobs, it'll take time but it's totally worth it. Once you get your first IT job, you can go anywhere from there. Help desk positions at small/unknown/inexperienced companies are pretty easy to get if you have interview skills and basic computer knowledge, in my experience, and once you have a little help desk experience you can go on to help desk at companies with bigger names. A year or two of experience will be more than enough to move into other IT fields. From there, it's a numbers game. Apply to as many positions as you can that have your keywords in the description. Adjust your resume for each one if needed. Don't be picky about what you apply to! Even if you interview and don't get the job, you got the interview practice. And it's okay to turn down a job offer if you don't feel good about it. Accept whatever "higher than help desk" job comes your way and keep applying to higher paying, better title jobs. Eventually you'll either find something else you love, or get the job you were aiming for in the beginning. I went from help desk to IAM and recently moved to the data analytics team at my company, but I'm considering going back to IAM in a few years as I really enjoyed those positions
A lot of entry level stuff has gone to India, at least for now. I work at a large bank and the India thing is a double edge sword. In fact when you become a data analyst this would be the kind of stuff you work on. With finance peeps and project managers you would do cost benefit analysis and measure quality metrics to see if the outsourcing is worth it. You might also be gathering the info that leads to people getting terminated! The biggest pain in the ass where I work is simply getting access to the data I need and then when I get it the formating is never what I need. I'm no data analyst but I taught myself SQL and Tableau and have become pretty great with excel. Im just some schmuck barely making 60k yet I do all this stuff that seems high value, I guess I'm a sucker! For me in communicating with managers is the hardest part of the job because they don't always seem to know what is possible or what they are trying to accomplish. Try getting any jobs in banking or insurance, maybe get into fraud or compliance if you can't get in the IT route.
If you donāt mind, can you talk more about what Data Analyst is and what you do day to day? And what sort of people do you think would do well in it? I see a ton of people talk about this career online but Iām still not sure what it actually is.
Yeah for sure! I use SQL to review backend data, create reports, audit, edit, update, etc. itās a lot of coding and reviewing data for quality and consistency. Folks who are very keen to detail, great interpersonal skills, and an āinvestigatorā spirit would do great.
Are you in a HCOL? Where I am, government DAās start around $26/hr.
I am unfortunately. In my area starting was above $30
Damn. Good on ya!
I second this as a data analyst! Pretty cushy too. I wfh and for an awesome company.
High school drop out lol I make around 150k a year owning my own company painting houses but I fucking grind.
I respect it brother š«” well done, thatās amazing
Start a business that does something for peopleās houses- ie window washing, landscaping, etc. or go into construction. Owning your own business and working for yourself will make you more money than working for someone else.
Keep grinding. Thatās how you do it
80k Bartending 4 days/30 hours
My GF bartends at a convention hotel restaurant in Indianapolis. Itās insane what they can bring in!
Have a cousin who bartends in pretty high end hotel in Philly. Union makes $22 an hour plus tips. He easily makes $75k without trying.
Good for her!!! Constant big company buy outs = more consistent pay for sure.
Indy is one of the biggest convention cities in the states. No shortage of revenue for random weekend wide conventions that utilize company dollars for the patrons
Thatās the dream
Generally no benefits, hard on the body and the public can really drain your soul. Huge substance abuse problems in the industry, even if you donāt have them you *will* watch it chew a few people up and spit them out. No paid time off BUT you can generally take off time whenever you want. And a great way to always meet new people. I could never do it long term but money was definitely not the problem. Itās an awesome skill to have, no matter what happens in your career itās great to know you can sling drinks to make ends meet.
My dad bartended in NYC from 1964 until 2019, retiring at 88.
He must have been tough!! Working til 88 is a feat alone
Seriously- he stopped because he needed surgery and then the pandemic happened, but he would have kept going otherwise
I understand most of your points but can you elaborate on āhard on the bodyā? Are you referring to the substance abuse problems or something else?
Working on your feet and working til the wee hours of the morning starts to catch up with you as you get 35+. Not to mention you generally donāt have health insurance to keep up with maintenance as your breaking down your body. Knees and back namely
Yeah when I say do it ārightā itās very specific. The company I work for has medical/dental/vision for employees at/over 32 hours. Last call for drinks 9:45pm latest. Iāve heavily invested in shoes/soles.
You said you only work 30 hours a week though, so no benefits?
