• Thanks for stopping by. Logging in to a registered account will remove all generic ads. Please reach out with any questions or concerns.

A College Degree Is No Guarantee of a Good Life

tomahawk6 said:
There is always the railroad. Great pay and benefits - at least in the US, and goes for Canada as well I expect.

Within one (oh en ee), year of hiring on at CN Rail, if you hired out of a double sub terminal (or alternatively a road terminal).. I will personally guarantee you will make at LEAST 100k/year (one zero zero) for one year full time employment (excusing if you are a book sick/off addict lol).

Any Veteran on here needs help getting hired, hit me up.

mariomike said:
There was no hardship for our family. We never had to change houses or schools or tolerate any inconvenience.

Dad spent a lot of nights at the Queen Elizabeth Hotel in Montreal. Took me with him sometimes. The hotel is located directly above the VIA station with its own entrance.

Mom is still alive and well. He took us on a lot of rail trips when he had time off. One particularly memorable trip was to New Orleans. First time I had been in the Southland.

But sadly, some of what Mike says here is no longer true. You will make money, no shortage of it. But expect to be sent on shrotages for months at a time, possibly laid off for the first couple years and a very.. tough atmosphere between management and employees.

But if you are taking money into account as the only metric for the good life.. you will make it here. You will also spend months away from your family too, high divorce rates, mental health issues, physical health issues and other issues. But it is a trade off, you want to make money without a degree or education, you will sacrifice time with your family with it. Yeah I am salty, just spent 10 days on a worktrain lol (yes deployment is longer.. but the 4,300 hours I spent at an away from home terminal last year.. sucked).

But the catch some like the road, some like the office, some like building things, others designing, others serving.. so screw everyone elses metric for what a "good life" is. If you can pay your bills, you are happy, your partner loves you, your kids cuddle with you, that is the good life.. go look for that.

I regret ever hiring on at the railroad, I am no longer eligible to do other things with my life. Now I am stuck here socking money away until I can quit and literally counting the days go by until I can leave, because this is not my happiness. I'd rather be driving taxi. But if you want to be a railroader and want information, I'll do what I can to help you get hired.

Just be aware, the railroads pay you well, because they abuse you.
Everything I have said can be independently verified, heck I can post income statements if needed or google tcrc vs CN or CP etc.

It isn't all bad, true. But yeah be careful.
Abdullah
 
Sorry to hear that, Abdullah. I never heard my father or grandfather say a negative word about being locomotive engineers on inter-city passenger trains. Both enjoyed long healthy, active retirements. They always bid for the highest paying passenger runs, and took pride in "bringing her in on the advertised." My father learned to invest his earnings wisely from his father. 

My uncle was a police officer in Toronto, and had the same philosophy. He talked to me about joining, and said, "Don't ever embarrass this job."

Just my personal opinion, but in emergency services, doing good work is the most fun you will ever have.

Do your job. Live your life. Simple as that. 
 
On gap year: maybe not for those who are high-performers intent on pursuing math, sciences, engineering.  Skills atrophy, and you can't afford to fall behind once classes begin.

A few people have hypothesized that a piece of the social unrest pie is composed of young adults finding that there are insufficient elite jobs for people with elite educations.

How many people skeptical of the value of credentials and the competence of educated people, at the same time automatically defer to "experts" ?
 
Brad Sallows said:
How many people skeptical of the value of credentials and the competence of educated people, at the same time automatically defer to "experts" ?

Dude, that how I make my living :)
 
Back
Top