“What do you do for a living?”, “What’s your story?” I hear this question every time contestants on a game show like The Chase, Family Feud, Eggheads, Who Wants to be a Millionaire and Jeopardy, get asked by the host at the introduction before the actual game scene commences. The response consists of professions in various industries, faculties, companies, organisations accompanied by brief descriptions of the everyday shenanigans they perform within their occupation. I always wondered why this question needs to be asked all the time? Even though we won’t remember it in the short and long term, why is it important to know someone’s occupation? What would the response be if I voluntarily chose not to reveal my profession or claim I wasn’t employed at all? A few examples include stripper, pole dancer, janitor, porn actor/actress, animal sexer, stay-at-home child/parent, professional procrastinator or homeless. I feel no one around me knows the answer, not even the production staff, contestants, studio audience and the host of the daytime tv shows. It’s obvious modern society revolves around jobs. The jobs market is the final step after graduating from university. Our education system is like a manufacturing production line for society’s job market.
Below is a simplistic model on how an average human is expected to mature through modern society throughout their lifetime:
1. Kindergarten
2. Primary School
3. Secondary School
4. TAFE / Tertiary School / Overseas Exchange
5. Alumni
6. Stable, Long-Term and High-Paying Career
7. Employment Status, Qualification e.g. Doctor, Masters, Dean, Professor
8. Relationship(s)
9. Engagement
10. Marriage
11. Honeymoon
12. Settling into Society
13. Repeat Daily events
14. Retirement
15. R.I.P
As young children your parents, mentors, older siblings, idols and teachers will tell you that the only way to survive life is to get a job, which yields wages (money) and work experience. A job contributes to a certain role in human society. A job is basically an activity, often regular and performed in exchange for payment (“for a living”). When you successfully landed a job, you are now an “employee” working for under an “employer”. Other jobs include volunteering, starting a “business”, or becoming a parent. The duration of a job you have ranges from temporary (i.e. hourly, short-term) to a lifetime (i.e. daily, long-term). When you are no longer eager and energetic to continue your lifelong career, you will go into retirement and become a pensioner. This means you are entitled to a large sum of money to help you live out the rest of your life for how long your body will be able to function properly. This is where I start to sound controversial and silly and I understand I’m asking to be criticised for being arrogant, stupid and stubborn, but this is just my curiosity.
- Where and when did this mentality of “working” come from? Is society based around jobs?
- How did human society begin?
- Why am I and many other people are being forced to work?
- What’s the point of a career?
- What’s so special about a career?
- What will happen if I choose to go against all expectations from parents, friends, society and government by deciding to not become employed nor develop a career?
- Once you do land your dream job and successfully earn a lot of money, what happens next?
- Is life complete and accomplished then?
- What’s the point of life if I can’t have the freedom to explore my curiosities 24/7?
Out of all the people I have asked, all I got from them were fruitless answers with nothing of substance whatsoever. Almost everyone gave me the same robotic responses like “Good job, good money, food on the table for the family, more beautiful girlfriends want to date you, something for your children to look up to for inspiration”. You can understand how frustrated I am that no one around me, not even my family, sees things from my perspective. This may sound like a conspiracy to you but you are welcome to disagree with me because this is just my opinion.
There are different categories of jobs such as:
— Hours per week into full-time or part-time. They can be further categorised as Temporary, Odd jobs, Seasonal, Self-employment, Consulting, or Contract employment.
— Paid or Unpaid e.g. Volunteer, Homemaker, Mentor, Student, Intern
— Level of Experience required i.e. Entry Level, Intern, and Co-op.
