8 ms·

I have three things to say about this: 1. Many people are horrified by the thought of not being a simple worker bee. They say they want change, but they don't.

by nhangen 13y ago

I have three things to say about this: 1. Many people are horrified by the thought of not being a simple worker bee. They say they want change, but they don't. They want the security of someone else taking care of them. The reason wealth exists is because there are people that cannot live this way, and thus, make their own way. You cannot fault hard working business owners because their employees put themselves in a place to require said employment in order to sustain a life they consider normal. 2. There will always be wealth. If the US gave up capitalism in favor of socialism, the money would be placed in the hands of the whole, and in this case, the government. At that point, the government has the money and the power. We're screwed. 3. Life is suffering. There is no perfection on this realm. Solve this problem and another will follow. This is a symptom of life in samsara. Bukowski recognized this, which is why he talked of a simple life without possessions. If you truly want to break free of 'the man,' you'll have to life a life defined by something other than money, objects, and achievements. For most of us, this is nearly impossible. Middle ground is an illusion.

brianpgordon 13y ago
I would reframe #1 in terms of acceptable risk. If you're very risk-averse - for example, if you're raising a family and it is absolutely unacceptable to you to fail financially - then it's difficult to justify giving up the security of regular employment.
- nhangen 13y ago
  Beyond that, most people just don't have what it takes to do anything else. We romanticism entrepreneurship often, and for good reason. It takes a lot more than wanting to be free of 9-5 bondage in order to be successful, and that's just to get to the point where luck can play a part. I try to share my enthusiasm with others but often meet responses like: 'Must be nice to be so:' talented/lucky/smart/blessed with understanding wife/motivated/etc So in the end, I grew tired of talking and just tried to lead with actions. Most got bored and stopped paying attention.
AznHisoka 13y ago
I agree on #3. Solve the money problem, and you'll then lament about the sex problem.
hnnnnng 13y ago
#1 is flat out wrong. THERE IS NO SECURITY! Is mcdonalds right? paying people so little that they need another job to not be out on the street? How is that TAKING CARE of employees? Before you say mcdonalds is an exception, theres so many others so dont give me the bullshit about wealth exists because blah.
- nhangen 13y ago
  In capitalism, pay is a result of supply and demand. The truth is that working at McDonald's requires very little skill, and because of that, offers very little pay. I thought they paid a great wage when I worked there during high school. And you're right, there is no security, so what is your solution other than whining about it?
  - Loughla 13y ago
    Those positions require very little skill, and provide very little pay. Correct. The next part is where most people today get the argument wrong; it isn't that those jobs should pay more for the arbitrary sake of paying more. Those type of jobs are the step for many people that not just have no more steps to take, but have never had any walkway to stand on. Their entire lives have been spent just trying to make it to the next day. The argument is that those positions are part of a larger, predatory economy or society seemingly designed to keep a certain subset of the country/world subjugated to another. When you see protests about a higher wage at entry level positions such as fast-food and retail, what you're really seeing is the confused, leaderless argument that life sucks for many people and shows no signs of relenting. It's a first world suck, but suck nonetheless. Source: research into lower-socioeconomic lifestyles while attaining advanced degrees (and living that life when young; thank God for scholarships).
    - nhangen 13y ago
