r/overemployed 17d ago

Legit OE business OE Discord

Upvotes

The original OE open unmoderated discord turned into an unusable mess with all the spam and bots. To prevent this from happening to our new discord and keep the tourists and your HR department away so it is a safer place to discuss strategies and methods we're removing the link from reddit and requesting anyone who wants access to request it through the mods first. Please have some sort of post / comment history in the sub first.


r/overemployed Feb 12 '25

Running FAQ

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I wanted to create a running FAQ to help cut down on the number of times we have to discuss the same topics and make sure people are getting the proper answers / advice. I will edit this post with additional questions and answers as they come up.

  1. What are the best jobs to OE?

People can and do OE in any Job where you can work remote or hybrid is a potential target. The ideal job is one that isn't meeting heavy or one where you can control the meetings. Being senior enough to delegate out some of the busy work is also helpful. You generally want to make sure you are good enough at your first job that you can meet/exceed expectations on less than 15 hours per week of actual real work. It's also better to OE on a large team / large company. When there is a busy season or a large project the increase in work is more evenly spread across a large number of people so you're less likely to have to deal with large peaks and valleys in level of effort.

  1. What jobs should be avoided?

Anything requiring any sort of clearance from the government or other regulatory body. Don't OE a federal clearance job or anything requiring a FINRA clearance. Good Rule is "If any part of your paycheck comes from public funds don't OE that job". Public sector work pays shit anyway and you're better than that. Go find a solid private sector role and reduce the risk.

  1. W2 or Contract?

A lot of people prefer the stability of having at least one W2 for the benefits but I (secretrecipe) personally prefer to go all contract (on Corp to Corp or C2C) terms. You make significantly more money and get far better tax treatment and the increase in net income more than makes up for having to cover your own benefits. There's more detail here if you are interested.

  1. Will the sub go private?

No. At least not for the foreseeable future. Every CEO and HR department already knows about OE and has for well over a decade. This isn't a new thing. It's all the quiet quitters out there who slack off and deliver nothing of value while working remote that are causing problems. Not the folks who are delivering as expected at multiple jobs.

  1. How do I manage a required office visit?

OE in the office isn't terribly difficult if you go in prepared. Have a mobile hotspot for your J2+. keep J2+ zoom or teams active on your phone so you can reply to IMs quickly. Find some nice quiet disused conference room or other space in the office you can utilize for meetings or work that pops up. Don't be afraid to take a call from the lobby or parking lot. People take personal calls all the time. If you don't act nervous then you won't look suspicious. Try and control your meetings towards the beginning or end of the day so you can minimize the amount of running back and forth you need to do.

  1. LinkedIn

There are a number of ways to handle this.
Obfuscation - Create multiple accounts with your name and various details. Don't upload a photo etc.. Create noise around the search and any time someone asks you about LI just mention that you don't use it.
Abandonment - Remove any recent work history and make it look like you just haven't done anything to update your profile. If anyone asks or pushes the issue tell them that you used an old work email to register the account and you have no access to it anymore so you just don't use LI any longer.
Restructure - (this is what I personally do) Nothing says your LI profile needs to be your online resume. Remove any work history or affiliation with any company and restructure the profile to discuss your talents, your aspirations and career goals.

If you work at a place or in a role that demands you have a Linkedin profile with them then go ahead and opt for the first option. Use a shortened name or a nickname and leave it as sparse as possible.

  1. How do I find a Job/J2 / Job hunting questions

This isnt a job hunting sub. that is a skill that you need to figure out as a prerequisite to being OE. Knowing how to fairly easily land remote / hybrid jobs is something most of the true OE community has become quite good at and tends to gatekeep for obvious reasons.

