In the US, at a certain level of wealth, I think it’s prudent to have a driver. It’s like having a corporate shield of liability for when you are driving. I’d probably do that.
I would have someone to do the cleaning and tidying and washing. I live on my own in a small flat so there’s no need for much of anything else.
I know I’d hire an Interior Decorator, a Gardener, and a Cleaning service of some kind. I’d probably have a PA, depending on how wealthy I actually was. And maybe I’d hire a Catering service on occasion. That’s about all, and I don’t think any of those count as Servants.
One for the yard if it was big enough (1/2 acre or more) and maybe one for routine stuff like car service appointments and odd errands. Laundry I enjoy doing and dust I ignore so that is about it.
I would probably have a general house keeper
general house keeping only, you clean your own personal messes and do your own laundry.
Dont know that i would need or want a cook, i dont generally ever know what i want to eat until i am ready to eat
and no cook wants to work like that.
Chauffeur do not need
On site Mechanic? I have one, me.
General grounds maintenance, i have one of those, me.
Someone for specialty stuff maybe? like to keep nice plants that i dont have but might if i was rich alive?
But that would be more of a service than a directly employed servant.
You don’t have to be wealthy in Indonesia to have staff - as several posters above who live/have lived outside the US have already noted, in certain parts of the world it is a cultural expectation once you are middle class, it’s affordable, and it is a way to provide honest employment to people when you are living in a country whose citizens are on average much poorer than you are.
I understand the comments about not wanting strangers to “touch your stuff,” or having trouble with the lack of privacy. But you adjust. It’s really not that bad. Every now and then I get pissed off because I can’t find where the maid decided to put away a new belonging. But then I remind myself that I live in a huge house in a polluted city, and despite that I don’t spend any time at all mopping floors or dusting. The trade-off is more than worth it.
The one thing most people do in Indonesia that I could never do is hire a cook. That’s because I love to cook myself and would be far too critical of the food someone else was preparing. I did try to have a cook for a while during a particularly busy period in my life, but let her go after a few months as it was driving me up a wall.
The live-in nanny was a different story. It was WONDERFUL to have someone on call 24/7 so that my husband and I could go out for a quiet dinner on impulse, knowing that our baby/toddler would be lovingly cared for by someone he adored.
Soon I will relocate to Hawaii and have no staff. I’ll miss the convenience a little (my son is 20 and out of the house now so child care is not an issue), but I will also enjoy the additional privacy, control over my household, and self-sufficiency. Six of one, half a dozen of the other. Well, maybe 7 for the convenience of staff, 5 for the virtues of living without.
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Hell, ya. If I were filthy rich I’d have someone on retainer to carve ice sculptures. I’d also gave a manservant to attend to my dressing (although I’d toilet myself). And a sous chef to assist me in the kitchen.
Housecleaner, definitely. Probably not live in. We enjoy cooking, so probably not a cook. Hell, I even enjoy grocery shopping (although my wife doesn’t). Driver might be nice. Assuming we had a house with a yard, then a landscaper for certain. No kids yet; not sure how I’d feel about child care. Maybe a babysitter/nanny (not live in) to watch the kids a once or twice a week if we’re busy or having a date night, but I don’t think any more than that.
I have a cleaning service come once a month for a couple hundred bucks a visit. It’s a relatively cheap convenience that takes care of a major PITA for myself and my wife. I would be fine just maintaining that service and not having an everyday person just to tidy up.
Other than that, I’d definitely want a full-time chauffeur. That’s probably about it.
But wouldn’t it be nice to pay someone to deal with your family for you?
Define “wealthy”. If I were really wealthy (in the top 0.01%, income of >$10M per year) I would probably also be so important that my time was the most valuable thing on the planet and I would have all kinds of staff. I would have a driver so I could spend my time on the road doing business deals with partners around the world. I would have a pilot on call 24/7. I would have a personal chef so I could entertain foreign CEOs while dinner is being cooked. I would have gardeners to care for my 120-acre estate. I would have housekeepers to tend to the 15 bedrooms frequently occupied by my many house guests.
How silly would this sound: “Sorry, Phil, but I can’t work with you on that oil contract because I have to cut the lawn today.”
If you were wealthy, how could you *not *have servants?
