MORFORD - Why do you work so hard?

SFGate ^ | 7/08/2005 | Morford

[Ultra Sonic 007]

There remains this enormous and wicked sociocultural myth. It is this: Hard work is all there is.

Work hard and the world respects you. Work hard and you can have anything you want. Work really extra super hard and do nothing else but work and ignore your family and spend 14 hours a day at the office and make 300 grand a year that you never have time to spend, sublimate your soul to the corporate machine and enjoy a profound drinking problem and sporadic impotence and a nice 8BR mini-mansion you never spend any time in, and you and your shiny BMW 740i will get into heaven.

This is the American Puritan work ethos, still alive and screaming and sucking the world dry. Work is the answer. Work is also the question. Work is the one thing really worth doing and if you're not working you're either a slacker or a leech, unless you're a victim of BushCo's budget-reamed America and you've been laid off, and therefore it's OK because that means you're out there every day pounding the pavement looking for work and honing your resume and if you're not, well, what the hell is wrong with you?

Call it "the cafe question." Any given weekday you can stroll by any given coffee shop in the city and see dozens of people milling about, casually sipping and eating and reading and it's freakin' noon on a Tuesday and you're like, wait, don't these people work? Don't they have jobs? They can't all be students and trust-fund babies and cocktail waitresses and drummers in struggling rock bands who live at home with their moms...

[LauraleeBraswell]

""But the truth is, God, the divine true spirit loves nothing more than to see you unhinge and take risk and invite regular, messy, dangerous upheaval. ""


Is that in the bible or something?

[SpringheelJack]

The only way you could phone it in even clearer is just to type "People work too hard" 250 times to meet word count.

[Lonely Bull]

More Morford, hm. If I were a columnist for a major newspaper, I'd work harder than that.

[Quick1]

I have an aunt who actually asked me how I could possibly live on less than $100,000/year. She said she likes "nice" things, like the ability to drive a Porsche, or go on vacation without having to run up a big debt.

I simply said that I've already been to many places in the world, and I don't need a Porsche.

I don't agree wtih everything, but Morford does have a point. There are some people who work far too hard to actually enjoy the fruits of their labors.

[Lancey Howard]

Sounds like Morford is depressed by the Democrats and the socialist welfare state they and their allies in the scumbag liberal newsrooms turned America into from the time of FDR until 1994. Don't worry, Mark - - Bush and the Republicans are attempting to reverse the damage but it will take a long, long time.

[commonasdirt]

"They can't all be students and trust-fund babies and cocktail waitresses and drummers in struggling rock bands who live at home with their moms..."

Sure they can. They are also known as DUmmies. Easy to find, they have their own website. LOL

If morons like Morford had their way right now we would all be anticipating our upcoming government mandated month long vacations as we work our 35 hour week (screwing off, since we cannot be fired). Oh yeah, we really need to emulate the French. That would do WONDERS for the GNP.

[Ultra Sonic 007]

Are you talking to me?

That wasn't my post; that's Morford's editorial.

[Lonely Bull]

The only way you could phone it in even clearer is just to type "People work too hard" 250 times to meet word count.

ALL WORK AND NO PLAY MAKES MARK A DULL BOY
ALL WORK AND NO PLAY MAKES MARK A DULL BOY
ALL WORK AND NO PLAY MAKES MARK A DULL BOY
ALL WORK AND NO PLAY MAKES MARK A DULL BOY
ALL WORK AND NO PLAY MAKES MARK A DULL BOY
ALL WORK AND NO PLAY MAKES MARK A DULL BOY

[KentTrappedInLiberalSeattle]

Why do you work so hard?

Because all that welfare money you and yours rapaciously demand as various sorts of "entitlement" has to come from somebloodywhere, Morford, you ignorant little slut.

[Advil]

My opinion:

Whenever editorials like this come up, it always leads back to the age old questions. Such as, "Why do we work so hard?" or "I thought technology was supposed to help us work less!"...

Well, in the USA, we made a major mistake that started decades ago. We started to cave in to all the external world interests that want a piece of our wealth. We also started to tax ourselved into a hole in the ground.

There's nothing wrong with "trust fund babies". Its amazing how many people here on FR despise those with wealth. It SHOULD have been the goal of every American for the last hundred years to obtain independent wealth. That is, an individual's investments and personal business interests generate enough income to keep them going indefinately.

Poblem is, we gave all that up. Now, in this supposed "Land of plenty" all the baby boomers and mid life worker bees are wondering what the point was since they can never get ahead. Well, we created our own problem.

Use your vote to start fixing it. Less taxation, more freedoms, more opportunity for an individual to work hard and actually get to keep and invest the money they make.

That is how you enjoy the fruits of labor. What's the point of working 14 hours a day, if you're dead before you reach a point where you can acutally enjoy your wealth?

That's also a dangerous line of thinking. Because if we ever reach a point where the majority of people say, "Why bother?" Then you know we've reached a socialist or communist state as bad as the USSR used to be.

Yikes, I rambled a bit there, but I think the point was clear.

[Flux Capacitor]

You know what's so incredibly damned funny about this editorial? Morford's paranoid bitching about Mel Gibson toward the end of the column. Gibson actually DID what this leftist whackjob prescribes: He broke out of the industry mold and took a RISK by sinking his own money into a project that no studio in Hollywood would touch, because HE believed in it and HE wanted to do it. The result: One of the most successful motion pictures in history. And all because Gibson dared to thwart the "demons of [Hollywood] stagnation".

Oh, but I forget.... one is not SUPPOSED to break out of liberal molds.

-Dan

[dob]

In fact "the exhausted american" is to a significant degree a statistical illusion. See:

http://truckandbarter.com/mt/archives/000590.html

Money quote: "In total, American men spend 4 hours more per week on Leisure and Personal Care than their Swedish counterpart. For women the corresponding figure is 3.5 hours."

[Flux Capacitor]

[Jaysun]

For Americans, work is what the pub is to the British, the vodka cellar is to the Russians, and what any place but the shower is to the French.

Somewhere down the line I decided that work could actually be fun. I believe psychologist describe this as the condition in which the person being held hostage actually falls in love with the person who's kidnapped them.

What really gets me is that you never see workaholics where they can do you some good. I mean, where are all the go-getters at the DMV, huh? They damned sure aren't writing articles for "SF Gate" I can tell you that. This prick probably keeps a TGIM mug in the cup holder of his ergonomically correct fake leather chair.

[Allegra]

"But the truth is, God, the divine true spirit loves nothing more than to see you unhinge and take risk and invite regular, messy, dangerous upheaval."

Hey! That's what I do for a living! ;-)

[Fresh Wind]

Morford may not know much about hard work, but he's real good at working hard.

[Arkie2]

Scary!