  1. Tax season

Unless you have an incredibly simple return, no kids, no property, no real assets, just a couple W2s and that's it I would recommend getting an accountant. A few thoughts beyond that. On withholdings, underwitholding penalties. They're small. You'll get a much larger return on your money over the span of a year even if you just park it in a HYSA than the underpayment penalty will cost. You can go to a simple calculator input your info and get a directionally correct estimate of how much you'll owe and adjust your withholdings accordingly.
On Security, the IRS / your accountant don't give a shit if you have more than one W2. Nobody is going to tell on you. No need to be paranoid about this.
On tax strategy. Advice on this is best asked to your CPA. Everyones situation is different so any advice given here may be awesome for some people and not work at all for others. I personally only work on C2C terms and have a moderately aggressive tax strategy and get my effective tax down to about 15% each year which is less than half of what I would end up paying were I working fully on W2 terms.

  1. W2? Contract? Mix?

If you're particularly concerned about stability then keeping one W2 job is great, gives you better protections, better benefits etc.. I'm of the opinion that J2+ is better on contract than W2. Lower risk, higher pay, less background scrutiny, no need for the additional benefits etc... I personally work all my jobs on contract (C2C) and here's my rationale. Quick disclaimer your personal situation may be unique. This is a one size fits most approach.

  1. Don't start new jobs close to one another.
    Keeping some distance between your J1 and J2+ isn't just a bit of good advice geographically but is also good advice on start dates. You never want to find yourself starting two jobs on the same day, week, month if you can avoid it. You need to figure out the lay of the land and your capacity for addtional work before you commit to additional jobs. Onboarding two jobs at once is a recipe for disaster.

  2. Is there anyone OE in _________.

Yes, if it's a white collar field that has the opportunity for remote or hybrid work there someone OEing it. If you want to find those people join the discord and ask around.

  1. OE isn't for everyone.

OE is difficult to pull off and even more difficult to manage long term. It isn't for people just starting out, people looking for a career change, people who aren't already at the top of their game or people that have to ask really simple questions that they could figure out with a google search. If you're not skilled enough to pull this off you could end up screwing up your career. Don't try this before you're ready. If you have to ask questions like "How do I find a second job?" or "how do I get a remote job" you're not ready.

  1. Is it worth the risk? Should I...? What's the best..."

These are all subjective questions that no internet stranger can answer for you. Everyone has a different skill set, different set of innate talents, different set of goals and different risk tolerance. If you were directed here after asking a question like this then it's because only you can answer this for yourself.

  1. J1 and J2 use the same payroll, insurance provider, 401k provider etc... Is this a problem?

No. The only scenario where this may be a problem is if they're using the same PEO like Insperity because they aren't just a payroll provider, they're an outsourced HR / Risk management team as well who has a remit to protect the business from liability.

  1. Will my bank, mortgage broker, loan underwriter, accountant etc... rat me out

No.

I'll dig around our past posts for some other frequently asked questions and keep adding here. If you have any you recommend be added please comment below.


r/overemployed 18h ago

Jury duty with 2 Js, and the part I cant solve

Upvotes

I got summoned last week for a pool that runs 2 weeks starting on the 21st. First time this has come up since I started OE and I couldn't find much in here about it, so here's where I've got to in case it helps somebody else.

Both Js have paid jury leave, which is the good news. Both of them want the same 2 things to process it, a copy of the summons up front and then a certificate of attendance from the court at the end (they both call it something different but it is the same form). The summons is a scan of one document with my name on it and nothing on it references an employer at all, so the same scan going into 2 HR portals isn't a problem.

Getting paid by both while I sit in a courthouse also seems fine. Neither one is paying me to do work in that window. They're each paying jury leave under their own policy, and neither policy says anything about other employment.

Where it falls apart is if I actually get seated. The pool I can probably manage, since you sit around most of the day and I can stay on top of messages in the gaps. A trial that runs for days is me being unreachable at both Js on the SAME days, and that's the one scenario I genuinely have no answer for.

