poker pro - hardest job there is?

[joop]

Just a few notes...

I don't think commuting makes a job harder. Two brothers both work as accountants... one walks out his front door and accross the road each day. The other catches a train for 2hrs into London, and back home each day. Which one has the harder job? Neither - they're both accountants. Commute is irrelevant, IMO. Which one has a harder time getting to their job? Obviously the second guy.

In regards to number of tables played. Since someone else also suggested playing less tables to make things easier. This is kinda a non-issue, since I started in my inital post "given the outline of 'my job' above", and that was playing 6 tables and 40k hands a month. That's what we're comparing to other jobs. I'm not looking for a way to make my job easier, I'm accepting it for what it is - and wanting to compare it to other jobs.

I get the feeling you play NL? There's a big difference between 6max LHE and NL in number of tables people can manage... playing winning poker at 8-12 tables of 6max LHE is pretty much unheard of at midstakes. There was a thread in MHSH a while ago where the consensus was that to acheive a modest winrate in todays games, people were playing 4 tables on average.

Flexibility. I guess having flexible hours makes it an easier job. It's more the time that I am playing that I was comparing, though [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

And regarding savings - a midstakes pro will have 6months living expenses ready to fall back on, so that is not an issue. Any "pro" that is living week to week isn't being much of a professional.

[john kane]

this has to be a joke post. the only hard part is mentally in that you don't have a guarenteed income.

other than that it is undoubtedly one of the easiest.

[joop]

[ QUOTE ]
this has to be a joke post. the only hard part is mentally in that you don't have a guarenteed income.

other than that it is undoubtedly one of the easiest.

[/ QUOTE ]

Not a joke.

How long were you a pro?

[demon102]

I used to do cleanouts, move furniture, cut grass, flip burger as well as other food service crap and all were harder then playing poke imo.

[john kane]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
this has to be a joke post. the only hard part is mentally in that you don't have a guarenteed income.

other than that it is undoubtedly one of the easiest.

[/ QUOTE ]

Not a joke.

How long were you a pro?

[/ QUOTE ]

meh played for last 3.5 years as much as i can. 6 months each year full time, other 6 months almost full time. took about 6-7 weeks off each year to pass exams.

i want to carry on playing pro now. making $250/hr+ at a computer game is every mans dream.

the only times i haven't wanted to go pro is when ive been losing, and that mainly becuase i haven't been playing well enough. my fault for playing badly, not the profession (and no not variance, just not playing well).

[wire]

Dude, try teaching kids.

With most jobs, if you refine your skills or get more experience, you are not directly (or immediately) compensated for it. Or your undercompensated.

Poker is great that way. It's one of the few meritocracies. Really, I can't think of another profession where skill and reward are more directly correlated. Maybe pro sports.

This is the benefit that outweighs all the bad.

[11ofhearts]

how about paremedic? at least if your aces get cracked nobody dies. plus they work 78 hour shifts sometimes...

I work in a factory 40 hours a week and make crap, poker is how i relax in my free time, i think people in situations like mine are why your post is causing aggrivation. I beleive that anything could seem very hard out of context but if you went and got a full time job doing something like assembly line work i think youd be DYING to go back to poker, dont complain TOO much, you are one of the lucky ones.

[KingGordy]

[ QUOTE ]
I used to do cleanouts, move furniture, cut grass, flip burger as well as other food service crap and all were harder then playing poke imo.

[/ QUOTE ]

Playing poker is much harder then flipping burgers or being a cashier or whatever, at least on a per hour basis. Obviously pokers better overall because you make way more, can set your own hours, and don't really have to play that much, but if you offered my 300/hour to flip burgers vs. 300/hour to play poker I'd flip the burgers.

[joop]

[ QUOTE ]
With most jobs, if you refine your skills or get more experience, you are not directly (or immediately) compensated for it. Or your undercompensated.

Poker is great that way. It's one of the few meritocracies. Really, I can't think of another profession where skill and reward are more directly correlated. Maybe pro sports.

This is the benefit that outweighs all the bad.

[/ QUOTE ]

This is a point some other people have touched on, so I'd like to address it. The fact that in poker we are rewarded monetarily directly based on our skill level doesn't make the job less/more difficult.

I like your pro-sports analogy because I'm into cycling and have thought about competing. I consider playing poker as a pro similar to this endeavor... and it's exactly why I consider poker to be so difficult.

As you get better and better at poker you start to move up the stakes... and of course, you come accross tougher and tougher competition. It's the same in cycling, say you are a CAT3 racer and move up to CAT2... you got better, but so did everyone else - it's still just as hard as ever, it never gets easier just because you got better. Same when you move up to CAT1, then you're racing against guys that are one step away from going pro. It's the same with weight training at the gym - you are almost always lifting close to your max... it never gets easier, because when you get stronger, you put more weight on the bar.

When you move up stakes in poker, it's good because you make more money - but it actually become harder, because your opponents are generally much more skilled. If I could sit and play $1/2 and make the same money I can at my current stakes, my "job" would be much easier. I wouldn't have to think nearly as much, I could go on auto-pilot, I wouldn't be faced with as many difficult decisions - and the general stress of playing would be much less because I'm up against easier competition.

I liken this to most other jobs. Your skills increase, you gain more experience and knowledge of your work, but it never actually gets anymore difficult. Say you're working in McDonald's for example. You've been there a couple of years and can handle the mad rushes of peak hour - you can make 300 burgers an hour, or whatever. The manager doesn't come up to you and say, "Hey buddy, we like your work - we're moving you up to our super-store, you're gonna need to pump out 500 burgers an hour". Another example, say you're an accountant... this job requires basic math skills... it never gets any harder, you do the same [censored] day in day out... after a while, you are going to be able to do it on auto-pilot. It's not like some day all of a sudden you're gonna have to be doing complex calculas - it just stays what it is. Most jobs continue to be the same, whilst the employee becomes more proficient... how much money you make is irrelevant.

There's an economic balance in the world where people are paid a suitable amount based on the difficulty of their job. There's a reason labourers aren't paid well - because it's mindless grunt work. Same with flipping burgers. Same for a cleaner... what's difficult about their job? Nothing. That's why they get paid so little.

So what about the well paid jobs... like a doctor or a lawyer. These are much higher paid because they are more difficult. They require much more knowledge, a much higher education, demand more of the employee, and generally are much more stressful - this is why they pay more. I feel it's the same for poker... if poker is so easy, like most people in this thread claim it to be, then why isn't everyone doing it? Because it's not. It's like trading the stock market... oh, that must be easy, sit on your ass every day and click buy or sell when stocks are going up/down... EASY! If it's so easy, why does almost everyone that attempts to trade for a living end up failing.

Generally, the highest paid jobs are the most difficult. There's a reason poker is one of the higher paid jobs.

Oh, and to all those people saying how lucky I am to play poker for a living... how exactly have I been lucky? Making poker my life for 3years wasn't luck. Working my ass off to beat these games day in day out wasn't luck. I *wish* I could be one of these poker pros that says poker is easy... I wish I had a natural ability to beat the games with little effort... unfortunately it's been a damn hard slug for me.

[Jamougha]

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There's an economic balance in the world where people are paid a suitable amount based on the difficulty of their job.

[/ QUOTE ]

This is rubbish.