I’m 45 and I’ve more or less accepted that short of an unexpected and massive windfall, I will never be able to retire, much less experience “financial freedom.”
I’m a school bus driver and I used to use my high vantage point to count how many passing drivers were looking at their phones instead of ahead of them, and I estimated that it was about 1 in 4. I even had a cop pass me while I had my lights on and kids were about the cross - he was face down in his phone and driving with one hand.
I stopped counting for the sake of my mental health. I truly don’t understand why I don’t see multiple collisions a day because of this shit.
Oh don’t you know? Cops are trained in the use of technology while driving so it’s perfectly safe for them to be buried in their phones or that fucking laptop they have mounted on their center console while running red lights at 80 mph without their sirens on. Don’t even worry about it.
Because they Know how much of a joke America’s legal system is and they will be bragging about how they got away with this later. Gotta smile nice for those photos they’ll be showing everyone.
What kind of self-moderation are we speaking? And what do your coworkers think. Do they consider talking about a 4 day work week with their employer, too?
My coworkers, particularly middle managers in the US expressed some envy, but applauded my negotiation and support me. I let my partner in engineering know before I said yes because I didn’t want them being surprised.
Self-moderation:
I have to be incredibly intentional about limiting my working hours. No one’s going to tell me to go home and I’ll feel the pressure to stay so I just have to commit.
No checking email or work slack after working hours. No. Matter. What.
Having four days has honed my ability to both prioritize and say no. But it also means those stupid meetings that are easier to say yes to and just kind of be there, I’m much more actively turning down. It’s hard to have defend the boundaries. But it’s worth it.
Yes, self-moderation and saying no are tough. But, if you relent once, you relent always. Never is better.
But it also means those stupid meetings that are easier to say yes to and just kind of be there, I’m much more actively turning down. It’s hard to have defend the boundaries. But it’s worth it.
It truly is. Hopefully, 4 day work will start to become the norm sooner rather than later. Thanks for sharing your experience.
I think it’s fair to say that I got lucky - you’re not wrong, they needed someone and I happened to have a very specific experience that matched with their need.
I met the team, I knew they liked me, and I really liked them. I also knew it was likely they couldn’t afford the comp I was getting at $lastjob.
My plan going in was to use that (scary to them, but very real) number to negotiate a four day work week at a full time salary. It worked out.
I think it’s crazy the number is people here who think that jail/prison is supposed to primarily be about punishment. Do they not understand the concept of recitavism?
Nah, the vegans absolutely will demand Sam Bankman-Fried’s release on the basis that he’s not getting gourmet vegan meals anymore, simply because all they really care about is their veganism and not other people.
Former Christian fundamentalist here. I think it’s a religious thing, actually. It’s very common in conservative religion in America to believe that there are good and evil things and people, and all you need to do is punish evil things and people. Any problems that exist are punishment from God for allowing evil instead of punishing it. Everything will be solved magically by God once you and your society are “righteous” enough (disapproving enough of evil), something which will never actually happen because this will literally just make things worse, providing more evidence of God’s wrath.
This religious belief has influences far beyond the fundamentalist religion it came from, and it really helps explain why so many right wing movements are so contradictory and hypocritical.
Everyone else is out here thinking things like “if there’s a problem, we need to figure out the solution” while a solid third or more of the American people is literally thinking that they just need to hurt the right people and God will fix it.
I assumed I was largely dealing with Americans on here. Are those other countries jails bad due to a desire to punish or lack of funding available as they aren’t rich nations?
I would guess that’s depends on the country, all of those have problems with funding, but they differ on the punitive philosophy. For example argentinean prisoners can get jobs that pay the legal minimum wage and all the normal labor rights any worker enjoys, in Brazil they can read books and wrote essays about them to commute prison time, but their jails still lack proper infrastructure and are overcrowded.
It is certainly odd, though I bet that’s going to change. For some strange reason people love talking about that stuff and even though it hasn’t appeared in this thread yet it probably will soon.
Edit: it already happened, someone decided to say that they wondered how chewed he’s going to be. You all just can’t help yourself with the rape jokes, can you?
It’s because most people saying this shit live in America where all prisons are for pure cruelty and punishment, not rehabilitation.
You see, here in America prisons are an industry that generates profits for stakeholders. True rehabilitation would cut into their profits, therefore they do everything in their power to ensure you never leave, and if you do they will leave you with enough mental trauma and behavioral issues that you will return.
Corporate media propaganda ensures americans continue to support this shit just like all the rest of the fucked up shit around here. Thanks corporate America!
What does the idea of punishing people even solve in the first place? It doesn’t help them, in fact it actually hurts them. It doesn’t teach them how to be better people, so they’re likely to do the same thing again. Oh yeah and it wastes resources on punishing these people, resources that could be going to regular people but are instead essentially being wasted to torture someone instead of trying to help them.
I bet somebody’s going to come out of the woodwork and try and argue that prison helps people somehow, by punishing them and making them scared, though I’ve found that making people scared is the wrong way of going about making them into a better person, because scared people just like animals will react, and it’s not pretty when they do.
Punishing evildoers doesn’t hurt me, it only helps me. What does hurt me and millions of other Americans is when looney-bin cultists like you take the worst offenders and exploit them to manipulate and bully their victims and the victims’ supporters into caving to your insane demands just so you can make yourself feel better. That’s what actually hurts people.
I’m now in a 2 income household with fewer kids as they grow up, and to us it feels more like we are close always, just no hope of ever actually getting there, if that makes sense. Always almost enough.
Which is better than my previous experience but since it’s happening later in life, still wouldn’t expect to ever stop having to earn money by working. I have never expected to retire though, it would take - as someone else noted - a windfall, luck, not effort. Effort has taken us as far as it can.
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