The other thing I keep turning over is that J2 asked for the juror number so payroll can verify the dates against the court calendar. J1 didn't ask for anything beyond the scan. I don't think that number reveals anything, but I also don't love handing an identifier tied to a court record to one employer and not the other.


r/overemployed 11h ago

Post OE LIFE and Job

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My Fire target is 4.5M i am at 2M. I am 42. I need 5 more years of OE i.e J2 or Max J3. I should reach 4M by 48. After that i can call quits but i don’t want to sit idle my kids will be in middle school and busy with their lives. I was thinking to do a Govt FT JOB and accrue some pension or just a good 120K salary laid back job. So my que are there jobs like this out there how do we get into Govt job where i make less act dumb and put in less efforts or it genuinely requires less effort.


r/overemployed 12h ago

Canadian 1st timer...

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Hey folks,

I just got 2 job offers for remote work here in Canada. One is a customer service type of role and the other is data centered, so theoretically there should be no problem doing both at the same time. But I am worried about potential pitfalls or legal repercussions.... If I accept both jobs, what are the risks with being overemployed in Canada? Can I get sued.... or worse? Am I potentially committing fraud or anything?


r/overemployed 1d ago

Curious if anyone knows if this is true? This guy worked 11 jobs and went to jail

Post image
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r/overemployed 11h ago

Background Check When Returning to an Old J?

Upvotes

Left my longest running original J1 in earlier this yr for a new J that fell through shortly after. Kept my J2(now J1) I've been working for 1.5yrs now.

Now there's a chance to return to my og J1, but I'm worried about the background check.

Everything's frozen as far as I can tell for verification.

My question is if I put down my current J1 as my recent exp, would it show up on the background check as overlapping with my old J1 or since everything's frozen could I just list my J1 with modified dates use my paystubs for verification?

Could also list my current J2, but only been there a month and would still have a gap of a few months.

Thanks for the help as always!


r/overemployed 1d ago

Have you accepted a an OE gig knowing you’ll have to quit soon?

Upvotes

Have an offer for J2 and I can definitely do it throughout the end of the year and maybe into early next year but 100% I’ll have to be in office for J1 by February 2027. Is it worth taking on J2 knowing I’ll have to quit 5-6 months later?

What do you say if you have to quit?


r/overemployed 1d ago

Company enforcing a 3-day in-office (WeWork) time

Upvotes

In short, the new job I'm getting has a 3-day in-office policy, which happens to be a WeWork office. Ideally I would like to stay 100% remote, so just curious how this policy is even monitored/enforced from the corporate side? All my coworkers (USA) work 100% remote, and this policy will only apply to me (Canada). My manager doesn't care if I work remote or not; the policy is coming straight from the top down / HR.

Basically is there a way to game the system so that I stay 100% remote, while complying with their 3-day WeWork in-office corporate requirements? I never worked at WeWork offices before so I'm not sure if there's a badge or something that you swipe to enter and exit, and that's how corporate tracks your in-office time remotely.


r/overemployed 17h ago

Lost J1 beginning of the year. Found a replacement, but don't want to put it on my resume. What should I do?

Upvotes

Lost J1 in Jan. Found a new role a few weeks later. Thing is, I don't want to put any of my active jobs on my "new" resume going forward. How do I explain my 7-8 month gap on my resume? There's 0 chance I get any callbacks with a 8 month gap in this market, LOL.

Has anyone extended their previous J1 dates to current? Even after they lost J1?

Wondering if background checks will flag a 8 month discrepancy between what I list on my resume going forward and actual proof (paystubs) I can provide. Has anyone ever done this? How did it go for you?

I know the trick of putting a C2C contract as my current role that no one can verify (haven't set this up yet), but looking for other solutions as well.

Thanks for all this community's help!


r/overemployed 18h ago

Resume & OE

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Hey everyone - could use some advice. I have an opportunity for a J3. The issue is that the skills I really need to be promoted are a combination of skills that I have in J1 & J2. My question is how to list my employment dates so it doesn't look like I am OE.