— Specific training or an Academic Degree
If you don’t have a paid full-time job and seeking one, you are categorised as “unemployed" or “underemployed”. If you are holding an additional job or jobs, often at night, to earn extra income or cash, you are “moonlighting”. If you have a “day job”, you are working to make ends meet while performing low-paying (or non-paying) work in your preferred vocation. E.g. Women who currently work as waitresses (her day job) while she tries to become an actress, or professional athletes working as labourers in the off-season because they are currently only able to make the roster of a semi-professional sports team. In other words, “day job” specifically refers to those who hold the position solely to pay off their living expenses so they can pursue, through low paying entry work, the job they really want. If you hear someone say “don’t quit your day job”, they are eliciting a humorous response to a poor or mediocre performance not up to the professional calibre expected from them. It implies that the performer is not talented enough in that activity to be able to make a career out of it. Depending on the country and community you live in, the earliest age to be legally employed varies. According to the FLSA (Fair Labour Standards Act), Americans at 14 years of age are the youngest to be employed but limited in terms of the number of working hours by minors under the age of 16. In Australia, whether your state has a minimum age census for employment or not is determined by the Fair Work Ombudsman. To check out your state’s youth employment limit, click on this website: https://www.fairwork.gov.au/find-help-for/young-workers-and-students/what-age-can-i-start-work
Most of the youth’s first jobs includes household jobs, odd jobs, or maintaining a family business. In other countries, school children perform summer jobs during their longer summer vacation. University / College students apply for interns his or coops to further enhance the probability of securing an entry level job upon graduation.
We are all told that to express interest in a job or volunteering role, you submit a résumé to the employer as a “job seeker". Derived from the French language, a résumé is a document that summarises a person’s backgrounds and skills, relevant job experience and educational qualifications and achievements. This term is used interchangeably with Curriculum Vitae (CV), but how detailed it is depends on the country you live in. In the UK, most Commonwealth countries and Ireland, your CV is a short summary (usually 2 pages) of your employment history, qualifications, education and relevant personal information. In the US, Canada, Australia, Germany and India, it is more comprehensive document used in academic circles and medical careers that elaborate on education, publications, and other achievements. CV is a Latin phrase translated as [the] course of [my] life.
P.S. There are other jobs that are explicit terms used in the porn industry which I will quite rightly not mention them for moral’s sake. If you want to know what those terms are and swear it’s for learning purposes, feel free to private message me through Facebook.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Career
A career is defined as an individual’s journey learning, work and other aspects of life. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, it is a person’s course or progress through life (or a distinct portion of life). It is generally understood to be related to the working aspects of an individual’s life. Another way in which “career” is used to describe an occupation or a profession that usually involves special training or formal education, and is considered to be a person’s lifework. In this case, a “career” is seen a sequence of related jobs usually pursued within a single industry or sector e.g. “a career in education” or “a career in this building industry”. As a noun, it was derived from Middle English carriere meaning “road, racecourse” or "running a course usually at full speed”, first used in 1530s. It may have derived from Old Provençal or Italian carriera, from Vulgar Latin (via) cararia “carriage (road), track for wheeled vehicles, from Latin carrus “chariot”. It wasn’t until 1803 that the sense of “course of a working life” was attested. My question is how many different careers are there so far? Well that question has no definitive answer because the number could be infinite. So far it’s estimated to be in the 10,000s but so far no one has done a thorough count. All careers so far are classified into 7 main blocks:
— Arts & Entertainment: Artistic, Dance, Film and TV, Theatre Personnel and Writing
— Business: Corporate Titles
— Industrial and Manufacturing: Metalworking, Railway industry, Sewing
— Law Enforcement and Armed Forces: Military
— Science and Technology: Scientific. Computer
— Healthcare and Medicine: Mental Health, Nursing
— Service: Professional Driver
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lists_of_occupations
According to Behling and others, an individual’s choice to join a firm may depend on any of the 3 main factors:
— Objective Factor Theory = An assumption that the applicants are rational. The choice, therefore, is exercised after an objective assessment of the tangible benefits of the job. Factors include salary, other benefits, location or opportunities for career advancement etc.
— Subjective Factor Theory = A suggestion that decision making is dominated by social and psychological factors. The status of the job, reputation of the organisation and other similar factors play an important role.
— Critical Factor Theory = An advancement of the idea that a candidate’s observations while interacting with the organisation plays a vital role in decision making. e.g. Promptness of response and similar factors are important in keeping touch with the candidate. This theory is more valid with experienced professionals.
