I need some advice.  I love my career and get paid a nice salary, but my work environment makes me miserable. I am a band director who loves teaching band and working with students.  However, I have to endure unnecessary stress and nitpicking that my other band director friends of other school districts do not have to deal with. I can't get 100% participation from all of the band members, parents are not supportive in fundraising, everyone like to tell me how my job "should" be done even though i have developed an award winning band, and the school is in a very rural area (therefore, I can't always expose the kids to established bands with dedicated kids). On the flip side, I make more money than all of my band director friends.

I was recently offered a position in a better work environment (talented students, nice facilities, great administrative and community support).  However, I would be taking a $15,000 pay cut.  

The problem is that although I make a good salary at my current, I still, also, struggle to pay all of my bills because of my debt.  

I am having a hard time trying to decide if I should take the better job with the large pay cut and possibly struggle even more with my debt or keep my current job with the nice salary but makes me miserable and where I have a little difficulty paying my debt.

Comments? Advice? Opinions?

Is $15,000 worth your potential happiness at your new job? Can you live confortably with the pay cut? Those are really the only two questions that would matter to me.

The grass isn't always greener on the other side of the fence. How can you be sure the new job will be without the crap you deal with at your current job? To me, it sounds like you will most likely have the same complaints regardless of where you are. Of course, I have limited information. So, I could be wrong, and I don't really care to hear your justification. Just be honest with yourself.

Also, if you didn't have debt, it would be much easier to change, as you wouldn't have the drag of the debt. Perhaps you should take care of that and then think about the pay cut.

I guess the question is: which is the bigger stress for you: dealing with those bad aspects of your job or struggling to pay off your debt?

I've taken big pay cuts (including one that was 50%) in the past for better jobs and never regretted it, but I wasn't in debt at the time. For me, being in debt (apart from a mortgage) is stressful, so I'm not sure how that equation would balance for me. But given that we devote a large amount of our time and life energy to our jobs I do think it's important to have a job that's at least bearable if not enjoyable.

You're really just exchanging one stress for another, so you have to figure out which one is harder for you to deal with.

I recently created a thread about my wife's employment where I revealed that I haven't been happy in my job for many years. I know I got at least one reply suggesting I find another job if I was unhappy.

Just as Bichon Frise stated, the grass isn't always greener on the other side of the fence. I left my current job many years ago for greener grass only to discover that I was lied to about the work environment. The staff that I took over was a bunch of unprofessional losers.

Fortunately I was able to get this job back because I had a mortgage to pay. Ever since my focus has been on paying off my mortgage so I have more options. Until then, I will manage to survive having a job I am not happy with. I will never voluntarily take a paycut unless I am COMPLETELY debt free.

I would try to balance out the stress of my current job against the stress of paying off my debt more slowly. If you're already struggling to pay your bills, now might not be the time to take a pay cut...

The source of the problem is the debt, not your current job. If you got rid of enough debt and changed your lifestyle, jumping jobs would be a no-brainer.

Kill the debt first!

Mr. Pop

Personally, I would stick it out at the higher paying job until the debt is cleaned up. Working in a job that makes you miserable isn't a long-term solution, but I'd deal with it until I fixed the mess I was in. As a matter of fact, I don't love what I do right now, but it does pay well and has good benefits. If I were in a better position financially I may not put up with it, but I don't think I have much of a choice right now.

I figure I don't need to love what I do, because it's just a means to an end. I'm concentrating more on paying debt and building savings than I am on whether I am happy enough with my job.

Do you have kids?

One solution is to have kids, it works better if you have two close together in age. Then, every time you go to work it will feel like vacation.

Ha... so true. I have a 3 and 4 year old and completely agree.

On the flip side of this reply is the care & happiness of my kid is far more important to me than whether I am unhappy at work. Thinking about what is most important to me is enough to get me through my work day.

It seems that you have two problems.

1. Debt & your struggle to pay your bills.
2. Dissatisfaction about your current job.

If you're already struggling to pay your bills, a 15k salary cut win't help that and may actually put you in a worse financial situation where you're not able to pay your bills at all. Why not focus on developing a plan to improve your finances, first, then consider alternate work opportunities.