Do I list one of the jobs on my resume, like it appears like I am no longer employed there? How have some of you approached this? I appreciate any and all advice.


r/overemployed 2d ago

J4 previous employer check was a joke…

Upvotes

Contract work.

I put a well known company on my resume as current employer (worked for them briefly a few years ago).

Got the job offer. Background check started by third party.

Only put one made up company on background check for last 7 years. Put my alternate number on the contact if they tried to verify.

They come back saying they tried to call three times ( they did not) and never got a hold of the previous employer (my fake company). Client/agency never followed up (or even looked at it probably).

I start Tuesday.


r/overemployed 1d ago

J1 (Big Tech SE, good comp + RSU) burning me out, got a J3 offer but it’s less pay/no RSU and I’m worried about stacking 3 jobs

Upvotes

Hey guys, I’m in a bit of a situation here and would like some advice.

I currently work at a big tech company as an SE. It’s one of the companies that looks great on a resume and pays well. We’re predicted to hit quota this year and beyond, and the RSUs are a great piece of my comp.

Recently though, leadership has shifted tremendously and started pushing us to do more with less, and if you can’t, it’s “why aren’t you using AI,” causing a lot of stress. I can also see a bit of micromanagement creeping in here and there, not too much, but I’m cautious about it. My second job is as a DevOps/SWE contractor, and it’s pretty chill.

The problem is J1 has been giving me a lot of headaches, to the point of near burnout because of this drastic change. It’s calmed down a bit this past week, but still.

I recently received an offer for another SE position, J3. This one seems a lot more chill, but it doesn’t offer RSUs and the total comp isn’t as much as my current J1.

Now I’m conflicted. If I take it, I’m not sure I’ll be able to handle the workload of J1, J2, and J3 all at once. If I don’t take it, I’m afraid I won’t be able to sustain J1 and will end up with only the contract role.

What would you do in this scenario?


r/overemployed 15h ago

Upper Level J’s

Upvotes

I’ve been reading a lot here, but it seems like everyone here that’s OE have J’s that are low level. Everyone is making less than 150k in their OE J’s. Does anyone here have higher level J’s that are OE? (Making at least 250k per J)


r/overemployed 1d ago

Has OE (3js +) affected you spiritually?

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I know this might be a bit of a different question.

But for the experienced ones that have performed OE for multiple months/years succesfully with more than 3Js

Has it affected you spiritually?

I am passing a bit of a tough time rn, and i am evaluating the different aspects of my life to search for the root cause.

I have 3js since 2 months already

And 2js for 6 months more

Def there it is challenging even though i dont feel has been outstandingly that i could not handle

It went exponential from 2js to 3js i am planning to change the j3 on january february max that one is the most drainning


r/overemployed 16h ago

How would you rank your js if one is much less certain

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Working 2js,1 is higher pay but more prone to layoffs and not long term imo. Someone will purchase this company and do layoffs, the other is less pay but much more stable.

Both remote both senior both great managers and Co workers

Which would you prioritize?


r/overemployed 2d ago

I'm taking the plunge - and can't tell anyone else

Upvotes

Long time lurker, and wanted to OE for probably 3 years. I've chickened out at least once with a potential J2 probably 2-3 years ago, but I've always managed to get a bump or something at my lax hybrid J1.

However, about a year ago, we got bought and the new owner has been nothing but a headache. We were actually kind of excited initially - our company bureaucracy was a little bit "overcompromising". Everybody had to be happy with an outcome, so our products didn't grow well and were clearly designed by committee. But of course with new owners comes "cost-cutting", and layoffs hit a few months ago. I am taking the leap to avoid being blindsided by a layoff, though I'm one of their high performers.

I know half the technology at this company, and I already have to regularly escalate to my CTO that "I can't do this all" to avoid burnout. It was a bit of a problem last year, but I'm proud I got it under control this year.