I kind of do already. We have a yard service and cleaning service now, and I also have an exterminator come in regularly to keep the bug population under control. I have a service for maintenance of my solar panels and a mechanic that works on my vehicles. Granted, none of these are live in ‘servants’ but they are all things I COULD do but that I choose not to since it’s better from my perspective to pay someone to do them.
If I were truly wealthy I don’t think it would change that much. I wouldn’t hire a cook or any sort of live in staff. But I would certainly expand the above things, probably from every other week in some cases to twice a week.
I have always been of the opinion that true wealth is the ability to have other people do the things for me that I don’t want to do.
I’m far from wealthy - talk to my ex-wife - but I’m comfortable. I have a housekeeper who comes in weekly - more often when I request - and a gardener/lawnkeeper. Both of them take on extra tasks as needed - hauling, pressure washing the house and such - on a cash basis.
Heck, at my last party, my housekeeper and her friends picked up and served the food. It’s not servents like ‘Jeeves, peel me a grape’ but I’m essentially trading money for time to spend with my kids and on other projects.
My spouse knew a gentleman who’s wealth is measured in billions (originally, he backed one of his business ventures, they later became friends). He does have a nice plot of land, but it’s only about 15 acres and only about two of it really has landscaping. He does have a driver, but only part time and he sometimes does do his own driving when he wants to. He does not have his own pilot and I think he even still flies commercial (although of course he can afford first class). He has a part-time housekeeper/cook who also does the grocery shopping, but she’s certainly not live-in and when she takes a vacation to visit her family he can do his own cooking and laundry. For that matter, he usually makes his own breakfast and often his own lunch because, as noted, the lady is only part-time. He has a lawn service come out once a week to mow/trim the landscaping. The main house has “only” five bedrooms, although for large family gatherings there’s a “bunkhouse” that sleeps about 40.
In other words, even someone as wealthy as you mention may not be living as extravagantly as you imagine. Mostly, these days he backs little-start-ups and business ventures in areas that interest him, and takes care of his wife, who unfortunately has Alzheimer’s. He probably spends more money on doctors, caretakers, and therapists for her than on all the other household “servants” combined. No one can cure her, but he is in the position that he can buy the absolute best care possible for her.
A Chauffeur! But I love to drive, so maybe he’d just sit in the back seat and look bored.
A Handyman! There are probably 20 things in my house that are semi-broken (as in working, but not 100% working). Things only tend to get fixed when they’re totally broken. But if I had a Handyman, things would be different.
Definitely hire someone to do the yardwork and shovel snow off the driveway. A once-a-week cleaning service, and, if I still had to work, doggy day care for Leet the Wonder Dog[sup]TM[/sup]. I don’t mind cooking.
Nothing live-in.
Regards,
Shodan
In that case, I’m wealthy even making only about $20,000 a year - I don’t want to change the oil in my vehicles so I have someone else do it. I use a drop off service for my laundry. I have someone else do my taxes.
Of course, I am ferociously frugal in other areas of my life in order to afford those little luxuries, and if I became unemployed I would go back to doing all that myself.
But it’s an illustration of how outsourcing things in your life is not an absolute indicator of wealth. It also shows that even people of modest means can do some of this.
What does get expensive for poor folks (and middle class) is things like child and eldercare. It’s a heck of a lot cheaper to hire someone to mow the lawn, take care of the pool, maintain your vehicles, clean your house, do your laundry, or do your taxes. You’re wealthy when the expense of hiring those folks to take care of someone is no longer a big deal or great financial sacrifice.
I was thinking maybe I’d get a maid,
find a place nearby for her to stay
Just someone to keep my house clean,
fix my meals and go away
-Neil Young
When the value of one’s time* exceeds the price to have someone else do a task, it makes sense to hire someone. Although like others, I’m a bit squicked by having people in my house. And “servant” has some baggage for me. And I’m not sure precisely where someone is or is not a servant.
*This can be a hard number to pin down. And it varies by task. I like cooking. I don’t like washing up after.
I like long trips, but my night vision isn’t what it used to be. Is there such a thing as an on-call driver service? I’m not looking to rent a limo-I just need a well trained and bonded driver available when I need her/him to drive my own car for long trips(room and board provided during the trip, of course).