I am always blown away by the mental disconnect between rich people and the rest of us.
I work for a doctor. He pulls in $70,000-$90,000 a month before tax. After tax, he’s still $200,000+ a year.
I earn $52,000 a year.
Yet his wife will still talk to me and say “oh, we’re not rich.” She drives a Porsche. She wears Carla Zampatti. They live in a new townhouse that cost well over a million.
So, when she gives me recommendations on things to buy and I tell her I can barely afford Kmart, she seems genuinely perplexed.
They are NOT bad people. I’ve worked for them for 12 years now. They are good people with good hearts. But they no longer connect with reality on level and it’s absolutely mindboggling.
And I think a large part of this is that rich people compare themselves to other rich people, not to the regular people.
He doesn’t earn as much as a surgeon. He doesn’t own a mansion or a helicopter (both of which I know a couple of surgeons own).
In comparison, they aren’t as rich.
They were once poor, 25 years ago when he was starting to become a doctor. But that memory is skewed now. Or perhaps they always aimed for the Porsche and the month long holidays in Scotland so the journey meant something else.
But, holy shit, when she shows me something on sale that’s still out of my price range, I feel that gap. And I don’t envy her. I don’t want a Porsche.
I just want to actually afford Kmart without saving up for it.
And since there seems to be some belief that I earn a huge amount, that is AUD.
It’s $34,000USD, rounded up.
And yet, horrifyingly, she’s kind of right.
Like yeah, the surgeon is unfathomably wealthy compared to someone who struggles to meet their basic needs… but he’s fundamentally still working class. He gets his money from his labor, not by virtue of merely owning something.
Does the surgeon make more than he “deserves”? Maybe. Even if he’s a plastic surgeon, I can still squint and kind of see how it makes sense for him to get paid that much. However, I do know that people who get their wealth by merely owning things absolutely don’t deserve it.
And like, the important thing is that it’s a difference in kind… but the difference in scale is absurd too. If her husband worked since Egyptians first started writing on papyrus, and didn’t spend any money, he’d still have less than what Jeff Bezos makes in a week. The pay ratio between Bezos and the surgeon is 60,000x greater than the pay ratio between the surgeon and you… and he literally doesn’t do anything besides own companies. Bezos literally does less work than you.
I don’t like this fact at all.
That last point is an important point to make. There is a big difference between those who are paid large amounts of money for their work and those who make 1000x more simply by ownership of capital.
When i think of who in society probably deserve to be paid the most? I’d say neurosurgeons. It requires a huge amount of skill, dedication, and study. 8+ years of medical school. Many more years of training. But the higher end of neurosurgeon salaries is just under $1 million a year.
Yes that is a lot of money and you can debate if its too much or too little for their work, but the point is they are arguably ~the most highly skilled and intelligent workers in the world~ (qualities that neoliberals say are the most important in society) and yet they are still paid pennies on the dollar compared to capital owners.
matt decided to not make this post rebloggable so here’s a helpful post for anybody who needs it
hope i don’t get banned for this
really confused as to how improving moderation wasn’t on their roadmap considering their lawsuit, contracting moderators who were being actively bigoted, and the concept of selling moderation (literally never even seen that one before)
i hate whenever people say “autism and adhd are basically the same disorder” because that isn’t even remotely true. autism believes a strong defense is the best offense, and focuses on keeping plays connected in order to steadily earn points, while adhd is characterized by unpredictable high risk combination attacks that prioritize scoring
dashboard unfucker will no longer be actively maintained, and the development of the Dashboard Plus extension is being shelved, along with all of my unpublished work for XKit Rewritten.
despite the fact that tumblr as a website is largely propped up by LGBTQ+ content creators, many of whom are trans women, the way this website has treated and continues to treat trans women is utterly disgusting.
from the harassment trans women face from this site’s users, many of whom claim to be trans allies or are even trans themselves, to transphobic moderators targeting trans women and selling bans for money, all the way to the CEO of the website directly confronting a trans woman and threatening legal action against her for inactionable threats, tumblr has made it clear that it is by no means the queerest place on earth.
some of my trans sisters may remain on tumblr, even when faced with constant vitriol. i am deeply proud of them and their visibility in the face of hostility, however after seeing recent events unfold, and after being directly confronted by tumblr’s CEO himself in a digusting display of indifference, i myself have decided to move onto better pursuits for the larger part. tumblr no longer holds the same shine for me that it did five years ago, and i can no longer justify spending hours of my time every week pouring more work and love into this site than any member of staff ever did.
i thank you all for the support you’ve given me in the past 8 months, whether through donations, contributions to the script, or even just sending me a kind message. i would ask that you show the same generosity and kindness to other trans girls in my absence, and especially to those who don’t code, or write stories, or draw art. every trans girl is valuable, and their worth is more than any arbitrary set of talents. and a little love can go a long way.
ALT
