[bdery]

Well, no. As Mick Jagger so eloquently put it, "What a drag it is, getting old." I'm retired for good at this point, don't need no more stinkin' careers. Or as Doc Brown put it, "Where we're goin' we don't need [careers]". And as Chief Dan George said in "Josey Wales", "I used to have powers. Now old age is creepin' up on me." I'm hoping to get a few good years out of playing with photography before my organic compounds get recycled. (I like movie quotes, could you tell?)

I was thinking : "someone knows his classics"

[hadi]

Well, no. As Mick Jagger so eloquently put it, "What a drag it is, getting old." I'm retired for good at this point, don't need no more stinkin' careers. Or as Doc Brown put it, "Where we're goin' we don't need [careers]". And as Chief Dan George said in "Josey Wales", "I used to have powers. Now old age is creepin' up on me." I'm hoping to get a few good years out of playing with photography before my organic compounds get recycled. (I like movie quotes, could you tell?)

haha yeah, that makes sense.
I also do wonder, in the younger generations with the Gen-x, Millennials, and Gen-Z, the concept of careers seems to keep getting pushed away.

rather than have one career you excel in, become the jack-of-all-trades-master-of-none.

not sure which route is more beneficial to the soul.

[house]

I also do wonder, in the younger generations with the Gen-x, Millennials, and Gen-Z, the concept of careers seems to keep getting pushed away.

Its not by choice in the vast majority of cases. Generally in the west you won't get proper long term employment, but have to work various short term jobs. Its worse in some countries but the trend is everywhere.

[hadi]

Its not by choice in the vast majority of cases. Generally in the west you won't get proper long term employment, but have to work various short term jobs. Its worse in some countries but the trend is everywhere.

exactly. I wonder which route is better in the long run. essentially do what your parents did, because thats what their forefathers did? Or have multiple small stints in random careers and explore accordingly

[house]

exactly. I wonder which route is better in the long run. essentially do what your parents did, because thats what their forefathers did? Or have multiple small stints in random careers and explore accordingly

If it was a free choice the latter. But it isnt so never getting stable employment excludes much of normal grown up life. Decent home, family, vacation. So as it is now is worse much worse. One can only hope that the poor working conditions come back to bite and that young people completely sour on the whole idea and refuse work and consumer lifestyle.

Is it because of the "disposable economy", or are the peasants (who call themselves, "middle class") being slowly shifted to the status of serfs?

[luftfluss]

I went to law school because I liked to argue with people from an early age and they all told me I ought to. When I got old enough to think about doing it, everyone told me I couldn't. I wouldn't be able to get in, much less get through it. Especially people who had crapped out after their first year of law school told me that I'd never make it. And I was foolish enough to react to that challenge (the "I'll show YOU!" effect).

What I should have done is switch from mainframes and PL/1 to micro's and C. (There was no "C++" at that time. Actually, at that time, I reckon I'd have had to have learned Iapx8086/8087 assembly language.) I was a much better as a programmer than I ever was as an attorney. Being an attorney is a lot like being a garbage man - all you do is clean up other peoples' messes; nowhere near as much fun as programming.

[hadi]

Is it because of the "disposable economy", or are the peasants (who call themselves, "middle class") being slowly shifted to the status of serfs?

funny you should bring that up.
It made me open my eyes to my privilege growing up. Prior to covid, i was traveling in Portugal, and happened across an area that i thought was a 'poor' area. I concluded to that as what i saw were a densely populated area, with several apartment complexes, broken windows, clothes hanging from windows/balconies; cars tightly packed in an area without any designated parking spots; random street lights flickering; and a HUGE diaspora of every ethnicity visible. It looked some what like the slums, but maybe slightly better (at least in my eyes it resembled that).

I commented that to my friends that 'i think we are in the poorer area of the city' and they retaliated saying 'no, this is middle class. We would know as this is how we were raised in our respective countries'.

Up until that point, i always thought that i was a middle class person growing up. Sure, i was also raised in random apartment complexes, but they weren't as tightly stacked together. Moreover, we had huge parks, and schools and hospitals and all resources within walking distance. But when i compared my past to my friends, maybe i never truly was a middle class person?