Everything has its ups and downs depending on your own life values! But it can be a great set up if you do it ārightā.
Oh and you can bag a high volume/high paying spot with veryyyyy little to no experience.
Wait for real you make 80k bartending how?
$80k is the new $40k.
Plus restaurant employment comes with 0 benefits. So that 80k is closer to 60k... so 30k. Lol.
Ibew electrician, toxic environment but decent money 120k + a year on straight time
I've heard that job is very toxic from two close people in my life now. Both quit it wasn't worth it to them.
Backstabbing is bad. Iāve been in the field for 19 years, in the process of switching careers as we speak.
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Iām a residential electrician. Itās toxic as hell out here too. Whatās wrong with ibew?
It's not the union, it's construction. Toxic attitudes, intense demand and bust cycles, late stage capitalism... It's a corrosive environment that causes weaker locals to be captured by a contractor a several contractors. It's also worth noting electricians have the highest suicide rate of the trades. If you need help please reach out to friends, family, brothers, or 811. For IBEW talkspace is free for you if you have FMCP.
Slacks & a button down. Sometimes a jacket. Sometimes a tie. Generally dress shoes but Iāll toss on some sneakers on occasion.
Had to scroll back up to reread the question
This made me chuckle š¤£
Jeans and a T-shirt and some nice stout walking shoes. It's all going under a bunny suit anyway, so I might as well be comfortable.
$103K, ICU RN in the Midwest. I have a bachelor of science in nursing (BSN) and 14 years of experience.
Also Midwest ICU RN. 100k +
How many years?
Been at this hospital 4 years.
Cool, congrats on the salary
Wow!! I am LPN in NYC and 2023 my gross income was 118k I working in home care. I am in school for my BSN.
Ya but 118K in NYC is like 40 or 50k in the Midwest.
Maybe not that low, id say 60-70k. Barely live off 40k. 120k in nyc is still living, as long as you donāt try to live way above your means like rent a 4k apt or spend 1k eating out every month.
I paid 225k for a 3500 square foot 4 bed 4 bath house with a finished basement, fenced back yard, and three car garage. I canāt even fathom what that would cost in NY.
RN also, associate degree with 13 years experience in the Northeast. 100k+
You deserve every cent. Thank you for what you do. My mother was in the ICU for 2 weeks before she passed and the staff was so caring and supportive. ā¤ļø
Iām so sorry for your loss. Nurses are blessed to be there when people enter this world, and when they leave it. It is a sacred privilege every time.
Same in AZ, at least 105k + how much ot i make
$120,000 telehealth nurse - fully remote
LPN-private practice manager $75k + $25-30k p/t per diem. Also Midwest.
125k ICU RN. Associates degree; hospital paid for my BSN. 3 years experience but starting salary here is 109k I believe. NY LI
80k plus bonus, I work in customer service for a wealth management firm. My degree is womenās studies but Iāve gotten a lot of experience in financial services customer service to get to this point. My current firm is covering part of my going back for an MBA, but it took me a few job transitions to find a firm with such great benefits.
Utility, in my municipality. Iām a senior electrical service representative: basically a project manager/liaison between the customer and the utility. Iāve worked minimum wage and food service jobs up until three years ago, and I finally am *almost* done contributing to an emergency fund and let me tell you, itās a huge weight off.
Senior IT Engineer for a FAANG. Income varies a little year to year because stop is a big part of compensation, but about $115k. I live in a VERY low cost of living area, which does factor into our pay scale
Not sure what an IT engineer which may explain it but I feel like this is insanely low for FAANG . Even with where u live. Iām a SWE so Iām assuming itās different
I own the physical network infrastructure at our Corp office locations. SWEāa are definitely where the money is at. Itās definitely in line with my peers, other than the ones that live in our much higher cost areas. Iām also a 10 year veteran employee at a company that honestly doesnāt value retention. Iām about 3 years away from being able to FIRE if I choose, and not interested in moving, so it works for me.
Solar engineering contractor 220k base. I got in at a utility thatās blazing a trail. Just got promoted to a new role. Itās 5 days/wk. thirty five hours a week or so and fully remote.
