The Economics of Working

You know, how funny it is that when we start working, we find ourselves sometimes working beyond the usual working hours, or working on something we do not have a passion of doing, or perhaps, working, but hoping that one day, one fine sunny day, we'll hit the jackpot and will be able to sit around at home, sipping our ice lemon teas and just lazing around at home? That childroom dreams might not be as easy as it seems?

I thought of this topic after going through Freakonomics, the book your truly so plainly tries to imitate (but fails miserably)

Think about this, an average graduate gets around RM 2k-2.5k upon graduation. In most cases around Klang valley, the graduate works 3-7 years to get promoted to executive and then managerial position. However, in some jobs, the graduate has to work late, sometimes 8, 9 or perhaps 11 pm. In extreme cases, till 2-3 am. And lets say, in some sectors like the IT sector, it's not a one off thing or a one month in a year thing (that auditors go through), but an average of 3-4 days/week, in a year, the graduate has most probably worked around 150-180 days of overtime in a year.

If you do calculate this by 5 years, the graduate spends at least 2.5 of the 5 years working overtime and coming back late.

You know, it's quite interesting to find that if a person was offered RM 300 more to work late on a regular basis, he'll most probably reject it. But add the opportunity of climbing the ladder (no matter how long it is), and most graduates would jump at the opportunity. Hmm, smart or foolish?

And it's most telling when senior staff of companies that worked them overtime start counting down the days till retirement. With the rise in the marrying age, the drop in the amount of social time we have for family and friends, we in danger of losing more than we hope to gain in pursuit of the 'American Dream' and being better than the Joneses (or in Malaysian terms, the Ah Kows, Ah Bengs and Alis, not forgetting Muthu too)

I've always told myself that while it might seem good to work for money, why don't we take work as a part time job and life/ministry as a full time thing. After all, in climbing up the work/political ladder, it's quite a common sight to see people scheming to get ahead of the rest in terms of lies, deceit and manipulation. Isn't life meant to be much more than just climbing a wrongly placed ladder?

Just watched 'Walk His Trail' by the Footstool Players and highly recommend it to anyone's whose reading this article. Your life might be changed.



Till then, God bless folks!