Should I find a regular job or continue doing what am doing?
"This might sound harsh, but the first thing I would suggest is to stop making excuses.  I wasn't able to continue due to pressure from college and family The college I went to was horrible. Employers can very easily hire foreign work-force for   very cheap; for example as a citizen if I work $10 an hour, they can   get someone from outside to work for $5 per hour There's no guarantee that the project will succeed. I cannot really work and at the same time develop software on my free   time.  Despite my failures in the past, I was not the main person that's   responsible for those failures. Even if all of this is true, it's not helping you move forward and it seems to be getting in the way of creating a good action plan and motivating yourself to succeed. If you believe (based on past experiences) that you are doomed to fail, then you are indeed doomed to fail. You need to take a step back and re-evaluate your current circumstances and what you can do to reach your goals. You have a couple of things working in your favor here. It's great that you are debt free. That already puts you ahead of a lot of your peers.  You have the option of living with your parents. Presumably for no rent, or at least much lower rent than you would have to pay if you move out. This is worth literally thousands of $/£/€ for every year you stay. Now, onto your questions: 1) Should I quit regular programming for a normal job because I never monetized programming so I can move out of my parents' home? Are you being paid for this ""regular programming""? If so, are you being paid more than minimum wage? If not, it's perfectly acceptable to consider alternative ways to spend your time and generate income. However, this doesn't have to be at the expense of living with your parents. Have you thought about getting a new or second job while still living with them? If you absolutely must move out of your parent's home, consider renting a room in a house with other people to keep the rent costs to a minimum. That way, even if your main job is low paying, you should be able to put aside some money each month for future endeavors.  2) Should I monetize programming and gamble with the future? What does this mean? Are you thinking you'll write a mobile app and sell thousands of copies for 99¢ each? That would indeed be a big gamble, but maybe that's not what you meant, so you'll need to clarify. 3) Would it be wise to essentially quit programming for the sake of a minimum wage job? I'm not sure how this is different from question 1. So I'll reiterate what I said there - moving out is going to be expensive. You can still do it, but you're asking on a Personal Finance site where the focus is usually how to minimize living costs and maximize income. Without knowing more about where you live (employment opportunities, cost of living) the default recommendation is usually to save money by staying in your parents house. TLDR: Don't focus on anyone else. They are not preventing you from getting the job you want. Look at your own skills and qualifications (not just programming, consider all of your abilities). What are you good at? Who might need those skills? What is the cost of reaching those people (commute time, moving nearer)? What is the reward? If the reward exceeds the cost, start approaching those people. Show them what you can do."
Thanks for explaining added value - I do not think professors are much, if any part of the problem, it really does come down to cost in my eyes. Year over year costs go up. As a country we are pricing ourselves out of education. It will continue to create disparity and eventually you will have a large segment of the population saying no way on college (I can get a lot of free courseware on edx.org and other sites).   As numbers drop colleges are going to be hard pressed to really make money.  I often ponder what that money is spent for. I know a chunk goes to sports and other not necessarily academic activities.  I have advocated for years to people who cannot afford to go to a 4yr college to attend community college, get an Associates and make their decision from there.   With exception of the Ivy league schools I do not think there is enough value in 4 yr degree's in the job market. I am in IT and the number of people I have worked with who have had degrees since the early days of my career has dropped greatly. Many of them had non-computer degrees and jumped job fields to fill gaps early on.  Just my two cents. I really believe that most professors are not the problem (unless they are paid huge sums and even that's dependent on a lot of things) I'm saying if she LIKES you (which she most like doesn't) she will help you regardless of whether your leave or stay.  But you should not even view that as an option.  You need to do what's best for YOU.  If you know a better opportunity is around the corner, your boss should respect your decision and you find a neutral way to leave your job.  However, I don't know your situation and it's not great to leave as soon as you got there, it makes you look like you don't know what you're doing or don't know what you want (which is what everybody is doing anyway..)  Don't trust your boss unless you knew her prior to this job for a long time, or through family.  That should not come into play in your decision.  You can network with bankers to get a banking job, do you really need to spend months and months appeasing this one person to get referrals? On the flipside, you definitely want to be in good standing with your boss.   Again, do what's best for you.  Don't take empty promises or you will get burned. Good Afternoon all,  My first time posting in this community as I am in need of some advice or insight into Bank Of America Merrill Lynch.  