Yeah, I feel like you really nailed it with your way above or way below comment. I wouldn't mind eating **** for a few years if it led to something, but I'm overqualified for a lot of those really low level opportunites. For instance at the I-Bank I briefly worked for before going pro, there were AA's who worked their way up to VP. Even though I could do the job of an AA there in about an hour/day, I wouldn't even be looked at for the position.

As far as my CS degree goes, it's pretty useless to me aside from proving I'm technically capable. I was only ever interested in analytical programming. I should have been a math major, but no one told me what a Quant was until I was a senior in college. Most CS jobs are obviously technical/systems support and applications programming, and I'd be much happier laying brick than trying to explain to some melvin why the Miley Cyrus nip slip video he tried to download crashed the system.

way more than 10% of people have the skill level to win at some form of poker...poker's pretty easy. Surviving as a poker pro is much tougher. I say maybe 5% of people who "go pro" have the skill to make it regardless of lifestyle leaks and maybe 10% are really good at being a poker pro despite being near the bottom of the talent spectrum( sterotypical live pro). Problem is most people undisciplined enough to decide not to do college/job are some of the worst people at being a poker pro(see: most online kids playing WSOP)

I'm somewhere in the bottom 95% of pros skillwise and was terrible at being a pro for pretty much my whole poker career so I'm giving it my best shot at improving at poker and being a poker pro for the next few months and if it doesnt work out for me I'm throwing in the towel.

Thanks for this post best thing I've read on the subject for sure

I am the first to admit, that despite being a winning player in 04-06, the game of mid stakes+ NL definitely passed me by. Mainly b/c I stopped trying to improve my game when I started trading. If I didn't trade and devoted all my time to poker, I am sure I could be a small winner at mid-stakes, but it's not even close to worth my time.

I just wonder how many people you think are a "good amount". I would guess that only a few hundred people in the world can and do make 6 figures+/year on a consistent basis playing poker. It's kind of a catch 22 also in that if you're not making 100k+, you should be doing something else, and if you are you making it, you probably are smart enough to be doing something else.

Where's the evidence for this?

I think at one point a site disclosed that something like <7% were winners

I'd be shocked if that high a percentage are long term winners.

this really is an epic thread

My main question is, if someone is consistently winning 200-300k a year in cash games, who is losing this same amount of money every year? I can understand someone dropping around 10k a year playing poker, but 300k? I would assume the person putting that much money in play will either A) attempt to get better or B) Quit playing and losing 300k a year. I don't know, maybe they are just huge degens who happen to have a lot of money.

My main question to those who earn atleast 200k a year through poker is how long do you expect your winnings to keep up? Will the losing regs at those stakes just leave? Will they improve and cut your profits?

I play 1/2 and 2/5 live, and am not worried as those players will always be around to play as a hobby on the weekends. I also understand that I should, and will (hopefully), get a job coming out of college and hope to do well while making some side money playing low-stakes cash games and taking tourny shots whenever the BR permits.

BTW, Great thread.

Most of those dudes are the ones playing 5/10, 10/20, and 25/50, so very few in the poker population play that and win at. MTT wise, I sucked major dick and had 30k profit on stars, and according to opr, still ranked like 2000th or something...and think about all the winners of the sunday mills/warmups that make up part of the 2000 ahead of me. Makes me wonder, too, who is making all the money in mtts...and what isn't factored into my 30k profit on that one site is I was backed, which most of the higher ups are, so they are making way less than they think; especially since they don't track live play.

http://www.nsdpoker.com/2011/01/mtt-pros/

they aren't making much, anyways good thread

It doesn't have to be one person, it could be 100 people dropping 3k each (just a simplified example not counting rake, etc...).

the tax situation differs widely across countries, have to take this into account
In UK poker earnings are tax-exempt.
Also, to compete for jobs such as those in the OP, you'd have to move to London (and/or pay hefty commuting expenses). I think this will increase cost of living by $20k/year.
Consider a british poker player earning $150k. Expenses are negligible (leased line, computer).

The equivalent salary working in the city should have $150k+$20k AFTER tax.
Thats L105,000 which would require gross income L175,000 = $280k


The tax exemption almost doubles your effective income from poker at these levels. Even for $100k poker income and ignoring the 20k cost of living factor i added, the equiv taxed salary would be $150k

However the issue of taxation is just shifting the threshold. The excellent OP still applies.