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the average person is estimated will have about 12 to 15 jobs in their lifetime and that number is predicted to grow. The average person will change careers about 5 to 7 times during their working life. With an expanding career market, about a third of the total workforce will change jobs every 12 months. By the time you reach your 40s, you will already have had about 10 different jobs. A survey conducted by Right Management suggests the following reasons for career change:
- Downsizing or Restructuring of an Organisation (54%)
- New challenges or opportunities that arise (30%)
- Poor or ineffective leadership (25%)
- Poor relationships with their manager(s) (22%)
- For the improvement of work / life balance (21%)
- Unrecognised for their contributions (21%)
- For better compensation and benefits (18%)
- For better alignment with personal and organisational values (17%)
- Personal strengths and capabilities were unfit with the organisation (16%)
- Financial instability of the organisation (13%)
- Relocation of Organisation (12%)
I get particularly annoyed when people especially by parents asks me “What's my plan for the future?” To me it sounds like social insecurity. I don’t enjoy being constantly bombarded with reminders that I don’t stray from your expectations. I feel more and more inclined to not follow their dreams. It now makes me curious about the outcome if I choose not to pursue any career. I feel society associates career with identity to build assumptions, expectations, stereotypes and generalisations upon this fact. If I choose to not have a career, what does that make me then? What will society think if I chose to be career-less? Would I shamed, embarrassed or mocked for being different and against the norm? Going against conformity and aiming for diversity would easily make me a scapegoat. So far I haven’t found any article that researches this question deeply, thus I’ll try my best to research conformity and diversity in a multicultural society in another post. I’ll also discuss change across many different contexts too in another post.
I notice many economic and business news journalists are obsessed with reporting the unemployment rate. In Australia, the unemployment rate hovers around 5.5% but the media always raises the suspense that this number will increase and all hell breaks loose. I can’t seem to understand why keeping a close eye on the unemployment rate is newsworthy. Are they trying to nitpick one of the government’s promises on increased jobs and growth in the short-term future? Isn’t it the aim to demonstrate to the rest of the world that Australia has the most stable job security and creates endless job opportunities? That is something beyond the scope of my knowledge. The world’s human population hovers around 7.4 billion, and about 70% of them are employed. That means there are about 5 billion jobs in the world and this number is expected to rise as the younger generations enter the labour market. Although the unemployment rate is decreasing steadily, but the number of people dropping out of the labour force is also rising. If this trend continues infinitely, will the global unemployment rate reach 0%? Economists constantly stress about the danger signs of a high unemployment rate in any economy and politicians always promise increased job opportunities to lower the unemployment rate. But how low is too low for our economical and political bureaucrats? To answer this question, we have to look at 3 different types of unemployment:
- Cyclical Unemployment = When the unemployment rate moves in the opposite direction as the GDP growth rate. So when GDP (Gross Domestic Product) growth is small (or Negative) unemployment is high.
- Frictional Unemployment = According to the Economics Glossary, it is unemployment that comes from people moving between jobs, careers, and locations. e.g. If a person quits his job as an economic researcher to try and find a job in the music industry.
- Structural Unemployment = Unemployment that comes from there being an absence of demand for the workers that are available. This is often due to technological change. e.g. If the introduction of DVD players cause the sales of VCRs to plummet, many of the people who manufacture VCRs will suddenly be out of work.
