How are you making money?

What do yall do for work to fund your climbing?

Does your job let you get out very often?

How often can you afford to go on a climbing trip?

My current solution isn't really applicable to anyone else, but before this renting a cheap room in the SF Bay Area and making $25/hr after expenses driving for Lyft in San Francisco (cheap car with good mileage required to see similar, also not applicable to other areas except maybe Chicago or NYC) worked very well for me. 

Mineral exploration and commercial fishing, gotta give up 3-6 months of the year to do just that, but get the rest of the year to do whatever.

Going on climbing trips isn't very expensive. Getting time off might be difficult, depending on your job. The key thing is having a job, so you can afford a trip.

What kind of work do you do, Christen?

FrankPSwrote:

Going on climbing trips isn't very expensive. Getting time off might be difficult, depending on your job. The key thing is having a job, so you can afford a trip.

What kind of work do you do, Christen?

Just graduated high school and working a minimum-wage fast-food job!

trying to figure out cool ways to make enough money to live and also climb a lot for the next couple of years.

Christen Shultzwrote:

Just graduated high school and working a minimum-wage fast-food job!

trying to figure out cool ways to make enough money to live and also climb a lot for the next couple of years.

seasonal work can a good gig that myself and a lot of my climbing crew use. think wildland fire fighting, river guiding, seasonal park work, etc. depending on where you live you can still get out a bunch during work season, then you can coast for the rest of the year and climb full time if that’s what sets your soul on fire  ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ 

Jobs and housing available at Rock City Mercantile, at City of Rocks.  Climbing on perfect granite is out your door.  Please do it so we can eat pizza. 

Armed security in the cannabis industry. We have no kids, we own most of our house so we climb, BASE, hike alot and go on all the vacations we want, mostly.

I'm also a journeyman electrician(but I hate construction, especially homeowners) so I'm not really compelled to do that anymore. The Wife makes plenty of money so I'm just a well payed security guard in an industry that's ALL cash.

I scalp rec.gov timed entry permits 

Software development, it’s probably one of the best careers/fields for climbing a lot

I used to work on the business side of digital advertising, did that for 15 years on 3 continents, 5 cities and 7 companies/agencies.
2.5 years ago I pivoted and I now own and run a jewellery store with my wife.

Hank Caylorwrote:

Armed security in the cannabis industry. We have no kids, we own most of our house so we climb, BASE, hike alot and go on all the vacations we want, mostly.

I'm also a journeyman electrician(but I hate construction, especially homeowners) so I'm not really compelled to do that anymore. The Wife makes plenty of money so I'm just a well payed security guard in an industry that's ALL cash.

Maybe not ideal because you have to be so darn old but being retired lets me do pretty much whatever I want - if only my body worked a little more like when it was younger.

Noah Betzwrote:

Software development, it’s probably one of the best careers/fields for climbing a lot

Boom years are over somewhat...after the crypto bust and the interest rate rises, there are no longer insane sums of money being flung around. Instead there are lay-offs left right and center.

There was a period where yeah you could have swung a stupidly well paid, fully remote Web dev job, knocking React boilerplate, as a boot camp grad. Not anymore I don't think. If you don't have a CS degree or real experience in a specialty, ChatGPT can code better than you.

rock climbing wrote:

Sugar mama period!

I feel like there might be some important punctuation that’s missing. 

Jay Andersonwrote:

Jobs and housing available at Rock City Mercantile, at City of Rocks.  Climbing on perfect granite is out your door.  Please do it so we can eat pizza. 

This is a great answer because, if you are wanting to climb a lot for a few years after high school, the best place to do it is in a place where you can climb before work, after work, and on your days off without having to travel.  You don't say where you are currently living, but there are places where you could find ample employment opportunities for unskilled labor, with year round climbing, and probably make enough money to pay for a room rental and a car.  Las Vegas maybe as one example.

Another obscure one, I knew a guy that was a fireworks display technician (pyrotechnician?) 

He would work 12 hours a day 7 days a week before New Years Eve, and other holidays, and make bank, and not have to work much the rest of the year.

If you like fire a little bit too much, it may be the part time job for you.

What are you doing after you graduate from high school? I hope it's more than just climbing. College? Full-time job? Learn a trade?

Are your parents letting you live at home while you're working your fast-food job?

Don't make climbing your primary goal.

I’ve been working in the pest control industry for 5 years. Started out hourly treating for termites but do the sales side now. I make decent money and have plenty of time to hit local crags before or after work. Some weeks are busier than others, but living somewhere central(15mins) to climbing has really tipped the scales of my work/play balance.

I’m not lol

A V wrote:

Onlyfans (the new dirtbag career)

You should check out OnlyCrags. It's the climbers OF equivalent.