But that also got me thinking, that no one, in their rightful mind, would boast about them being poor. You have a dollar? GREAT, you're richer than X% of the global population, meaning you aren't 'poor'. As such, even if someone is in the 'lower class', maybe they would have an assumption that they, too, are in middle class. Even if the concept of 'poverty' is defined, it would depend on a person's jurisdiction. As in, if you happen to live in Hong Kong, Vancouver, or Toronto (some of the most expensive places to live in terms of house prices to income ratio), then majority of people would be considered living below the poverty line. However the same people can go to places like Nepal, or South East Asia, and now they can live luxuriously with the same level of income they had, thus no longer considered 'poor'. then, are they middle class?

or perhaps, middle class doesn't exactly exist. The rich keep getting richer, and either the poor stay poor, or they get poor-er?

i do ponder on that quiet a lot

[Wheatfield]

Which career? My first career was in the photo lab industry, which took up 30 years and I decided to leave with the advent of digital photography. I saw the writing on the wall, in that it was going to destroy the lab industry as I knew it, so I got out.
As a side career to that, I worked as a freelance professional photographer. I got out of that at about the same time that I left the lab industry.
I really didn't want to do digital photography for a living.

I changed course quite drastically and tried my hand at general contracting as a home renovator. No matter what I had been doing, I always had a hand in building stuff, so it was a logical transition as I had an excellent skill set. Sadly, it turned out to be somewhat too physical for me at the age I was at, and so walked away from that and took on working for a construction materials supplier, which I intend to do until I retire for good, hopefully within the next five years.

[house]

They actually called me that at a former job "Wolf" based on the cleaner in reservoir dogs, jokingly of course. Because if something was difficult or a mess or not enough time I would take time off the thing I had at hand and sort things out. A skill best hidden from employers but it wasn't abused at that job so it was fine. I guess I'm good in such situations because I enjoy it a bit... When everything is smooth sailing I get a bit bored.

funny you should bring that up.
It made me open my eyes to my privilege growing up. Prior to covid, i was traveling in Portugal, and happened across an area that i thought was a 'poor' area. I concluded to that as what i saw were a densely populated area, with several apartment complexes, broken windows, clothes hanging from windows/balconies; cars tightly packed in an area without any designated parking spots; random street lights flickering; and a HUGE diaspora of every ethnicity visible. It looked some what like the slums, but maybe slightly better (at least in my eyes it resembled that).

I commented that to my friends that 'i think we are in the poorer area of the city' and they retaliated saying 'no, this is middle class. We would know as this is how we were raised in our respective countries'.

Up until that point, i always thought that i was a middle class person growing up. Sure, i was also raised in random apartment complexes, but they weren't as tightly stacked together. Moreover, we had huge parks, and schools and hospitals and all resources within walking distance. But when i compared my past to my friends, maybe i never truly was a middle class person?

But that also got me thinking, that no one, in their rightful mind, would boast about them being poor. You have a dollar? GREAT, you're richer than X% of the global population, meaning you aren't 'poor'. As such, even if someone is in the 'lower class', maybe they would have an assumption that they, too, are in middle class. Even if the concept of 'poverty' is defined, it would depend on a person's jurisdiction. As in, if you happen to live in Hong Kong, Vancouver, or Toronto (some of the most expensive places to live in terms of house prices to income ratio), then majority of people would be considered living below the poverty line. However the same people can go to places like Nepal, or South East Asia, and now they can live luxuriously with the same level of income they had, thus no longer considered 'poor'. then, are they middle class?

or perhaps, middle class doesn't exactly exist. The rich keep getting richer, and either the poor stay poor, or they get poor-er?

