When I was staying at a youth hostel in Maui in Hawaii I met a beach bum type guy who reminded me of the OP. This guy sort of “works”.
Well actually he does many things. First, he is reliable so the wealthy people of the area hire him to house-sit when they are away. So that’s shelter, food, and some money. When he isnt doing that he stays at the hostel where if one does say 4 hours of work, you get a free bed and a meal for the night. For clothing people give him things. He gets free medical at the clinic. If he needs some money he will make a sculpture out of leaves or shells and sell it to a tourist. He spends the rest of the time hiking, swimming, surfing, fishing, or doing whatever else he wants.
He has the life he wants. He told me about the rat race lifestyle his brother whos a bigshot attorney in New York has and he wants no part of it.
So while he doesnt really “work” so to speak, he is still a part of the community. Their are people living in other tourist areas who do similar things.
Your posting reminds me of comments I hear from people who have never actually worked in that kind of role or fundamentally have no respect for the profession. Regardless of what the profession is.
When I think of friends and family members who have had mental health problems, and sough out a medical professional for help, I find it hard to believe having to deal with this all day and every day could be ever feel like someone could simply just “phone it in”. There are patients who have depression, are violent, have thoughts of suicide, I can’t see anyone think you could simply take a passive role watching the clock when they are in your office in need of help.
"Your posting reminds me of comments I hear from people who have never actually worked in that kind of role or fundamentally have no respect for the profession. Regardless of what the profession is.
When I think of friends and family members who have had mental health problems, and sough out a medical professional for help, I find it hard to believe having to deal with this all day and every day could be ever feel like someone could simply just “phone it in”. There are patients who have depression, are violent, have thoughts of suicide, I can’t see anyone think you could simply take a passive role watching the clock when they are in your office in need of help."
When I think of friends, family members, and myself, who have had mental health problems and sought out professional medical help, I find it hard to fathom that anyone could deal with this at work every day without a healthy dose of dissassociation and a sense of humor. There are patients who have depression, are violent, and have thoughts of suicide. There are even some former patients who have ended their own lives.
If I were going in to the mental health (or any) profession, I would definitely go for the highest paying position with the least amount of 8-6 work. I am so dissappointed that OP’S thread ended with a sensible and conforming occupation. My one consolation is that he chose , within a given field, the highest paying and most vacation-condusive position. Psychiatrists are like the movie stars of the mental health field. I still don’t like this ending, though. The fact of the matter is that movie stars have to (or have had to) work hard, too.
If not, they better find a way quick. There are an awful lot more men than work in the world, and the gap is widening rapidly. When will the conventional paradigm be rethought – the one that rigidly holds that surplus wealth (after profits) is distributed according to work done on behalf of the owners of capital. The days are over, forever, when there is more work than men to do it.
Depends on what you consider “living”. If you’re willing to “live” in substandard conditions and/or mooch off others or the government, sure, you can do that. Everything else requires luck or actual effort (work).
Actually, in the US, for the first time there are more job openings than unemployed people.
That doesn’t mean that unemployment is solved, or that anyone who is unemployed can automatically get a job, but it is not the case that there are more workers than work, and the gap isn’t widening. So we don’t need to change the paradigm just yet.
This thread is absolutely classic. “How do I live without working”, then he becomes a doctor making $200K a year, and this shows how the system is breaking down.
I suspect that the technological advances have paradoxically created clerical jobs, rather than reduced them. The amount of floor space in office buildings must have increased at least tenfold in the past several decades, and I can’t imagine what could be going in in all those buildings except mostly clerical work. I recently read that 99% of the output of xerox machines is never looked at by nobody. “Work” now consists of putting all that useless paper somewhere in an organized fashion. The modern equivalent of digging holes and filling them in. In the era of digital data storage, and the virtual disappearance of the printed newspaper, US paper consumption is still steadily increasing. Consumed by “workers”.
It strikes me that today, there are sources of income which did not exist when I started this thread. For example, if I were a hot chick, or a guy who was really witty/funny and good at video games, it wouldn’t be unreasonable to suggest that I become a YouTube star.
There’s one born every minute, and he and his money are soon parted. Lean to exploit and harvest this vast resource. Instead of being a “human resource” yourself.
