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Working for Someone Else

V

venk

Banned
I just had one of those early morning, hour long IM debates over the nature of people to work for employers. I think that regardless of your profession, you will be underpaid for the work you provide because that is the nature of the system. If you make 50k a year and you produce 50k a year for your company, what the hell is the point of keeping you around? But if you produce 200k a year, then keeping you at 50k is a great bargain. Therefore, you will always be underpaid for what you do.

Because of this, I argued that unless you own your own buisness and get paid what you produce, then it is vital that you perform a job that benefits you and the rest of humanity in more ways than just a simple paycheck. Become a doctor, a teacher, hell, even an indy film maker.

Think of it this way, if you are a doctor, you might see a patient even if he can't pay, a teacher might tutor a student after class even if he isn't payed an ot, a film maker may put his own money into a movie to finish a film. Would some guy doing IT repair jobs stay even an extra minute without compensation (assuming there is no threat of losing your job if you don't work unpaid OT) ? At the end of the day, doesn't the work feel pointless? You just spent all this time fixing laptops of annoying co-workers just to make the company run better and the CEO richer.

It seems 99% of the people out there are working for big companies paying them a quarter of their total output for jobs they hate being at. What I want to know is why? Especially in todays economy. There is no job security anymore, corporate health plans and other benefits are a joke, more and more companies force workers to work unpaid shifts and/or 60-80 work weeks.

Instead, why don't more people pursue a career that benefits humanity beyond their paycheck (even LAW is preferable to other crap), or do something they absolutly love, and/or start their own buisness? Why are we a society of surfs dedicated to making a few people extremly rich through our break backing labor?

 
I actually feel the same way. Both of my parents are in public-sector jobs (and they deal directly with the public; they're not stuck in an office somewhere). My mom is a librarian at a local public library and my dad is a doctor working for one of the largest university hospitals in the nation. They've never pressured me in the least to get a job in government, but I really feel that I won't truly be happy with my job unless I'm getting out of the office, dealing with the public, and making people safer, more happy and more satisfied with their lives.
 
Starting your own business involves giving up the safety net that exists in terms of expected consistent income, time off and benifits.

Now you have to chase clients/customers, cover your owen expenses, time off means no income to pay the bills.

Once you actually have a business established with a consistent income flow, then that is better, however, many times you wish to grow the business.

All that takes work, effort and time.

It boils down the value of your time and the risk factor that you are comfortable with.
 
With that kind of thinking though, there would be no buisinesses large enough to produce any complex goods, or mass transit systems to deliver them (and food for that matter).

Sometimes a persons situation dictates that they must work for someone else (mostly people who can't afford higher education, or startup funds for thier own business)
 
I agree with the benefits of owning your own business, but I don't think I'll ever start one. Only because I can't possibly think of anything that I could start a business involving that I'd actually ENJOY and not just be doing it because there's a market for it.

I've always been interested in technology and what it has the potentional of doing for our lives. That's why I want to study electrical engineering. I can only hope it won't lead me to a job I hate.
 
Plenty of people are also paid far more than they are worth. To some people the ideal job is getting paid a lot to do nothing.

 
There's more to life than money. I know I'm underpaid, but there are a lot of things about my job that I really like and would hate to lose.
 
> Why are we a society of surfs dedicated to making a few people extremly rich through our break backing labor?

Very few people in the US, Canada, or UK fit that description, probaby only migrant farmworkers.

As a "serf," you live better than the wealthiest king of a couple of centuries ago, and have as many luxuries as most of the upperclass did even more recently. Look in your closets, shelves, den at the amount of clothes, books, music, games, toys, electronics. Look at the amount of food you can afford to eat.

Yes, the paper wealth of the "bossman" is greater than yours, but your life really isn't so bad either.
 
By working for somebody else you get stability/security and no startup costs. If you go out on your own, there is no guarantee that you'll get paid at the end of the day. You also need that great business idea, which the company you're working for has already done.
 
you're obviously indian.... (correct me if im long), anywho im goin to bschool to be an ibanker and all my uncles call me a wanna be wall street punk, and have spilled this same theory on me
 
The fact is, society is hierarchal in nature. There are those who enjoy taking risks, calling the shots, making the big decisions. There are those who don't share the same intensity, and would rather feel secure in their livelihood by working a steady job where they are given instructions. If EVERYONE were type A or type B, we'd either have a lot of companies with no employees, or no companies at all.

For every big business that exists, there is a need for their services. You can attempt to belittle them, but for the most part they all serve a purpose. If they didn't, they would not be patronized and therefore they would cease to exist. Are all companies' products honorable, admirable, or beneficial to society? Of course not. But that doesn't diminish the fact that we do need businesses to provide goods and services. In order to have a business, you typically need management staff for direction and a labor force for production. Again, just the hierarchy of society.

Another problem is, not many people truly know what their passion is in life -- or it's possible they have no passion at all. You can argue they're just lazy, but these people simply do not have any inspirations. There is nothing wrong with this -- and if you think on a deeper level, there is in fact very little in life worth getting so passionate about anyway.

In life, there are many motivating factors that drive us -- some are humanistic, some are materialistic, some are idealistic, and some are individualistic. Just because you value humanistic ideologies, doesn't mean everyone else has to. You may think it's selfish, but you'd be pretty naive to think the rest of the world should conform to your values.

 
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