i do ponder on that quiet a lot

I have pretty much adopted the sociological theories of Marx, Weber, and Mao, though I vehemently disagree with their political and economic conclusions about how society ought to be structured. My simplified structural model, abstracted from their theories, is this: there are four basic social classes: the wealthy (those who own and have the power to exploit the resources and means of production but because of the profitability of the enterprise are not required to invest their own labor, and possibly even their own personal participation in the enterprise, e.g., Warren Buffet); the middle class (what Mao would have called, "rich peasants", such as the CEO's of profitable corporate entities, as well as professionals and people whose skill, training, and expertise make them able to own and operate their own businesses such as licensed tradesmen, but who are obliged to invest their own labor, time and energy in the operation of the enterprise); peasants (ordinary wage-earners, sharecroppers, etc., whose time and labor constitute their only capital and who are obliged to work for others who own or control the resources and means of production, but are entitled to be compensated monetarily for that part of their lives they expend for the benefit of the employers); and serfs (like peasants but compensated if at all by direct contributions of necessaries; I use the term to include slaves). "Wealth" is that which can be exploited to provide "income", which is obviously, the product of the exploitation of "wealth" (by that definition, "wages" do not constitute "income", but that definition changed when the U.S. amended the Constitution to allow a tax on "incomes" - it was a trick).


The reason there is no middle class today as there was in de Toqueville's day is ... uh, oh, I'm getting political - better quit while I'm ahead.

---------- Post added 2021-05-13 at 08:42 AM ----------

@luftfluss, thank you for that reference; I have complained that I never made any money as a lawyer to speak of because I spent all my time "helping" the poor schnooks who'd made some stupid mistake, ran afoul of some law or another, or were simply incompetent to manage their own affairs. The System is way too complex, having been designed by bankers, lawyers, and financial analysts, and the average person gets swamped pretty easily resulting in legal problems. What I discovered, like "The Wolf" in "Pulp Fiction", that at some point you have to tell people bluntly what the problem is, what the range of possible solutions to the problem is, the risks and benefits of each possible solutions, a recommendation as to the best solution, and the rationale for that recommendation. They don't like to hear all that, because they just want things to be easy. So, when "The Wolf" says, "That's the situation, boys, now do you want my help or not?", they always want the help and are willing to go along to get out of trouble. But they hate having to do it and their attitude towards the helper is a lot like Jesus' experience with the lepers: ten were healed, but only one came back to say, "thank you". There's a reason why a standard lawyer's rule states, "Get the money up front."

My father used to say, "God save me from people who want to help me.", and one of my favorite fortune-cookie-aphorisms was, "Why do you hate me? I've never helped you."
It's a good thing that Marcellus Wallace was paying "The Wolf".

[house]

I have pretty much adopted the sociological theories of Marx, Weber, and Mao, though I vehemently disagree with their political and economic conclusions about how society ought to be structured. My simplified structural model, abstracted from their theories, is this: there are four basic social classes:

But Marx and Weber's conception of class is completely different and serves as analytical tools to examine completely different questions! There's no way of consolidating the two conceptions.
(don't even know much at all about Mao but I *think* pretty much all his "ideas" were geographically and historically specific, beyond being wrong that is)

But Marx and Weber's conception of class is completely different and serves as analytical tools to examine completely different questions! There's no way of consolidating the two conceptions.
(don't even know much at all about Mao but I *think* pretty much all his "ideas" were geographically and historically specific, beyond being wrong that is)

The sociological aspects of their theories inform my own. I didn't say they were identical. And as to Mao's ideas being "wrong", I would point out that he was an awfully good historian, if his political and economic conclusions were, shall we say, inappropriate for export.


My dentist is a member of a particular religious organization of which I am not. He takes the notion (erroneously) that I must be allied with other organizations, and often prefaces his lectures (while I'm sitting there with all sorts of machinery in my mouth) with "Well, YOU people believe...", which is invariably hogwash. My standard response is to tell him that I don't think his organization has got it ALL wrong, just because some aspects of their belief system based on intellectual whackiness. I think everything about human culture is a mixture of worthwhile stuff and (shall we say) less effective stuff. I'm not a "marxist", but I think Marx was right as to some aspects of his analysis. It's like buying apples: you have to be able to pick the good ones out of the bin and leave the bad (or less desirable) ones where they are. Just because you want half a dozen doesn't mean you have to accept the whole bin-full.

[JaydenPlowman]

since school I dreamed of this path

[timb64]

I grew up wanting to follow my father into a career as a Chartered Surveyor which I duly did and had a productive and rewarding time for 30 years.I then needed a change and took up a post with the local library service driving the Mobile Library. Less rewarding financially but I feel it is giving something back to the community.