Anyways, I think I had the fastest interview of my life to a "next-monday-offer" from a personal connection. Another hybrid role, but I'll be damned if I step in shit leaving J1. I'm making the leap! I've got some J1 time off for my new start date, and I'm going to milk the new owner for all he's worth. I slogged at this place for ages and I'm ready to try something different, and get a better deal out of it. I start J2 soon, J1 is about to be my bare minimum job. I'm going to be "grabbing coffee from the store" almost every morning 😄. I like bribing my colleagues, so I like to think it'll buy me some grace.

I haven't told my partner yet. I'm not sure when I do tell them. I don't think I will until I can give them something nice as a "thank you for letting me work so much and not asking questions". Wish me luck - I'm hoping I make it to the holidays for Round 1.


r/overemployed 1d ago

How do you rank your J’s?

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Besides which came first, how do you decide which one is primary vs secondary?


r/overemployed 1d ago

Holidays

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What do you do when 1 or 2 of your N servers are on vacation? Do you take on the full workload for the ones who are still working, or do you work ahead?


r/overemployed 1d ago

Looking to OE again

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I am looking to OE again but really struggling to find something where u won't get caught. I have a really nice role but work in recruiting with LinkedIn recruiter so I cannot hibernate. This is what got me caught 2 years ago.

Backstory - I was working as a director of talent acquisition for a small nonprofit with about 100 ppl and a director of executive search for a small search firm with about 10 ppl. I somehow managed to do this for one year. I got caught because a new leader joined the nonprofit and looked me up on LinkedIn. My boss from my other role shouted me out recently in a post, and although I asked her to remove it, my name, untagged myself, and reported it, it still showed up when you searched my name. Devastating. I was given an option to pick. Was too scared to OE again. Then got laid off in Jan of this year. I've been in my new role for a large company as an executive recruiter for a few months now. I want to bring in extra cash to boost my emergency fund after being without work for six months.

Okay, if you made it this far, what are some suggestions of other areas I could oe in besides TA? If I stayed in TA, any recommendations to prevent getting caught again. We all know the job market is brutal right now, so how do I stand out? Finally, anyone hiring?! Hahaha don't answer that one.


r/overemployed 2d ago

Welp, back to one job

Upvotes

Well… back to only one job.
It’s been a crazy journey. I started OE about a year ago when I had an in-person job two days a week and got offered a fully remote J2. I took both and was literally hiding my second laptop at J1 and running around trying to find places to take meetings.
As insane as that was, OE allowed me to fully fund a six-month emergency fund. Then, literally three weeks after I voluntarily quit J2 because the situation became impossible, J1 announced they were letting me go.
That alone showed me why OE can be so valuable. I didn’t have to care what unemployment decided or panic about immediately finding another job. I had six months of expenses sitting there because of OE.
Fast forward to the last six months and I think I’ve worked 11+ different jobs/contracts of varying lengths. Some lasted less than a week, some a few weeks, some months. I’ve had so many different combinations of J1/J2/J3 that I’m going to get an absurd number of W-2s next year.
Financially, though, it worked. When I lived in Europe I was making around $30k/year max. In just the last six months, I’ve managed to save/invest around $60,000 between retirement accounts, my emergency fund, taxable brokerage, etc.
Three weeks ago I still had three jobs. One six-month contract wasn’t renewed, and then two days ago another job let me go for “performance reasons.”
The weird thing is that none of the jobs that have let me go for performance have ever actually talked to me about my performance beforehand. No “why is this taking so long?” No “where are the notes?” No “here’s the expectation you’re not meeting.” Nothing. They just make assumptions and then suddenly you’re gone. I genuinely don’t understand where the performance expectation is coming from if nobody ever communicated it to me.
But over the last few months my attitude toward OE changed anyway. I realized I was starting to burn out just to endlessly accumulate money. Every extra dollar was going straight into investments, but there’s no finish line to that. You can always make and invest more.
So I decided my stable J1 with my health insurance, PTO, benefits, etc. gets priority. The contract J2/J3s? I’m not letting them make me miserable. One basically turned into a call center job, so I took as few calls as I could reasonably get away with. If eventually they fired me, so be it. I still squeezed a lot of money out of these jobs without letting them completely consume my life.
And now that I’m suddenly back to one job, I actually don’t know if I want another one until next year.
The biggest thing I’m noticing is the mental load disappearing.
I’m taking three days off in a couple weeks to go to the beach. Normally I’d take PTO from J1 but still have a contract job with no PTO. I’d be “on vacation” carrying two or three laptops, checking Teams, taking meetings, answering emails, dealing with multiple bosses.
This time I’m actually going to be on vacation. I can be at the beach getting drunk on a Thursday afternoon and literally not think about a job. Same with Thanksgiving and Christmas. When I’m off, I’m actually off.
After six months of constantly juggling multiple laptops, bosses, coworkers, meetings and calendars, that sounds fucking amazing.
So yeah, OE worked. I saved/invested about $60k in six months, built a real emergency fund, massively accelerated my retirement savings and survived losing multiple jobs without financial panic.
But for now, I think I’m going to enjoy having one job again.


