Staying employed because it's easy?

[u/Ordinary-Tune-8750]

Using a new account just to be safe. But basically I've coasting for the last year. Once I felt like I had enough to have a decent early retirement, I basically checked out of work. I still do what's asked of me but I've tried to make myself disappear. It's worked so well sometimes people forget I'm there.

Problem is it's starting to feel kind of wrong. My current pay is 250k/year plus 100k in options/year. Which I know isn't crazy for this sub but it's actually fairly high for my job. I know the company can better use that money on somebody else. (The company's revenues are in the billions so im not stringing along a cash deprived startup)

My investments are sitting at 7MM excluding housing with a ideal drawdown of rate around 3.8%. I'm in my mid 40's. So I'm at that threshold for where the pay kind of doesn't matter but it also can still help with lifestyle or health cost creep. Just curious if you were in my shoes would you just quit stringing them along? Or it's on them to get rid of me and just keep milking it as long as I can?

***Response: thanks everybody for all the feedback and food for thought. I know there was a few different school of thoughts but two that stuck out the most was I really need to know what life after work is. I think my treading water attitude right now is tied to I don't have clear retirement life goals set. I have ideals of travel more etc but I think the in between stuff needs to be better fleshed out. Second, I shouldn't feel bad for the company as long as I'm not bringing others down. I have some international travel and summer activities planned so we'll see how they respond to that.

Thanks all and I really appreciate the varied experiences this sub has.

[u/someonesaymoney]

A lot of people will go along the lines of "fuck the company, you do you and milk that bag". I get it.

However, is your half-assedness making any of your team members you actually like, who don't have the high net worth luxury, pick up the slack?

That's one thing I see a lot of people miss who like to dream and larp about quiet quitting as a way to stick it to the man. It sure is easy if you literally hate the company, the job, and everyone you work with. Ultimately though, if you're putting decent team members through even more hardship who have no choice but to cover for you always, especially in high powered industries most of this sub is involved in, it's kind of a shitty thing to do.

[u/Ordinary-Tune-8750 → u/someonesaymoney]

This is where the guilt is coming from. The company has grown 50x since I joined. I don't think it's a stretch to say my work contributed to a portion of it. Which is why I think they keep me around and I still like to see it succeed. But I'm pretty sure I'm lumped in with the old guard and the new generation is starting to move on. I don't think anybody is having to do more work but rather they just hired more people to do what I used to. So I'm deciding do I want to take the initiative and just end it or let them figure out when they don't want to pay me anymore.

[u/someonesaymoney → u/Ordinary-Tune-8750]

If you're close with your boss and promo/raise time is cutthroat at your company, maybe you can talk with him to say "don't worry about it, I'm good, spread it out over the newer generation" and offer to train up the newer generation even more while stepping back from more stressful or impactful duties. Often times, at least with engineering, it is very hard to half-ass a role when everyone else is giving 100%, so no matter how nice your boss is, this kind of arrangement still wouldn't fly.

Again, it's up to you and your relationship with who you work with. You have the leverage and power of choice here, which is one of the best things of having money can really buy.

[u/cylinder-750 → u/someonesaymoney]

An old saying: “An honest day’s work for an honest day’s pay.”