I've been a long time lurker here and I wanted to introduce myself before I left. I first started in cable about 2 years ago as an in house tech for time warner here in southern california. It was supposed to be a "part time" job as I was finishing my senior year of college. I found it to be an enjoyable job and I lasted about a year until I graduated. Once I finished school I thought I was done with cable. However after a year passed by I decided to give contracting a try because of all the great money that these guys were making...or so i had heard.
To be honest I was making decent money, an average of 1,300 a week take home compared to the 12.50 an hr Time Warner started me out with. This was until this March (only 2 months ago). Time Warner killed all the contractors in my area (orange county) except for 3 companies. I than found a contractor in Los Angeles (the 2nd biggest time warner area in the US) so I thought I would be ok again.
As everyone is finding out, this industry is dead. I'm averaging about $500 a week take home, the pay sucks (I'm doing video for free on any combo job). My dad owns a trucking company and I'm going to go drive for him until I can save enough to go back to school for a Masters.
I truly enjoyed my job for the most part and was pleasantly suprised to find most of my contractor co-workers did better work than my inhouse guys. If there is no work in the LA metro market, everyone else is screwed. It will NOT get better, if you're not planning to leave this industry, I highly suggest you start.
For those of you who have no other choice to weather out this storm, I wish you all the best, good luck and God bless.
hello and goodbye
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