How do you expect consumers to view flying as anything but a commodity when I can pay 2x more then the customer sitting next to me? The airlines, with their byzantine and constantly shifting prices, have totally ruined any correlation between 'price' and 'value'. It's completely arbitrary from the point of view of the consumer. I might end up an old plane with a horrible seating configuration, or a brand new plane with plenty of legroom and in-flight entertainment. All on the same airline, between the same cities. My experience has no correlation with the price I'm paying, unless I decide to pony up for business class. Even then, among business class, there's a big difference among airlines.

The industry is so concerned with extracting the maximum amount per customer, they forget that it's more important to grow their customer base.

That said, I've been flying almost exclusively Virgin (America/Atlantic) for the last year or two, and they are definitely a cut above. Virgin America has an entire fleet of brand new planes, comfortable seats, personal in-flight entertainment and wifi, and great staff. Virgin Atlantic has Premium Economy, which is so worth the extra few hundred dollars (as opposed to the 2x for business) for flights to Europe. Here, at least, I can justify the price difference, at least vis-a-vis competing airlines.

I wonder how you phrase the offer.

If I were planning to interview with a company and they suggested I use the service, I would get the impression the company is cheap beyond practicality, and find a way to politely back out of the interview.

I lived in China in 2008 and while I'm no expert on China, you will learn quite quickly that some of your perceptions about China are not true:

- In china, you can pay a programmer 600€ a month

Sure, for average programmers. For good ones, you are going to be paying the same as elsewhere. A friend of mine there told me her brother was earning nearly $500 US/day working as a programmer for a company and they even gave him one week off per month. That would be a monthly salary of $500 x 5 days x 3 weeks = $7500

- you have a wide pool of qualified people leaving university which you can always pick from.

True but the Chinese educational system is very different from the "West". Their educational system focuses more on memorization. Creativity and problem solving are not taught very much. This is going to be a huge problem when hiring programmers right out of university. They will be looking to you to tell them everything they should be doing.

- Also, in china people are more willing to travel around to find an appropriate job than in Europe

Yes, I would say this is generally true amongst all classes.

- Quite apart from the chinese programmers, it’s also easier to get foreign programmers to work for you in china than in europe

Are you talking legally or just by the candidate's motivation?

When I was looking for a job as an English teacher, I went to one place and they told me they were only one of two officially registered English schools in the city. They told me that I would need a TESL (Teaching English as a Second Language) degree, which I did not have, in order for them to arrange the work visa. At the place I was hired, I still did not have a TESL degree but they arranged the work visa for me no problem.

Yes, it is more of the wild, wild west but as a foreigner, you are not going to be able to figure out the system very fast and it will cause you a lot of frustration and wasted energy.

- Important is that there are very low additional costs paid to the government. In Europe, you could pay 1/3 – 1/2 of your profits as a small company just servicing the goverment, China does not require this.

To be blunt, this is a very naive statement. Official costs might be low but you're not factoring bribes and other unofficial costs into the mix.

While teaching English, most of my students were in their 20s and 30s so I would often try to bring up topics of conversation for me to understand the way business works there. Many students would tell me that they would hate when government inspectors would come by as that would mean they would need to pay bribes to them. It is also expected that companies need to lavishly entertain these visitors, so in addition to the bribes, you are expected to drop hundreds/thousands of dollars on dinners and drinks.

Many students would also tell me that their dream job was to be a purchaser for a company. Some explicitly told me that this is because then they could receive kickbacks. I also heard quite a few stories about people stealing from their own companies. In fact, one story came from a guy who was just hired at a company and the manager encouraged him to "take a little for himself." The guy was uncomfortable doing this but he later found out that pretty much everyone in the company was doing this and only the owners were unaware of it.

This is the mindset that you need to adjust to. Many people do not think there is anything wrong with bribes and stealing from the company. If you are going to pay them low salaries, they will find a way to make it up from you.

Anyways, I wish you the best of luck. You'll sure learn a lot. It would be great to see a follow-up post from you in 6 months with your experiences.

I wrote about my experience with burnout on a HN comment earlier: https://hackertimes.com/item?id=1508844

I really, really, really want people to avoid what I went through, so it thought I'd share some gory details. I clearly went through every phase of burnout jacquesm mentions.

A compulsion to prove oneself:

This was my entire purpose in life. I worked for a consulting firm with an 'up or out' culture, and this really fed into my desire to prove myself. It's like getting addicted to leveling your character in an RPG, except in real life.

Working harder:

My only mechanism for coping with stress was to 'work harder', which of course fed right back into this vicious cycle. There was a point when I saw how much work was ahead of me on my project, and it was distressing. I didn't think I could keep up the pace. I spoke to someone close to me and said as much, and they said sometimes this is what is required in a job; just break it up into pieces and bulldoze through it. That's the advice that stuck with me for the next year. That advice fed into all of my personality flaws.

Neglecting one's own needs:

At one point I told my boss I needed a weekend off. He was a bit shocked since I hadn't had a weekend off in months. I remember still taking calls on my 'weekend off'. I worked from home, but not so that I could take a break, but instead so I could waste less time commuting or dealing with stuff like personal hygiene, (I'm not joking, I actually rationalized this). My schedule was wakeup, grab breakfast and laptop and start working. Work until I was hungry, then stop to make myself a sandwich and have a 'working' lunch. Around dinner time my wife would feed me, and I would usually work straight through dinner, if I didn't I would spend most of dinner talking about work. Then I would typically work until I fell asleep. I did this for months.

Displacement of conflicts (the person does not realize the root cause of the distress):

Near the end I fabricated paranoid stories about my coworkers and their attempts to make me fail. It took me a year of recovery to finally realize these stories were false and my failure and eventual collapse was almost entirely my own fault.

Revision of values (friends or hobbies are completely dismissed):

It's hard to have friends when you are working 80 hours a week. I didn't have a social life and I killed all hobbies.

Denial of emerging problems (cynicism and aggression become apparent):

-- See displacement of conflicts

Withdrawal, behavioural changes, substance abuse, depression:

I went from occasional smoker to smoking a pack a day. I gained 40 pounds. I became physically ill for weeks at a time, (a simple cough took me a full month to get over). And..(and this is humiliating, but I'm hoping other people will learn from my mistakes), I cried myself to sleep most nights. I don't cry, but during this period of my life, I did.

Nothing is this important. It takes years to recover. If you are still convinced that you need to 'optimize your productivity' then know that my output dropped to zero and stayed there for a long time. That is not very productive.

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