> You could retire at 35 and not have to work for the rest of your life.
Why does everyone on this site want to “retire by 35”? I don’t know anyone who retired (or plans to retire) at 35. Besides, hand-waving about “basic financial literacy” aside, doing so would require living like a broke college student from age 22 to 35, and then moving to an RV in Nebraska to live out the rest of your natural life in “retirement”. What the fuck is the point?
I don't want to retire at 35, but I would like to be able to if I burn out, can't find a job, or whatever. Not having to work ever again (but choosing to continue to work) eliminates a lot of sources of stress for me.
It's not about wanting to, it's about having the option. Then you can do whatever you want. There's no downsides, and it gives you much more leverage in negotiations even if you continue working exactly as before.
Not that hard depending on your natural cognitive ability. Just grind leetcode questions. For higher level interviews, also study up on systems design questions.
I think that's underselling things. These companies have very low admit rates, and leetcode is pretty tedious. That said though, divide the compensation difference by 200 hours of studying and it probably works out to a worthy investment.
One reason they have very low admit rates because most candidates are absolutely awful and cannot code at all, even if they have years of software development experience! Grinding leetcode is definitely worth it.
Before you go gaga over this figure, here's a reality check. Oracle only paid such high wages in their OCI division which had a blank check. After their brutal fight with AMZN over the cloud wars and the subsequent reality check, they've had a ton of layoffs (surprise, surprise). So I would take this comp with a pinch of salt.
I mean... just... wow. You could retire at 35 and not have to work for the rest of your life.
How hard is it to get these jobs?