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Trading only career that doesn't require people?
- Thread starter cashonly
- Start date
I read the post by the programmer and partially agree. However since I have worked in various IT jobs besides programmer, and known many programmers personally, I can tell you that IT has become much more social and consequently much more filled with BS in the past few years. Lots of more "social" and less engineering minded people have entered the field. It is now much more likely that your boss knows absolutely nothing about programming or anything else and is much more likely to be an MBA type.
Then there are the layoffs. If you have 5 programmers and all 5 are reasonably competent but you only really need 3 of them, then guess who gets laid off ? At that point it is totally 100% political and beyond the control of those 5 programmers. Factor in union membership, affirmative action, experienced and expensive vs. young and cheap, and you can see that whether you stay or go has nothing to do with how well you did your job.
Then there are the layoffs. If you have 5 programmers and all 5 are reasonably competent but you only really need 3 of them, then guess who gets laid off ? At that point it is totally 100% political and beyond the control of those 5 programmers. Factor in union membership, affirmative action, experienced and expensive vs. young and cheap, and you can see that whether you stay or go has nothing to do with how well you did your job.
Originally posted by darkhorse
All professions that depend on service or customer contact in any way shape or form have a sales aspect. If your livelihood is linked to playing nice, you have to play nice.
Trading and individual professional sports are unique disciplines in that they do not require selling or cooperative exchange. Traders makes use of brokers and clearing firms, solo sport athletes make use of coaches and the media- but the relationships are distinctly one sided. Consider the bee and the flower. The bee can treat the flower like crap, but the flower will take it because it needs the bee's business. Not a perfect analogy by any means, but the point is that the other party needs you more than you need them, negating the need to sell/convince/suckup in any way shape or form..
I was attracted to trading because of the sheer elegance. Even as a kid I was more interested in hacking through the gordian knot than untying it. I wanted to run my own show from the start, but the idea of rent, employees, inventory, payroll etc. etc. disgusted me even at age twelve. Too mundane, too much boring paperwork. I remember wishing there was a way I could make a living just by thinking. Halfway through college I came across 'the investment biker' by Jim Rogers, and my professor ideas went right out the window.
What other business offers a pure meritocracy with no employees, no selling and negligible overhead? Where else can you give yourself a raise every year through compounded gains? Where else can you take a few years of tuition and convert them into decades of positive cash flow? Where else can you take on investors and expand your gains with minimal expansion of effort?
Yep! That's my sentiments EXACTLY! It's a perfect meritocracy and independence.
Horray to Prop Trading!!!
trader99
Originally posted by Newatthis
When things are going poorly in the trading arena, I collect redeemable recyclable cans. Don't need noone else in the dumpster with me.
I think we have another winner:
No one to work with.
You know how much you're going to get for your effort.
Law says they have to take your redeemables
If you want to bump up your efforts and ask establishments for their redeemables, that would involve people, but for the basic business, it works.
Originally posted by BillyG67
Yes but you still have to bring them to the recycling center where SOMEONE will weigh them and make sure you didnt sneak a plastic bottle in there and then hopefully that PERSON gives ya a wad of cash
Not necessarily. They have automated centers now. Just like you used to have to talk to a broker... now you don't
a lighthouse keeper
Originally posted by cashonly
Hmmm... we may have a winner here. I don't see any people interaction required. But, are there any players that consistentently make money doing it? It's gotta be something where you can actually make a living. I really don't know enough about it to say, myself.
actually, it seems the OTB can be a profitable career. I read an article in wired magazine some time ago about some Hong Kong guys using computer analysis to improe their odds. They would do things like create a database of info about the horses and their percentage of wins/loses, etc. They would watch videos of the races and see how the horses handle turns, whether they did better in the begining of the race or the end, etc. All of these factors would then be factored into the final bets. If I remember right these guys were claiming to have an average annual ROI of 24%. When you consider that they had a bankroll of tens of millions of dollars (so they claimed), 24% isn't bad...