For my interview I have to prepare a 10 minute presentation with a further 10 minutes of questions afterwards. The presentation should consist of 3 points; 1) What do you see as BOAML’s strengths and weaknesses over its competitors 2) Why do you want to work at BOAML and why have you chosen to apply for this particular division? (The role I am applying for is a Systems Operations Analyst role)  3) What are going to be the key challenges of joining BOAML? (I have never worked in the industry before-previous experience in catering and retail).  Mostly looking for advice on point one as I am finding research somewhat difficult to come buy in terms of products and services (mainly just different statistics at the moment)  Any advice would be greatly appreciated! "From the poster's description of this activity, it doesn't look like he is engaged in a business, so Schedule C would not be appropriate. The first paragraph of the IRS Instructions for Schedule C is as follows: Use Schedule C (Form 1040) to report income or loss from a business   you operated or a profession you practiced as a sole proprietor. An   activity qualifies as a business if your primary purpose for engaging   in the activity is for income or profit and you are involved in the   activity with continuity and regularity. For example, a sporadic   activity or a hobby does not qualify as a business. To report income   from a nonbusiness activity, see the instructions for Form 1040, line   21, or Form 1040NR, line 21. What the poster is doing is acting as a nominee or agent for his members. For instance, if I give you $3.00 and ask you to go into Starbucks and buy me a pumpkin-spice latte, you do not have income or receipts of $3.00, and you are not engaged in a business. The amounts that the poster's members are forwarding him are like this.  Money that the poster receives for his trouble should be reported as nonbusiness income on Line 21 of Form 1040, in accordance with the instructions quoted above and the instructions for Form 1040. Finally, it should be noted that the poster cannot take deductions or losses relating to this activity. So he can't deduct any expenses of organizing the group buy on his tax return. Of course, this would not be the case if the group buy really is the poster's business and not just a ""hobby."" Of course, it goes without saying that the poster should document all of this activity with receipts, contemporaneous emails (and if available, contracts) - as well as anything else that could possibly be relevant to proving the nature of this activity in the event of an audit." "Hey just letting you know that I've sort of felt the same as you before. I'm not 29 yet, only a few years younger, and I too am in Alberta. Knowing that many trades can be quite lucrative here I too dipped my hand in them, namely the HVAC and Plumbing trades, and after a bit I felt that they weren't for me. And this was after using a year looking for any ins during the recession since nobody was hiring helpers/first years. During that whole year in the times I wasn't looking for a job I was researching and looking up videos of the trades and was thinking how INow after some career counseling, soul searching, all that jazz, I'm about to head back to school next week. If things go well by the time I graduate I will almost be 30 with my first (and probably only) degree.    I wouldn't consider the years from the time I graduated high school to today, where I think I've figured out what I want to do, a waste, but instead I look at them as years where I grew as an adult and gaining real world experience in a few areas I've dabbled in. A future employer may look at them as wasted years, but it is up to me to spin them in a positive way as my ""story"". Just know that you aren't alone in this situation, and I'm sure there's plenty of people worldwide in their 20's and 30's who are still trying to figure out what they want to do. Keep your head up and good luck." "It's a tough thing to do.  You should look for a salaried position.  Your freelance skills will be much better received, if you've worked for a couple of companies doing programming full time.  Nothing beats working at it all day long for a few years. If you're set on being freelance, write some utility that will be popular, and submit it to Freshmeat.net.  Now that's asking a lot.  Those on the Web looking for programmers will most likely want you to work for 'sweat equity'.  That is, a share in the company for you labour.  In other words ""FREE"".  I've done my share of those, and if you're just getting into this, you should steer away from them.  You may hit the jackpot, but you won't sleep for the next few years ;-)" If you are doing this because you are interested... this is one thing. But a degree in economics is probably not going to help you find a job.   Before going into it, research available opportunities in the field first. Is it worth the cost of the degree to study it? Are you going into it because your employer wants you to have this knowledge?  The answer to the question about Math is yes. There is a lot of math in Economics.  A good idea is to get the course catalog for the degree at the university where you would be going and see which classes are required to get the degree. Wannabe2good is completely correct, Money and Banking (one of the classes required for an Eco degree) is something that helps you know why the president of the US is doing what he is doing, but really does not apply much to you personally, and employers will not care.  I urge you and ANYONE else who plans to go to school, please research if there are JOBS in the field of your study. I have seen so many people study things they were interested in and then later graduate and were not able to find jobs.  Good luck! "No, there aren't only 2 choices as I have a good job. In this case though, there are two options, either continue to have the ""bad jobs"" that this rich guys company is providing or he shuts down the company and there are no jobs at all.  It's not a loaded question. I'd rather have a bad employer than no employer at all."