New post, 5 Things You Can Do Right Now To Enhance Your Employability is up now, I hope you guys enjoy the ideas.

I'm going to plug our marketplace thread too, this service is the product of countless hours of researching, discussing with industry reps, and consultation with other poker players. Check it out and good luck to everyone in their career search.

Terrific articles. Read them all even though they were long. Can we have an interview article? Thanks.

sixthstreetcareers - cool name

Myself moved away from poker 2007

My prediction for the next 10 years are stronger opponents, shrinking online poker market, legal and tax problems here and there.

So i guess a good player could be glad to have a stable income, many will have
less year to year.

In a normal job your income increase.

So lets say a pokerplayer have now 60K year in 10 years this 60 k are worth around 45 K.

Someone with an slightly above average job have also 60 K but this will grow to 75 and are still 60 in 10 years.

I am not in the US are health insurance retirement etc..added to the income, or do you have to pay from that income ?

Art, not sure if you've mentioned this, but what is your background and resume like?

age.. college.. work history.. etc? just curious because your posts are always really good and can't picture what your background is.

This entirely.

quick question and its not job related, someone "important" asked me about tax yesterday, now in the UK i dont pay tax as a poker player. i dont always like to say im a poker player for a living. So instead of sounding like a tax dodger can i say with my online investing stuff its already taxed at the source so i would be paying tax twice? - is there any truth in that? is there a better way of saying it without having to say, yeah im a pro degen and pro degens dont pay tax in uk.

Great article Art, 2+2 delivers as usual, love these boards.
Since I am in college I've been thinking about going this route. I have a couple questions tho, I switched my major to Applied Math and now I've taken a big interest in finance/economics and the whole market. If I take some extra courses or minor in subjects like economics/finance/statistics/etc, I should be on the right track, right?
Also, I just opened FX Demo account and I've been playing with it and reading alot about FX/Market, but how good are these demo accounts as indicators to where you stand at? Whats the big difference between actual trading and simulation, besides the obvious (money).

Your college path seems good, I'd recommend you look and work hard for an internship at a financial firm, this will be a huge bonus on your resume, to get those you may need good grades so put the hard work in now.

With fx trading, I'd work on looking for correlations between assets, trying to explain those, creating backtests, generally surveying the market. It doesn't sound like you're in a position to trade yourself, you're looking to get into a firm, so your best course of action is to get really good at computing. Have a read of my "5 Things To Improve Your Employability" guide and think about getting good at manipulating financial data for backtesting and statistical analysis. Compile a database of this stuff, come up with some theories, go from there. The worst thing you can do right now is 'paper trade' by random button clicking and let your school go to ****. What you need to prove is an aptitude for the theory side, and then you'll get your shot, but clicking buttons on a sim probably isn't going to interest anyone.

This is hands down one of the best things I've ever read on 2p2.

All the points made in this post are particularly spot on.

I'd also like to add that python, in addition to being a great language to learn first, is also one of the best all around languages out there. Easy to read, web and desktop compatible, and incredibly stats friendly which fits in nicely with the other recommendations you've made. While you're not going to get a job in IT knowing only python, its perfect for people who working on their own projects, or need some custom code every once in a while when Excel just won't cut it.

I majored in econ and physics in college and worked as a spreadsheet jockey at a consulting firm for a couple of years (learning way more Excel than is necessary in the process). I didn't *actually* know how to code until i started collaborating with the free poker database project (fpdb) right here on 2p2 - where surprise, surprise, they use python. For poker players wondering what the best way is to learn how to code, I can't think of a better introduction than python's fantastic online tutorial and the fpdb codebase.

New article: The Importance Of Interview Technique

Enjoy!

best post i've ever read anywhere.

in the process of graduate jobs right now. this has helped HEAPS!!

thank you.

wondering if anyone has tried using the poker report or mentioning 'Professional Poker Player' under employment history?

I skimmed the OP and it seems like a really informative post. Thanks for doing that.

I graduated with a degree in Chemical Engineering, worked 1 year using my degree in the manufacturing industry, then spent the last 2.5 years playing poker professionally. I have recently been thinking about leaving poker and although trading or entrepreneurship sounds awesome, with my lack of knowledge of those skills going back to engineering seems like the sensible decision. Catering to engineering jobs I am wondering how much detail, if any, should go into my resume describing what I did the last 2.5 years. Should it be a small footnote or a full listing with bullet points formatted the same as my other work experience?