r/overemployed 2d ago

Anyone here get into OE from a non-tech background?

Upvotes

Most of the OE stories I see seem to come from people in tech or people who already had a pretty established remote career.
I’m curious about the opposite path. Has anyone here successfully gotten into OE without a tech background or a particularly impressive/linear resume?
I’m reasonably comfortable with AI and picking up new tools, but otherwise I’d be coming at this pretty fresh. I’m less interested in specific job openings and more interested in how people in that situation actually made themselves OE-capable.
Did you deliberately build toward a particular kind of remote work first, or did you end up in an OE-friendly role and realize afterward that you could add another J?
Would be interested in hearing how people here actually made that transition.


r/overemployed 2d ago

Dumb Question about Background Checks

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When you try getting a 2nd, 3rd, 4th, etc. job, don't they run a background check to find out your previous employment. I mean, it seems like that would throw some red flags showing you have multiple jobs simultaneously.


r/overemployed 1d ago

OE while J1 (Job1) is with a city government. What are the potential issues?

Upvotes

For a person who is Over Employed (OE) while J1 (Job1) is with a city government. What are the potential issues, legal and otherwise?

Background:

This is in Texas in a large city, like Dallas, Houston, San Antonio, Fort Worth, or Austin.

All work is remote. All work is in IT (Information Technology). There are no set hours specified for any of the jobs. There is no working for one employer when supposed to be working for another employer. All work is satisfactory or better. There are no missed deadlines.

Question:
What are the potential issues, legal and otherwise?


r/overemployed 3d ago

OE Made Me Extremely Intolerant

Upvotes

Currently working 4Js. I've had J1 and J2 for about 3 years now, and J3 and J4 for a couple of months.

I was a Staff Engineer about 4 years ago, before OE, but when the layoff season started in late 2022, I basically had to start doing OE out of necessity since I was the breadwinner.

Now I have way more experience, but all my positions are Senior Engineer roles. Realistically, by now I probably should be Staff/Senior Staff, but I'm also probably making 2–3x more with OE, so I don't really care about the title anymore.

J4 has a pretty toxic culture. The manager disappears for weeks, and when he comes back, he suddenly expects everything to be perfect. The team is all over the place, and things barely move because we basically have one squad doing the work of an entire department.

Currently, I'm probably working more at J4 than at J1–J3 combined. The only reasons I haven't quit are that my total hours are still manageable and J4 pays the most.

Well, my manager just went full micromanager on me and asked why I wasn't available during a certain period. It was literally like a 30-minute gap. To be fair, that's probably only the second time something like this has happened in four months, so it's not frequent, but man... for the entire day I kept thinking about telling him what I really thought and quitting on the spot.

I didn't say anything. Instead, I'm just going to put less effort into this job and prioritize the others. I'll probably milk it until at least the end of the year.

Thats why we OE.