So young, so innocent....
I was out walking my dog, and sat down outside at the local coffee shop. I overheard a conversation going on next to me with two teenagers, I am guessing around 16. The guy said, “I am going to write the programs that run video games when I grow up”. The lady said, ” I am not sure what I want to do, I think I’ll work at In and Out (that is a burger place for those of you not from California) for a while”. “How much would you get paid” she asked him, “about $150,000 or more per year” he said. “Wow, that is a lot, right now I get $10.00 per hour and I don’t know how much that is per year but not very much”, she said. “Everyone will want to be my friend when I start pulling down that bank”, he said with a smile. “I sure will”, as she bent over and gave him a kiss.
I rose up from my chair, wanted so bad to sit down and give them some instant lessons on taxation and inflation, but somehow, or some higher power pulled me away, and I said quietly under my breath, “I remember those dreams”. Which then made me think as I walked home, Why did I work, and why do all of us work today?
Let me tell you I struggled answering the second question so let us focus on the first. Why did I work, why did you work at first, I imagine we all had similar reasons. That first paycheck of course. Did any of us go to work for any other reason then either money or our parents forced us to go to work for slave wages for their business. I got a taste of both at 14 years old. My parents started first by telling me they had some jobs for me at this new “shop” that they purchased. Essentially I was their “free” labor for the next several months after school and on weekends. They would be nice and buy me dinner, or some other thing that I found out later most regular parents did that because that is what parents normally are supposed to do, not as “payment” for 5 hours of sanding a wall, but I digress. A friend of mine at school in study hall said, “Chris, we need help over at Frisch’s big boy, why don’t you come over there with me after school and see if they will hire you, it is fun.” two days later I was starting my first real job, washing dishes on the 6pm to 4am shift Friday and Saturday nights.
This was my most fun job....
As I look back on it, the job was fun, I got to meet several great guys, and about a dozen hot female waitress’s, (that I will edit out of this story). But I learned one thing, and one thing very well, how to suck as many hours as possible from the clock to get as big as paycheck as possible. With money came power. I could tell my parents to go get some one else to do their slave labor. I was able to buy a moped, so now I could have some FREEDOM. I had gas money, could go to the movies, and take woman, (I guess still girls), out on dates. I now could even buy my own pair of LEVI jeans to replace those wrangler jeans that to this day I still have nightmares being forced to wear. I wonder how many people from my hometown are now shaking there heads?
Why did I work originally;
- Money
- Power
- Prestige
- Freedom
- Sense of self worth and accomplishment.
When did that start to change, college years. During college I was blessed with a partial football scholarship, which helped pay for some of the tuition, but not any of the food, books, or housing costs. So working soon became a “have to do” to pay bills. If I wanted to get out of Ohio, and become a “successful man”, then I had to have a college degree. So every weekend outside of football season I was working, and all summer long. So why was I working during college years:
- Money
- Pay Bills
- Get my Diploma, pay for school
You will notice now that original feeling of self worth is now gone. So was freedom, because now I had no free time, it was either classes, football practice, studying, or working.
Corporation Enslavement...but I thought I was important
It must get better once I graduated, oh gosh no. So now I was quickly hired into Corporate America. Here is where yes, I got a good bi-weekly salary, but now I learned what the term “exempt” manager meant. EXEMPT from labor laws! For the next 10 years of my life I worked 70 hours a week and got paid for 40, how did that happen. Well I did it because all the other managers did it, and that one manager whom complained, was gone quicker than a prostitutes virginity. As I look back on my 20′s and life in corporate america, why did I do it?
- Job Title, (AKA, EGO)
- Money
- Benefits, ( I was learning about how expensive health insurance was)
- 401K (Have to plan for my own retirement, at 25)
- PAY MY MORTGAGE AND PROPERTY TAX
- PAY MY CAR PAYMENT
Here is where life just starts getting screwed up when I look back on it. I was EVERY BIT the brainwashed zombie, putting myself into a 30 year mortgage, and buying a nice car, because I deserved it, made good money, and that is what EXECUTIVES do. I could not have the job title “district manager” and drive a piece of junk, or rent an apartment. Those getting ahead are the ones whom buy homes, and build equity, so I thought.
WELCOME TO ENSLAVEMENT. At 25 years old I had placed myself into indentured servitude for life to the banks whom made me give them every dime I had for a down payment on this enslavement. This is the part of the story that as I type this I want to cry, so I am going to for a few minutes……………………..
(Wiping my face), okay so as I left corporate America because I felt they were not valuing or paying me enough for my talents, I thought I would take some time and figure out what I wanted to do with my life. Let us just say the next three months, AWKWARD. I never understood that my self worth, at that time, was based on my job. My work defined me, it was who I was, how could I go on a date and say, I don’t have a job right now, or I was unemployed. But more than that was the pain of dipping into my savings to pay my mortgage, oh that sucked. However with my wonderful talents it did not take long to get hired by a dot com company with a large salary, stock options, signing bonus, and of course, a two hour one way commute, but who cares about that for the money. I remember getting the options explained to me, something like this. We are going to give you 10,000 shares @10.00 per share. The current stock price is $12.00 per share. You can start to exercise 20% of the shares after every year of employment, essentially by the end of 5 years you should be a millionaire Chris!
But they all said the stock price would go up!
Now at 32 years old why was I working?
- To feel useful
- To pay my mortgage
- To go on dates and sound successful
- To build back up my 401K
- To eat
- To DRINK
- TO BE A MILLIONAIRE
Do we see enjoyment on this list anywhere? How about job satisfaction, and caring about what I was doing? How about matching up my God given talents into a mutually beneficial working environment, (Yes we all put that on our resumes don’t we).
When they gave me the stock option pitch, something was left out, like, what if the stock price falls. It was my one year anniversary, and the stock price was $8.00/share. Now I learned a term UNDERWATER, soon that would even apply to my house; but lets wait for that happy moment. I had all these share that I could now sell, but what good are shares at a $10.00 strike price with a value of $8.00 bucks. So now me and every employee in the company had as our screen savers, STOCK PRICE MONITOR, I shit you not, every computer had the stock price of our company every minute of every day starting back at us.
$7.50…..$7.30….$6.80….$6.00…..$4.00…..$1.50. I felt like I imagine every employee at Bank of America must feel like today. After this daily misery cycle which lasted somewhere into 2003, I was finally called into my mangers office and put out of my misery. “Chris, we are going to lay you off as well as 80% of the company, it just has not worked out for us. Here is a folder, you will receive two months of severance pay, and then here is a form for how you can apply for unemployment. Good luck, have a nice day.” Guess I won’t be cashing in those stock options I thought. Here is where I need to cry again; sorry…………………………………………………………………..
Slaves to our masters...until we break free...
Okay, I still have so much pain to go here, but I can’t. Perhaps you now see why I looked at those kids outside at the coffee house and wanted to just shake them senseless. We all had our work dreams, I know that I had those types of conversations with dozens of my friends at my high school in Fremont Ohio. Heck our class song was “DREAM ON”, by Aerosmith.
Why do we work? The better question that I think every person needs to ask themselves right now is:
Why am I working today, and when am I going to stop this enslavement to the banks?
God Bless You
God Bless America