Thursday, 10 July 2014

Careers. Why you should not have them.

What is a career? It's a series of jobs where you can advance up and take more responsibilities and get pay raises to reflect the increase in responsibility. You advance up by accumulating experience.

What's a job? It's just a duty you perform to get money. There is no chance for you to move onto a higher paying position.

This is what I define a "job" and a "career". So out of these two descriptions, obviously the career is the better choice, right? Yes, if I had to choose between the two, I'd choose to get a career over a job.

In fact, many people pursue a stable career as the end game plan for their life. I think this is the wrong move. At the end of the day, most people don't have a career cuz they like it. They have a career because it gives them money in order to pay their expenditures and to allow them to live a life they want to live. The career gives people more freedom to do the things they want.

So in essence, a career is where a person sacrifices about 25% of their life (40 hours a week of work per 168 hour week) in order to make money so they can have a happier time during the rest of their life, which is about 43% (168 hours - 40 hours work - 56 hours sleep). Now, some people might argue that some people like what they do at work. They find meaning in their jobs. Good for them. I'm sure some people have a great sense of purpose at their job. But for the vast majority of people, if you tell them they've won $10 million from the lottery, they'll quit their job in a heartbeat and live the life they want, free from the burden of having to make the money.

A career/job, in my eyes, is a method to ensure that you provide services to the community, and in return, you get to take services from the community (in the form of money). That's fair. I'm rambling now.

What I wanted to say was aim to not work and still be able to live the life you want. Aim for passive income. That should be the ultimate goal in life. But you might think it's not fair. You are not contributing to society, but you still take resources form society. It's all philosophical at that point, because you can argue the value you added to the world is so great that you continue to reap the benefits of your value over a very long period of time.

But just think about it like this. You've got a newborn baby. Would you rather go work 40 hours a week to provide resources to raise that kid up right, and to be only able to see him, realistically speaking, for an hour or two a day during weekdays (cuz you know, you gotta eat n shower and take care of yourself too, not to mention you gotta take care of your significant other). Or, would you rather just have the money, and have the entire day with your newborn and partner? 

The choice is clear here, at least for me anyway. And of course you won't want to spend 24/7 with the kid, so you could argue you could work during that time. But I'd then argue that there's an opportunity cost for working. The time you put into working, you could put into other stuff more valuable for yourself and your family. You could read up books on how to become a better parent, or a better husband or wife. You could exercise to make sure you live longer. You could take your husband or wife out for a date. Lot's of stuff you could do that would be better than working.

I dunno, maybe I'm selfish in that I think about my family first before society. But isn't that how we're programmed subconsciously? We want to be able to provide for our families, first and foremost right?

I'm rambling again now. TL;DR = Don't get a job. Get passive income. For the sake of yourself, your friends, and your family. 

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