Fellow travelers,
How much were you making when you Quit/Give up (on your own term, not being laid-off or thinking that's a dead-end job) your job before setting out for your first (or 2nd, 3rd….) long trip? The background to answer this poll is preferred based on:

1. You are quite happy/satisfied with your current jobs/relationships (that you are not trying to run away or escape from where you are);
2. You are not that cynical about how the corporations work in today’s society (Of course we all hope the world can work better and more fair).

Welcome to share what you were doing (position) then and what were you thinking at that time.


Note: question is modified. the previous poll result is (by 2007-2-12):
3 votes, 11%: Less than USD 20,000
10 votes,37%:Between USD 20,000 to 50,000
6 votes, 22%:Between USD 50,000 to 80,000
2 votes, 7%:Between USD 80,000 to 100,000
3 votes, 11%:Between USD 100,000 to 120,000
3 votes, 11%:More than USD 120,000

I will be giving up about 39,000 when I quit in august. It's my first "real" job--doing mostly employee communication for a large corporation. I'll be at 2 years in June.

I currently work as a legal secretary (well, until next week anyway), and am on $45,000 (AUS).

I'll be leaving to travel and work in China for less than $12,000 a year.

When my husband and I quit to go RTW he was in the 80,000-100,000 range and I was in the 50,000-80,000 range. (The advantages to being in your 30s when you go RTW)

YES it was totally worth it, even if we never made that much money ever again. AND despite what everyone said, we were both offered our jobs back. I declined, my husband went back and was given a slight pay dip and he lost some vacation time the following year.

If you can do it, the return on your investment is priceless!

oh yeah, I worked in Children's
Publishing and the hubby works in IT.

I'm secretly hoping they will outsource his job and ask him to move to India...

wow, I feel so broke compared to all of you

It's my first job out of college and I've been there for 5 years at the moment I'm making $40,000. When I quit in April I'll also be giving up 4 weeks vacation/year, 2 weeks off at Christmas, 12 sick days, 3 personal days, and all of the bank holidays for the first 2/3 of the year, and not to mention the flexibility to work at home when needed or to go t doctor's appt. during the day.

I've always had "throw away" jobs that I was never really afraid of quitting.
For about 5 years now I've been working seasonally in a Nat'l Park. Which is a great way to save/make money.
I've always said that one could show up in Yosemite nothing but a toothbrush and within a day or two you would be employed, housed, clothed and even fed.
My boyfriend rolled in there once after one of our trips with $40 dollars in his pocket and we were traveling again within a year.
We haven't taken a year off yet, but we live in a beautiful spot (where it's not really about the job, but what you do on the weekend) that affords us to travel for about 3 to 6 months a year.

oh yeah, We've done everything from Employee Recreation to Ski fitting to Zamboni Driving and various and sundry retail jobs

I have 2 major "give up job" scenarios under the belt.

First was when I was working for a day cruise company - something along the lines of Gato Feo's "throw-away" jobs. Not too much to learn, work with fun people but a "go-nowhere-job". I earned something short of USD30,000pa and this is in the mid 90's.

Second was on a small cruise ship (surprise surprise) with basically the same specs. I will admit though - working on the cruise ship made it very easy to save money. That one was a bit over USD25,000pa in the late 90's, but I paid virtually nil for food and accomodation for the 18 months I was there.

gato, that is so cool. I wish I had the wisdom to live like that when I was younger.

We may make more $ out here but you lose part of your soul doing it. Trust me, there are a LOT of soulless people living in big soulless houses around here.

That never even struck me as 'giving up'. I made up to 90k US$ - and never thought about the money. Now I live in Oz and make about half - which sucks. But no money in the world can buy anything that is more rewarding that the experiences I made through travelling. When time comes, I'll just say good-bye again...and that's it.

When I take off next year I will be leaving behind about $25,000 in headaches. I do not consider it giving up anything. Every time I have left a job to go vagabonding I have enjoyed myself more had less worries(even when in some so called hot spots) and definately dreaded coming back to the ol' work will make you happy attitude of corporate America. Give up let's just say good riddance.

I was on about 28 grand when I quit. I also sold the house, everything in the house and everything that wouldn´t fit in the house.... except the motorbike - couldn´t sell that..... and the guitars. Well, a boy has to have his toys!!!!

elv

It's not so much the job, as everything else. I mean, assuming you can get a comparable job again after the trip, what's the big deal.

The trouble we ran into is that we ended up giving up a lot more than we bargained for. My girlfriend sold her condo so we could both go travelling together. This was obviously not what would normally be called a smart financial move, but it was right for us at the time. Unfortunately, while we were gone, the housing market exploded, and low end housing prices are about $100k higher than they were when we left.

Oops. Had we known that was going to happen, we would have figured out another way.

Oh well, that's life. We're moving forward, and no regrets. We had a once in a lifetime experience, one few people can relate to, and that will undoubtedly shape the rest of our lives. It just means more years of paying a mortgage.

I'm going to be giving up a fairly well-paying teaching job in Japan to teach in Thailand next year. I actually love giving up things and starting over. My way of living has made me realize how insignificant material things are. Oh, I love things a smuch as the next person--and I love having a place to put all of the souvenirs from my travels--but I love giving away my things even more. I chose ESL as a career path so I could live this way. People do try to scare me:what about your 401K OR Roth IRA, they ask. Well, they have a point so I started saving as much as I can for my retirement. But i will never let anyone scare me into being a part of the souless corporate world. I CHOOSE not to, and I love that I can make that choice. God bless the child.