There are arguments from people who state that cyclical unemployment is a bad thing since it’s a by-product of a weak economy, whilst others have argued recessions are necessary and beneficial to the economy. Whatever the case, someone will always be unemployed at anytime temporarily or forcibly due to change of heart to pursue a different career and advancing technology that would render older technologies worthless and unpopular.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Dream
A book I once studied in high school called “Death of a Salesman” depicts the so-called "The American Dream". I felt it accurately illustrates our parents’ expectations on make progress through society and settle in with a stable and money-making career. In 1931, James Truslow Adam defined “The American Dream” in his book Epic of America as ‘life should be better and richer and fuller for everyone, with opportunity for each according to ability or achievement” regardless of social class or circumstances. Rooted in the Declaration of Independence, the American Dream proclaims that “all men are created equal” with the right to “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness”.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_Dream
Derived from the American Dream is the so-called “Great Australian Dream”. Like its derivation, it is a belief that owning a home in Australia leads to a better life and expresses success and security. This Australian Dream is almost impossible to materialise for many young Australians in today’s society, especially for those living in large cities like Melbourne, Hobart, Sydney, Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth. This is due to increasing prices in the housing market and the median house price, on average, is about 10 times dearer than it was last century. Experts call this urbanisation or suburbanisation which represents the widespread urban sprawl in Australia’s cities into the outer suburbs. For instance in Melbourne,
- West: Werribee, Point Cook, Seabrook, Altona Meadows, Tarneit, Wyndham Vale, Hoppers Crossing, Altona, Altona Meadows, Laverton, Melton, Caroline Springs
- North: Mernda, South Morang, Epping, Yan Yean, Craigieburn, Greenvale, Sunbury, Broadmeadows, Roxburgh Park, Somerton
- East: Hurstbridge, St. Andrews, Eltham, Diamond Creek, St. Helena, Eltham North, Research, Healesville, Lilydale, Doncaster, Donvale, Croydon Hills, Warranwood, Croydon North, Chirnside Park, Belgrave, Upper Ferntree Gully, Mount Evelyn
- South: Sandringham, Black Rock, Beaumaris, Frankston, Pakenham, Cardinia, Cranbourne, Clyde, Nar Nar Goon, Berwick, Mt. Eliza, Mornington, Mt. Martha, Warragul, Rosebud, Portsea, Dromana, McCrae, Seaford, Carrum Downs, Bittern, Hastings, Baxter
There's a website called EconStats: http://www.econstats.com/wdi/wdiv_494.htm which summates every legally registered business in every country. In 2007, worldwide it is estimated there were more than 44 million businesses but this number is out of date as new businesses have registered since. The world's oldest company beginning in the year 578AD is a Japanese construction company named Kongō Gumi, famous for its construction of Osaka Castle. Although his name is not known, it is known that one of the skilled immigrated invited by Prince Shōtoku from Baekje to Japan to build the Buddhist temple Shitennō-ji, was postulated to have started his own business. However in 2006, the company experienced hard times and went into liquidation in January 2006. In the same year it was purchased by the Takamatsu Construction Group and now operates as a wholly owned subsidiary of Takamatsu. Before its liquidation, it had over 100 employees and annual revenue hovered around 7.5 million Yen or $70 US million with the 50th (Kongo) and final president to lead the firm Masakazu Kongō.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_oldest_companies
In terms of the number of employees, the largest non-corporate company is the United States Department of Defense with 3.2 million as of 2015. The largest private-sector company is Walmart, also situated in the US, with about 2.3 million employees.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_largest_employers
We live in a debt-based economy where money is created by banks in order to stabilise the economy. In Australia alone, the general government sector net debt is more than $6 trillion dollars and it continues to rise as you read this post. You can check out Australia’s and the world’s current debt levels at: http://www.australiandebtclock.com.au
http://www.economist.com/content/global_debt_clock
In economic terms, debt is any sum of money owed by one party, the borrower or debtor, for a second party, the lender or creditor. The borrower may be a sovereign state or country, local government, company, or an individual. The lender may be a bank, credit card company, payday loan provider, or an individual. The word “debt” was first used in the late 13th century, derived from “dette, from Old French fete, from Latin debitum “thing owed”. If debt can be reduced by paying out what is owed, why can’t we simply print out more money to reduce the debt to 0 (zero)? The answer is inflation. Money itself don’t have any intrinsic value like chicken nuggets, pizza and chocolate. They only have exchange value. That means a $5 note does not mean it’s worth $5 but it means you can exchange it for goods or services worth $5. This is called legal tender meaning you are authorised by law to use it for exchange. In the US currency, it costs 5.4 c to print every $1 & $2 note, 11.5 c for every $5 note, 10.9 c for every $10, 12.2 c for every $20, 19.4 c for every $50 and 15.5 c for every $100. 80% of the world’s economy is shared amongst the top 20% wealthiest people in the world, including trillionaires, and billionaires. The remaining 20% is competitively shared amongst the other 80% of the human population using what ever means to survive. In Vsauce’s video “How Much Money is there on Earth?”, he mentions “money supply” as the total amount of monetary assets available in an economy at a specific time. Different types of money are classified as “M”s, and each classification is different depending on your country’s central bank:
— M0 = Includes bank reserves, referred to as the monetary base or narrow money.