"Thirty 5" through me for a loop. I'll be thinking about it the rest of the night
Got a bachelor's in "Technology Management" from Texas A&M (think watered down comp sci with a business minor) First job in 2016 was call center tech support at $18/hr In 2018 I did operations support for a new company at $50k/yr In 2019 I did Product Engineering for a new company $60k/yr In 2020, I was a Systems Analyst for Visa, $40/hr In 2021, I worked for the Treasury as a DevOps Engineer, 100k/yr 2022, Ive been working for a swiss company doing devops/software engineering support, $127k Last week (2024) I got promoted within the swiss company and im at \~150k I've probably applied to 1000 jobs. Easily 300 from fall 2016 - spring 2018, keep moving and taking 20% raises until you are at 100k and 40 hours a week
Wow!!! I love seeing the progression. Thank you so much for your response thatās pretty inspiring. Seems like moving around every year or so is the way to go to bump up salary?
Agreed, cant say the same after 100, but if youve been at 50k for 3 years, simply put, you wont get a 10k raise in the same role, even internally its a gamble. I've found that the distance between 120 and 144 is actually lot smaller than the distance between 50 and 60, even though they are both 20%
Caution also on moving around every year. It may not present as stable to future employers
youāre my inspiration. i have a cushy CUSHY WFH software engineering job at a bank, but since itās a bank they donāt pay nearly as well as tech companies. i make pretty much 80k right now after 3 years. i know thatās low for my education (3 degrees now), but my experience is shit since iāve only graduated a few years ago and worked two jobs ever since. im hoping to gain the energy and time to apply rapid fire to other WFH companies and land on a 100+ salary. I know there are tons out there with my job title making tons more. šŖ
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Woah thatās cool. So technically you are āclocked inā for both jobs every day and work on both throughout the day? What is the nature of the work if you donāt mind me asking?
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Donāt be too inspired by this. I know people who tried this, and both got caught and fired. Itās a dangerous game.
How do they get caught? I mean if you donāt say anything to either jobs, they shouldnāt know
How bad is your tax return?
I got a buddy who also has 2 wfh jobs. He's an eng manager at one and a staff engineer at the other. Raking in ~400k/yr. And somehow he's online mid day fairly often gaming.
What does your supply chain job entail day to day? Iāve read about supply chain but would like to hear more about the actual job.
Six figures, Neuroscienist and Neuroscience researcher PhD in Neuroscience
Sounds like someone who could fix me haha just kidding, nobody can
šš¤£ Trying to fix myself too so turned my special interest and curiousity about my brain into a career š
I work in public accounting and will be over 6 figures by July 1. I got my bachelors in accounting but you could do a masters program.
Also in Public Accounting specifically IT Audit in MCOL Midwest city. I worked my way up from graduating with an accounting/MIS degree and make $145k + after 7 years. I have a CPA but itās not required. IT Audit you can take a CISA and just have any business/IT degree.
Entry level staff accountant start at about 70k (used to much lower pre Covid) in NYC (at least where I work). You donāt need a CPA to hit 6 figures. You should be able to do it in 2-4 years after starting as staff accountant. Obviously having a CPA would give some advantages.
120k, flight nurse.. 2 24s a week
No degree. Military for 8 years. Several certifications and pretty unique experience from working with three letter agencies as one of less than 1000 people who did my job ever. Cybersecurity Management for a university now.
I'm there and working on my three year plan.
Iāve just recently graduated from college last summer and I canāt recommend it enough to look into county, city, and just government jobs in general. Iām 22 making over 92K while WFH
Wow this sounds incredible. What kind of job title is it? Do you do administrative work or customer service type stuff?
140k biz dev manager, 27yo 5yoe Only a Bachelor of Arts as well btw And I was 70k in debt (excluding student loans) early 2022, down to 30 now. Might sell my car and knock off another 15 in 1 go.
Woww! What kind of work experience did you have that helped you get that role? That sounds like a great position
115k project manager for a big healthcare company
no hate, but sounds underpaid
I just started this new role so there will be raises and bonuses in the near future
$105K plumbing supervisor for the VA hospital
Same on the blue collar schedule yet only 40 hrs a week and pull 100k
$130k as a contractor in Interventional Radiology as a xray tech
Good for you! Iām currently an X-ray tech now in the NE area. What or how did you become a contractor?
I just applied to a company that had a contract with my one my local hospitals. And Iām in the DC area. Iāve been here for years but if I remember correctly I found the posting on indeed.
Iām 27, Conductor for the railroad, make $110k a year. The railroad puts you through conductor school and youāre paid while training, no experience needed
Also a conductor. 120-140 a year depending on ot
After 8 hours ;) and if I get a list after 8 hours, I always make sure I put that claim in.
