I’d never work again, no. But I’d end up a full-time volunteer for the ICRC, or something similar.
I’d quit my job, but I certainly wouldn’t stop working. There are tons of things I’d love to do if I had the money. I’d volunteer at our local elementary school, for one, and open an animal sanctuary. I’ve also always wanted to own my own bookstore, which would allow me to work on my own writing during the day during lulls. I also have so many places I’d love to visit. Ok, I’m beginning to see that this list is endless. I’ll stop there!
I work and I don’t have to. I could live off my husband’s income - but I don’t. (He could live off mine, but he doesn’t)
There are a lot of reasons for this.
a) Turns out, I’m a lousy stay at home mom. My kids are way better off spending several hours a day with someone who thinks fingerpaint is an important child development tool instead of a mere instrument to stain carpets - with people who schedule outside time - even in Minnesota winter - rather than their mother who doesn’t go outside except to get from the car to the door from November to March. With people who don’t get annoyed that they are reading Green Eggs and Ham again instead of a Margaret Atwood novel. Being a stay at home mom is a lot of WORK! (I love my children, am glad I have them, and enjoy the time I spend with them - but I enjoy it less when its seven days a week. And I have nothing but respect and admiration for people who make this choice and do it well).
b) I enjoy my job. Really, I do. If we were truly independantly wealthy, I might choose to do something that was more rewarding and less lucrative, but maybe not because…
c) You keep score with your salary. Seriously, there is a certain amount of satisfaction I get from making money - even if I didn’t need it. And you can always use more money. $100,000 a year is not alot once you have it. Particularly when you are funding a life of leisure. My leisure hobbies of choice (golf, travel, food) are not cheap (except reading).
d) You never know what the future will bring. Bill Gates could go bankrupt. The trust could get invested in junk bonds and be worthless. In my real life, my husband could get laid off. This happened to us a few years ago, and knowing that we could pay the mortgage and feed the kids off my income was the only thing that held my sanity together.
e) I, too, had a period of time where I didn’t have a job to go to each day - and it was horrible. No adult conversations (other than you all at the Dope). Too much daytime TV and junkfood. I’m just not self disaplined enough without a job. Turns out I thought I’d do all this cool stuff to fill my time - and did almost none of it.
I don’t have to work now, and I don’t.
I’m not retired, just happen to have enough to live on this year without working.
I’d try to write fiction full time. See how much of it (or any of it) I can sell.
I used to say that if I came into money, I wouldn’t work and would spend the rest of my life puttering around the house, reading books, watching movies, and gardening. I have since realized, however, that most women find ambition attractive and don’t like guys who sit on their butts all day, and since I’d like to get married, I’d have to hold down some kind of job in order to attract and keep a wife.
Now, I wouldn’t keep my current job. But I would work in some capacity.
Oh, and $1,000,000 probably isn’t enough to make one independently wealthy for life anymore.
I’d leave skidmarks! 
And, lurkmeister, you’re my kinda guy!
I figured if someone handed me $1M, after taxes, I could in vest it and see 10% return on average, and I could comfortably live on $100K a year in a low cost area. So $1M would be enough for me I think.
Absolutely i would quit. All I want to do is write, and working (and school mostly) really gets in the way of that…
It would take £3M (US$5.5) for me to stop work, simply because I have that long left to live.
At the moment, my job isn’t particularly stressful, and I have nothing that I want to do with my free time. If I quit working, I’d probably just sit in front of this computer more.
I would invest the 100,000 per year, instead of spending it. Periodically, I would re-evaluate the situation… maybe my job would have gotten more stressful, maybe I would have found something I really wanted to do with my time, etc.
my present job i would leave in a flash. the flash would have to catch up to me.
i have many outside interests and as long as amazon delivers and cable is available i’m a happy hermit!
A guaranteed $100K a year for life? I would be out the door. We’re talking chair-spinning, mouse suspended in mid-air, Otto-shaped cloud of dust out the door.
I’d quit my very well-paying but somewhat unfulfilling job immediately (although I’d give notice as I like my employers and don’t want to screw anyone over by just walking out) and work at least part-time at an emotionally satisfying job that pays really crappy, which is working at an animal shelter and fostering kittens until they can be adopted. I’d probably also do other things that I can’t live off full time but that I’d love to do, one of which is designing and making corsets for Ren fairs, re-enactments, kinky people, etc. Also doing various crafts projects that I can’t live on but are fun to do.
In short, I’d quit THIS job. But I’d probably still work at something. And, is that $100K before or after taxes? Makes a big difference.
hmmm. I would go to college part time (8 hours a semester or so) to study something i liked but i wouldn’t work. Having nothing to do would get to me, i need about 10-20 hours of structured activity a week so id either have to work, or go to school, or join an organization.
I guess if i joined an org. i believed in as a part time volunteer i wouldn’t work anymore.
Heh.
No fish would be safe. I’d get carpal tunnel from all of the casting and reeling.
In fact, if I hit the lottery, I’d make sure my friends shared in the wealth and none of us would work.
I would quit my current job.
I would go back to school.
I would make many many films.
I would not sit idly.
I would take the money now, please.
I wouldn’t quit my job, but I would probably go down to part time. I don’t mind what I do, I just am not a huge fan of spending so much time doing it.
I’d end up working a lot harder than I do now, because $1m would simply advance our current plans to purchase a livestock farm from a 10-year plan to a ‘current year’ plan.
I imagine that we’d both work out a month’s notice and not change anything about our lifestyle very much, but live off part of the interest whilst travelling round the country (New Zealand), looking for the perfect bit of land.
I’d teach for another three years or so, and then reevaluate–somewhere along the line it would be lovely to go back to school and get my Ph.d, and then, frankly, go right back into the high school classroom. As silenus say, teaching is not what one does, it’s what one IS.
What I would do is streamline the rest of my life so that it didn’t distract from my teaching: I’d have all my laundry done professionally, have someone in to clean the house once a week, pay an accountant to manage our bills and a gardener to take over the yard.
I would also, frankly, end up spending a lot of money on my students.
I would stand up to administration more when they do really stupid shit, which might mean that soon I wouldn’t have to work.