— MB = Monetary Base or Total Currency. This is the base from which other forms of money like check-in deposits, listed below) are created and is traditionally the most liquid measure of the money supply.
— M1 = Bank reserves not included in M1
— M2 = Represents M1 and “close substitutes” for M1. It is a broader classification of money than M1. M2 is a key economic indicator used to forecast inflation.
— M3 = M2 + Large and Long-term Deposits.
— MZM = Money with Zero Maturity. It measures the supply of financial assets redeemable at par on demand. The velocity of MZM is historically an accurate predictor of inflation.
If you evaluate the ratio of these measures, like M2 / M0, you will get an (actual, empirical) money multiplier.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Money_supply
I feel, through the magic of television and social media, we may be brainwashed to believe that to survive we have to work our asses off. Everyone around me spend most of their lives blinding accepting the commands and meeting the expectations set by our educational institutions, respective governments, parents and media. We spend most of our days oblivious to our docility and the trickery of false advertising. We become engrossed in the latest invention, I get random notifications from LinkedIn saying that my friends are waiting to accept my invitation when in reality they aren’t. I feel our education system is sandpapering the diversity of human culture and is enforcing conformity. Your peers, family, friends and government media outlets nonchalantly radicalise you to align your attitude, beliefs and behaviours with them in order to calm the social storm. Our desire to fit into a group with those who think like you and understand your feelings is making us look like guinea pigs desperate to relieve the pressures of social norms and life expectations. We naturally feel disgusted when we’re left on our own. We would feel life is not worth living if no one around us is willing to hear us out and acknowledge our concerns, values and ideas. One may argue that our job market celebrates the diversity of passions, interests and skills but the mindset to conform in this system is nothing but programmed within us from a young age. People are aware the system is not great and requires improvement but they are taking it on the chin like it’s the only way forward to maturity. This is concerning to me.
Whenever I walk past any walk past any shopping strip or numerous stores in a shopping centre, I notice something that most people don’t see. Imagine each store is a drawer filled with miscellaneous collections of things, gadgets and gizmos. When it’s closed it is dark, silent and alone. Until someone opens it letting light into the drawer whilst looking at these objects and objectively takes an object out of the drawer and then closes it again. The periods the drawer is open represents the exciting, active and enlightening times when you interact with something new like a new customer walking in with a chance of purchasing something from your store. But for the majority of the time the drawer is closed, your store experiences long periods of quietness, boredom and loneliness. There is nothing to pass the time other than look out the window gazing at anonymous strangers. You hope that sending mental messages via telekinesis (a theory you may have read about in your church sessions) would attract new customers to your store just to cut the boredom. This repetitive daily lifestyle is reminiscent of an ancient story called “Frog in the Well”. I’m the turtle who has accidentally and coincidentally entered your well. Whenever I share mind flowing facts about the world and vast general knowledge of our Earth’s historical, social and political moments triggered by humans, everyone is either mind blown because they are not aware of these facts or just shrug it off like it’s not relevant to their survival. This story encompasses a situation or individual who refuses to visualise the big picture because of the entrapped environment they settle in for an uncertain period of time, making them sheltered and closed minded. Literally speaking, you can only see from the perspective of the small hole from above which is the sky and the levitating animals and insects flying above you. The proverbial message it conveys is to release yourself from the shackles of settling into society, drag yourself outside of the enclosed environment you are trapped in and experience what Earth actually has to offer in terms of life, existence and nature. Don’t be afraid to step out of comfort zone and think outside the box. Don’t worry if someone criticises you for altering your state of mind because they’re jealous you are experiencing life to its fullest potential in terms of fun and exuberance. It’s ok if you feel physical pain because these lessons are more memorable to learning about the mysteries of what life is like on Earth and in our universe, therefore you discover new things satisfying your curiosity. We are born to experience. We are born to learn. We are born to interact with animals of our own species and other friendly species. We are born in a race to spread our own genes through breeding to ensure the survival of your genes. We are all born human not robots. We should not be puppets of our own societal system. Live life to the fullest. Make this one and only life you have count.
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