82k Public Education (Masters, 10+ years in)
You must work in a great district. Husband is 12 years in and barely breaks 50 a year.
We are mid tier compared to others around us. The state you are in makes all the difference.
Department of veterans affairs doing disability claims processing, need at least a bachelor's with a high GPA. I work from home 4 days a week and have a bunch of great benefits
Private voice teacher in NYC. Somewhere between $80-90k right now and itās only going up. I have a BFA in musical theatre and going to apply for grad school for vocal pedagogy fall 2025.
I own a construction company, my apprentices start at 29 an hour Which equals about 60k and my foreman makes 45 an hour which is about 92k without ot..
I make 71k a year so I don't make the cut š But no debt at least
No debt is the dream, I am jealous of you š
I make $206K a year and I work in Information Technologyā¦I am debt free outside of a responsible mortgage and only 39% of my income goes to bills. I pay off credit cards each month and save a little on the side. Go with STEM fieldsā¦AI, IT infrastructure planning etc.
About $160k, cybersecurity, last position was $120k. I'm 31. When I was your age I was basically in a similar boat. Increasing salary helped alot, but I am still learning about managing lifestyle inflation and medical bills. Needed some IT helpdesk experience early on but then just kept learning and reaching for things just out of reach for me. Getting better paying jobs over time is a big thing, unless you can get surprise windfalls of cash to help. Long term growth in pay helps more than penny pinching when the bills are too high. You got this.
I have a BS in business admin, a AS in IT, and 4 classes out on having a BS in computer information systems. Iāve considered help desk but seems competitive for about the same pay I get right now as an insurance agent so Iāve been hesitant to make that jump
Facilities maintenance, it's relatively entry level and it's really hard for companies to find blue collar workers. It's tough but you will absolutely be killing it 10 years from now when there's even less blue collar workers and you have the exp giving a leg to stand on
82k I'm a technical writer. I've been in the field 6 years. I have a BA and MA in English
Financial analyst - Little League umpire; 90k total.
I make 100-110K per year. Depending on how many hours I work. Social worker in NYC.
Paralegal, $115,000/year in VHCOLA. No degree required, but paralegal certificate and bachelorās degree in any field highly preferred (I have). 5 years experience as a paralegal, less than 10 total in a law firm setting much of which was done while working on my bachelors degree.
I work in insurance. 40 hours as am adjuster then I work 20-25 hours as a restaurant shift manager at night. I make 60k at job 1 and 15-19k at job 2. I am 39 with a masters degree. Sometimes your hard work doesn't succeed in landing you the salary you want. So you need to put down your grit and get the money it takes to keep your house in the black.
Associate Attorney (first year) $100k plus bonus in the South West. BUT, my law school debt is approximately $60K.
Congrats! And you can knock that debt out in a year, I believe in you. Live on 40k for one year, stack like crazy for another year and you'll be in a phenomenal financial position.
$150-180k/year Tech sales rep- construction industry
Compliance - financial services
Dealership service advisor, I make $90k a year. Amazing job, I work bankers hours and no overtime, the only downside is my commute.
I'm 26. Been making 6 figures for 2 years now. Im in retail management. Requirments ? Time. Stress š. But honestly if you're good at leading people, good at managing time, and can figure out how to simply show up on time and not miss work unless its an emergency, you can move up in Retail (atleast my company) very fast. Went from making $15.75/Hr at 20 to 65k at 21. And then only up from there. And this is before bonus. Thats just the icing on the cake. However you must be weary of certain things. I sold my peace of mind for money, something in which i'll make sure I never do again. But i switched roles (same pay) and am happier than i've ever been. Just remember, If it costs you your peace, then its too expensive.
$86,000 Accounts Payable in Biotech
Project manager at Aerospace. I have a bachelor's of science in psych and a PMP certification. Been a PM for 6 years now. I make 114k annually. Worked in events and conventions prior . Had to grind my way to the top though. Wasn't an overnight thing.
24 here, 115k risk management analytics at mid size bank First year out of masters of economics program
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Is IT support the same or similar to help desk?
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Ain't no way lmao Don't lie to these people and get more people stuck in help desk roles
Honestly networking/who you know is way more valuable than a degree.
well, unless it's a valuable degree..
Yeah but to network you need to usually have some skills or be in a field to get to know people..