      You're right. Been there done that. During a period in my twenties, I had lost my job, had a negative bank balance, and two kids to feed. I was on foodstamps while I worked at the Olive Garden making very little while spending far too long in college subsidized by grants and student loans. I finally graduated, got another job, and was let go within a year. I now had tons of debt and a degree that was almost worthless. So I joined the Army and left my kids for 16 weeks to attend bootcamp and AIT. Spent 5 years, including a stint in Afghanistan. Needless to say, I recovered, taught myself how to program, and now run a software company. Life sucks. For many, it sucks hard. But there are ways out. Most people just don't want to make the sacrifices necessary to do so. Btw, I'm speaking of 1st world. 3rd world is obviously a different story.
blottsie 13y ago
>They want the security of someone else taking care of them. Performing a job, even a "simple worker bee" job, is still a job, not charity. As a worker, you perform a function, and the company pays you for your time/expertise/ideas/efforts/output/etc. What the hell part of that is charity, or being "taken care of"? I find your implication that the employer is somehow doing the employee a favor by paying them for their work baffling and wrong-headed.
- nhangen 13y ago
  I'm not sure where you're getting that, but if you read the rest of my comments on this thread I think you'll get a different impression.
- Guvante 13y ago
  Everything in life is a trade-off. Being an employee at a decently sized company is about trading certain pleasantries (e.g. having to deal with the 9 to 5 drill) for certain benefits (e.g. a stable income). Similarly in jobs that have no paid overtime, you are usually compensated a bit more and don't always have to work overtime. Taken care of in this context is talking about the stability a company provides you. It isn't given to you out of charity, you certainly earn it, but it doesn't come free either.
eli_gottlieb 13y ago
Stop making excuses.
pessimizer 13y ago
Governments always have all of the money. They issue it, and they define it by only accepting their type of money in order to pay their taxes. They hold that value by being strong enough and/or well-connected enough to defend themselves from physical threats from inside and out, and enough to extract taxes and fees from individuals in order to pull that money back out of circulation. In order to do this, they have all the guns. Government has all of the money and all of the guns. We're already screwed. What we need to focus on is making the government help us structure a better society - a kinder, safer, braver, smarter society. The further we get from that ideal, the closer we get to a world where we will again remember that money can't save you from the people with all the guns. Khodorkovsky thought money was worth something.
- zanny 13y ago
  > Governments always have all of the money. Unless you use bitcoin! In the past, the best solution to a government you didn't agree with was to leave. Head into the unknown and try new things. That, in practice, rarely ever happened on a macroscale (the new world was firmly cut out and brought under the European model of ownership in centuries as its colonies with no real room to experiment, while simultaneously slaughtering entire civilizations of actual divergent societies) but I'd like to think space presents us with a real opportunity to pick up a few thousand people, find a rock in a habitable zone with water, and try things differently.
  - ksrm 13y ago
    Why go all the way to space? Just head to the oceans: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seasteading http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seasteading
vendakka 13y ago
Life is suffering? I find that to be overly pessimistic. Life is not simple and there will be sorrow. However, there will be joy as well. "Suffering" is a very strong word to use. There is happiness and there is sorrow. To expect only happiness is not pragmatic, but to expect only sorrow is unfortunate. Life can be beautiful, even if it is not always so.
- nhangen 13y ago
  It's a tenet of buddhism. I'm just re-stating it.
pond_lilly 13y ago
> Life is suffering. There is no perfection on this realm. Solve this problem and another will follow. This is a symptom of life in samsara. this is why Buddhism is so dangerous to the Western society, because of this. Life is dukkha, so go mediate to disassociate like a victim of a rape, then go back to work, slave.

