Advice on leaving a 40k job at 24 to go back to university and change career

I have some mates who have worked in the 'motorsport' business (as you put it), and they all found that the pay, and the way they were treated left a lot to be desired. I hold a masters degree in electrical engineering, and have worked about 20 years is satellite communications. In the states, someone with a bachelors in IT, with about 10 yrs experience, should be earning about $60,000 currently - roughly 40k quid. With a masters, you could add about 20 to 30k to that. Realistically, [on this side of the pond, and i suspect on your side], in order to run a reasonable sized project (say $1mill or more), and to have some say in what you are doing with it, you would need to have a master's degree. Without that, most people are going to figure that you don't really know what you are doing. This is true, when those making that judgement, don't have master's degrees in ANYTHING. They may be lucky to have even bachelor's degrees. Not fun, but there it is. I have [in my past life], been over-ruled on project management, had my decisions countermanded, by people who either had NO engineering degrees [one had - believe it or not - an ENGLISH bachelors], or no degree at all. On three separate occasions, this resulted in total disasters, one of which cost our employer [the US Federal Government], well over $1.5 million, and nearly 10 months of time. I objected to this change of course on the project, (perhaps too strenuously), and was over-ruled. The net result was that the person over-ruling me, was promoted for his error. I got nothing, and decided to leave the government, and go back and get my master's. That helped. I could have gone on and done a doctorate, but then, you tend to be considered "over-educated", and incapable of working with hardware - and i like hardware. With a master's in IT or engineering, i would think that someone with 10+ years of experience here, should be earning $70,000 to $80,000 at least. $100,000 would not be out of reach. I was earning nearly that when i semi-retired. Best of luck!!