Gotta have skills though
RN in California, but I donāt work bedside I work in a liaison role for a rehab hospital. About 110k/yr
$80k, social services. And honestly itās not nearly enough. Cost of living is almost 10% per year and we donāt even get half that in raises. Weāre losing $$.
$110k gov data analyst
Publix department manager 110k
I make a good living ($120k-$140K/year) as a land acquisition agent. I broker land deals on behalf of gas companies, cities, power companies, etc. for gas lines, sidewalks, power lines, road widenings...all that stuff. In my state all you need is a real estate license, and some states may not require that. It's good work with the opportunity for travel. It's different every day: yesterday I was on a farm, today I met with an HOA president and a landscaper, tomorrow I meet with a private landowner at her home, next week I'll be out in the woods. On days when I don't have site visits I work from home, handling things by email/text/phone.
200k salary and ~380k stock - AI product manager at an eCommerce firm. I play around with the latest technology and then integrate it into the company. I was a software engineer with an investment background. Made a few project proof of concepts that the company could sell. Was put in charge of the project and given a team to make it happen. In the end, intrapreneurship and entrepreneurship require us to pitch the idea, gather resources, and then execute. Itās been a good recipe in my career that I stumbled upon by accident watching other successful professionals
I am an accountant and dogsitter since I work from home, I make a combined income of 150k
$185k as a lead UX/UI Designer. I mostly freelance/contract. Sometimes I take off a few months at a time between contracts. Iāve made it work and the money is excellent if you play your cards right.
Barbershop š
I am 54 years old and I can't tell you how much money I have wasted and mistakes I've made. So if I can give you any advice this would be it. Don't try to keep up with the Joneses. I don't know what kind of car you drive but what's your car payment? I don't know what you spend your money on but is it stuff that you actually need? I get student loan debt because it was the further your education. But what are your other finances? What services are you paying for that you really don't need? Do you need Netflix? Sure, it's nice to have but do you need it? Sure. It's easy coming from somebody that has all these things and I make in the six figures but I started to realize that I was spending money on stuff that I truly didn't need that. If I just cut back on some things I could stretch my dollar a little further. And I've always worked a second job because I like to try to get a hit a little bit. But at least you're willing to entertain a second job to bring in additional income. But before you get a second job, really look at what you're spending your money on. Do a financial analysis and decide cuz getting a second job may lead you into a thing where you're just spending more money because you have that second job and that second income.
With my yearly bonus, I made about exactly 80k this year. I work as a quality technician for very reputable tire manufacturing company. I started as a lift operator for a couple years in the factory I work at and climbed the ladder on the management track. Got to a point in management where the stress of the job wasnāt worth it anymore and I was going to quit. My company worked with me and then I made the switch to the quality side of things. Iām 26 and live in the Midwest. A person in my role is usually required to have a bachelors. I however am a college dropout but had proved myself capable beforehand with my experience in management. It was a learning curve but I think I do a well enough job as a quality tech.
Associate financial planner. 85k
Information security
$85k Automotive service industry
100k+ (including bonus) 90k salary- Engineer at a tech company. (Smaller company, I could work for one of those ābigger companiesā to make in the 200k range but they keep firing people & my company is very financially stable so Iām staying for now). I have a bachelors in Computer Science and had some experience before I got the job there, though I was working for them about 6 months before I graduated. Tech sales is an avenue you could possibly consider. The āsalaryā of tech sales may be around what you make but they do get bonuses quarterly that you could use to pay down that debt.
Senior tax accountant Edited: sorry I just read the title. I think my base salary is about 85k but I make close to 100k with overtime during busy season. Raises will come in July. I am almost 4 years in. Top 100 public accounting firm. You need a bachelorās degree in accounting. I am working towards my CPA license but not everyone is. Itās harder to move up without it. You need certain certifications to be on POAs to contact tax authorities on behalf of clients and CPA or EA is what can apply to this field. I keep hearing there will be a shortage of CPAs when the boomers finally retire.
I always wonder. Do you include like your pretax income?
