When I started my career I thought I would love doing this forever

I basically agree, just adding context. As companies grow, it's the natural state of things, as any hope for goal alignment goes out the window. I am OK dealing with situations where the good for the company's long term might not be the same as my personal preferences. But we often see situations where what is decided isn't good for the company, or for most workers, but great for a decision maker, and we all know that at those layers, talking about the misalignment to the layer above is a great way to get canned. A decade or that, and the company is a zombie. I've enjoyed tech in environments where there was alignment, and in a few cases it made me serious money, which is why I have said optionality myself. But nowadays AI has led to much higher capital costs to do innovative things, so the number of companies with the right size and potential has shrunk, and that makes fulfilling career…

I could and did live frugally before I had kids. How can one continue living in a small apartment with lead and asbestos hazards is beyond me.

It comes down to perspective tbh. For someone who's worked hard labor throughout their life, the cushy tech job you get is actually worth doing forever. But for people who have never experienced that, I can see why retiring early makes sense, but honestly most of us get to work from home and do our jobs on the computer, which doesn't require much. It's still an amazing career to be in IMO

You know, I think the experiences you are describing are the norm for non-tech corporate jobs. Now with AI as an excuse, management is now subjecting the tech positions the same as the non-tech workers and it stings. Tech people were previously treated far better than the average corporate workers, and started after the tech hiring boom from Covid.

I would take this advice a bit further even -- I don't think savings alone is the key, because inflation and de-dollarization are exponentially eroding purchasing power. The key is ownership of income-producing assets. In late-stage capitalism, the vast majority of people who work in exchange for wages will be members of the debt class; workers who manage to escape debt will still be living on a knife's edge where you can be laid off at any moment regardless of how well your company is doing. The only people living with stability will be those whose lives are paid for by the assets they own, rather than by the hours they sell.

such a wonderful advice, this resonates a lot with me. I know i would ignore it when i needed to hear it though

I'm coming up on 40 years with the last 17 at the same company. I'm so burnt out that I resemble a charcoal briquette.

I broadly agree, but expensive homes are an odd example because, like, you can just sell the house later. There might be some opportunity cost relative to investing in a broad market ETF or whatever, but that's not the sort of difference that makes or breaks your early retirement strategy. It's a bit odd to get moralistic over saving/spending money in general, but that's especially true around expensive homes.