by nhangen 13y ago

brianpgordon 13y ago

I would reframe #1 in terms of acceptable risk. If you're very risk-averse - for example, if you're raising a family and it is absolutely unacceptable to you to fail financially - then it's difficult to justify giving up the security of regular employment.

nhangen 13y ago
Beyond that, most people just don't have what it takes to do anything else. We romanticism entrepreneurship often, and for good reason. It takes a lot more than wanting to be free of 9-5 bondage in order to be successful, and that's just to get to the point where luck can play a part. I try to share my enthusiasm with others but often meet responses like: 'Must be nice to be so:' talented/lucky/smart/blessed with understanding wife/motivated/etc So in the end, I grew tired of talking and just tried to lead with actions. Most got bored and stopped paying attention.

AznHisoka 13y ago

I agree on #3. Solve the money problem, and you'll then lament about the sex problem.

hnnnnng 13y ago

#1 is flat out wrong. THERE IS NO SECURITY! Is mcdonalds right? paying people so little that they need another job to not be out on the street? How is that TAKING CARE of employees? Before you say mcdonalds is an exception, theres so many others so dont give me the bullshit about wealth exists because blah.

nhangen 13y ago
In capitalism, pay is a result of supply and demand. The truth is that working at McDonald's requires very little skill, and because of that, offers very little pay. I thought they paid a great wage when I worked there during high school. And you're right, there is no security, so what is your solution other than whining about it?
- Loughla 13y ago
  Those positions require very little skill, and provide very little pay. Correct. The next part is where most people today get the argument wrong; it isn't that those jobs should pay more for the arbitrary sake of paying more. Those type of jobs are the step for many people that not just have no more steps to take, but have never had any walkway to stand on. Their entire lives have been spent just trying to make it to the next day. The argument is that those positions are part of a larger, predatory economy or society seemingly designed to keep a certain subset of the country/world subjugated to another. When you see protests about a higher wage at entry level positions such as fast-food and retail, what you're really seeing is the confused, leaderless argument that life sucks for many people and shows no signs of relenting. It's a first world suck, but suck nonetheless. Source: research into lower-socioeconomic lifestyles while attaining advanced degrees (and living that life when young; thank God for scholarships).
  - nhangen 13y ago
    You're right. Been there done that. During a period in my twenties, I had lost my job, had a negative bank balance, and two kids to feed. I was on foodstamps while I worked at the Olive Garden making very little while spending far too long in college subsidized by grants and student loans. I finally graduated, got another job, and was let go within a year. I now had tons of debt and a degree that was almost worthless. So I joined the Army and left my kids for 16 weeks to attend bootcamp and AIT. Spent 5 years, including a stint in Afghanistan. Needless to say, I recovered, taught myself how to program, and now run a software company. Life sucks. For many, it sucks hard. But there are ways out. Most people just don't want to make the sacrifices necessary to do so. Btw, I'm speaking of 1st world. 3rd world is obviously a different story.

blottsie 13y ago

>They want the security of someone else taking care of them. Performing a job, even a "simple worker bee" job, is still a job, not charity. As a worker, you perform a function, and the company pays you for your time/expertise/ideas/efforts/output/etc. What the hell part of that is charity, or being "taken care of"? I find your implication that the employer is somehow doing the employee a favor by paying them for their work baffling and wrong-headed.

nhangen 13y ago
I'm not sure where you're getting that, but if you read the rest of my comments on this thread I think you'll get a different impression.
Guvante 13y ago
Everything in life is a trade-off. Being an employee at a decently sized company is about trading certain pleasantries (e.g. having to deal with the 9 to 5 drill) for certain benefits (e.g. a stable income). Similarly in jobs that have no paid overtime, you are usually compensated a bit more and don't always have to work overtime. Taken care of in this context is talking about the stability a company provides you. It isn't given to you out of charity, you certainly earn it, but it doesn't come free either.

eli_gottlieb 13y ago

Stop making excuses.

pessimizer 13y ago

Governments always have all of the money. They issue it, and they define it by only accepting their type of money in order to pay their taxes. They hold that value by being strong enough and/or well-connected enough to defend themselves from physical threats from inside and out, and enough to extract taxes and fees from individuals in order to pull that money back out of circulation. In order to do this, they have all the guns. Government has all of the money and all of the guns. We're already screwed. What we need to focus on is making the government help us structure a better society - a kinder, safer, braver, smarter society. The further we get from that ideal, the closer we get to a world where we will again remember that money can't save you from the people with all the guns. Khodorkovsky thought money was worth something.

zanny 13y ago
> Governments always have all of the money. Unless you use bitcoin! In the past, the best solution to a government you didn't agree with was to leave. Head into the unknown and try new things. That, in practice, rarely ever happened on a macroscale (the new world was firmly cut out and brought under the European model of ownership in centuries as its colonies with no real room to experiment, while simultaneously slaughtering entire civilizations of actual divergent societies) but I'd like to think space presents us with a real opportunity to pick up a few thousand people, find a rock in a habitable zone with water, and try things differently.
- ksrm 13y ago
  Why go all the way to space? Just head to the oceans: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seasteading http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seasteading

vendakka 13y ago

Life is suffering? I find that to be overly pessimistic. Life is not simple and there will be sorrow. However, there will be joy as well. "Suffering" is a very strong word to use. There is happiness and there is sorrow. To expect only happiness is not pragmatic, but to expect only sorrow is unfortunate. Life can be beautiful, even if it is not always so.

nhangen 13y ago
It's a tenet of buddhism. I'm just re-stating it.

pond_lilly 13y ago

> Life is suffering. There is no perfection on this realm. Solve this problem and another will follow. This is a symptom of life in samsara. this is why Buddhism is so dangerous to the Western society, because of this. Life is dukkha, so go mediate to disassociate like a victim of a rape, then go back to work, slave.