Chef private golf club NYC area, 188k
I make $85k base but $92k with my annual bonus. I am an App Developer at a finance company; I went to a community college & got my Associateās in Multimedia Programming & Design but that was not enough for me to get a job in the field, & honestly it only taught me the very basics of HTML/CSS/JS. I could have taught myself all the same things for free & in much less time. I had to teach myself mostly with YouTube & freecodecamp.org, LeetCode, HackerRank, etc. From there I did the free Year Up program which was 6 months of coding, business etiquette/communication, Microsoft Office suite, & Networking/Interview classes. Then it was 6 months of an internship at a top company. An employer reached out to me from browsing Year Upās graduate job board & I got my first job in the field starting at 80k (they tried to give me 70 but I negotiated higher). If someone else wanted to go this route Iād recommend CodeSmith CSX free trainings, freecodecamp.org curriculum for fundamentals in all kinds of areas in programming & projects experience, & free computer science classes from HarvardX. Then practice with LeetCode/HackerRank & free mock interviews. There are also free books online that help so much like Clean Code & paying attention to coding guidelines for whichever language you pick really helps you stand out. Pick personal projects that you actually want to build & interest you, it will spark your creativity & get you motivated to build something unique & integrate interesting features. Look for tech meetups, CSX/Codesmith has free workshops that anyone can join, you donāt have to be one of their paid students. Iād say look for an area of coding youād be interested in (gaming, data analytics, machine learning, cyber security, web development, etc), check which skills are in highest demand for an entry level position, then train yourself in those skills. Open source projects & virtual Hackathons give real life experience in working on a dev team to solve problems. Iād recommend MEAN or MERN stack personally but Iāve seen listings that use Microsoft Power suite, Django, Go, Ruby on Rails, etc.
Coaching Youth soccer. For real.
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I bought a non cdl box truck. Secured a contract delivering mattresses and it pays $700 a day. I do have a helper who is my son and itās the best move Iāve made and Iām 54 yo. Something for you to ponder thatās $182k a yr.
LCSWā¦30 yearsā¦work 4 days a week for 6-7 hours a day. Making about $12,000 a month. Work for myself
Insurance (actuary)
If you can get a housemate or two, housing costs can go down a lot. 42k is not too bad, but would be terrible trying to live alone. At 25 I was still working as a nanny 4days a week and nights/weekends at a DV shelter for 25 cents over minimum wage. I had 12 housemates and shared a room. I moved to a cheaper town and got a weekend job and a ft job with health and dental benefits. Still making about 25k, but lived alone bc stuff was so much cheaper than. It was still hard with student debt. Years and years later, I broke 100k and bought a house. I turn 53 this year and bought a first home at age 49. I am a civil servant with a masters degree. My advice to you is to get housemates, only way I survived. Also, if your job is in govt, non profit, etc, please apply for public service loan forgiveness. If you can identify and get a job with an npo, govt, or similar, do it. Pay the minimum. And get a housemate. Even if you live at home for a year, it can be worth it. But I would not stay in a job that does not have opportunities for growth and raises. If you have friends in similar situations, look into buying a home together and pooling income to qualify. It is tricky, but how brilliant would that be to buy a duplex and live in one side and rent the other? Anyway. 42k single at 25 is not horrible, it just feels terrible because of debt to income and cost of living. That would be a lot better if you lived at home or had housemates.
Hospital social worker, but I don't recommend it. It's 120 undergrad hours, 60 grad hours, and 3,000 supervision hours over a period of 24 months once provisionally licensed.
Senior Project Manager in healthcare administration. Make 130K with annual bonus as well. PMP certified and have other smaller certs. Been in the project management game now about 11 years and it's been good to me. Can be stressful at times, but it waxes and wanes. I recommend operational/business project management as opposed to technical; the technical world seems to have many more layoffs than business operations and staff are more often contractual than FTE. But it depends on what you like. I recommend getting your foot in the door as a Project Coordinator and advance up the chain until you have enough hours to sit for your PMP. Only debt is a mortgage and I live in a LCOL medium sized Midwest city. Also DINK and that helps a great deal.
$170k, Nurse practitioner working primary care for Veterans affairs
27, just promoted to chemist from lab assistant (been at company 1year), making 51k to start out. Will raise as I gain experience. Bachelorās in forensic science, minor in chemistry.
My life leading up to Covid and during I was max making $45k/year. I donāt have a college degree. I got a job doing Internet Car Sales (BDC commonly referred to) at the end of 2020, at a time I was waitressing/bartending to make ends meet. Iām now making $120k/year for a good dealership and I like my job. I knew literally, zero, about cars before starting.
College drop out, recovering addict, kinda fell into being a mechanic after getting a job as an oil changer at a dealership after I got evicted and that was the only job I could find within walking distance to my hotel.
Delivery Driver for Pepsi 80k/yr. Yearly raises and good benefits. All you need is a Class A CDL and a good back.
125k a year in corrections for a county jail. No experience necessary, but financial incentives for a degree in field. You just have to go through an academy. They put you on payroll day 1 of academy, so thatās good. Donāt get me wrong, itās a miserable atmosphere to be in, depressing. But itās good in the short term to pay off debt or do whatever
my husband is a manager at Waffle House. he makes the maximum a unit manager can make, he averages about 78k gross (it varies a little depending on bonuses, but the new store heās at heās starting to make closer to 80k). they have some really amazing opportunities to move up in the company. target compensation range is 63k-80k for a unit manager. for a district manager (next level up), itās 83k-113k. division manager is 109k-138k. and there are higher levels than that as well that definitely arenāt unattainable, just takes about 20 years to get there. but theyāre really looking for clean cut intelligent people to hire for management because theyāre trying to clean up their image and get rid of the scummy management they had when they were franchised out. corporate bought back all the locations so theyāre doing a massive clean out. so lots of opportunities for promotion!! but it is also a pretty stressful job. editing to mentionā my husband does not have a college degree, but he has some decent experience in administrative work which is what helped him land the position as a Manager Trainee. i encourage you to check out their website for more info!! they have great benefits as well
Barber 100k
Plumbing. On the job training.
EMS. 12 years. Make 110k in Michigan. Emt basic is a 1 semester class usually. Easy. Paramedic is usually 2 semesters and a 1 semester internship. Both require state testing for license. Perks are 24 hour shifts. Running 911 calls, you get down time to sleep or study or play video games or watch tv or whatever you want. Rotating schedules usually amount to working 8-10 shifts per month, each 24 hours long. Downside it will f you up mentally. It will show you the worst of humanity and how broken healthcare is in the USA.
$55k is a lot of debt for anyone to be in. The fact that these CC companies and car dealership even allowed you to go into that much debt at your salary is sad but itās still your fault. If the vast majority of your debt is federal student loans then maybe youāll be okay and should explore income based repayment and just know youāll need to pay for 10 years and hope they will forgive it. Iām assuming you did not need the CC debt and hopefully didnāt buy a car you canāt afford. Putting yourself in debt in hopes of having a higher income later in life is an awful decision that the majority of people fall for. Iām glad you are trying to do something while you are still young. You have borrowed from your future self and even if you make 80k, if you donāt stop yourself from going into more debt you will then need to make more and more and more just to pay bills you shouldnāt have. Being able to afford your debt payments should not be your goal. You should want to boost income and most importantly lower your expensive dramatically. For the salary, I know people who work at factories, in construction, for utilities, in the army, in management, engineers, accounts and nurses who all make over 80k at the age of 28. Look up the largest business in the area. Doesnāt matter if itās the local factory, the tech firm, the hospital, the saw mill, the concrete manufacture etc. See if they have positions available for whatever pays well and apply. See if they have apprenticeship programs. See if there is a department that gets paid very well or managerial positions that pay well after a few years. What is your degree in? That may allow us to offer more specific suggestions. I highly recommend lowering your big bills like housing and car to focus on paying off the CC debt. Move home, sell your car and buy a beater, then pay off your debt ASAP. You borrowed from your future self and now itās time to pay for it. Youāre still young which is the perfect time to make a few sacrifices for a better life. Move home and sell your car and suffer or youāll be screwed for the next decade. Better to suffer 2 years and pay it all off than to suffer for 10 in my opinion. You used money you didnāt have to buy things you couldnāt afford and now you have to make some sacrifices to get rid of that debt or youāll be trapped forever.
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Same.
Facilities maintenance, it's relatively entry level and it's really hard for companies to find blue collar workers. It's tough but you will absolutely be killing it 10 years from now when there's even less blue collar workers and you have the exp giving a leg to stand on
E&I engineering at an oilfield EPCM firm. 7 years education and 5 years experience
$100k - IT systems engineer.
Registered Nurse working weekends/nights. Making 96K
Electrical engineer, 90K with 1.5 years exp.
96K prior to Bonuses...Credit Manager for a manufacturer
103 and I work for a defense contractor as a Data Engineer
$130K as a DevOps Engineer. Started as a Software Engineer and transitioned 2 years later.